"What are you doing?!" Hookfang hissed at me.
"My best, okay?! Now shut up, literally shut up! Shh!" I whispered back, before stepping forwards again, straightening my posture and clearing my throat. "Uh, heeeey! So, like, you ain't dead yet, big plus, but I just wanna say that before you come out? It's totally okay, like emotionally, to just take a second or two and scream." I rambled, watching Stormfly facepalm out of the corner of my eye. From Snotlout, there was the clinking of the chained shackles still locked to his wrists as he pulled himself up, groaning.
"Those voices... The people from that monster jail?" He mumbled.
"People." Meatlug snorted, completely immune to the violent glares she got from the other dragons.
Snotlout finally lurched out of the cheap shelter, stopping dead in his tracks, frozen as his eyes met with our mishapen forms. I winced, unable to make eye contact.
"I can't watch..." B.B. whimpered, coiling his heads in on himself into a ball. Toothless coughed hollowly.
"...Hi?" I tried, clicking my nails together.
"You're..!-" He started, taking a step back as his voice caught.
"We are." I continued.
"...Dragons..."
"So he does recognise us..." Hookfang groaned. "I almost wish he didn't..."
"But then we'd have to explain more." I whined back at the brooding nightmare.
"...Ruffnut's weird dog?" Snotlout finally finished, eliciting a few ill-hidden giggles from B.B.
"Hey!" I cried out, indignantly putting my hands on my hips and glaring at the riders dragon. "Okay maybe a little bit of not recognising us."
"What happened." Snotlout demanded, straightening himself out while wiping at his eyes in disbelief. Hookfang shoved me forwards.
"You want the long version or the short version?" I quipped, yelping as Meatlug flicked one of her pebbles at my back. "Alright geez fine! Um, fuck, uh... You might wanna sit down." My throat felt like I swallowed a fistful of sand. Snotlout, head in hand, felt his way over to the one unoccupied fallen log. I put myself down on the opposite end. "If I wanna do this right, I gotta ask you how much you remember from before we busted you out of jail. Is... That ok with you?" I asked.
"Sure, yeah..." He mumbled, not looking up. "I remember everything burning after the monster's leader threw something at us..." He sat up suddenly, chains clinking against the log as he pointed an accusatory finger right at me. "What were you even doing there?!" He demanded, making me flinch guiltily and hunch my shoulders.
"How about we don't make this about me!" I shouted, throwing my arms up.
"I specifically told her to stay home." Toothless growled, walking over to grab at my scruff. I flailed futily as he plucked me up and dangled me like a cheap fur stole. "Should have figured from the company she keeps that her brain is about the size of a terror scale." I swung out, punching and kicking at his arm.
"Let me go you overgrown handbag!" I yipped. "After everything i've done for this team!" He dropped me right back onto the log, only looking vaguely sorry when I fell backwards into the dirt, half starfished with my legs sticking straight up against the log. "Out of everyone who has been gifted oposable thumbs, you elect to use yours for evil. Evil, I say." I groaned, rolling over without getting up.
"You'll have to explain that too, you know." He intoned as he looked down at me.
"Sssssshut up i'll get to it!" I declared, pointing to the sky and pulling myself up to sit upright. I wobbled, reaching to steady myself on the log. It suddenly felt as if my ears were full of water, but just as soon as it came it was gone. I heaved myself back up and just flopped over the log like a discarded sweater.
"Knock it off, both of you." Hookfang snorted, arms crossed. He turned expectantly to Snotlout, leaning forwards slightly. "What else? Do you remember anything about being captured? Anything we can use?" He wasn't doing too well hiding his concern, but he had a point. It took Snotlout a moment to think, prodding at the shackles on his wrists and ankles.
"They knocked me out with some sort of gas. Probably because they knew they couldn't take me on-" Meatlug feigned choking on a pebble to hide her laughter, "and then you guys woke me up." B.B. shook his heads.
"What happened to all those cats we left down there? When we got back, they were just," he made a popping gesture, waggling his fingers as he did, "poof! Gone."
"You don't think they all left the way Tiger did, do you?" Stormfly pondered. I shivered, recalling the carnal way he had begged for Whittney to save him. The way that he was consumed by the blinding magic was, frankly, fucking haunting.
"Who's 'Tiger'?" Snotlout questioned. I cringed.
"I can't beat around the bush any longer, can I?" I groaned as I pulled myself back up onto the log properly. "I think it'd be best if I started at the beginning..."
And I told him everything I could. From the first time I fell into the cats' way, to training with Paw in the forest, to Petite's serpent egg, to how she betrayed us and how I snuck into Ruffnut's bag to come along. Even the dragons looked surprised at the detail I went into, adding on when I missed something and taking charge when they remembered something I didn't.
"So in the end, all we have now is this," I held the crystal out in my palm, letting a few glowy orange motes float out, "...and you." A quiet fell over the camp as the information steeped.
"That's... A lot." Snotlout finally spoke, combing a hand over his head and taking a deep breath. "But that still doesn't explain what happened to you! Why do you look like that?!" He questioned. I sighed, dropping my head.
"We don't really know." I admitted. I twirled the shard in my hand, more lights gently trickling out and fading. There was a twinge in my temple as that waterlogged feeling reared up again, going away once I pressed the side of my temple. "This magic in general... I don't think even the cats know what it does." B.B. cleared one of his throats.
"I... Have a working theory." He said, shuffling to straighten his back and necks. "It's based on purely circumstantial evidence, but..."
"Let's hear it." Toothless nodded encouragingly. The zippleback shook his hands out, psyching himself up before continuing.
