36. New responsibilities

"Hello Gobber."

"Hi, laddie, lass. What brings you here?" The smith looked up from his work when Hiccup entered the forge, Storm trailing behind him.

"We left the saddles here last night," Hiccup pointed to the pile on the table. "We need them."

"And we left the gang alone, without giving them anything to do," Storm said while picking up a few saddles. "By the way, we're not responsible if the twins burn down the forest."

"They're under your supervision," Gobber pointed out with a smirk, "You kind of are."

"They're not children, we aren't responsible for them!" Storm yelped while walking out of the forge, leaving Hiccup with Gobber. The men shared a look, Hiccup shrugged and took the saddles that were left on the table.

"We're really not," Hiccup mentioned.

"I know, lad." Gobber nodded.

"We can't control them," Hiccup continued to justify while he was half way out the door.

"Goodbye, Hiccup," the smith said in a friendly voice. It was early in the afternoon, so most vikings were hard at work and none where near the forge, so he could speak freely without giving Hiccup away.

Hiccup gave Gobber a smile, which the smith couldn't see, but the thought was still there. Hiccup left the forge and hurried to catch up with Storm, who was slowly walking to the clearing where they left the gang. The pair planned to have the group show them the commands they taught the dragons.

Thankfully nothing was on fire when they got back. The twins actually have been more subdued after the mud incident, the punishment of having to bathe the tired and dirty dragons was enough to get them to calm down with their crazy ideas.

"Oooo, give me! Give me!" Snotlout excitedly shouted after noticing the pair had come back with the saddles. He looked ridiculous giving the pair grabby hands like a child would when they wanted their favorite toy.

His shout attracted the other's attention. Their faces lit up like on Snoggletog morning, even though they knew what they were getting, the prospect of getting something tailored to their tastes made them excited. The pair gave out the saddles and stepped back to wait.

"Hey! Where's my catapult?" Tuffnut was the one who complained the first. The pair anticipated this, because some of the requests were very absurd.

"Why would you need a catapult?" Storm prompted him.

"I need a weapon at the ready, duh!" He stated like it was the most obvious thing ever.

"The only way you could use the catapult is if you were using the saddle, the saddle that will be going on your dragon," she said, trying to get him to understand.

"And…?" Tuffnut asked. Storm couldn't help but look at the others, she saw that most of them also had looks of disbelief on their faces. Most did not include Ruffnut or Snotlout. She pinched the bridge of her nose and exhaled.

"Your huge, fire-breathing dragon," It still seemed that they weren't getting in. "You do not need a weapon when you are riding one!" she exclaimed. The three finally understood, if the accepting looks on their faces were anything to go by.

"Yes, that's why there are no spikes on your saddle," Hiccup stopped Snotlout from asking the stupid question. Snotlout shrunk back, embarrassed. "Go, try them on," he encouraged them.

The group complied and happily strapped their dragons in. At this point their trainees didn't need the pair's help with the saddles, the gang had learned how to correctly position the saddles so it was both secure and comfortable for the dragons.

Most of the upgrades added by Hiccup and Storm were the same on all of the saddles: handles for better a better grip, back supports, bigger feet rests and a lot of hooks, for pouches and security for the riders to strap themselves in if needed.

After the group finished their test laps in the air, which took quite a long time, they were ready to show what their dragons learned. The pair was intrigued to know if the group managed to train the dragons without any help. If they managed to do so, that meant the gang didn't need supervision when they were with their dragons.

"Who wants to start?" Hiccup questioned, he didn't bother standing up from his spot under a tree. Storm was next to him, the early evening warmth, the slow going day and only a few hours of sleep made them both sluggish.

"I can," Fishlegs pointed to himself.

He was practically vibrating with excitement, eager to show how well he managed teach Meatlug. When no one objected and went to the edge of the clearing to give him space, he got ready. He told Meatlug to go to one side of the clearing and he stood at the other. He opened his arms wide and gave the needed command.

"Meatlug, hug!"

The Gronckle immediately flew at him and collided with him with force. Fishlegs praised her for a job well done and Meatlug happily licked his face. The pair was impressed, and so were the others, except, of course, Snotlout.

"That's lame," he jeered, "You'll never win with tricks like that!"

"What?" Hiccup asked in confusion, but he was ignored.

"Yes I will," Fishlegs didn't back down to Snotlout's booing. "We needed to teach our dragons a command, it didn't need to be for battle." He reasoned.

"What is happening?" Storm whispered to Hiccup, who shrugged, he also had no idea.

"It's still a pathetic command!" Snot insisted. Fishlegs' eyes narrowed and he pointed at Snotlout.

"Meatlug," he slowly said, "HUG!"

The Gronckle didn't waste a second and careened into Snotlout at full force, flattening the viking to the ground. Meatlug ran back to Fishlegs happily wiggling her tail. Snotlout stood up, grunting in pain.

"That hurt," he complained like he didn't bring this on himself. He stretched out and smiled smugly. "No matter, let me show you a command that will guarantee I'll win."

"Win what!?" Hiccup finally cried. Everyone looked at him and Storm, both were confused, and it showed.

