Chapter 7, everybody! In which our boys question each other's abilities to survive long-term….

Obake's quoting Hobbes from Calvin and Hobbes, by the way—love that strip. And dragonbite vipers come from Tui T. Suitherland's Wings of Fire series, which is worth checking out. Meantime, Hiro's imagine-spot references Mike Wazowski in Monsters, Inc.

Blacksmiths basically did everything metal in a village, from nails to forks to armor to swords, so yeah, that's got to be one of the most crucial jobs. The moon being made of green cheese is one of those old sayings, kind of the equivalent of and if you believe that I've got oceanfront property in Arizona to sell you. Guinea fowl will loose their feathers in favor of making a getaway, as I found out one daygoing from being used to grabbing a chicken by the tail to catch them to a guinea is an experience, let me tell you. D:

Big Hero 6 © 2014 Disney

How To Train Your Dragon © 2010 DreamWorks

Little-Brother was very frustrated with this so far.

Be patient, he told himself. Like everyone tells you about hunting. It's only been…what, a day? Two days? It's falling asleep next to you, that's a start. It also has you pinned, so….

He had to use his head and think things through, like Older-Brother told him—daah he missed Older-Brother—this was a very big deal, trying to train a Yokai. It wasn't like teaching a Nadder how to fling spikes, or learning how to fly or hunt—this was uncharted territory, no one had ever done this, no one thought it could be done.

He felt the limb pinning him slowly relax, could hear its breathing even…waited…waited…patience….

When he felt it fully relax, he carefully sat up, tilted his body so the limb slid off onto the Yokai, scuttled away and tucked his tail in when he turned around—asleep. Totally asleep.

Good, he reflected, sitting down to watch it. Now, what have we learned so far, Yokai-Tamer? What will you tell the rest of the flight when they ask you using that glory-name?

Yokai with ghost-faces have qualms about killing younglings. They will give fish for the darndest things (a fish for just sitting? Incredible—or as Older-Brother would put it, unbelievable). They will wrap broken wings up in animal hide and the same stuff their claws are made of—thank goodness it was animal hide though; he wasn't sure if he could keep this up if it had used dragon hide.

Speaking of—a Yokai's black hide was not, in fact, made of dragon hide, despite smelling of old spilled blood. Matter of fact—if it was asleep he could test this—sniff it up and down, carefully, gingerly, always keeping one eye on its face…it smelled freshly of old dragon blood, but the only portions that smelled of dragon hide were near the base of the torso where wings would tether above hips and on the back feet. Maybe that was a not-true true-story, like there being such a thing as a dragon that could change into a not-dragon and vice-versa. Its black hide was most definitely not a dragon hide it had stolen.

But that! Now that was a new wrinkle—flipping the black hide off with ease to tangle Little-Brother up so it could escape, like how a lizard cut off its own tail or some birds loosed their feathers to make a getaway. He had been quite interested in sniffing at the hide, wondering how long it would take for a new one to grow back, or if it was off to steal a fresh one oh please don't steal his—

Instead, when it came back, smelling freshly of stale old blood, it picked up its old hide and shrugged it back on, going from looking like a not-dragon to an unmistakable Yokai.

Talk about fascinating—this was like how Changewings could change colors, only different. This would change how they handled raids on not-dragon nests, if there was a possibility that a Yokai was hiding in the midst like a dragonbite viper coiled in sweetgrass. If that were the case, they would have to be sure to plan accordingly.

And he had to remind himself that he only had this one raid to go by, it was too early to agree with his brother and their friends about how stupid it was to raid not-dragon nests because Mountain-King was too lazy to go fishing and too much of a jerk to let them go and feed themselves.

Shook his head, ears and flaps slapping against his neck—don't think like that, because if you thought it then you said it, and if you said it where Mountain-King could hear you were a snack. Focus on the big picture.

