Author's Notes

This was asked/speculated about often enough that I figured I'd write it out, and it's been a bit of a theme recently. Similar to the last entry, it's an alternate course of events, but I always knew this was never going to be part of the story. I've heard a lot of thoughts over the course of the story on how it might go down, well, this is what my character models produced. Fair warning – it wasn't written into AGoW for good reason.

This branches off from the start of act 3, as we look out to the horizon.

The sun shone from a pale blue sky, one of the rare pleasant days for the Meridian of Misery in the middle of spring. With the melting snow and lengthening days, productivity in the village was starting to pick up, the yields from crops improving and the herds expanding. It was a time for the village to enjoy fresh meals, and for the riders, more time to… practise, or whatever they did to sharpen their skills.

Stoick looked sternly down at the nearest Night Fury, loitering at a cliff on the eastern side of the village. "You pair have put enough grey in my beard," he grumbled. "Find what you need, come straight back." Toothy looked up at him, his expression unreadable. "I mean it," Stoick said sternly, "don't make me come looking."

Toothy huffed and went back to watching Hiccup and Fishlegs, who were talking. So strange, that they could talk two completely different languages and completely understand each other. Strange enough that they could talk plain Norse to a dragon and be understood.

And now they were off to have their own adventure, beyond the horizon. Gothi's message came to mind again – something about it had been bugging him – a little sapling with wings ready to take off and explore the world… "Oh, son," he murmured solemnly, struck by the similarities…

Hiccup's ears flicked, his attention grabbed.

Something about that was… odd. A lot of being Chief was knowing how to read people, and Stoick knew how to tell when someone had their ear on a conversation. Toothy couldn't have been less interested, but Hiccup was listening.

Gothi's message was still vivid in his mind. A tree and a sapling. Stoick himself represented the tree, that he knew, and the sapling had represented Hiccup. But the sapling had wings. She had never drawn such a perversion before, a paradox such as a deep rooted tree being able to fly.

He sharply exhaled, and Hiccup's ears flicked again. A perversion, but one that explained much. Everything, even. Lightning and death. Hurling an axe at someone did not make them a master of death. But tearing death away from someone?

Gothi had to be wrong. She had to have made a mistake, missed this particular interpretation…

He walked forwards, and Hiccup turned his head to watch him out of the corner of his eye. "Hiccup?" he asked quietly, his voice breaking.

Hiccup's head swivelled around to look at him even while he had his back turned. A sharp intelligence resided behind those eyes, fierce and sharp.

He recognised that stare, one of a disobedient child daring his father to say something. The only differences were that it was on the face of a dragon, and there was no undercurrent of fear. It stopped Stoick in his tracks.

Fishlegs nudged the Night Fury, trying to get his attention. "Hiccup?" he asked, but went completely ignored. "Chief?" he tried instead, looking to Stoick. Did he know? Yes, of course, he had said back then… He knew their secret, had so easily communicated with them…

Stoick grappled with the impossibility, struggling to wrap his mind around it. Then another thought struck him. "Toothless?" he croaked, tearing his gaze away to look at the other Night Fury.

Toothy was instantly alert, ears raised and eyes narrowed.

That settled it. He took a slow step back, then another, before his legs simply gave way beneath him and he fell back onto the grass. "Y-you," he slurred, feeling as if he was trying to talk around a rock in his mouth, "you… shouldn't…"

Hiccup flicked his head, then snarled, rising to his paws and stalking towards him. His ears and the fleshy protrusions from his head were fanned out, his wings lifting and spreading, flexing their powerful muscles, his claws digging into the grass as he advanced, his dark face split with gleaming white teeth and those fierce green eyes.

It wasn't supposed to be like this! Hiccup was in Valhalla, not cursed to live the life of some animal! Stoick floundered, hand fumbling around his belt at his side, he had to do something, "I'll-"

A long, deafening snarl crackled over him as Hiccup stepped onto his chest, driving him onto his back and nearly crushing his ribs. One hand grabbed the leg, trying to relieve some of the immense weight bearing down on him, while the other…

There was nothing he could do with it. Hiccup was guarded, protecting his neck with the joint of his wing, the enormous appendage held firmly in the space beside them to prevent Stoick from getting a good angle or swing. He was expecting to be struck.

That horrified Stoick. But, even worse than that, he had only noticed because he had looked for that angle. To strike him.

To strike his son in anger.

Again.

Hiccup's furious eyes bored through him, his claws digging into Stoick's chest through his leather cloak.

"I'm sorry," Stoick forced out. The words did not come easily, but he said them. "We can figure this out," he said sincerely; he would do whatever it took, for his son. The black slits in Hiccup's eyes narrowed even further. "I promise."

The large, flat head withdrew just a little, a finger's width, while Hiccup stared at him. Then those white fangs parted, and Hiccup barked, the sound clapping into Stoick's ears like a physical strike, then he barked again even louder, then roared, a shrieking sound that would be heard for miles. It was followed by a tirade of snarls, snaps, growls, and sounds that Stoick had no words to describe, all to a steady background ringing that seemed to partially mute everything else.

He would have given anything for a chance to listen to his son. To hear him, to make up for when he had not bothered. What cruel irony, that his wish would be granted in every way except the one that mattered.

The paw on his chest shoved as it stepped off. Stoick wheezed, the breath knocked from him, then sat up and stared helplessly at the Night Fury, who strode to the cliff, staring out to open sea, his head held high. He snarled and twitched something over his shoulder, then leaped into the sky, and Toothy… Toothless… snorted before following, two dark shapes flapping towards the horizon.

His son was alive. How many times had he prayed for this? Hoped for it? Dreamed of it? Wished to go back and undo what had been done? For the impossible to become reality? And now…

"Fishlegs," he croaked, and the man froze from where he had been slowly backing away. "What… did he say…?"

"Uhh…" Fishlegs wrung his hands and shuffled his feet, staring at the ground. "Most of it? I have no idea. That wasn't Dragonese."

"The rest?" Stoick grunted.

"That last bit…" Fishlegs looked towards him with wide, downcast eyes that glistened wetly. "Don't follow. You won't find us."

The breath forced itself from Stoick's chest. "What…"

What had he done wrong? He couldn't ask the question.

He looked down to his waist, to his hand tightly gripping the handle of his axe. He couldn't ask because he already knew the answer.

Everything.