A/N: Sorry to leave you hanging for so long, my loves! School is, well, overwhelming. Seriously man, college sucks and rocks, all at the same time. I don't know if the next chapter is going to be up on time, but I have hopes that it will be. Hang in there, friends! I swear, I won't abandon this story. It may take me a little while, but ATSO will be complete! Have faith, my friends.

Now, ON WITH THE STORY.


Chapter Twenty-Nine: Falling


Toothless beat his wings, flinging him and his rider out of their gloomy cover and toward Aoife. She was hovering, her massive wings straining to keep her enormous body aloft, and all six eyes darted about wildly, searching for any sign of her prey.

Today, you're my prey, Aoife.

Cloaked by the murky, dark clouds, Toothless felt his fear fade away, replaced by bloodlust. He would kill this enslaver, leave her bones charred and broken on the ground far below. With his wings tucked close to his body, he was nearly invisible and only the shrill sound of his flight gave away his position. He built a ball of gas in his throat, and then ignited it, loosing it towards Aoife.

She heard him coming, but it was too late. The fireball struck it's target, – after all, he never missed – tearing a hole in one of her wings. She roared, snapping her jaws, but Toothless had already carried himself and Hiccup back into the cover of the thick clouds.

He repeated the attack, striking Aoife's other wing. She cried out a second time, in pain as well as fear. With two gaping holes, she had to beat her wings faster and harder to keep from falling out of the sky. Toothless smirked to himself as he retreated back to the cover of the clouds. His Hiccup was brilliant for thinking to hurt her wings while she was in the air. It was probably the only way they could kill Aoife, her hide too thick and claws too long to suffer any other area of attack.

Hold on, Hiccup. We're going in for the kill, he crooned softly to his human. She seemed to understand his message, for he felt her lay flat and hold on tightly.

He shot forward again, striking out at Aoife. His fire burned, blasted. His aim was perfect, his wings strong and sure, and he once again escaped to his gray, misty haven. Pausing only for a moment, he quickly shot out again and again.

Each time, he made sure to come from a different direction to confuse his enemy. He also took care to always come from behind, where she couldn't see him. Bolt after bolt found it's target, and with each new hole that ravaged her wings, Aoife became more frightened – and more dangerous. Toothless' multiple attacks had only taken a few moments, and she'd had enough.

Toothless only had a moment of warning. He heard the hiss and crackle as the gas in her throat ignited, and frantically tried to put distance between himself and Aoife as she tossed her searing fire all through the clouds. Her flames were hot enough to cause him discomfort, but even she couldn't penetrate his scales with her fire. It was Hiccup he feared for. She would be reduced to no more than a pile of ashes atop his back if he didn't get away.

Behind him, he heard and felt the flames racing towards them. He flew at top speed, struggling to stay ahead of the furious fire, and knew Hiccup's life hung in the balance. He heard his little human whimper at the ferocity of the heat, but the fire had not yet reached him. They might still get through this.

Then he felt the prickling of the flames, licking at his tail.

NO! He roared. He would loose Hiccup!

Toothless put on a last burst of speed, and at that very moment the flames petered out and receded. Hiccup was safe.

But oddly enough, even though the heat was gone, he could still feel flames brushing against his tail. The heat was gone, true, as was the almost-painful prickle of Aoife's fire. So why did he still feel fire?

"Oh, no!" he heard Hiccup mutter, horror-struck. "Toothless, we're out of time! You're tailfin's on fire! We need to end this, and get on the ground before it gives," his human whispered frantically. "Get her attention, make sure she follows us!"

Toothless gave one short nod.

Let's finish this.

He rocketed toward Aoife one last time, eyes slitted. Toothless gave his best roar, drawing her six eyes towards him, and immediately shot of a bolt for her wings. It struck, for Aoife was unable to evade it in time, and Toothless knew he had her attention. She was angry and hurt, and she would kill them or die trying.

He was pretty sure that was what Hiccup's plan hinged on.

Toothless dove through her open mouth, which closed just seconds too late. He dove straight down, cutting through the grayness of the clouds, and Aoife followed, enraged that they had escaped again.

Okay, Hiccup, what's the plan?! He crooned anxiously.

Even though she was flattened against his back, he felt one of her hands pat his neck.

"Hold on, Buddy. Just a little more," she shouted over the roar of the wind and the giant dragon that followed close behind them.

Down, down, down they fell. Toothless thought Aoife might be gaining on them, and imagined he could feel the stink of her breath.

Hiccup? He asked again.

"Only a little more, hang in there!" she cried, able to hear his fear even if she couldn't understand his words. Toothless gritted his teeth as they continued to fall through the dark clouds.

Then, in a sound that froze his bone marrow, he heard Aoife collecting gas in her throat. He gave short roar.

"Wait! Wait!" Hiccup shouted. Toothless couldn't believe it, but he listened to her, trusting that she knew what she was doing.

The wait stretched for one unbearable second, and then;

"NOW, FIRE!" Hiccup screamed. Immediately, Toothless flipped to his back, loosing his blue fire straight into the cluster of gas in Aoife's throat. It ignited within her, the only place where fire could ever do damage to a dragon. At that very moment, they broke through the misty screen of the clouds, and the ground was quickly rushing up to meet them. Toothless fought the turbulent air currents to turn himself around, and flared his wings. He pulled up, shooting right past Aoife's burning mouth as they slowed. She, in turn, tried to slow her fall, but her wings were too riddled with holes. They air rushing through them only served to enlarge the wounds, and Aoife crashed headfirst into the rocky shore. She exploded into a massive fireball on impact.

