EDITED 3/14/16 – Fixed some typos.

Chapter 11: What It Looks Like From Up There

Astrid's construction experience was limited to occasionally helping her father with projects around the house. And the shed he had built out back. Though that never actually been finished, despite the year or two he had worked on it.

Working with Hiccup was completely different. For one, he actually had a clue what he was doing. He worked with an engineer's precision, and the steady speed that came with experience. The wood to make the framework for the wall was precut, so he just had to line the pieces up, telling her where to screw the pieces together. (He had the kind of power tools her father dreamed of. And they were well taken care of, but still marked from use.)

In less than forty minutes they had the framework raised, creating the last partition in the space. Astrid couldn't help but grin as she looked at it. She couldn't remember the last time she had accomplished something she could actually step back and look at.

They worked putting up the sheetrock until they had used up the stack that had been leaning against one of the unfinished walls. All together, it was less than a quarter of the wall space. Still, as Hiccup pointed out: it was progress.

"I'll pick up more when I'm in town tomorrow," he said, as they went upstairs.

"I don't have class in the afternoon, so I can come back to help," she offered. "If you want."

Hiccup shook his head. "No. I mean, that would be great. But I'm behind on school work, so I'll be in the lab all day."

"If you have all the tools you need here, why do you spend so much time in the lab?"

"Because Professor Felix checks the log to make sure we're all meeting the minimum lab time," he said, opening the door. "And I—"

He was interrupted by a squeak of surprise from Rapunzel. They both looked over to see her in front of the dryer, looking at them with wide eyes.

"Sorry," she said, blushing in surprise. "I didn't realize you were down there."

Hiccup chuckled. "Sorry for scaring you. Did you just get back?"

"A few minutes ago," Rapunzel said, recovering from her surprise. She pulled a shirt from the dryer and folded it neatly. "I just put the lasagna in the oven – it should be done in a couple hours."

"Thanks. Have you seen Toothless?"

"He and the blue Nadder are in the backyard," Rapunzel said. "Do we have a name for her yet?"

"No yet." Though something about Hiccup's tone made Astrid look over at him. To her surprise, he was looking at her, green eyes slightly out of focus as he considered something.

She was getting used to that. Though what he was thinking, she couldn't begin to guess.

"Will you meet me in the garage?" he asked, eyes snapping back into focus.

"Sure?"

He grinned again. "Thanks. I'll be there in a minute."

Before she could respond, he slipped past Rapunzel, turning towards the kitchen before he vanished from view.

Astrid turned to Rapunzel for some kind of explanation. But the older girl seemed just as surprised as she was.

"What's he up to?" Rapunzel asked.

"No clue," Astrid admitted. After another moment, she shrugged, and headed for the garage.

The light was on, and the couch had been put back into position. Rapunzel's doing, probably.

Crossing the garage, Astrid stepped outside and took a deep breath of the evening air. The sun was just starting to set, lighting up what few clouds there were in a brilliant display of pink and gold in the western sky. Above, the stars had already started to come out. She had lived in the city the past couple years, and sometimes she forgot how bright the stars were when you got away from the lights and the noise.

Less than forty-eight hours ago, she had been up there.

In the excitement of everything had happened Friday night, and since, she had all but forgotten about the fact she had flown over the city. Seen it laid out like a map.

The memory of flight washed over her. The rush of the wind, the sea of clouds, a sky full of stars… she had the sudden desire to be back up there. Her practical mind reminded her that she was afraid of heights, and the last thing she should want would be to get thousands of feet up in the air, with nothing but Hiccup and Toothless between her and a fall to certain death.

…But she was already trying to figure out if she could ask Hiccup to take her flying with him. He would probably be going up anyway. And it seemed like it would be worth a shot to ask, at least.

