If Horrendous thought he'd woken up early the day before, he woke up much earlier the next morning. There were a few reasons for that. For one thing, at some point during the night it had started to rain, and Horrendous's stump was once again in pain. There was also the matter of the small thunder of dragons that he was currently sharing the room with. Fortunately, they didn't try to warm up a spot to sleep like Toothless did, seeming to find Horrendous a warm enough source of heat. Unfortunately, one of them woke up for one reason or another, which caused the rest of them to wake up, and it wasn't long before they were all doing everything in their power shy of burning him to death to get him to wake up and get more fish for them.
"Morning to you too." Horrendous huffed as one of terrible terrors nibbled on his prosthetic, pulling himself out of bed and putting on the clothes he had bought yesterday. He'd spent most of the evening altering them to fit him and then sketching up his project for today. Then, just as Horrendous and the terrors had started nodding off, Hiccup had wanted to talk, and it all came together in him not getting much sleep.
It took a moment, but eventually he was able to convince six of the terrible terrors to stay behind, taking only Aorta with him and running through the early morning rain. It would probably clear up, but at least it meant that nobody was out and about. He left the small dragon in the forge, instructing her to start heating up the furnace and hoping she understood him while he ran to the Great Hall and got some fish. There was then another trip back to the house, throwing some fish into his dad's room, and then returning back to the forge.
Aorta was standing proudly before a bed of hot coals and he praised her, tossing her some fish before spreading out his design. If dragons weren't going to come to him, then he'd just have to go to the dragons.
Still, looking at the design before him, even he had to admit it looked both ridiculous and crazy.
"This'll work." He said to himself. Aorta landed on his shoulder, looking down at the parchment curiously and he turned to her. "This will work!"
Aorta got bored of watching him work rather quickly and had settled back near the forge, somehow managing to nap as he beat the Hel out of the metal. Gobber came in at one point, but Aorta had the sense to hide while the viking grabbed some things. Horrendous pretended to be busy sharpening weapons, praying that Gobber didn't notice the extremely hot furnace, nor the designs lying clear as day on the table. He didn't.
"Aorta, come here." Hiccup called, and the dragon slithered over, inspecting the leather in his hand. He carefully positioned it over her, checking the straps a few times. She squirmed around a bit, but it didn't seem to be uncomfortable for her to wear and Hiccup nodded to himself. He'd love to keep working on it - there were still six more to go - but he sadly put his designs in a stack, the least revealing of their true purpose on top, and took the harness off of Aorta, shoving it all off to the side. Eventually Hiccup or Gobber would notice if the pile of weapons didn't start to go down in number.
It was while he was working on sharpening a sword, long and heavy, that Hiccup bustled. Aorta had been chasing the sparks coming off the whetstone, but quickly retreated into the helmet of Horrendous's armor, the dragonhide parts still here from his first day awake.
"Dragon Training over already?" Horrendous asked as Hiccup walked over to his corner of the workshop.
"No, it hasn't begun yet. Just, uh, wanted to look over something." Hiccup said, the kid doing his best to surreptitiously look at the tailfin he must've put together last night. It certainly explained why he'd taken so long to come home. Horrendous smiled. He could still remember checking over everything several times before he put the first tail on Toothless, nervous and excited all at once. And now here he was, six years older and still working on things with dragons.
Aorta poked out from the helmet, original fear of Hiccup giving way to curiosity, and Horrendous made a hissing noise that she heeded, retreating back into the helmet.
"How's the Dragon Training going anyway?"
Hiccup shrugged, shoving his stuff back and out of the way.
"Oh, you know. Life threatening, almost getting killed, it's amazing." Hiccup rolled his eyes and Horrendous chuckled. He looked over at his project. He could put it off for a little bit, couldn't he?
"I think I'll watch today."
Hiccup looked up, clearly surprised.
"I- wha- why?!" Horrendous shrugged.
"Why not? It'll be… fun, watching you kids go up against dragons. It'll remind me of when I was a boy, doing Dragon Training, nearly getting burnt to a crisp by a hideous zippleback." Horrendous said wistfully as they made their way out of the forge.
"Wait… I thought you said your parents were travelers? And that you didn't live in one place?"
It was all Horrendous could do not to freeze right there. Right. He had said that, hadn't he? It had seemed like a smart thing at the time, but now he wasn't so sure.
"I… did." Horrendous ground out, trying to go over everything he had claimed about himself since he'd gotten here. Frick, he'd even claimed to have been a blacksmith's apprentice! And he clearly had been too. Nobody walked into a forge and just naturally had that kind of expertise.
There was a bark from behind them and both Haddocks turned around.
Aorta was flying out of the forge, carrying Horrendous's helmet with her.
"Dragon!" Horrendous yelled, though not loud enough to alert the other vikings and hoping he didn't sound as excited as he was for the distraction. "Hiccup, you go, I'll take care of the beast!"
"W-wait!" Hiccup put his hand on Horrendous's shoulder, but he easily pulled out of his weak grip and ran over to the terrible terror. He plucked his dragon blade from his waistband and threw it as far as he could. Aorta perked up and chased after it, dropping the helmet. Horrendous spared a look behind him and threw Hiccup a thumbs up.
