36 The Chapter With The Boring and Repetitive Title

The sun was moving very slowly towards the horizon, but everything seemed to be happening all at once on Horston Beach. Sailors and Vikings did their very best to get the most tasks complete before sunset. Ack, Agnar and Helga all arrived back within fifteen minutes of each other riding on the Sharktooth's Tug Gronckles with Fishlegs and Snotlout not too far behind.

"Fishlegs" Astrid called to him as Meatlug settled into the sand "can you give me a lift? I need to go and check out a ship that's just appeared on the horizon."

"Sure thing Astrid" Fishlegs replied as he happily pushed off the sailor who had so offended his precious Meatlug earlier in the day "anything for a beautiful lady such as yourself."

If those words had been spoken to her by Hiccup, Astrid's heart would have melted. If they had been spoken by Snotlout, she would have not been able to keep down her lunch. Tuffnut would have just confused her but from Fishlegs, it was well and truly just a pleasant compliment from a good friend.

"Have you got one of Hiccup's spyglasses?" she asked as they flew out over the coast.

"Always" Fishlegs replied as he pulled it out of his saddlebag and handed it back to her "What are we looking for anyway?"

"A blue flag" Astrid replied as she did her best to steady her arm; a simple task on a rock steady Gronckle which was one of the reasons why she hadn't asked Snotlout for a lift. The other reason being Snotlout.

As they gained height and neared the ship, Astrid could see a second vessel about a quarter of a mile diagonally behind the first. This second ship flew no flag at all but the first one clearly showed its colour and it was blue.

"Deric has done it!" Astrid cried "that poncy, patronising little screamer has done it."

"Done what?" Fishlegs asked confused.

"Convinced the captains of the first two warships to support King Joric" she replied "let's go tell him the good news."

Twenty seven Vikings stood by their dragons as Stoick, Hiccup and Sigfus prepared to depart.

"Are you ready to put on a good show for us Toothless?" Stoick rubbed the top of the purring Night Furies head.

"Right then" he continued "everybody mount up and let's be off."

Bloodstorm was a very different dragon to Stormfly and as they all lifted off from Lookout Island and headed off into the growing darkness, Sigfus was quite glad that he was able to leave the piloting to Stoick; even though all he had done on Stormfly was to sit still and let her do her own thing (ie: follow Hiccup). None of them knew exactly how long their task would take so it was decided to begin just before twilight but several hours later, when the first lantern was spotted on the ships of Nainn's fleet, night had fully fallen so the plan could begin.

"Are you ready Sigfus?" Stoick checked.

"All set" he replied and so the Chief gave his son the signal.

"Let's go Bud" Hiccup whispered to the dragon and they soon left all the others circling slowly behind the fleet.

Toothless gained height until he was several hundred yards ahead of the lead vessel but then he pulled in his wings and dove rapidly towards the surface of the water. As the sound of the high speed Night Fury grew, every eye of every watchman was drawn off the bow of each and every ship until Toothless pulled out of the dive and rose up to the clouds once more.

"Here we go" Stoick remarked as he guided Bloodstorm in a slow glide in towards the stern of the trailing ship.

As they neared their destination, Sigfus slid his body half off the saddle and half hung from the left side till he was just over the stern. When the time was right, he let go and dropped lightly onto the rear deck. Stoick and Bloodstorm peeled off and began to circle above the ship as Sigfus marched off past the sailor who manned the ships wheel.

"As you were" he saluted as he made his way down to the main deck and to the door of the Captain's cabin and gave three slow knocks.

"What the... it can't be" Captain Ferric looked up from his navigational chart as soon as he heard the very old signal and hurried to the door.
"Jolfson! What the hell are you doing stowed away on my ship?"

"Don't panic" Sigfus grinned "I haven't got time to go into any detail but I'm not a stowaway; I've only just arrived here."

"But how..?"

"I just said that I don't have much time, so listen up. Big news; Rekkur is no longer on the throne in Bolthorn..."

"WHAT?"

"Just listen will you! Nainn doesn't know yet but his father is a prisoner on the island you will arrive on tomorrow."

"Have you got any proof of this?" Captain Ferric asked suspiciously.

"Have I got proof? How's this for proof?"

Sigfus opened the bag he had slung over his shoulder and produced three items that he had procured from the captive former king, one at a time.

"Firstly; Rekkurs gold headband with the emerald centre stone."

"How on earth did you..."

"Like I said – prisoner. Secondly I have the Royal Crest that I have cut from the breast of his tunic and finally this" and he placed in Ferric hand one of the most important items of all for his inspection; the Elydonian Royal Seal.

"Oh come on now... where did you get this?"

"I took it from the chain that hung around Rekkurs neck less than an hour ago" Sigfus grinned.

"Do you know what you could do with all these things?"

"I know what I'm going to do with these things if you will allow me to use your sealing wax."

With a distinct thud, a crossbow bolt struck the main mast of Elydonian warship Victorious and redirected the attention of the watchmen on the bow, who had been discussing the strange noises they had been hearing for the last few hours. The Officer of the Watch had told them to be vigilant when they had reported these noises and to advise him of any other odd occurrences. But the fact that they were currently sailing west into the unknown, was making the entire ships company very nervous and tonight's strange sounds were not helping.