Those thoughts were interrupted by a happy squawk, and the rush of leather wings. The blue dragon touched down a few feet away, then pranced over. Astrid tensed as the dragon got closer. Riding Toothless was one thing. The Deadly Nadder looked… deadly. Razor sharp teeth jutted from her lower lip, and the crest of yellow spines around her from her head looked sharp enough to impale anyone so careless as to get too close.

The Nadder cocked her head to the side, fixing a yellow eye on Astrid.

Cautiously, holding her breath, Astrid held a hand out to the dragon. She half expected the Nadder to sniff at it – instead, a scaly nose bumped her palm. Smiling a little, Astrid stroked the blue scales – careful to keep her wrist away from the teeth.

"I think she's picked you," Hiccup said, from where he and Toothless had landed, a few seconds behind the Nadder.

Asked yanked her eyes from the dragon to look over at him. "What do you mean?"

"She seems to think she's yours," he explained. "Or vice-cersa."

"Mine?"

He shrugged, going into the garage. "Toothless picked me."

"When you were a baby." That seemed different from a random dragon deciding that Astrid was her human. Her hand started to fall from the Nadder's scaly blue nose. But the dragon bumped her palm again, making it clear she was not done with Astrid's attention.

She looked between Hiccup and the dragon.

"Don't ask me to explain it," Hiccup said, picking something up from the floor by the work bench. "But dragons form deep attachments. Once you earn her trust, there's nothing she won't do for you."

Astrid looked into the Nadder's eye again. Hesitantly, she lifted her other hand to stroke the dragon's jaw. "How do I earn her trust?"

"I think you already have." Hiccup came back over.

"But…" she wasn't sure what to say.

Somehow, she seemed to have ended up with a pet dragon.

Since the moment she had walked into the art lab, her life just kept getting weirder.

What would Anders think of any of this?

She laughed inwardly. Because there was so much she wanted to tell her brother, but wasn't sure that she could.

"I've never made a saddle for a Nadder before, so I'm not sure how well this will work," Hiccup said. "She wouldn't let me test it earlier."

"Wait. Saddle?"

As if in answer, Hiccup threw the saddle over the Nadder's back. The dragon squawked again – not happily this time. She twisted her head, trying to see what the new weight on her back was. When she made to try and flick the thing off with her nose, Hiccup placed a hand on her side.

"Easy, girl," he said. "Astrid, talk to her."

"What am I supposed to say?" When he shrugged, she looked back on the dragon, trying to swallow down a surge of panic.

Dragon.

She had a pet dragon.

This…

She touched the dragon's jaw to get her attention. The Nadder looked back, cocking her head again.

"Hey, will you take me flying?" Astrid asked. "Can I fly with you?"

The dragon seemed to bob her head… but Astrid wasn't sure if she was being crazy to think that the dragon was nodding at her.

She could hear the jingle of metal as Hiccup worked, but she didn't look away from the Nadder.

First dinner with the Big 4, now a dragon.

But as the surprise started to wear off… Having a dragon could be really cool.

"Um, my apartment doesn't allow cats," she said. "They're definitely not gonna let me bring in a dragon."

"I wouldn't even let her in the house," Hiccup admitted. "Toothless and the Terrors are the only ones we take inside. She can live here in the stable." He took a step back, examining his work.

"Not bad," he murmured, mostly to himself. She recognized his expression from when they had had the fitting for her jacket. "Not perfect, but it's a good start. You'll have to let me know how it works."

"Is this why you're behind on school work? 'Cause you were making this saddle?"

Hiccup looked sheepish as he patted the Nadder's shoulder. "This was more interesting."

He turned towards the Toothless. She heard his Night Fury prosthetic click into the gears.

"Wait. You want me to fly alone?"

"I'm going up with you," he said.

"I can't fly!"

Faced with flying, without Hiccup to hold on, she finally received her brain's reminders that she was afraid of heights. Very afraid of heights.

"You did Friday night."

"That was different," she said.

"It's not much different from riding a motorcycle," Hiccup said. "You'll do fine."