Okay—Yokai could shed and pull back on the hides they stole—and this was definitely a stolen hide, it didn't smell like the Yokai like Little-Brother's wing would smell like Little-Brother. Well, it did, but like how Little-Brother's favorite sleeping spot smelled like Little-Brother.

And it wasn't just the stolen hide—most of the Yokai seemed wrapped up in hides, although in some cases he couldn't even begin to guess what animals they were from. He wondered if the Yokai wore these to protect its skin—which didn't seem capable of taking hard hits, he thought, looking it over critically, noting the grayish cast. Still not healthy.

And then a glare at the scratch just under the crest—no wonder it wasn't healthy, if it barely ate and wouldn't take care of its own wounds. Were all Yokai like this? They had to eat, something had to happen to the dragons that were shot down, and it was certainly not getting wrapped up and fed.

But leaving a wound unattended wasn't smart. Neither was denying having it tended, he thought with a huff—how did Yokai take down dragons if they couldn't even do something as basic as taking care of themselves?

Sniff, watch the Yokai carefully…breathing even…ish. Was most likely sleeping. Inch closer…closer…definitely sleeping. And if Little-Brother was going to train a Yokai, he had to make sure said Yokai didn't die on him from something easily fixable. Gingerly put his paws on the rock, get himself braced, lean as close as he could without touching, holding his breath—

He had his tongue out and almost touching when the Yokai said "As if life wasn't short enough."

Little-Brother huffed right in the Yokai's ear, causing it to startle sideways and making him bound away in alarm before he realized he was being stupid. It wasn't like—

He froze, tipped his head as he evaluated the Yokai, patting itself down and glaring at him.

It was skittish, he realized—more so than you would reasonably expect an apex predator to be. Sure, it was because Little-Brother was OBVIOUSLY very terrifying—he was a Night Fury, after all—but…you know, young dragon, barely fledged, one wing broken. Versus a Yokai who looked like the only thing wrong with him was that scratch on his head, and the only problem with that was that he wasn't taking care of it.

He was missing something…but what?

Huff in the meantime. "You're such an idiot," he scolded. "Fine though—get blood poisoning and DIE, see if I care." No wait he did care, the fish in the cove wouldn't last forever and what about his wing and what it was bound in a downed dragon was a dead dragon everyone knew this and this meant that his health was linked to the Yokai's health and just UGH.

"I think I liked you better when you were scared witless," the Yokai countered, sounding belligerent.

Little-Brother turned around, scuffed his paws and flicked his tail in dismissal, stalked away to find somewhere else to sleep where stupid Yokai couldn't get to him.

That didn't last long though—because shortly after curling up in a little crevice and dozing off, he jerked awake, almost hearing Older-Brother going found you and teasing him for picking an obvious hiding spot no challenge at all I swear—

He missed Older-Brother.

Actually he missed everybody—well, not everybody, just those in his immediate wing—but Older-Brother was called that for a reason. Older-Light-Fury may have raised them, but Older-Brother was the one who was always on his tail, pouncing on it and pinning him whenever he was about to go do something monumentally stupid. He wondered what he'd say about this.

Actually, he had a good idea: Unbelievable—are you INSANE? You can't train a Yokai NO you can't keep it I don't care if it followed you home that THING is a KILLING MACHINE just WAIT until you fall asleep and NO, I will NOT save your sorry hide when it steals it. The Yokai wouldn't have gotten within ten feet of him if Older-Brother had been there.

That would have still left him with the problem of being a downed dragon—and they would have both been dead because Older-Brother would never go and leave him like this.

Where was he?

Little-Brother already knew the answer, could feel it in his bones—Older-Brother was stubborn, but even he couldn't defy the orders of Mountain-King. He'd have to wait—try to hold out until Mountain-King relaxed his ruling and sent them out raiding again. Older-Brother would make a beeline right for here, he knew it.

Which meant he'd have to hold out until he came.

It was cold here without the fire, stone soaking up his heat and not reflecting any back. He was used to sharing a space with at least one other dragon, being alone just stunk.

