After several weeks of hunter hunting, Dagur and Sleuther had finally found a hunter that they could squeeze the information out of-and quite literally as the chief utilized a Berserker choke hold. He was a viking that nearly made Hiccup look muscular. Still, it had taken them longer than expected to find someone who could provide the information. The chief felt entirely responsible and bad for the duration of the trip, though. At every other turn, Dagur swore that he was witnessing the Berkian riders being captured and slaughtered by some hunter fleets. The uncertainty of what he kept seeing was not aided by how the Triple Stryke had to be on alert, anyway, to spot hunters. Any mild ear twitch that Sleuther did, made his friend draw some knives and ready himself for attacks. More than once, Dagur heard the dragon grunt at him, in frustration. "Sorry, Strykie." he apologized, again. The Berserker rubbed the bridge of his nose, "At least we're not far from Dragon's Edge. You know the rest of the way, right?" he inquired. Sleuther gave a knowing roar and sped up as his rider shut his eyes, preventing anymore false visions to deceive him.
Dagur did not reopen his eyes until he felt Sleuther land. Then, he dismounted and nuzzled the Triple Stryke's head against his own. "Great job, little buddy." The two walked towards the main part of the island and saw the vikings doing drills. After seeing the visitors, Toothless and Hiccup flew over to them. "Hey." the Berkian smiled. Dagur smiled back, "I've got some good news for you." Hiccup's brow rose, "What is it?" The older viking's grin grew wider as he divulged, "We found out where Viggo's gold is hidden. And among that would be..." he trailed off, letting his friend finish. "Ours!" the heir exclaimed, happily. "How'd you find the right hunter?" Dagur shrugged, "It wasn't too hard. The funny thing was that the one who knew was like a twig. It was kind of pitiful, but almost reminded of-" The other viking began to frown and his friend stopped, "Anyway, I don't discriminate and got rid of him too." Not noticing Hiccup's look of disturbance, Dagur brought a hand to the side of his mouth and semi-whispered, "The trick is to make them think that they won't die if they tell you, but then you still kill them to eliminate any loose ends." he finished, chuckling. The Berkian was at a temporary loss for words and cleared his throat, "Um, let's go tell the others." he suggested.
The four told the location to the others, who were thrilled. "Two quick questions." Dagur started, "Have you all found any dirt on Viggo that we could couple this blow with?" Hiccup bit his lip, "Not exactly." "Well, I'm sure that you've learned something...haven't you?" the Berserker asked, feeling less hopeful about the impending response than when he started out. Tuffnut flicked his wrist, "We haven't had time. What with our cousin, Gruffnut, coming. You'd be surprised how many things can clog up a day. I mean, what are we going to do? Just schedule everything around our search for the hunters? Ha! Not on your life!" Besides his sister, the rest of the team looked less than thrilled that Tuffnut had admitted their lack of trying to recover the gold. Dagur's not so restrained look of disappointment did not help either. "The other question was if Heather had gone to Vanaheim, since she's not here." Hiccup's head bobbed, "Yeah, she went a little after we last saw you." The Berserker's expression was unreadable, but wiped it off his face and replaced it with one of positivity, "Let's go before Viggo decides to transport it again."
The team flew off, being led by Dagur and Sleuther. They arrived on an island and looked around. From the looks of it, the only things that were on that island were themselves and ruins. "Yeah, sure looks like a lot of gold here." Snotlout snarked. The Berserker was still determined, "Given how terrified as the hunter was, I don't think that he would've lied about this. As far as he knew, I would have just found him again to kill him, if he had told me the wrong place." Some whispering sounded and Dagur turned, pulling out a knife. Instinctively, the other vikings got into defensive stances. "What happened?" Hiccup asked. The chief looked at him, "Didn't you hear that?" The Berkians shook their heads and Dagur made a low groan, then resolutely got onto Sleuther's saddle. "We're going to do a quick fly around the island to see if anyone's here." he told, also seeing that Snotlout was rolling his eyes. "You're being too paranoid. There's no way Viggo's worried about someone finding his special, broken buildings." Fishlegs appeared to be in agreement, "He might have a point. Nothing valuable seems to be here, Dagur. I doubt that Viggo would waste having any of his men on this island when they could be out capturing more dragons."
