The leather cord of the harness pulled taught as Hiccup sharply banked Toothless around a gargantuan rock spire, towering out of the ocean and reaching towards the heavens. Flecks of loose dirt and pebbles cascaded down off a rough patch of rock towards the vast, outstretched water below as Toothless' left wing grazed the pillar. Hiccup was keeping them as close to the rock as he could, limiting the firing angles of his pursuers. Toothless' face was set in grim determination, letting out small growls as he labored for breath. A quick glance to his right reminded Hiccup of the three arrows lodged in his dragons' wing. He breathed in sharply.

"This is bad, buddy." He murmured to his dragon, stretched out low along his back. Toothless glanced at him with a side-eye as if trying to communicate with his master with a look that said We've had bad before.

"Yeah, but this is worse." He whispered as he manipulated the reigns, urging Toothless to use what strength he had to climb into the sky. They needed height. With height, he could get speed.

With obvious difficulty, Toothless roared and beat his wings, climbing higher and higher despite his injury. His master had never steered him wrong, and they were under attack. His master would know what to do, and his master wanted to go higher. So higher he would go.

Hiccup risked a glance backward, in time to see two of Grimmel's men on dragon back shoot around the same rock pillar. Where is the third one? He thought for only a moment before he snapped his head around, eyes roving for the obvious trap. The third rider came around nearly on top of him, thinking to gain height and attack from the top. The dragon and rider both stared wide-eyed as they careened towards Toothless and only a flourishing roll from a quickly reacting Toothless saved them from collision.

Hiccup needed help, but Astrid, Ruff, Tuff, Snotlout and Fishlegs were all in their own aerial stand-off with Grimmel's men, and his father, Stoick, wasn't much of a rider. A fireball flashed past his shoulder, singeing some frays off his leather-clad shoulder pad. A second blast hit Toothless in the injured wing and sent the dragon tamer into an uncontrollable spin. Hiccups harness and the white-knuckled death grip on the reigns was the only thing that kept him on the saddle.

"Toothless! We have to-" intense, searing pain erupted on his side and he howled into the chilled air. Another fireball had lanced in and hit him in the back. His leather had ignited immediately and the only thing that saved him from being consumed in flames was the quick wit to unbuckle his harness and let it fall off of him. Leaning from the hit, he watched in horror as his wings and armor descended towards the dangerous ocean below.

"Hiccup!" Snotlouts voice pierced the cold air from far above, "Hang on, man! I'm coming!"

He just had to evade these riders for a few more moments. If Toothless hadn't been hurt, these dragons and their riders would have stood very little chance against the might of the dragon tamer. But Toothless was hurt.

Badly.

Hiccup knew the fire was coming again so he applied pressure to his left leg and pulled the reigns, moving Toothless into a sharp left turn, trying to avoid using that right wing as much as possible. Glancing back over his shoulder he saw the open maw of the dragon, already knowing he would have to go left, orange with flames as another ball leapt towards him. Instinct took over and Toothless snapped from his left into a hard right.

The wing couldn't take it.

A sickening cry erupted from Toothless as his right wing seemed to go limp and crumple, Hiccup was jerked hard at the frantic thrash of Toothless' body. The leather straps holding him to the saddle that had burned from the fire snapped.

It was as if everything in the world had gone silent and it was the only sound he heard. Everything seemed to move in slow motion as the recoil of the snapping leather rebounded and slapped his chest. The pressure of the saddle in his thighs evaporated and he was filled with a floating sensation as slowly. So, so slowly he watched a terrified and frantic Toothless gain distance. Toothless roared and reached out with a massive paw, and caught only air inches from Hiccups hand.

Hiccup was falling. He could feel the air pushing against his body as he slowly turned end over end towards the unforgiving sea. Above him, he caught site of Snotlout, horror on his face, as his mouth worked, but the wind drowned out whatever he was saying. Hiccup blinked and stared up again. Snotlout and Hookfang weren't fast enough, he knew it, they knew it. Hiccup blinked again.

He was falling to his death.

His eyes glanced towards the battle raging in the sky beyond the pillar he had tried to use as cover. Dragons were everywhere. Ruff and Tuff were flying with abandon, Fishlegs was using Meatlug like a battering ram, and however bad his father was at flying, he was equally good at fighting; swinging his massive hammer with such speed from his dragon that he had engaged four different riders in combat.