Fire was warm.

He huffed, irritated that this was a thing he was going to have to do—held out for a few more minutes before slinking out and padding back over. The Yokai was starting to drift off again—must have heard him, because it looked up when he came close.

"Finally decided to join us, did we?" the Yokai asked drily.

Little-Brother decided to try untangling the mess that was Yokainese later. "Don't make anything of this, it was just cold over there," he groused, moving a paw in a negative motion before flopping down next to the fire.

The Yokai snorted, sounding amused—rolled over and looked like it was trying to go back to sleep.

Little-Brother waited several long moments, tracking a little nightjar through the woods, before getting up and sneaking over to the Yokai. Seemed asleep…sniff to see if it reacted to the noise.

"Try it one more time and I go with my original plan of making you a coat," the Yokai muttered darkly.

Again, it was a garbled mess of noise, but the intent was clear—Little-Brother padded back over to the fire, settled down, curled up so he could glare at the Yokai.

Jerk.


Obake had really hoped he could stay away from the village for at least a little bit longer, he really did.

Unfortunately, in his haste to get back here and bandage up the dragon, he hadn't really picked up any extra supplies. A bedroll, yes, but that didn't fill any bellies, and now he had two to consider.

Especially if he wanted this plan to work.

There were still issues with getting the dragon to be friendly, still issues with keeping it in the cove, but he was able to slip away again, this time with his coat still on (his pack had to be sacrificed to facilitate this escape).

Okay, he told himself, heading back to the village—mentally tick off everything you were going to need—get in and out quickly because genius you, you decided to go and become the blacksmith because you were desperate to prove your worth and why didn't you just pick one of the most crucial roles in the village you idiot Yokai you. He was probably looking at a horrendous backlog waiting for him.

That dragon couldn't get full-grown fast enough.

But there were other benefits to being the blacksmith, he reflected as he slinked through the village; benefits such as being able to work on his ideas as soon as he conceived them, without having to try to explain it to some dimwit. Honestly, the whole mercenary band was full of them, didn't really recall the old village being any better—superstitious idiots the lot of them, why did he miss them again?

It's not them you miss.

He snarled under his breath, kneading his forehead to get the thought out of his head—no, no, he would have never gotten that even if he had gone with them, there was no use pining after what never could have been. Everything he had tried to impress her had never been enough, he was doomed to being kept at arms' length and treated with aloofness, saddled with limits.

He'd be better off on his own.

Slip into his forge, mentally go over everything, get things started and get a few basic molds filled up and fixed up to keep people off his back—

And while that was going, get started on some of his prototypes.

Flip through the sketches he had done—he was pretty sure the dragon wouldn't drastically change shape as it grew; he could test out saddle designs on it now, find out which one worked the best without wasting so much leather. Leather was at a premium.

Actually, everything was—the price of living an unsustainable life, like a swarm of vicious locusts.

How far would it take to get away from Callaghan's shadow, he wondered as he worked. And where—should he even waste his time looking for the remnants of his old village? Probably not—probably there wasn't anything left to find. South then—south to warmer weather, he had always been cold, always possessing of a lower body temperature even before that dragon attack rendered him anemic for the longest time—something that had reinforced his name.

Maybe there were intellectuals to the south. Right. And the moon really was made of green cheese and there was some sort of howling sasquatch on Muirahara Island. He wasn't an idiot, he didn't deal in fallacies, he'd probably forever run into idiots, it was an inevitability.

He had everything prepped and bundled up by the time the molds cooled—he'd do the final rendering when he was back in the cove and could make proper measurements against the dragon—measuring tape, he needed to pack that—

After that, it was simply a matter of evading everyone for long enough to get some food and get out.

Glance around, skitter to the food stores—okay, deep breath, act like you knew what you were doing and were going to murder anyone who stood in your way. Right.

Having to deal with an idiot whose name he wasn't even going to dignify with thinking going in helped to cement his resting murder face for the rest of the trip.