Dagur eyed the Berkian and, despite not glaring or anything, noted that Fishlegs had clammed up. "It won't hurt either way." the Berserker stated, taking off with the Triple Stryke. Once in the air, he frowned, "I am not being too paranoid. Us looking won't seem like such an insane notion when we find some hunters." They zipped past ruins and more ruins, but no hunters. "Maybe those ruins are something." Dagur thought, aloud. There was only a small amount of ground to cover before they were done and, to their lack of surpise, some Dragon Hunters had docked at the shore. "Who could have seen that coming?" Dagur mused, sarcastically. He toyed with the idea of going down to attack a few himself, but knew that the others needed to be aware of the danger they were in. Along the way back, he thought, "That proves it. There has to be something of value on this island. Like Fishy said, Viggo wouldn't just send out hunters for the heck of it." The chief and reptile found the other riders, just in the nick of time as the hunters were stalking them from behind. Before one could fire his aimed arrow, Dagur put a knife in the back of his neck. The hunter fell, dead and toppled forward, surprising the riders.
Sleuther stung several hunters with his one of his tails, killing them upon conact. A smug smile found its way to Dagur's face as he turned from the dead hunters to the Berkians. "More are probably out there." Hiccup said, getting onto Toothless's back. The team split up to stop the hunters and each found a few. Quickly, the hunters were defeated, with the ones gone after by the riders incapacitated, while the other ones that were pursued by Dagur got killed. He giggled with each kill and every time, it sounded more maniacal. His last kill of the afternoon, a particularly unfortunate hunter, had tried to sneak up on the riders when they thought all the foes had been vanquished. The hunter was stung by Strykie's tremor-causing tail and got his arms and one leg lopped off. The Berserker chief laughed like a madman at him attempting to balance as he shook. With uncomfortable glances, the Berkians observed the Berserker's clear delight in the hunter's agony. Astrid had Stormfly move closer to Hiccup and Toothless, as her fingers caressed her weapon's handle. "Since the hunters being here is an obvious indicator of something of value being here too, we should keep searching around. If we're lucky, they might have really been trying to secure the gold's secret location." Hiccup suggested.
The group walked around the island again, finding dilapidated structures once more. Dagur looked at them and ran a hand over their surfaces. They felt different from how most building materials were. They even distinguished themselves from the hunters' dragon proof materials. The Berserker put his eye close to one, inspecting every speck. Stepping back, he folded his arms and noticed some tracks. They had been made by wheelbarrows and looked heaviest where the buildings were, then lighter as they lead away. "Why would they build ruins?" Dagur pondered, "Strykie, mind blasting this?" he asked. Though not knowing the reason for the request, the Triple Stryke complied and blasted one of the buildings. As the smoke from the shot began to wane, a deep yellow shone through. Excitedly, Dagur and Sleuther went to each ruin and fired at it. The same thing occurred at every one. Cheering, the chief hurried over to the others. "It's the ruins." Dagur told them, enthusiastically. They looked doubtful, "The gold is?" Hiccup questioned. The Berserker took his arm and brought him to one of the exposed establishments. "See?" he proclaimed, proudly, "That's why the hunters were trying to protect an otherwise useless island."
Berkian and Berserker ships came with wheelbarrows and zealous vikings. Within little to no time, all of Berk's gold was back with its rightful owners and the rest of Viggo's found a new home in Berserker Island. The riders (including Dagur) flew back to The Edge. The chief was going to let Sleuther rest for a little bit. The dragon had done an extraneous amount of flying and had been a trooper through it all. "We have enough huts." Hiccup mentioned, walking over to Dagur who had sharpened six knives and counting, "That way, Sleuther will be ready for your trip back. He's a strong dragon, but even the best of them need sleep and a chance to let their wings not work." The Berserker thought about it and grinned, "Sounds like a fine idea to me." Hiccup smiled and squinted at the sky past Dagur. Following his gaze, the chief saw Heather and Windshear flying in. The duo landed on The Edge and the Berserker could see that she was holding the map to Vanaheim. Heather noticed Dagur and marched up to him, roughly handing him back the map. "We need to talk." she declared, eyes blazing, furiously. Dagur nodded and followed the viking into her hut.