And there was Astrid.

Astrid.

Her pure-blonde braid waived in the wind as Stormfly darted with artistic grace between attackers as Astrid swung her axe with the deft skill only Odin could grace on someone so perfect. She glanced towards Snotlout as he waived crazily from the back of his dragon, and she almost lazily looked down towards what he was pointing at.

Time seemed to stand still for Hiccup as he locked eyes with her. He knew they were adults but this time, with the expression of terror creeping across her face, he suddenly was reminded of when they much, much younger.

Wind ripping at his body, he slowly rotated again, the cold sea filled his vision, and he remembered…

FLASH

"My Gods, why are we even going on this trip…" Tuff complained as he irritably pushed a long tree limb aside, that promptly snapped back and collided with his chest. His twin sister, Ruff, cackled wildly from behind him as she dumped part of her water skin on his dead, skipping just out of reach of his lunging grab.

"Because," Gobber explained while shuffling thru the foliage, "Vikings haf' ta learn to survive in the wild. Ya' can't jus fight dragons from yer bedroom. Isn't that right, Hiccup? Don't get lost now, ha ha."

Hiccup struggled to keep up with the pack of teenagers as he clutched his brown notebook to his chest, willingly taking scrapes and scratches from the underbrush in order to protect his vulnerable book. Slipping on a stone that still had the morning dew on it, his knee banged down to the ground and he rolled onto his butt, massaging the soon-to-be bruised area. With a longing look back over his shoulder, there was no where he would rather be right then than his bedroom.

The walk from Berk had been strenuous and boring. Ruff and Tuff had bickered as they always do, Fishlegs had kept mostly quiet but piped into the conversation at times, Snotlout had been talking basically just about himself the whole trip, and Astrid had mostly kept silent, sometimes verbally sparring with Snotlout about his exaggerated deeds. Every once in a while one of the teens would glance back and offer a word to Hiccup. Loser, was a popular one, although Snotlout favored runt, or runty. Even Fishlegs had ventured a stab of offering to carry him. Only Astrid had not said a word to him, but whenever she shifted her cool, piercing gaze with those unbelievable blue eyes to him, he felt like a bucket of ice had been poured over him and the only thing keeping him warm was that stare.

Hiccup lost sight of the group more than once, but was always able to follow Gobber's voice back to the pack. For a few hours this went on until Hiccup finally stumbled into a clearing next to a long stretching beach on the ocean. The cool breeze was a refreshingly welcome contrast to the summer heat and all the sweat from the hike. Far into the ocean stood great, giant boulders and peppered the landscape giving the ocean an almost tooth like horizon.

The other teens had mostly unpacked, with Astrid and Fishlegs well into setting up their tents as Hiccup burst from the tree line. "Nice o' ye ta join us," Gobber said absent-mindedly, "Set up over there." He gestured. Ruff giggled behind her hand at him and Astrid just shook her head before going back to he own preparation work.

Hiccup unslung his pack and moved to the other side of the clearing where no one else had claimed and methodically removed different tools. The others had set up in sort of a circle with each other but Hiccup decided to continue the trend of being alone and… be alone.

"Don't be so dramatic, dude," muttered Tuff as he rolled his eyes. Fishlegs motioned to a spot near his space and gave an encouraging smile. "Just leave him be," Astrid's voice cut through the din, "We are here to train, he is here to goof off. Who cares?"

Hiccups face turned pink as he waved off Fishlegs and went back to his tools. Was that the most Astrid had ever spoken to me? Doesn't really count, I guess, it was more at my direction than to me. Picking up a few things he disappeared back into the woods. He might not be good at fighting, or running, or jumping, lifting, carrying, climbing, throwing, tracking his mind continued to list, but he WAS good at building. A tent was a building, a very simple building. Snatching this limb and that, he accrued a sizable pile of good wood. Shaving it down to proper usage size, he made his way back to the clearing and starting knotting here and tying that. Folding to just this angle on this side and in a few short minutes his tent was complete. Straightening up from his knees, he brushed off loose sand and admired his work. Not half bad for not using plans.

"Ok I guess you're good at at least something," Astrid said from behind him, flanked by Tuff. "now if only you could kill a dragon by building it a tent." Tuff snorted and made a face at Hiccup as they both continued past him into the woods.