"Oh, the competition," Astrid explained shrugging her shoulders.

"Oh Thor," Hiccup sighed. "You turned your training into a competition." He murmured in understanding. Next to him, Storm chuckled at the absurdity of the gang's behavior.

"We sure did, and I'm going to win!" Snotlout said, he was so sure of himself. The pair didn't bother to explain that the 'competition' wasn't part of their training.

Snotlout ordered Hookfang to the edge of the clearing, he the pointed at a tree.

"Annihilate!" He ordered, yet Hookfang didn't do anything. Snotlout stomped his foot and whined, "Hookfang!"

He gave the order again, and this time Hookfang reacted. The Nightmare closed his jaws around Snotlout's head and flung the viking in the air. Surprisingly, Snotlout landed on Hookfang's saddle. This was not Snotlout's wanted result as he whined again, this time in disappointment.

"He always does this!"

"What was the command supposed to mean?" Hiccup questioned.

"He was supposed to fire at that tree!" He pouted. "Every time I tried to teach him that, he threw me on his neck!" He exclaimed, his voice full of irritation. Hiccup shared a look with Storm and smiled.

"Congrats," Storm said in a deadpan voice, "You taught him to throw you onto the saddle."

"I did?" Snotlout asked in disbelief. "I did! Ha!"

He proceeded to taunt the other with his 'impressive' command. No one from the group gave into his taunting, Fishlegs believed his command was better and the others trusted their dragons to actually preform what they were taught to do.

Eret went next, even though he didn't understand the other's need to make this a competition, he was excited to show what he could do. He had taught Skullcrusher the command 'Bash!'. After receiving the command the Rumblehorn swung his tail into a tree truck and the force of it brought the tree down. It was an impressive outcome.

The twins went next. They had actually taught their dragon two different commands. They had went into the 'competition' with a simple 'Shake!' command.

"It's deceiving," Tuffnut assured them after the Zippleback had started shimmying on the ground and did not try to give the twins their front legs like some were expecting.

"It's lame! You didn't let me teach him anything!" Ruffnut complained, her brother disagreed of course and took great offense at his trick being called 'lame'. They got into a fight and Ruffnut had shown a command that she taught the Zippleback. With her yell of 'Snatch!' Belch caught Tuffnut by his tunic and lifted him from Ruffnut. This caught Tuffnut of guard and Ruffnut laughed, delighted at her brother's predicament.

Astrid was the last to 'compete'. Her trick was actually a bit deceiving, because it added on to a command that Stormfly already knew. She had built on the single spike command The Nadder already knew, and with a few taps on her neck from Astrid, Stormfly let out a continuous flow of single spikes.

"So, who won?" Snotlout had excitedly asked when Astrid was done. Hiccup stood up, dusted himself off and held out a hand to Storm to help her up. When she was standing, he turned to the expectant group and smiled.

"No one," He said and watched their faces fall. "You came up with the competition yourselves, we had nothing to do with it, and therefore we don't have to pick a winner."

"What? NO!"

"But we worked so hard!"

"So we get nothing for THIS?" came the complains.

"You finished basic training," Storm stated and that quieted them down.

"What?" Eret was the one to ask. Storm nodded at Hiccup, who cracked his knuckles and smiled.

"Congratulations! You're official dragon riders from now on," He clarified. "That doesn't mean training is done – "

"That means that you have free reign to go on flights with your dragons from now on, at least around the island – " Storm had continued for him.

"And, that means that we'll be giving you harder task to complete and you'll have more responsibilities," He stopped talking when Snotlout started complaining for all of them, even though the others took the revelation without problem.

"We finished training and your reward for us is more work?" He asked, sounding offended.

"You finished basic training," Storm reiterated. "Now you start advanced training." She thought for a moment and her eyes lit up. "Which, if Chief permits, starts today."

She look at Hiccup with the silent question. He had no idea what she had in mind, but he trusted her and silently give his permission for her to go ahead with her idea. She gave them a mischievous smile.

"Your new responsibilities start today," She stated. "Go back home, get some food and warn anyone that needs warning. Be back here at sunset," her gaze ran over them, "You're going on patrol."

She didn't let them ask any questions and dismissed them. They finally left, wondering what patrol entailed, Storm had promised to tell them when they got back, so their curiosity was stated for moment, but not Hiccup's.

"Why?" He asked when they were left alone, he wasn't mad, he was genuinely intrigued. Storm ran a hand down her hair and gave him a smug smirk,

"Snotlout showed me that we have misled them a bit. They, or at least, he believes that being a dragon rider is all exiting battles and engaging tasks and activities. It's not always that. Having them sit on their asses for a few hours while surveying the ocean will set them straight."

"Okay, that's a good idea, but what will we do?" He asked once again. "I don't want them to see Toothless yet, and even at night they would recognize a Night fury."

"Well, the ocean has been calm for a while and I doubt we'll see anything today, so we will use this opportunity to teach them what to look out for. Just…" she paused and looked at him with sincerity, "Do you trust me?"