Heather took a short breath, "I know that you didn't kill Dad." she said. Dagur smiled, hopefully, but his sister's subsequent glare made him change his mind. "Why lie? Why say something so terrible as you killing your own, loving parent?" she asked. The elder Berserker leaned against a wall, "When he left, I had to take over as chief and I lacked the respect of the people. Since he had vanished and I couldn't figure out how else to get them to listen to me, I just let them think that I had killed him. Technically, I never said that I did, but everyone assumed so." Heather eyed him, curiously, "Why did they automatically think that? Wouldn't him leaving be more probable?" Dagur rubbed the back of his neck, sheepishly, "Well, yes, but I've always been a little-" "Crazy?" Heather chimed in. The chief grimaced at the word and did a quick chant in his head to calm down, "Violent." he corrected, "That along with Dad and my relationship-which was pretty bad-made them think that it wasn't too unbelievable." Heather set her jaw, "Was your bad relationship the reason that you never looked for him until recently." Dagur shook his head, "He had told me not to and not to tell anyone what he was doing. During that time, I was just trying to make sure the island didn't implode and afterwards, I was a bit tied up for three years."
The chief chuckled, morbidly, at his words and looked at the younger Berserker. "Why search now? It's not like he could have told you that he wanted to be found all of a sudden." she commented, "Did you just decide that you didn't like the responsibility of leadership?" Dagur glanced at her with a sad smile, "Actually, I was trying to find him for you." Heather's eyes opened wide in shock. "I know how it feels to not have your family around and was hoping that when reunited, you two could form a nice bond." This was where he lost her. "If you wanted me to have a nice bond with my father, why did you send me adrift?" she interrogated, voice raising with her increasing anger. Dagur diverted his eyes from hers, "I can't tell you." "Why not? Was Dad showing too much favoritism to a child without problems for your liking, so you had to get rid of me?" Heather pressed. Her words cut deeper than she realized, but Dagur kept his face the same, "Like I said, I can't say. It wasn't done for the reason you've suggested, though. I'll tell you that." Annoyed, Heather went over to her door and opened it, "When you're ready to tell me why I was forced to live without my birth parents, come back, but until then, get out."
Dagur looked at the viking for a moment and left. Once he had gone far enough away, Heather exited the hut and went to the stables. Also there, Hiccup and Toothless saw her deeply furrowed brows. "What's wrong?" the heir asked. Heather sighed, "Dagur didn't kill Oswald." Her friend looked surprised, "Really? I was hoping that he hadn't." Hiccup smiled, but it faded, "Then why are you upset?" Heather got onto Windshear's back, "Because he's still dead and he wouldn't have been if Dagur had gone against his wishes to look for him sooner." She and the Razor Whip did a flip in the air and ended with Windshear's tail cutting a board in half. "He claimed that he was doing that for me. That he wanted me to have a good relationship with my dad, but that doesn't even make sense with what he's done. Why send someone adrift just so that they can spend time with the person they're already living with?" she asked, irritated. Hiccup shrugged, "Did you ask him?" "Of course!" Heather exclaimed, "He said that he couldn't tell me! That sounds like he knows he had no good reason. I can't think of any that would make it so that he should have done it." The viking did more training and Hiccup watched, thinking hard about what to do.
Late that night, when the Edge was silent, Dagur went to stand by the coast. The waves crashed into each other and provided a refreshing mist that splattered upon his face. The Berserker rubbed his temples, exhaustedly. He could no longer keep track of how many days he had gone without getting rest. A few footsteps came closer to Dagur, but he kept his back turned, only sending a quick wave. "Hey." he greeted, quietly. Hiccup was coming over to him and stood by his side. "Why are you still up?" Dagur inquired. The heir smirked, "I could ask you the same, but I think that I know the answer. You clearly have a lot on your mind and a lot of things that you want to say. How about you just let it out?" The Berserker squinted at him, "Are you even here right now?" he asked, doubtfully. Hiccup shook his head, "No, but if you won't tell your friends, you can tell me." Dagur chuckled, "I appreciate your honesty. What I want to talk about aremy friends." He grunted and ran a hand through his messy hair. "There's no point in saying anything, though. After all, you're not even here." The chief tilted his head, "I'll admit that it's getting more realistic. Great." he added, sarcastically. "Who are you talking to?" a voice inquired.