Hiccup was normally extremely witty but whenever Astrid's voice hit his ears, it did something to his brain where it just didn't quite put words together very quickly. He wanted so badly to say something clever, have her stop in her tracks. Turn towards him and smile, maybe even laugh.

"Y-yeah,"

Nailed it.

A commotion from behind him caused him to glance back, in time to see Snotlouts tent come crashing down around him. With a look of confusion and frustration, Snotlout just stared at his messy pile of junk. "That took me twenty MINUTES!" he howled as he flung sand from his knees and bounded to his feet, snatching his axe. He raised it menacingly over his head when Hiccups small hand gently rested on his shoulder. Snotlout looked at Hiccup in bewilderment. "You don't need to attack it. Here, I'm not great at a lot but let me show you how to do this.

Snotlout continued to look at Hiccup with confusion, after a few seconds he simply asked, "Why are you helping me?"

"Because sleeping in the cold, open air sucks." Hiccup replied without looking up.

"Oh, thanks."

After a few minutes, a serviceable tent was constructed on the beach. It wasn't as nice as Hiccups, but he wasn't sleeping in it, so he didn't care. If it rained Snotlout would stay dry. Job completed. As he finished up and turned back towards his camp area, Astrid and Tuff were both standing at the clearing with firewood, looking at him. Astrid's calculating stare made Hiccup shift his feet and then dart back towards his side of the campsite. "Damn, if I could have just had him build my tent, I'd have done that." Tuff said with a snicker.

The rest of the day passed with different exercises and calisthenics. Swimming along the whole beach to run back through the sand and swim the length of the beach again turned into jumping jacks, push-ups, and finally attacking a large set of logs Gobber had placed in the middle of the sand to simulate a Gronkel. Hiccup sucked at all of it. As twilight decended and the stars started kissing the nights sky, even Astrid, the last one up, fell into the sand in a heap of exhaustion. Her sweaty hair matted the side of her face and her brown circlet was crooked. Heaving chest sucking in air was covered in sand and smudges of dirt laced her cheeks and forehead. Hiccup couldn't stop staring, she was stunning. Rolling a bit she shook her head a little and glanced at Hiccup, eyes narrowing as she caught him gawking.

Busted he thought as he tried to play off that he was looking at something else and got up to help Gobber transfer more firewood to the fake Gronkel, starting a bon-fire. But every time he glanced at Astrid she was either ignoring him or glaring at him. Glaring is an improvement, right? At least she's looking. The bon-fire turned into a shining blaze as the teens relaxed and Gobber strung story after story together. Most about fighting dragons but some about Berk, others about life. He talked for another hour or so before loudly retiring to his tent for some sleep, promising another action packed day tomorrow. Another day like tomorrow was the last thing on Hiccups to-do list.

Hiccup tuned out the others as he sat at the fire. He was vaguely aware that Snotlout, Fishlegs and Tuff were talking amongst themselves, Astrid and Ruff were having a separate conversation, and he got lost in the flames. Inevitably he found his gaze drifting skyward, he loved the stars. Often times, he would climb out his window onto the roof of his house and draw different constellations or just admire the night sky. The fire was making it hard to see anything other than the brightest dots of light and he slid off his small log he had been using as a seat to walk down closer to the ocean.

He glanced at the fire as he made a stop at his tent for his notebook, but no one had seemed to notice he had left. Heaving a small sigh, he trudged to the water and sat down just where the ocean barely could reach his toes, and laid back looking towards the sky. Leo he thought silently, tracing the stars with his finger in the air, Taurus seeing the unmistakable 'V' shape. He sat up and opened his notebook to draw out some of the stars, or maybe the scenery in the twilight, but his pencil had a mind of its own. He placed lead to paper and started to draw Leo, but instead of the Lion shaped star pattern, the pencil was in the middle of drawing an intricate, long, tight braid that was in a swinging motion. Attached at the top of that braid was cascading hair that was kept in check with a thin, strong circlet. Underneath came two of the most perfect eyes looking at something in the distance running down to a wrinkled nose and a grim pair of soft lips, tight in determination.

Hiccup lost himself in the drawing. Minutes turned into an hour. An hour turned into two, and the sounds of chatting had died behind him as the embers started to burn out on the unattended fire. Soon all he could hear was the soft waves lapping the shore, and a distant snap or pop from the remains of the fire. What he couldn't hear, was the sound of a pair of eyes staring at him from inside of a tent.