CHAPTER 27: Consolidation
A month had passed following the day of Hawkon's appointment as Chieftan of the Pacifists. The entire structure of the tribe had changed, the whole island had undergone a transformation of sorts that completely killed off its previous iteration under all the Chieftans prior to Hawkon. Politically and socially, it was unrecognizable from the tribe's beginning days generations ago.
Amongst the changes, the Pacifists no longer wore white gear as they did in the past and very recently prior to Hawkon, they were now required to wear pure black leather clothing, some with chain shoulders, loose skirt-looking clothing, with steel belts, with regular viking helmets, whatever individual vikings preferred, pretty much all in pure black in contrast to the white.
Grugg Hawkon, albeit under watch by the Founding Father, wanted to grow the tribe in numbers and to ensure its existence for the generations to come. That meant making sure the vikings continued to have kids. It was only a month into his leadership and Hawkon had already promoted the idea of the women vikings being of sole importance in keeping the tribe existing for years to come. To him, it was vital that as many of them as possible had children because of that.
In the old days prior to Hawkon's arrival as Chieftan the women vikings of the tribe could do whatever they wanted. If they wanted to fight (not that the Pacifists fought anything or anyone anyways) or explore, they could. If they wanted to simply not have kids or even a partner they didn't have to. Because the Pacifists were a tribe of fairness and were more or less similar to the Hooligans except for the fighting part.
Under Grugg Hawkon, none of this was the case. They were expected to not only have children, but to find husbands and were also expected to never get involved in weaponry building or any work that involved supplies. They were simply expected to stay in their huts, look after their children and provide for their husbands or partners, all with the benefit of the tribe's future existence.
The women were rewarded for their newly recognized and strictly enforced job and role with food, promises of hut extensions, and a future in which they were to benefit from Hawkon's archipelago plans. Hawkon planned for the women to simply be 'left alone' in that regard, to give them as peaceful a life as possible within his 'regime', in return for them living by their new and compulsory role under his leadership.
The only type of work Hawkon considered giving the women under the 'New Pacifists' was potentially picking out potatoes and crops in farms. But that was about as close as it was going to get for them.
As he proposed in the emergency decree and promised numerous times prior to coming to power, Hawkon wanted husbands and young boys put into camp excursions that trained them with weaponry, adventure, and journeys across the forests for a number of days to develop the survival instincts needed for the future if they were ever required to fight. He saw the men and the young boys as vital to the tribe's defence if it was ever needed.
The sons and young boys of the tribe were automatically given a sense of purpose unlike in the 'Old Pacifist' iteration of the tribe, so despite the crazy schedules and the authoritarian implementation, most of the young viking boys and their parents thoroughly enjoyed it. They were also trained to build stuff out of wood, like fishing rods, and were planned to be put into training routines for things like catapults and other weapons like maces and so on.
Again, it was only a month into Hawkon's leadership so some of these weren't even in action yet, but this was precisely what the vikings who voted for Hawkon wanted - a brand new sense of purpose and a need to actually do something to stay in line. They were loving it.
The women vikings loved the fact they were treated as important, even so that some who were wary and nervous about Hawkon from his political perspective, were now broadly happy.
It was the same with the men. They were happy that their sons were going to be given compulsory days out in the forests and on the boats for training lessons in building and weapons, and the men themselves felt happy because unlike the past where they could do whatever the heck they wanted with no sense of purpose, now they felt like they had a strict routine that had to be followed and that meant every waking day for them was one of purpose and staying busy.
Ultimately, this was Hawkon's plan for the tribe and he was now set to put it all into fruition after a month of being Chieftan and after getting the approval from the Founding Father.
To him, this was what it meant to be a viking in the past, prior to all the dragon appeasing and friendships that ended in conflicts, that ended with the Drago conflict that got his mum and dad killed. And on top of that, which also ended with him being abandoned by his own tribe nine years ago when they evacuated Old Berk to escape Grimmel. Those two things were stuck in his head and as a result he was conflating multiple goals in his head: bringing the world back to the old days of being 'true' vikings, and taking revenge on those who abandoned him and, in his view, got his mum and dad killed.
The 'those' in this case was Hiccup, with him having abandoned Hawkon on Old Berk nine years ago. The rest was Drago's men, Grimmel's men, and every single outside tribe who engaged, touched, and befriended dragons, which to Hawkon was every single one of them. He blamed Hiccup equally as much as Drago and Grimmel for his parents being killed in the battle that saw two Bewilderbeasts in the form of Valka's own and Drago's own go head to head. And so he conflated all of those into one big agenda that'd hopefully, in his view, come to fruition.