"The cats were transformed on purpose, we gathered that much from Tiger and the fortress guards. But remember when Whittney was called? She wasn't expecting us." He explained.
"The look on her face when she saw us standing there." Meatlug spoke mirthfully, shouldering Stormfly. The other dragonette giggled.
"She looked like she was about to have a fit!" Stormfly laughed at the memory.
"Presicely!" B.B. pointed, "She hid it well, but she wasn't expecting us to look like this. Even though she already knew that she changed the other cats."
"So you're saying we're stuck like this on accident?!" Hookfang growled, flaming up and quickly extinguishing. B.B. placated him quickly, raising his hand.
"Almost. She definitely meant to hit us with that dampener spell. What I think happened was that having to change her entire army left a sort of magical residue that attached itself to the dampener spell once she cast it." He elaborated, gesticulating as he spoke. "The spell can be removed in layers, I believe. Pepper getting us our abilities back is proof enough. So by the time we collect the rest of the fragments of the crystal..." He gestured to me.
"...You think she'll be able to change us back once we take all the fragments from the cat deputies." Toothless finished for him.
"Bingo!"
"That's... That's crazy. This is crazy, right?" I sniffed. "Why me?!"
"You're the only one that can touch it." Hookfang stated.
"Okay yeah the magic finders-keepers aura but-"
"You managed to figure out how it worked, and how to counter it, from just one fight." Meatlug intoned.
"That was more of an emergen-"
"You exploded a pond." Stormfly huffed.
"ONE TIME!" I flailed, almost falling backwards. No fucking pressure, then! Totally!
"You exploded a pond?!" Snotlout looked to me incredulously.
"Okay look all I did was copy what Tiger did with it!" I stood up, brandishing the shard. "I took the rock, I raised my hand, I gathered the light ball, and then I just chucked it at the water-" I narrated, only realising that I had just repeated the steps when I, quote enquote, chucked, a small ball of light into the underbrush where it promptly blew up, sending a burst of leaves, dirt, and twigs outwards from the blast point. My eye twitched. "Fuck. I meant to do that."
"No you didn't." Toothless deadpanned.
"No I didn't..." I sighed. "I guess I kind of thought that we'd wind up holding Whittney at gunpoint and making her fix what she broke." I slouched over, waving the dust cloud away.
"What's a gunpoint...?" B.B. mumbled.
"Not important right now that's what." I brushed off the question quickly. "What is important is figuring out what we're gonna do next."
"...Right. Huddle in." Toothless gave me a dissapointed look, before untucking the stolen map from his saddle strap, rolling it out onto the ground and motioning for everyone to get close. With a nod to Stormfly, the four corners of the paper were staked down into the soft dirt. He crouched, using his claw as a pointer. "The fortress used to be just south of here, before it collapsed. That just leaves the mines, the 'Big House', the flying ship, and the castle where Whittney is hiding."
"Which of these spots is what?" I whined, tilting my head at the weird symbols.
"I can't say for certain. The most we can do is head for the closest location." Toothless shook his head, tapping the square on the mountains. "That's just up the mountain. We should be able to find it if we continue into the northwestern parts of the forest."
"That's a long walk..." Meatlug grumbled, clearly unenthused. Toothless nodded sympathetically.
"We'll just have to start early then. We can stay here for one more night, but we'll have to leave early tomorrow morning. Although, because we aren't used to walking..." He trailed off, a little pained.
"It's going to take us forever!" Stormfly groaned, clasping her hands onto her face.
"We may need to stop and make camp again, yes." Toothless rubbed his neck, popping some of the joints in his neck. "Sorry." I leaned over to flick his wing.
"If I could make the sprint across Berk almost every day for over a month, then you all can manage a hike in the mountains." I sniffed.
"You're right..." B.B. conceded, heads low. "I reserve the right to complain, though."
"Sure you do." I yawned, strectching. The sky was slowly growing orange, it had taken all afternoon to get Snotlout up to speed. "Now's a good time to stop as any. Let's get some dinner goin!" I pumped a fist up, already starting towards the fire pit. Hookfang cleared his throat, however, catching my attention. I looked back to him, confused. He pointed to Snotlout over his shoulder, before tapping at his own wrist.
Oh yeah. I trotted back, already feeling the energy crackle through the crystal shard.
"I'll hold him down for you." He stated, not bothering to keep his voice down. The rider in question backed up, worry drawn all over his face.
"Wait, what?" He stepped back. We stepped forward.
"Works for me!" I giggled, before lunging for the human. "C'mere!"
"Hey, wait! HEY!"
Author's note:
I'd like to take a moment to acknowledge that yesterday, February 14th, was a national holiday that should be respected an honored.
It was the anniversary of the release of the Sonic movie! Holy shit! Happy birthday baby im so proud of you. God, one year since the release of a goddamn masterpiece. We've been blessed.
And five days ago, on the tenth, was the day I became an adult. I'm eighteen. I can, like, vote now.
Sure woulda been useful three months ago am I right.
Anyways ENTER SNOTLOUT! Not the most conventional first rescue but y'know! I'm not really in control here you see every time I write this story i'm actually possesed by the spirit of Pepper herself. Which is kinda funny because she can't write.
Shoit houghya looka liykthys.
Haha just kidding. Unless?
There's gonna be more angst coming up, warning you now. It's been too long since Pepper's mental state has taken a nosedive. And we haven't even gotten into the deep dark secrets i've been poorly foreshadowing! Dang. I'm putting this dog Through It.
Either way you can send me birthday wellwishes through the reviews. Or you know. Leave an actual review.
Think of it as a birthday present! -Carly