Dagur blinked a few times and saw Hiccup again, but he seemed like the real one. "Ar-are you really here?" he asked, almost whispering. His friend raised a brow, "What?" The chief shook his head, slightly, "Nothing. Um, it's kind of late. What's keeping you awake?" Hiccup stood in the same place that faux Hiccup had, "I've been trying to figure out Viggo's next move. You'd be surprised how late I've been up doing that." The Berkian listened to the sounds of the peaceful waves, "Are you feeling all right?" The other viking gave a solemn nod, "Just..tired." "Heather told me some of what happened. Why didn't you?" Dagur breathed, heavily, "I didn't want anybody to know. I was still so new with leading that if anyone thought we were vulnerable, they might have attacked. Not that I thought you all would have, but you might have let it slip to some other vikings." Hiccup's face saddened, "It must have been difficult to have to take over like that." The Berserker kept his eyes on the sea, "It was far from one of the least stressful things I've had to do." There was still something that lingered in the back of Hiccup's mind, "Why won't you tell Heather why you sent her adrift?" Dagur frowned, "It won't do her any good to learn it." The Berkian was not going to give up this time, "Then tell me. Come on, Dagur, it doesn't make sense that Heather being away from Berserker Island could be in her best interest."
Hiccup thought of how to provoke Dagur into telling. "The only reason I can think of for why you don't want to say, would be because you did do it with malintent." he stated. The Berserker knew what he was doing, but was beginning to care less. "Whatever was in that letter he wrote her, made her love him. How could I ruin that by saying I sent her adrift due to him not being protective enough? She almost got hurt by Ansson and would have, if she had stayed. Given my winning record against him, I didn't want to risk her safety by hoping something I could protect her alone. I mentioned it to Dad, but he couldn't see Ansson as anything beyond a great example for all Berserkers. Even if he had found out later that I was correct, it might have been too late." Dagur stared at the sea and thought that he saw Shattermaster being harpooned by a hunter. His heart tugged and he looked away. "Not real; not real." he repeated. Hiccup looked conufused, "What's going on, Dagur? Why do you keep acting like there are things everywhere trying to get us? Each time I turn around, you're staring at nothing like it's about to kill somebody. You can tell us. We're your friends." the Berkian said, voice gentle.
Dagur scoffed, "Yourfriends." Hiccup eyed him, "What are you talking about?" The chief started to pace, "They aren't my friends, Hiccup. I want them to be, but they aren't." "And how aren't they?" the heir asked, indignantly. The chief folded his arms over his chest, "We can start with the twins. They study me like I'm some sort of experiment. After almost every sentence of mine, they jot it down." Hiccup started to protest, but had noticed them doing it as well. "Snotlout thinks I'm too paranoid and not adventurous enough like I used to be; Astrid's worried that I'm going to freak out and hurt you-she keeps inching closer to you whenever I do something that's different; and Fishlegs is afraid of me." the Berserker finished. That one, Hiccup strove to refute, "Fishlegs is not afraid of you. He's just kind of scared of everything." Dagur rolled his eyes, "Don't act like he's not, now. You know he is and even tried to use it to your advantage." Hiccup's eyes widened, "When?" "When he thought that he was Thor Bonecrusher. He told me later that you all knew the only way to snap him out of it was if he was terrified and what did you do? You really wanted me to be around him all day. I scare him, concern Astrid, bore Snotlout, and intrigue Ruff and Tuff."
Hiccup was speechless for a few moments. He finally found his words and spoke, "Whether you believe it or not, they're your friends too. We all are here for you if you need us." A nerve was struck with that and Dagur turned, furious, "You know what, Hiccup? There was a time when that help would have been really appreciated. A time when even being killed would have been appreciated, but where were any of you? Hm? You weren't there when I needed you, so don't try to claim you'll be when I don't." He faced Hiccup and the moon shone on him, illuminating what the heir was previously unable to see, due to the darkness. The Berserker looked differently from how he used to. Hiccup saw that this time. It was more than just scars, a beard, or shorter hair. Dagur looked exhausted, worn out, and, for once in his life, broken. There was no fire in his eyes or even a disturbed twinkle. In place of those, came depression. It hurt Hiccup to see his friend in such a way, but he did not know what else to do. He started to walk away, "If you ever want to talk..." he began. Dagur only turned back around to face the water again. Oh, how those waves crashed upon the rocks, destroying anything and everything in their path. That was more peaceful and worthy of hope than any other thing in the chief's life. "Goodnight, Dagur." Hiccup told, dejectedly. The Berserker stayed facing the sea, "Goodnight, Hiccup."