The dragon chirped, in what Astrid thought might be encouragement. So she took a deep, bracing breath, and gathered her courage. Setting one foot on the Nadder's leg, Astrid swung up into the saddle.

Unlike Toothless, who had the body shape of a lizard, the Nadder was built like a bird, so the angles were different. And it felt nothing like sitting on a motorcycle, either. It took her a few moments to get situated, learning the feel of the saddle.

She looked back over at Hiccup, who was once more mounted on Toothless.

"Just a quick flight," he said, grinning. "We have to be back in time for dinner."

Toothless shook his head and spread his wings, clearly done with all this talk. The Nadder did the same in response. Her wings were drak red, save for the blue spots rimmed with gold. Her wingspan was a few feet shorter than the Night Fury's, but they took off together, rising into the side.

Astrid grabbed the wooden handles, holding on for dear life as they rose though the crisp autumn air.

When she had wanted to fly again, it had been the assumption that it would be with Hiccup, and she would be free to grab onto him when her stomach dropped.

That was too much to think about on top of the fact she was flying solo. Well, some-what solo.

But now they were past gravity's pull on her, and the feeling of weightlessness settled in. They leveled out, and she relaxed her death grip as she looked around. Hiccup turned Toothless flew back towards her.

"You doing okay?"

Astrid took a moment to assess, but then nodded.

"See? Nothing to worry about."

Sure. If she didn't look down.

Hiccup turned away from the city, and Astrid felt the Nadder adjust direction to follow. Unlike a motorcycle, where she had to always be calculating and steering, she realized she could mostly let the dragon handle their direction. The movements were similar, though. When they started to arc left, her body leaned that way out of habit.

The whole living-fire-breathing-dragon thing was strange. But it was also easy, in a way she couldn't describe.

They picked up speed as she grew more comfortable with their flight. Hiccup lead her on a twisting, turning path above the woods. Wide arcs through the sky becoming tighter turns as she adjusted. Until she broke away from his lead, letting the dragon (for the most part) do what she wanted.

Below them the clouds had begun to gather, so it was easy to forget just how high up they really were. Even when the dragon began spiraling upwards, then slid back down in a rush that sent Astrid's heart pounding. But exhilaration mixed with fear, eclipsing it.

And this… this was amazing, she thought.

Against Astrid's will, the dragon decided to do a large loop, and once more she was holding on for dear life as she felt her body turn upside down. She didn't even realize she had screamed until they righted out, and she heard Hiccup laughing.

"That is not funny!" she said, though it was hard to sound angry when she was breathless, her heart pounding so hard all she could hear was blood rushing in her ears.

"Sorry," Hiccup said.

The dragon looked back at her, obviously confused.

For a moment Astrid almost snapped at the dragon… but found it hard to stay angry for some reason.

They flew on for a few more minutes – no more loop-the-loops, thankfully.

"Aside from that," Hiccup said, coming alongside her. No matter how fast they flew, Toothless didn't seem to have any trouble keeping up. "Not so bad."

"No, it's not," she admitted. Especially when she looked up at the thousands upon thousands of stars overhead. "I could probably get used to this."

"That's the idea. Now…" Hiccup stopped suddenly, looking around.

Astrid was about to ask what was wrong, then she felt it. The temperature was dropping. Fast. While it had been chilly this high up a few minutes earlier, now the air turned frigid. Its touch on her face wasn't enough to numb the skin, only to make it hurt. Their breaths came out in puffs of white fog, and the dragons made sounds of displeasure. She didn't blame them.

"Is this normal?" she asked.

When Hiccup didn't answer, she followed his gaze to the clouds below, which had started swirling with a new anger, growing thicker, and darker.

Astrid had seen clouds like this a few times. A few people muttered that they weren't normal… but she had always written it off as part of Burgess's strange weather patterns. Meeting Jack had made her question those "weather patterns", and that thought flashed through her mind now.

"Could Jack cause this?" she asked carefully.