Horrendous picked up his helmet and went between throwing his helmet and throwing his dragon blade until they were far enough away from Hiccup and the town.
"Okay, c'mon, give it up." Horrendous put out his hand and after a moment Aorta put the helmet in his hand, tongue darting out and licking his nose. "Let's get you home before you get into any more trouble."
The rest of the terrors were excited to see both of them again, quickly finding their perches on him and crying out when he brushed them back off. He clipped the dragon blade back to his belt but tossed the helmet on the bed. The thunder pounced on the new object and Horrenous made his escape.
The training grounds looked so much more bleak here in the past, and the metal ropes over it made Horrendous's heart pound a little uncomfortably. It wasn't exactly easy, being reminded that his tribe had once done the things that they now fought so vehemently against. Gobber was in the stands while the teens ran through the maze he had constructed. Meatlug was barreling around, knocking into walls as she wound around the maze. To them it probably looked like she was hunting them, but Horrendous could tell Meatlug was more just curious about what was behind every corner.
"Find her blind spot!" Gobber called down as the Hiccup ran away from the Gronkle, running into Fishlegs. Horrendous huckled as Ruffnut and Tuffnut tried to use the same blind spot of the deadly nadder - which just put them right in Meatlug's line of fire.
"Have you lost any kids yet?" Horrendous walked up to Gobber and leaned on the railing as the twins ran into the maze screaming with Meatlug in pursuit.
"Not with me on watch." Gobber said. "What brings you out here, Horrendous? Not enough to keep you busy at the forge?"
"More than enough to keep me busy for my life," Horrendous said, thinking of the three different projects he meant to work on on top of actually doing his job. "But I wanted to see how they were holding up against the dragons."
"I helped dress your wounds when you first showed up, looks like you've had your fair share of run-ins with the beasts." Gobber nodded to Horrendous's shoulder. "Gotta say, I'm impressed you survived some of those."
"Yeah, I've handled a lot of dragons in my time, species you've probably never even heard of before. Comes with being a traveler." Gobber seemed to buy that.
"Who can tell me how many shot's she's used up?" Gobber shouted down to the teens.
"Three!" Fishlegs immediately responded loudly and attracted Meatlug's attention in doing so. He then screamed and started running, the gronckle giving chase, both of them knocking into the walls.
It all went to shit pretty fast after that.
The wall that was falling near Astrid and Snotlout probably wouldn't have hit them, but Snotlout tackled Astrid in some kind of failed attempt to save her, and then got them both stuck under the wall. The twins both run into each other while running through the maze, trying not to get hit by the collapsing walls, and were now both holding their heads in their hands. Fishlegs had rounded a corner without looking and had accidently run into the stone side of the academy.
Thus, Hiccup was the last one standing and the one that Meatlug now had her eyes on.
Hiccup seemed frozen, looking around desperately for something to help him, and a chill went down Horrendous's spine.
He didn't remember this happening.
"Throw your axe Hiccup!" Gobber shouted, and Horrendous could hear the hint of fear in his voice. He looked over and he could see very clearly that Hiccup had no intention to throw the axe. Not only did the kid not have the arm strength to do so, but he'd also already made a connection with Toothless. Dragons were no longer mindless creatures to him anymore.
With hardly a second though, Horrendous slipped over the metal ropes and hit the ground running. He almost called the gronckle by name but instead just grit his teeth and jumped on top of the dragon. Her mouth had been open, preparing to shoot a blast at Hiccup, but she closed it in surprise. She bucked wildly beneath him and Horrendous held on tight, feeling her rough hide scratching up his arms.
He shifted his weight and sent them both barreling towards her cage. He reached his hand to the spot behind her jaw and scratched it before letting go of the dragon and jumping off. She had stopped flapping in response to the scratch but the momentum carried her into her cage. Horrendous jumped back to his feet, pushed the doors closed, and threw the lever to set the log back over the door, successfully locking Meatlug in.
"Sorry." He whispered, wincing as he heard something bang on the door.
It was then that he noticed that all eyes were on him.
"That. Was. AWESOME!" Tuffnut pumped his fists into the air. Ruffnut had her hands over her heart.
"Take notes. That's how you take care of a dragon." Gobber praised from the stands.
"I was totally going to do that, I was just busy making sure you were safe babe." Snotlout said to Astrid, who just shoved him away. She had an odd expression on her face, the one that said 'I'm impressed but I still don't trust you'. It was a bit weird to see in on a much younger face, but also somewhat reassuring to know that even six years in the past, his Astrid was still there.
He caught Hiccup's eyes and was shocked to see even more distrust than Astrid had. Right. They had never resolved that whole thing from earlier. Despite this, Hiccup saw everybody starting to crowd around Horrendous and clearly saw it as the perfect opportunity to get back to Toothless with the tailfin.
"So, Horrendous, how many dragons have you killed?"
Horrendous hadn't noticed Ruffnut getting so close, but now she was holding his arm and looking up at him with dreamy eyes.
"Uh, I've got, uh, things to sharpen." Horrendous pushed Ruffnut off of him. "Maybe we can talk during dinner?"
He didn't wait for a reply and booked it out of there. He could feel all of them watching him as he went and he wondered just how long he'd be able to keep this whole thing up.