Toothless wasted no time. He immediately began to ascend once more. He heard the crackle of the fireball that had once been Aoife, and knew that the heat would expand it upwards...directly towards them.


On the ground, Astren's heart pounded. The roars of the giant dragon carried faintly down to them, and within the thick, murky clouds, flashes of blue light came forth. What was going on?! Fists clenched, heart racing, each moment of silence was almost worse than the terrible noise of the Queen's roar. A burst of orange-yellow light emerged, and his palms sweated as he wondered if that was the Queen's fire. Could Hiccup and Toothless have survived her flames again?

The suspense was killing him. Just when he thought he couldn't stand it anymore, that he would explode in a jumble of raw nerves, Toothless burst from the clouds. He noticed with alarm that the Night Fury was heading straight for the ground, with no signs of slowing down, and his heart skipped a beat when he saw the yellow light of flames spread across the speck that was Toothless' tail fin.

He knew Hiccup and Toothless were in dire trouble.

Then the Queen burst from the clouds. She, too, was falling. Her wings were ravaged, torn to shreds, and flames licked at the corners of her gargantuan mouth. Suddenly, Toothless pulled up, and the Queen crashed into the ground, exploding into flames and sending out a shockwave that threw up a huge cloud of dust. Before it reached them, Astren strained to catch sight of Hiccup and Toothless again. Were they ahead of the fireball?

Then, the shockwave came, forcing him to cover his face, and bringing with it a dust cloud that veiled everything else from sight.


They did it! As the Queen exploded in fire below them, Hiccup's heart had a moment to leap in joy. She couldn't believe her mad, wild plan had succeeded! She'd never been more terrified in her life than she had up there in the clouds. Thank goodness for Toothless, who'd kept them alive and hit the Queen. She may have devised the plan, but it didn't have a chance of succeeding without Toothless.

Suddenly, she realized that Toothless wasn't relaxing. He was flying upwards, at top speed, and for a moment, Hiccup didn't understand why. And then the heat and great roar of the fireball registered, and her heart nearly stopped. They would be trapped by the fireball.

Hiccup devoted her full attention to working the foot pedals as Toothless wove in and out of the rust-colored spikes on the Queen's back. Even though her head had impacted, her body was so enormous that the rest of it was still falling. The fireball was too wide to allow them to swerve away from the Queen's body – it would catch up to them before they could reach it's perimeter.

As they continued to rise, the fire scorching beneath them, Hiccup felt the prosthetic tail fin become more and more difficult to maneuver. The fire that ravaged it was making it give way.

"C'mon, c'mon!" she shouted in frustration. They couldn't come all this way for it to end like this. The tailfin only had to last for a few more moments! They just had to get past the falling body of the Queen! After that, Toothless could just fly straight upwards until the fireball gave out, and glide to the ground, which would be trick but not altogether impossible without his prosthetic fin. There were only seconds more of hard flying!

They cleared the spikes, but as Hiccup tried to change the pedal position, it refused to move, and she heard a horrible click. Turning her head, she saw the burnt remnants of Toothless' prosthetic falling away into the raging fire.

"No!" she cried. Ahead, the Queen's tail swung. Whereas before it had been away from them, it now swerved straight into their path – and they had no way to avoid it.

"No!" Hiccup screamed. Toothless flapped frantically, struggling to change their course. Without a second fin, he had no control, and only managed to pivot a little bit. As the round end of the tail rushed to meet them, his left side turned towards it.

"No, no, NO!" Hiccup shrieked. Toothless' left shoulder collided with the round tail, pinning her left foot between the two. She felt, more than heard, a sickening crunch, and thought she heard the twang of her harness straps breaking. Then darkness claimed her, the force of the impact knocking her unconscious.

Hiccup felt nothing.


Toothless was spinning. His shoulder ached, and his mind was dazed from the impact.

But something was bothering him. He'd forgotten something important, he knew it, but he could barely think past the stun still stifling his system. It was like it had slipped from his mind, fallen away...

Fallen.

Hiccup!

Her weight was no longer on his back. A split second ago, she had been there, and then they smashed into Aoife's tail. He'd heard and felt Hiccup's leg break, and also heard the very slight twang as her leather ties snapped.

HICCUP, he roared, struggling to shake of his daze. Toothless flapped his wings, desperately trying to stop his wild spinning, and then he saw her. His heart stopped.

Hiccup was falling, her left leg hanging at a horrible angle, the great deadly fireball rushing up to meet her. Even in death, Aoife was going to be victorious.

NO.

With more strength than he knew he had – strength that was, at this point, probably sheer will power – he managed to stop spinning. Instead, he propelled his body downwards, toward Hiccup...and toward the fireball.

He was catching up, but the fire was moving faster. His wings strained to their limit, and Toothless cried out in desperation.

He couldn't lose her. He simply wouldn't live without her, and not because if Hiccup was gone, so was his flight. It was a choice, and he chose not to live without his twin soul. Down he went, after the silly, clumsy, wonderful human girl that his life revolved around.

The flames closed around Hiccup, enveloping her and Toothless as they fell from the sky.


A/N: I could be so mean right now. I even thought about it. I thought about changing this story to complete, and the genre to tragedy, just to scare you all. But I decided to not be mean, because I've already given you like 800 cliffhangers in a row, so I decided to be nice. Now, you can repay me for this niceness by reviewing. PS: the longer the better! ;D

Also, I'm really interested to see how my take on this sequence of events is taken. I always find these flying-action scenes to be the most challenging, because I want to incorporate a new perspective and new insight into an event that already has a lot going on. So: how well do you think I conveyed the bond between Hiccup and Toothless? How about Toothless' attitude towards Aoife? Astren's perspective? Let me know!