Chapter 19

"TOOTHLESS!" That was all Hiccup could say as he watched his best friend turned lover get his leg ripped to shreds by the intense magnesium flame breathed by Astrid.

Once the deed was done, Toothless lied on his side feeling more intense pain then when his tail fin got ripped off when he got shot down. Pain that was like his leg was being stabbed by a thousand flaming daggers, pain that would make any normal person go completely insane with agony or make them feel like they want to die.

Toothless, however, didn't think about dying but couldn't do much but lie there, clutching his singed leg as the flames fade, showing that his whole left foot and lower calf was gone.

Due to being literally stabbed in the back earlier by Astrid, Dagur could only lie there and watch what had happened, cringing at the pain he could tell Toothless was in.

Astrid, on the other hand, sees the results of her work and smiles. "Well, it's not what I was going for but it will do. Now, my darling Hiccup, why don't you give some thought about maybe ditching Toothless and coming back to me. Go ahead, I'll wait." She put her wings around the bars and kept up that devious smile.

Just then, Stormfly and the others, who had landed on Berk to help out the land strike squad, run up having heard the commotion. What they saw was Hiccup in a cell with Astrid looking into the cell, Dagur on the ground and Toothless on the ground holding his left leg. "What the hel happened?" Stormfly asks.

Astrid looks over and yells at Stormfly, "Back off! We're just having a nice conversation."

"Wait, I'm confused. So, if Dagur is on the ground and Astrid isn't but Hiccup is still in a cell, then that means…" Tuffnut says, pondering this like it's a grand mystery. "Anyone?"

"Astrid, what is going on here?" Fishlegs asks.

Hiccup couldn't say anything because he was still in total shock at watching his mate perform such a daring move.

Astrid, on the other hand, growls and says, "Fine, you caught me. This whole ordeal involving Dagur coming here was all because of me. I had him come here and capture Hiccup so I could rescue him and he would have no choice but to fall right back into my wings. But, of course, not everything could go entirely as I planned and I ended up setting his dragon's leg on fire, now I'm just waiting as he tries to remember his old feelings."

Everyone stood there with their mouths wide open. None of them could believe that it really was Astrid who made this happen. Hookfang breaks the silence by saying, "Whoa, so, all of this was because of you? And the Union temple, were you responsible for that too?"

Astrid smirks. "Hey, you figured it out all on your own. You must feel so proud."

Hookfang's shoulders drop in disbelief. "You. Bitch. So Hiccup was right, there was a rat amongst us. One that was right under our noses the entire time."

"That is correct, my dark skinned friend." Astrid says. "And now that you all know about it…" She raises her tail and makes her spines pop out. "You all need to die too."

They all take a step back as Stormfly carefully says, "Whoa, calm down Astrid. You don't need to do this."

Astrid makes one more step forwards before hearing someone saying this behind her.

"You…Bitch."

She looks behind her and sees Hiccup's body shaking and his eyes were wider than ever. "You…bitch." He says again, making Astrid turn around completely.

"What now?" She asks, pressing her face against the bars.

"You bitch…..you….BITCH." He yells as he could feel something stirring inside of him, as if a flame was just lit and was spreading through his body.

His muscles tensed up and you could see veins from underneath his black scales, his wings and tail fins spread as far as they could despite the stone cell walls, the flaps on his back opened up, and finally, he lets out a roar that created a purple shockwave and had enough power force the bars open and push Astrid against the pole that Toothless was tied to.

Astrid shook her head before opening her eyes and yelling, "What the fuck was that?"

A cloud of smoke was created after Hiccup let out that roar but soon, a light blue glow could be seen coming out of the smoke. Hiccup uses his wings to make the smoke dissipate and reveal that he had a blue glow running from the top of his head to the base of his tail. And above all, he looked angrier than ever. Teeth showing, eyes wide, claws digging into the ground, wings spread, the whole 9 yards.

The rest of the gang looked to him in awe. "What. Is that?" Snotlout asks.

Meatlug had a huge smile on her face. "I don't believe it. Hiccup has entered the Night Fury's Alpha Mode."

"Alpha wha?" Ruffnut asks.

Meatlug explains, "It is the most powerful ability in a dragon's arsenal. It gives him powerful, unlimited shots, unmatchable speed, and immense strength. It is said that all dragons have a mode like this but hardly any have ever been able to figure out how to activate it."

Fishlegs asks, "So, what's the secret to activating it?"

Meatlug explains some more, "They say it activates from a need to defend someone else from grave danger. That could be a close friend, a family member, and especially a mate. Hiccup saw what Astrid did to Toothless so it must have triggered the mode inside him."

Fishlegs's Gronckle mouth was hanging open at this point. "That's…the most amazing thing I've ever heard of."

Hiccup steps closer to Astrid, causing her to back away. "Hey, there's no need to go crazy here, we can just talk about this."

Hiccup growls before firing a blast at the ground in front of Astrid, causing a small explosion and making Astrid back off some more. "Talking time is over. Now, you must pay." Hiccup says in an incredibly angry tone.

Astrid knew there wasn't much chance in fighting him, so she flies away as fast as possible, shooting spines as she left. Hiccup dodges the spines and allows her to get about 20 feet away before he leaps towards her at lightning speed.

Astrid had to keep moving in random direction in her attempt to dodge the plasma blasts that Hiccup was firing. Hiccup couldn't quite figure out what sort of pattern she was flying in if there was any, but that didn't stop him from firing blast after blast until finally, he was able to figure out where she was going and managed to shoot her down, making her crash to the ground.

Astrid quickly recovers from the fall and tried to get up but found that there was a Night fury lying on top of her. She tries pushing Hiccup off of her but his strength was too much for her. She grunts. "How the hel did you get so strong? A few years ago you couldn't even carry an axe."