In conflating those issues into one big agenda, as a result, Hawkon felt like one day it was going to be his duty to 'cleanse' the archipelago of any possibility of a Grimmel or Drago re-emergence, anything similar to those two coming back. And also of any possibility of Hiccup-lite emerging.
Hiccup, Drago, Grimmel, the dragons, all the outside tribes that touched, engaged and bonded with dragons, they were all the same to Hawkon. And he was going to genuinely take action on that basis when the time was right.
On the flip side of all this, and this was also something that had once again been deliberately hidden from the Founding Father's view, there was now a core group of Pacifist vikings, those with burning passions of support for Grugg Hawkon and the new future for the tribe, who were to enforce the new beginnings. They were allowed to go into any hut they wanted, to take any action they wanted against anyone, if they dared speak out against Hawkon and or the New Pacifist tribe.
This was just the beginning of it all. Most of the core group of enforcers of Pacifists in the tribe numbered to something in the thousands, out of the 50,000+ total number of Pacifist vikings.
These were basically secret council members who were to detain any fellow Pacifists without any fair hearing or any reason if even the slightest joke was cracked about Hawkon or any sort of disagreement was spouted.
They were to make sure absolutely no armor with dragon scales was worn, and if they were, they'd once again detain and question why the viking they detained was still wearing them, and to quickly dispose of the said armor.
And most importantly, these core group of supporters, the secret council member vikings, were given a vital thing to enforce - any wild dragon on the island, baby, small or medium, they were to be poached and killed and forced to whine in sheer pain before making their bodies as trophies to hang on the shores of the island from wooden logs gathered from trees.
Any Pacifist who hesitated to do this or point refused to kill the dragon(s), these secret council Pacifist vikings would, as you guessed, detain and question the ones who didn't do it.
This was Hawkon's ultimate plan of not only consolidating his power and establishing his future as hopefully a long-term Chieftan, but also to counter the wild dragon problem. Part of the reason he wanted to become this type of Chieftan was because of the scarring left in him from losing his mum and dad, combined with being abandoned by the Hooligans nine years ago as they evacuated to find New Berk to escape Grimmel.
But it was also a foreshadowing of sorts of what was seemingly coming for the rest of the archipelago. Subtly the sufferings and scars came out from Hawkon in the form of these dictatorial measures he was imposing in order to begin the new era for the Pacifist tribe without fully realizing it.
In short, it was very very easy for the Pacifists to live in this new beginning and lifestyle, all they had to do was do their sword salutes (which was now a compulsory gesture to do in the yet-to-begin camp excursions between young vikings and their trainers as well as in general across the tribe), simply keep quiet and carry on with their every day lives, make sure they weren't wearing anything with scales amongst other banned things, and to kill dragons that landed on their island.
In that sense, the decree really didn't effect much if anything in their day to day lives apart from making things compulsory and forcibly giving women vikings a new role which was lax depending on who it was.
And a lot of Pacifists genuinely did want change after being the background guys for generations. It got tiring and boring very quickly, and Hawkon promised to shake things up whilst also promising revenge for his biggest and most famous claim of all, that the Pacifists in particular and the archipelago had been taken for granted by the likes of Hiccup, Drago and Grimmel, evident mainly by Hiccup and the Hooligans simply leaving it at the time they evacuated to find New Berk. Many Pacifists brought into it.
It was a shiny morning on Pacifist Island, and in the open plains there was an assortment of logs, chains crafted specifically by the smelting huts, and a bunch of hammers and saws. All scattered on the grass as if a tornado had hit the island. A group of Pacifists in pure black leather gear were carrying around other equipment.
A top council member made his way across the plains to check up on the men for the first time. As he approached them, the men raised their swords from their sword holders on their belts and held them upright to greet the council Pacifist, to which he let off a brief salute before they put their swords away.
"Morning men," he said, holding his palms behind his lower back as he studied the equipment, "so today's the day we begin the construction of what is to be called Camp Education?"
"Affirmative sir," one of the men replied.
"The Chieftan personally requested this so I expect that you'll do a good job of it. You'll get your breaks as planned but we have a deadline of next month to complete this thing, so don't get too comfortable okay lads?"
"Indeed. We've had the final designs drawn out to us on numerous sheets so we're going to follow them. We will firstly begin with the perimeter in the form of a chained fence that stretches to about nine foot in height, this will go around the entire camp. Then we will have three central huts and an open field."
"Sounds about right. The Chieftan expects this camp to be heavily used when all is said and done, so make sure you get it done on time."
"You have our word sir," the men reaffirmed.