"He could… but he has better control," Hiccup said, frowning. "It would take a lot to set him off. Especially since he's with Rapunzel."

She was going to ask what significance Rapunzel has on it (unless maybe it was tied to Jack's obvious infatuation). But before she could, Hiccup turned Toothless back towards the house.

"We should head back."

Their flight back was a straight line, rather than the meandering path they had taken.

"Since she's yours, you should probably pick out a name for her," Hiccup said, when they landed outside the stables.

Astrid dismounted, turning to stroke the dragon's side. There was no hesitation in the motion now.

"Stormfly," she said.

The Nadder – Stormfly – made an approving sound as she bumped Astrid's shoulder with her head. Grinning, Astrid looked over at Hiccup, and saw him smile as well. She could still make out worry on the edges of his expression, but it was mostly hidden.

"Stormfly it is," he said, nodding.

They left Stormfly in the stables and headed back to the house.

"Hey," Jack greeted, looking up from his laptop as they came in. "How was it?" he asked, meeting Astrid's eyes.

She couldn't help grinning at the memory of flight. "It was awesome."

"Have you seen the weather?" Hiccup asked.

Jack's expression shifted infinitesimally. "She's having a temper tantrum."

"Are you sure?" Hiccup asked, looking out at the clouds doubtfully. "This is more like you in a full on rage."

"I'm not even on," Jack said, gesturing to his hair, which was warm brown.

Hiccup frowned.

"If it doesn't blow over by tomorrow, I'll go talk to her," Jack said. "But I'm not in the mood to babysit."

"Who?" Astrid asked, tired of being left out of the loop.

Jack shook his head. "Elsa Arendelle. She refuses to learn to control her powers, and I'm tired of babysitting her."

"Jack," Hiccup said, a cautioning tone in his voice.

Jack's annoyance turned into a full on scowl, and Astrid couldn't help but stare as his coloring started to change. She had seen him go from Jack Frost to Jackson Overland the other day, but it was the first time she had seen him change the other way. His skin paled, the color bleeding out of his hair.

"I was having such a good day." He screwed up his face in concentration, and his coloring changed back.

#

Jack was usually the last person to fall asleep – he had always been a night owl. And he liked the way the house felt when everyone else was asleep. It was the peace he needed to think, but with the knowledge that the closest thing he had to a family was still nearby. And if they were all safely in bed, he didn't have to worry about any of them.

Valka was away on Berk, and that always seemed to create a tension in the air. It was something they had never spoken about, and he knew it centered on Hiccup. It wasn't that they worried about their den mother – she was on an island full of dragons who would give their lives for her. There was still the question every time she went away, though. One that had gotten a lot heavier since Stoick's death.

Astrid was asleep in the guestroom, despite protests that she didn't want to intrude. But Rapunzel had refused to let her drive back to the city when it was already past midnight. So she had accepted a set of pajamas from Rapunzel, and turned in with the rest of them. (Jack was predicting that it was going to be their new normal.)

Not long after he had joined the team, he had noticed that Stoick always did one last walk around the house, to be sure everything was as it should be. It had fascinated Jack, in a way. To his surprise, he had found it reassuring. Stoick might not have thought of Rapunzel and Merida as his children. But he was still a father. And he seemed hardwired to ensure that everyone in his care was safe.

One night, when he had been especially tired, Jack had had the image of Stoick as a Viking chief, or something. And they were his village. Hiccup had inherited his father's determination of protect his people, so to speak. But since Hiccup was on the back of a dragon, his range had given him a much larger scale.

Jack and Stoick hadn't initially gotten along. He knew his defiance of authority (and even his infatuation with Rapunzel), hadn't sat well with the man. They had reached a truce after a few months, when Jack had learned to follow the rules. But Stoick had died before they could progress to more than that.

But he had still developed a deep admiration for the man. Stoick was the opposite of Pitch. And if Jack had been a few years younger, he might have been more willing to admit that he found comfort in having Stoick as the head of their "family".