Maybe if they could have known that the whistling whines that came and went every fifteen to twenty minutes were nothing more than a young man on a Night Fury trying to divert their attention away from what was going on around them, they may have felt a little calmer, but probably not. And if they had been made aware that the strange buzzing that they had heard up in the rigging was only a Viking on a Gronckle stealing and changing their flag, they may have just laughed it off, but they didn't. So now the two watchmen were left with this: a letter addressed to the Captain that bore the Royal Seal of Elydonia pinned to the mast by a bolt that had come from who knows where.

Sleep was rapidly overtaking Captain Pratt when a junior officer knocked on his cabin door and opened it a crack.

"Sir; a message has just been... well... delivered and it has the Royal Seal on it."

Fine fine fine; put it on my desk and get out" he mumbled as he nodded off.

Pratt despised the other Officers even the junior ones, because of the way they all looked down at him. 'They're all jealous of my success' he always told himself. It had only been a few short years ago he too was no more than a junior officer, but thanks to his discovery of a conspiracy plot to return the old Kings bloodline to the throne, King Rekkur had rewarded him. The information Pratt had brought about the traitor Sigfus Jolfson, had put him on the fast track to the Captain's cabin and now he was leading the invasion fleet to the Northwest Archipelago; life was good.

The dawn of the new morning brought a few surprises for a former Elydonian prince.

"WHERE THE HELL ARE ALL MY SHIPS?" Nainn screamed as he emerged from his cabin and rushed to the railing.

Prince Nainn had not even been able to have one good night's sleep back at the castle, before his father had sent him out on another mission. Although this warship was much larger and more stable than the last ship he was on, he still was finding it hard to sleep. So when the first signs of light had peeked around the door, Nainn had arisen and dressed only to find that his vessel was completely alone on the ocean. After rushing around the main deck in an extreme panic for half a minute, he ran up the steps to the ships wheel.

"WHERE DID THEY GO?" he shouted at the helmsman.

"Well... they were there last night sir" was all he could offer.

"DIDN'T YOU NOTICE THAT THEY WERE GONE YOU IDIOT?"

"Err... sorry sir but ever since first light, I've been keeping a close eye on that island ahead and making sure that I keep a straight course around the northern side to the inlet that you told us about."

Nainn looked out over the bow and sure enough, there was Lookout Island looming up only a few miles away. This trip was rapidly turning into a royal disaster.

"GET THE CAPTAIN UP HERE; NOW!"

"Captain Julius Pratt had already been awoken by all the yelling and screaming that was emitting from his leader and was trying to dress himself as quickly as he could manage. Eventually he decided it would be better get his Senior Officers butt up on deck as soon, as he heard the Prince demand his attendance. And so with mismatched buttons and one boot still only half on, he rushed out of his door and went sprawling onto the main deck. After pulling the second boot on the rest of the way, Pratt quickly climbed the steps to the aft deck and reported to the bright pink Prince.

"You called Your Majesty?"

"My fleet Captain; where... Is... MY... FLEET!?"

"I... I... don't know sir; I can't think of any reason why they shouldn't be there. Maybe they turned back in the night."

"Maybe one of the sea monsters got them" the helmsman offered and got a kick in the seat from Nainn for his trouble.

"There are no sea monsters out here you superstitious fool" Nainn commented "I've been out here before and the only thing we have to concern ourselves with is a small group of belligerent barbarians and they weren't even on this island when I was here several days ago."

"Maybe they received fresh orders in their letters from King Rekkur last night" one of the junior officers suggested.

"What letters?" Prince Nainn asked slightly confused.

"Well we received one last night so... maybe they did too."

"WHY DIDN'T YOU BRING ME THIS LETTER FROM THE KING YOU FOOL?"

"It was addressed to Captain Pratt so I took it to him."

Prince Nainn looked at the Captain with intense anger in his eyes.

"I... I didn't receive any letter" Pratt was adamant.

"Yes sir; I brought it to you as soon as it arrived and you told me to put it on your desk" it all started to come back to the Captain very slowly.

"How did it arrive?" Pratt asked "Who delivered it?"

"I... err... don't know who delivered it sir; it came by bolt."

"Bolt?"

"Crossbow bolt sir"

The frustration grew in the Prince's face.

"WELL GO AND GET IT YOU IDIOT."

(Theremin music plays eerily) There is a large patch of ocean that forms a triangle between Berk, Lookout Island and the Elydonian coast where seven vessels of the Elydonian Navy were reported to have gone missing; disappeared... without a trace.

Was it a sudden storm or some other force of nature or maybe it was... aliens? Some have reported other strange occurrences such as crossbow bolts coming from out of nowhere – another dimension perhaps or a tear in the time/space continuum? And what of the reports of witnesses seeing a white cat with grey markings on its head that made it look like it was wearing a bad toupee?

This is just one of the many... Mysteries of the Unexplained: presented and narrated by Leonard Nimoys second cousin twice removed (but never quite far enough).