This camp that was starting construction today, was specifically approved by Grugg Hawkon himself. It was to be a camp for the many excursions with young vikings to begin their training and camping skills, but in the future Hawkon saw it as a place for any 'rule-breakers' to potentially take a visit to, in order to be given some 'education' as the camp was named.
Its full name was to be 'Camp of Education'. Again, none of this was worded in the blunt way to the Founding Father, in order for him to give it approval. Hawkon obviously lied and worded it differently to make it sound different. That was why the go ahead was given for the building of it to start.
A whole week had passed since the construction of the education camp began, and within that week something significant had happened that would go on to alter the course of the Pacifist Tribe permanently. The Founding Father had mentioned previously about his health, how he was still able to move around and so on, and that he didn't need to be condescended by anyone, the words he used with Hawkon in the first of many weekly meetings with the Chieftan.
He was no longer able to move following tonight in the middle of the early morning, because he had passed away.
Numerous Pacifist guards and council members did their best to revive the Founding Father but to no avail. His health and his old age got the best of him, and he was now all but a past figure in the tribe's history. Grugg Hawkon was present as they tried to revive him but eventually they all gave up and came to realise the brutal reality, that he was truly gone.
"Chieftan...he's gone..." one of the guards said to Hawkon.
"As short a time as I'd known him for he did some good stuff for me...he allowed me to become Chieftan, he allowed us to start all of this," Hawkon said, not showing any tears or any signs of emotional reaction to the death of the Founding Father but merely shock, "is he truly dead?"
"Affirmative, there's no heart beat in there. We're gonna have to break this to the tribe later on in the morning."
"I will approve of such movements. There's no way we cannot hold a tribe-wide funeral on his behalf, we will organize it and will address the future arrangements now that we don't have a Founding Father in our presence anymore," Hawkon said.
Usually, in the past when the previous Founding Fathers had passed away, the sons of those, who carried the bloodline, would automatically take over the position of Founding Father due to the bloodline extending to the original founder of the tribe.
Grugg Hawkon had planned for this day. There would be no such transition this time, not least because the Founding Father's son(s) were nowhere to be found on the island anymore, they had vanished as soon as Hawkon became Chieftan. The Founding Father himself never brought this up or addressed it because he only feared the worst outcome. And in his final breath before passing away tonight, the father had come to realize that in appointing Hawkon, he had been taken as a fool and had made a grave mistake, a mistake he wanted to pretend was anything but, until his last breathing moments just now. So he had passed away fully aware of his mistake.
And a mistake it was. Because with Hawkon now as Chieftan he didn't want there to be another Founding Father. He didn't want the eldest son of the two that the Father had, to take over the role akin to a monarchy.
No, Hawkon wanted the position combined with his role as Chieftan. He wanted the 'Founding Father' role scrapped and for the bloodline to be completely removed from the tribe's history.
In doing this he would not only maintain the powers that Pacifist Chieftans had, but he'd now also have the powers of the Founding Father, meaning he'd be in free full control of the fighter vikings of the tribe, his word would be final on anything, and there would no longer be any checks on his power.
To accomplish this, he was going to hold a tribe-wide vote after the island-wide funeral to ask the Pacifist vikings if they'd approve of the roles being combined into one.
Grugg Hawkon, in potentially combining the positions of Chieftan and Founding Father into one, he'd no longer be Chieftan of the Pacifists, he'd become the Chancellor of the Pacifists.
He was going to have the sons be taken care of wherever they were. They must've went out into hiding because they were nowhere to be found at all, but if they were to be found, Hawkon was going to approve a task for his secret council members in the tribe to end their lives.
He'll be going down in the Pacifist tribe's history as being the first ever leader without a Founding Father - because in combining the positions together, he would be the Founding Father in effect.
There has also never been a 'Chancellor' in the history of the vikings in the Barbaric Archipelago, but to Hawkon it was a position that was fully justified and suitable for returning the world to the past. When you combine the words 'Chieftan' and 'Father' together, one word has 'Ch' at the start and the second has 'er' at the end, which sounds like 'or', as Chancellor has at the end.
Chancellor is the result in Hawkon's view of what you get when you combine such words, and it was a title that was fully suitable because it sounded not only more powerful, but as Chancellor, not Chieftan, it sounded like what it was - the most powerful viking in the whole archipelago. He wanted that to be widely known across the whole archipelago.
Should he achieve this and consolidate his power, Hawkon would at long last complete his long journey of becoming a fully fledged dictator, the first time ever that the Pacifist tribe in its history overturned from a democratic tribe into a one man dictatorship.
After which point his eyes would turn beyond the shores of Pacifist Island, most likely.