The night after Stoick had died, Jack had found himself following the routine he had watched so many times. Making sure the doors were locked, the lights were off (save for the one over the stove, which they always left on), and that everything was as it should be. And he had done it almost every night since. On the few nights when he hadn't, he hadn't slept well. It felt like neglecting his responsibilities, though he wasn't sure how he had come to think of it that way. Maybe it was because he was the oldest male in the house.

It took longer than usual for the house to settle down, since Astrid's presence wasn't part of their usual routine. Yet. And she had to use the bathroom in the hall that Jack and Hiccup shared. But eventually it did settle, and the familiar quiet wrapped around the house like a blanket.

Jack set aside his headphones and his essay, and left him room to do the rounds.

When he saw the light on in the living room, it was a pretty easy guess that it was Hiccup. He was usually the only person who deviated from schedule on normal nights. Sure enough, Hiccup sat at the breakfast bar, intently focused on whatever he was sketching.

"Don't you have class in the morning?" Jack asked, going over to the front door to check the lock.

Hiccup hummed noncommittally, without looking up from his journal. It was a sound that made it clear, yes, he should be asleep, but he didn't want to stop what he was doing.

Deciding not to press it, Jack went down the hallway to look into the garage. Outer door closed. Light off. Hiccup had left a mess on his work bench, but that was nothing new. Going back, he couldn't resist glancing over his friend's shoulder as he went over to the sliding door. He didn't manage to see it.

But once he had locked the sliding glass door (it was usually forgotten), Hiccup slid the book across the counter for him to see.

Jack looked over the design, figuring out pretty quickly what it was supposed to be.

"Have you gotten Merida's vote yet?" he asked.

"Merida voted against you, and we still let you in," Hiccup reminded, with a dry grin. "She voted against giving Eret a second chance, too."

Jack snickered. He wished he had been able to watch that whole thing progress. She had no doubt said things he would now love to tease her about.

"But, no, I haven't," Hiccup said. "Astrid hasn't said anything either, though."

"She will." Jack was sure about that.

When he looked back at Hiccup, he saw the all-too-familiar weight settle on his friend's shoulders. A weight Jack knew they were all trying not to let weigh them down.

"It's been less than a week," Jack said.

"But he's still out there," Hiccup said. "And planning something, obviously."

They tried not to use Pitchiner's name if they could avoid it. They usually all knew who "he" meant.

"We'll figure it out."

Hiccup snorted, running his hands over his face. "I'm so behind on everything. Pitch is just one more thing on the pile. Him, and all the others."

"You're not gonna figure it out tonight," Jack said with a yawn. He glanced over at the clock on the stove. 1:07 am. "Or this morning. Whatever you wanna call it."

Hiccup nodded, exhaling as he got off the barstool.

Flicking off the light over the bar, Jack turned towards the bedrooms. The easy part, since he just walked by the doors to make sure nothing was out of place. He could hear Hiccup's footsteps behind him.

The hall was quiet, and there were no lights coming from under the doors. His door was only a few feet from Hiccup's, so he glanced over.

"Get some sleep," he said, opening his door. "We'll work it out. We always do."

"Thanks," Hiccup said. "Good night."

Back in his room, Jack started closing down for the night, putting away his notes and essay. It would have to be finished later.

Once he had turned out the light, he glanced out his window. The clouds were still gathering, and now he could feel the atmosphere being manipulated. His powers gave him an awareness of the weather, and he felt every shift to it. When the weather patterns weren't natural, he could feel it in his core.

Elsa was the only other person in Burgess who could create a storm like this. But it was somehow different from her normal loss of control.

He didn't like that feeling. Especially with everything else going on right now.

But as he had told Hiccup: they weren't going to figure out anything tonight.

Needing a distraction from thoughts about Elsa, Pitch, and everyone else, he turned to the design Hiccup had shown him.

Stormfly.

It had a nice ring to it.