Hiccup leans in and says, "Love is the strongest force in the world. A force so strong that not even the halls of Valhalla can defeat it." Hiccup flips her so that she is on her back and they are now face to face. He presses his head against hers so that they are now eye to eye. "You're right, there was a time when I would kill a dragon for you, but now that I have a loving mate of my own I don't need you."

If Astrid's eyes were any wider, they would likely pop out of her head. Hiccup leans his head back and charges up a powerful plasma blast, the most powerful one he's ever attempted. Astrid saw her life flash before her eyes before she closes her eyes, fully expecting to be dead within the minute, until both of them heard a loud voice.

"HICCUP!" Hiccup heard the voice and it made him stop charging and look to his right to see Stoick standing nearby. "Don't do it Hiccup, it's not worth it."

Hiccup yells. "Dad, she tried to kill Toothless! To kill my mate! She had me locked up and had Dagur destroy an ancient dragon temple just so she could be with me! She has to pay!"

Astrid had opened her eyes at the realization that she wasn't dead, at least not yet. Stoick takes a careful step forwards and says, "Son, I understand how you would be upset. Believe me, if I was in your position, I would be just as mad, but killing? That wouldn't make you any better than Alvin when he betrayed Berk."

Hiccup still had the most furious look in his eyes. "This isn't about whether or not it will make me better. It's about doing to her what she tried to do to me."

Stoick growls. "Then maybe this will change your mind." The Rumblehorn moves to the side and behind him comes Dagur with Toothless on his back. His pants leg was covering his charred leg.

"Toothless! You're alive!" Hiccup nearly yells.

Toothelss nods. "I am. And I am here to tell you to not do this. In case you recall, I had the perfect chance to kill you too for shooting me down and taking away my flight after you released me, but I couldn't do it because I saw the good in you after you did it. I saw that there's no way you would kill a living soul. Now look at you, about to kill the girl that was one of your best friends, one that you've known since long before you met me. Please Hiccup, don't do it."

Hiccup felt conflicted. He really did want revenge on her but at what cost? The respect of his father that he worked so hard for plus his mate?

He looks down to Astrid and saw the blue eyes that he once fell in love with. He decided that, they were right, killing isn't the best option, but there was something else. Hiccup raises his claws and uses them to slice into Astrid's wings, causing her a great deal of pain, almost as much as Toothless felt, and rendering the wings useless.

Once Hiccup was satisfied with his work, he gets off of Astrid and walks over to join his dad and Toothless. On the way over there, Dagur gave a nod and soon, two Monstrous Nightmares from his army sweep in, roll her onto her back, and tie her wings together.

Dagur walks up to Astrid and says, "Astrid Hofferson, for the crimes of attempted murder, vandalism, and assault towards a chief, you are under arrest under Berserker law." Astrid grunts before closing her eyes and lowering her head, accepting whatever was about to come her way.

Hiccup sighed, glad that that whole thing was now over.

(The next morning)

Hiccup, Stoick and Dagur stood on top of Berk's cliff with Dagur facing the first two. Toothless was with Gothi who determined that his leg was so badly damaged that she had no choice but to amputate the leg. Hiccup would've stayed to watch but the second Gothi pulled out the knife to cut the leg, he felt squeamish so he just let her do her thing.

Astrid had been placed into a crate made of dragonproof material. She was then carried away by four Changewings from Dagur's army who each held a chain attached to the crate. As Astrid was taken away, Dagur says to Hiccup and Stoick "She will be held in a Berserker cell until we can figure out what to do with her. I am sorry for the trouble that she caused."

Stoick nods. "It's alright, there was hardly any damage done to any buildings so the village won't take long to recover."

Hiccup adds. "I never thought I'd say this but, thank you Dagur, for everything."

Dagur's eyes widen. "Oh right, you probably want this back." He holds up Stoick's axe in his hand.

Stoick had a look like he just found his long lost twin. "My axe!"

Dagur rubs the back of his head. "Yeah, so the deal was that I got to keep the axe in return for destroying the Union Temple. I didn't want to deny that deal because I didn't want Astrid to believe that I was planning to betray her."

Stoick felt a tinge of anger for not acting when he first noticed his axe was more blunt, but that faded quickly with a sigh and he says. "Keep it. Your claws allow you to have a much better use for it than my paws."

Dagur's eyes widen some more. "Th-thank you, chief. I promise that I will cherish this axe with my life." With that, Dagur nods them both a goodbye before beginning the flight back to Berserker Island.

As Dagur was leaving, Hiccup felt something on his neck and hears a voice saying, "Sure is amazing how one can change so quickly."

Hiccup looks next to him and sees his black haired mate standing next to him. "Toothless!" He gives him the biggest hug he can before pulling away and asking, "So, what about your leg?"

Toothless smirks. "See for yourself." Hiccup looks down and sees that the leg is indeed missing. In it's place was a metal prosthetic leg that looked highly familiar.

Hiccup gasps. "That looks…just like my old leg."

Toothless nods. "I had it specifically designed like this. Figured it would bring back some memories of the days before the transformation."

Hiccup smiles wide before hugging Toothless once more. He pulls away after a solid minute before saying, "You know, when we first found out about the transformation, I don't think either of us knew what to think of it. But now, I think it just brought us closer than we've ever been."

Toothless smiles before rubbing Hiccup's cheek. "I couldn't agree more, my Fury mate."

Hiccup gives Toothless a long lick. "My loving human." He replies.

Toothless wipes the saliva off of his shirt. "Hey, you know that doesn't wash out!" Hiccup and Stoick laugh hard at the comment.

And that concludes that chapter. Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it if you did please leave a fav/rev/follow. I have one more chapter planned for this story, and if the previous chapters say anything, it's going to be good.

Thanks for reading, and I'll see you soon.