Reflections [Rating: K]
Takes place a good several years after the events of How to Fight a Dragon's Fury.
One lonely longship drifted through constellations, navigating between Ursa Minor and Cassiopeia. Starlight above, starlight below, an infinity of sparkling points, stretched further than the eye could spy.
Hiccup could hear a faint tinkling in the background, providing harmonies to the waves lapping against the ship's stern. Though Fishlegs sat scarcely three meters away, Hiccup could barely hear the soft notes his companion played. At times though, the bard would mumble, and these words Hiccup could hear. "…legends of the dragons… dragon legends… myth of the… no, no, none of those are quite right. Mythical beasts of land and sea? Is that too flowery?"
"Working on the epic?" Hiccup asked. He turned his gaze away from the sea to glance at his friend. In the dark, Hiccup could see little but a faint glint off Fishlegs' glasses. It looked like there were two translucent moons floating side-by-side.
Those two moons nodded. "Yeah, but it's not coming along very well." Fishlegs sighed and set his harp on his lap.
"If it makes you feel any better, this business trip isn't going so well for me," said Hiccup. "Part of me hoped that being King would mean more peace between the tribes. Guess not." A groan. He rubbed his forehead, careful not to disturb the crown on his head. "Diplomacy. It's never easy, is it?"
"Life's not easy."
"No, I suppose it isn't."
At that quiet comment, Hiccup glanced back toward the waters. He could not distinguish sea from sky, for the stars glowed just as brightly in the waves as the atmosphere… but when he leaned over the deck of the ship, he could spy his dark reflection lapping in the waters. It was not a kingly sight. Circles below his eyes. A permanent brand above his brow. A burdensome crown upon his head.
Even his reflection appeared exhausted.
He shuddered and pulled his arms about him. The night air's cold crispness suddenly chilled his spine. "I never wanted much in life for myself," said Hiccup morosely, "but it's hard to keep going and going and going and going. I know me and Furious made peace… I just don't feel peaceful. I don't feel like I'm going anywhere sometimes." He let out a hollow laugh. "It doesn't even feel like this boat is going anywhere."
Fishlegs was wordless for a spell. He let his right hand idly pluck at the strings on his lap. They vibrated with his tapping, letting out a contemplative pentatonic reverberation.
"It does look like we aren't going anywhere, doesn't it?" said the king's friend. "We're still sailing through a bunch of stars with endless ocean everywhere. We've been on the ocean with this uninterrupted view for three days. But Hiccup, we're not going nowhere. Or uh, not going anywhere. We're going somewhere? Grammar. Ugh, you know what I mean.
"The thing is, it just looks like we're going nowhere. We're actually going somewhere. Someday, on that horizon, we're going to suddenly see land. And it'll seem like we've gone leaps and bounds all at once!
"But that's not what happened. We slogged through this ocean night and day steadily. We might not have seen the gradual progress, but that doesn't mean the progress didn't happen."
Hiccup stared into his own reflection. He shifted. Stared at Fishlegs. A slow smile pulled on his lips. "You sounded a lot like Old Wrinkly just now, Fishlegs."
"I have you to blame for that. You made me the king's bard. It's because I'm bogged in poetry that I sound like this. If I'm not metaphorical and deep, I'm doing something huge time wrong." Even Fishlegs' punctuating snort sounded sarcastic. Still, there might have been an affectionate eyeroll behind the moonbeam glasses.
"No, no, it was good. What you said was good," said Hiccup. "You're right, you know. We don't feel like we're making progress most of the time. But it doesn't mean we aren't making a difference."
"All your work will pay off. The tribes are going to get better eventually. I mean, they have to, right? They're stupid barbarians who smell like unbathed barnacles and have the patience the size of a snail eye, but I do think they'll get better. It might start with a bath twice a year instead of once a decade, and they might fight once every three hours instead of once every three minutes… but I think your ideas are rubbing off on them."
"Thanks." Hiccup laughed at his friend's creative description of the Vikings. "And you're going to finish that epic. Line by line, you'll get there, too."
Neither found words to speak after that exchange, but they mulled at the others' encouragement. The two reflected on life while studying their reflections in the water.
"We've gotten through some wild things already," Hiccup pointed out at last. His words sliced through silence like a knife. The stars shuddered in the water. "No reason we can't get through this, too. Especially not when we're doing this together. Thanks for coming with me on this trip."
"Anytime." Fishlegs shrugged. "You've always been here for me. I'll return the favor. Besides, we're family."
We're family.
They might have been distantly related by blood, but their hearts were one. Hiccup smiled.
"You know," Fishlegs piped up, drifting somewhat to a new topic, "I used to be angry that I never got any good family memories growing up. I had a Long-Eared Caretaker Dragon watch me as a baby and a kid. But I never got memories of a mom or a dad or a grandma or even a wacky uncle.
"Looking back, it's nice to remember that you'd come visit me. You decided to help me. And even though we thought we were just friends at the time, it means… it means I have old family memories." He choked a bit on the last few words. "I do have old family memories."
"Oh, Fishlegs…"
He could see his friend's fists tighten at either side. "And so I'm going to keep making more! Suffering scallops, I don't care HOW many arguing tribes or HOW stubborn poetry lines or HOW many unbathed idiots we have to go through! We deserve some good times and we're going to GET them!"
Fishlegs' fist shot to the air in determination.
"WE CAN MAKE SOME GOOD FAMILY TIMES STARTING NOW!"
Hiccup found himself both cheering along and laughing. And he thought, as he turned toward Fishlegs for more amiable conversation, that he saw the shadow of an island approaching from the west.