The question caught Hiccup off guard, to him, trust had nothing to do with her want to show the gang how to patrol, it was just a responsibility. He didn't give himself time to overthink her question.

"With my life," he answered honestly.

She smiled, and nodded to herself.

"Then don't worry, I have everything planned out."

Eret was the first to show up back at the clearing. When he showed up, the pair seemed to not have moved from where he last saw them. They were once again sitting under a tree, but this time they had their eyes closed and it looked like they were asleep, but he knew better, he didn't believe that the 'demons' had ever been caught off guard, let alone while asleep.

The others came as a group, probably because they were coming after eating from the Meade hall and Eret hadn't joined them, because while they were telling their families where they were going to be, he had gone ahead and took care of the food for himself.

The pair had opened their eyes and stood up when the whole group reached in the clearing, they had gone on a small flight while the gang were busy so Shadow and Toothless were content for the evening. Even though this was still training, the gang couldn't help but be excited. Storm pulled out a swiftly drawn map of Berk and its surrounding waters.

"Patrol is rarely interesting," She started, "But you need to learn how to do it. That means you need to learn what to look out for. Chief has agreed to stay on the island and create disturbance somewhere, disturbance that you will have to notice and check out. Astrid," She called, bringing the girl's attention from the map to her, "You'll be creating a disturbance over the water, I'll show you what I mean when we start."

Astrid nodded dutifully, Storm then brought the attention back to the map.

"These are the routes," Storm continued, pointing out drawn arrows around the map. She pointed to each of the arrows and showed everyone their routes. "Tuff, Ruff you're on your own, but that doesn't mean you can slack off. Fishlegs, being vigilant is good, but don't be paranoid, it can bite you in the ass; Snotlout the fact that you're going with Fishlegs doesn't mean you can won't be doing any work. Eret, you'll be on your own for a bit, but I'll join you when I get done with Astrid." She closed the map and gave them one final look, "Let's move out and remember, you might not even see something."

Hiccup was the first to leave, he already had some ideas how to cause some trouble that the riders would notice. The riders left next, they were told not to hurry in their routes, and that was the only advice they got from Storm. Lastly, only Astrid was left with Storm, they gave the rest of the gang a head start and took off.

"So what do you want me to do?" Astrid asked, they were flying slowly and hadn't gone far from the island.

"I want you to fly around and drop me off in a few minutes," came Storm's answer.

"You're not going to tell me what you want me to do?" Astrid was shocked, she practically felt Storm smile.

"I want you to drop me off with Eret, then go back to Berk, find Hiccup and talk to him."

"You think he's ready?" Astrid barely kept the hope out of her voice. Storm chuckled a little, remembering how well the conversation with Gobber went.

"Yeah, I think he is," She concluded, then patted her on the shoulder. "Come on, drop me off."

Astrid urged Stormfly to fly faster, it was a good thing that Storm had drawn out the routes beforehand so they knew where to find Eret. Eret, who had noticed them approaching, was only a quarter way in his route when Storm jumped off of Stormfly and onto Skullcrusher.

"Bye!" Storm yelled at Astrid's retreating back, she then turned to Eret, who had turned back to look at her, "Hi."

"Hello, had a nice flight?" he jokingly asked. Storm nodded and the conversation was replaced with comfortable silence.

Astrid was full of energy. Storm had promised her to get her a chance to talk to Hiccup, but she hadn't imagined this. When the others weren't expecting either of them that gave her more time to figure everything out with Hiccup.

She had been searching the direction of the island where Hiccup had left to for a few minutes when she finally spotted him. He was actually out in the open, half jogging to the destination that he had in mind, and Astrid wanted more privacy in case the others went off of their routes. She made Stormfly hover for a second, before an idea struck her.

She once again urged Stormfly to go faster, and to fly lower to the ground. Astrid asked the Nadder to do a simple command when they reached Hiccup.

"Grab him!"

Hiccup's startled scream was loud, and Astrid finally understood why the pair's preferred retrieval method was snatching people from the ground. It was fun to scare people.

"What is this!?" Hiccup yelled at her.

She didn't answer, she just smiled at herself. Astrid had a great destination in mind, it would give her wanted privacy and it held sentimental value, both for her and for Hiccup. The cove. The place that everything started.

Hiccup's scream echoed. It was a good thing that Storm had the foresight to give herself and Eret the closest route to the island.

"What was that?" Eret asked stopping Skullcrusher, his eyes frantically darted around trying to find the cause for the noise.

"Probably nothing, maybe Astrid scared the others," she tried waving his concern off, but she couldn't help but look around.

After a few moments Storm decided to call Shadow to her, and let out her dragon call. It didn't take long for the Skrill to show up and Storm expertly jumped from Skullcrusher's back onto Shadow's. She knew that even if Hiccup hadn't yelled, Toothless wasn't about to leave him alone, at least the Fury had learned to observe the situation before jumping head first into it when Hiccup was concerned.

"So, how are you doing?" she asked the still alarmed man, trying to distract both him and herself.

'I really hope she didn't kill him,' Storm thought. She signaled to Shadow to start flying, Eret didn't know what else to do but follow.