A/N - Sadly, I don't own How to Train Your Dragon. I just love writing little AUs of the storyline and seeing the results.
Please enjoy this early Christmas present, stay safe and read and review.
Travelling the World.
When he killed the Queen Dragon, he had nowhere to go since his father had disowned him. By the time he had gotten over the shock and the pain of how his father had just cast him aside after discovering his bond with Toothless, it was almost too late. By the time he had gotten to the Island where he had found the nest, the Queen was out and proving his point, his father was out of his depth.
A month before the final battle, Berk and the Hairy Hooligans had suffered another Dragon raid where the dragons would plunder the island of its food stores, taking away sheep and whatever else they could find and take them to the nest. Aided and abetted by the dreaded, almost invisible Night Fury, the dragons plundered the tribes….and then Hiccup had managed to bring the dragon down.
Nobody believed him.
That was the trouble with the Hairy Hooligans; they had spent so many years seeing one disaster after another with his inventions. Looking back, Hiccup wished he had never really come up with so many of them, although if he hadn't he would never have met Toothless, and not only that he would never have discovered the truth of the war.
But before that, he had discovered for himself just how the others in the tribe had viewed him. His own father used him to rally the others for those wasteful hunts, and then suddenly Hiccup had suddenly realised why so many people hated him. It wasn't just how his inventions failed. Everyone blamed him for the loss of their loved ones because if Stoick didn't offer him up as an even worse alternative to the hunt for the nest, they would never have died.
It was a bitter remedy to swallow. But it was the truth. Hiccup had only heard the whole thing by chance; he had merely gone into the village after the raid when he was supposed to still be inside the house - a prison, more like - in order to find out what his father had to say this time, although he knew it was likely to be the call for a hunt.
Truly, Hiccup didn't know why he had gone. He imagined the Gods, tired of seeing how people talked behind his back, wanted him to hear what Stoick said. What he had heard would forever change his views of the tribe.
He was not one of them. When he had gone to find the Night Fury - it took him the rest of the night, even going into the early hours of dawn, but when he had found the dragon, hopeless, wounded…. He had looked into the dragons' eyes, seen the fear, and he had seen for himself the truth, the dragons were not emotionless monsters. They had feelings. They had emotions. So why were they raiding? Why did Vikings over the generations claim they were demons without feeling when the Night Fury showed fear? What was really going on?
He took advantage of Stoick's absence to sneak to the dragon, tending to the wounds, even giving him a name which fit him, Toothless. He learnt more from the Night Fury than he ever learnt from that stupid book, with its sole advice being Kill on Sight. He flew on the dragon while he was learning how to fight them, although he did the barest minimum although he did take part so Gobber would see he was paying attention and putting in the effort.
A few times, he snuck in and used his knowledge of dragons to keep them away… unfortunately it earned the ire of Astrid. Hiccup had once fancied the girl, but over time he lost whatever attraction he had for the blonde shield maiden wannabe. He became tired of her competitiveness streak, the way she arrogantly believed she was better than everyone else… after the way Hiccup had learnt how Stoick had used him behind his back to rally the troops for the hunts, he had taken a good long, hard look around him, and he did not like what he saw. Okay, he had wanted to give Astrid the benefit of the doubt.
She was a lot like him, even if she fit in more with the village than he did.
She was intelligent, smarter than Ruffnut.
She was beautiful.
She was driven.
She was…. A female Snotlout.
Hiccup just had not realised that for himself until Dragon Training; the teens and he didn't mix in the same circles, they bullied him while she watched and did nothing, but he'd been optimistic if they became friendly… Oh, who was he kidding, by Thor? Hiccup saw her real self in the arena, and he hated it.
Astrid was not a nice person. She was so much like Snotlout, it was not funny. She might not be as boastful, but she carried a cold kind of arrogance Hiccup had found disturbing. She had no problems undermining him whenever he had done well, knocking him aside so she won each round. It was ironic, really; Astrid kept yakking on about Viking honour, and yet when she wanted something - in this case, the so-called honour of being the one meant to kill the Monstrous Nightmare - she was more than willing to do whatever it took to get it, and if she had to knock out some of her so-called friends, including Ruffnut, her lackey, so what?
But he hadn't realised until much later Astrid had followed him out of the village. She had not only discovered what he was doing, although Hiccup hadn't expected her to even care to that extent about his activities - she must have become curious and suspicious of him, despite his best efforts. It didn't matter anymore.
Astrid not only told Stoick what he was doing. She told him how he had ridden Toothless. She had been there in the cove where he and Toothless had become friends, looking arrogant and smug with a thin layer of Viking pride at having discovered a traitor. Hiccup had only recently discovered the dragon nest, and it was the only bargaining chip he had to spare Toothless' life. Once he realised only a dragon could get to the nest and lead the way there, Stoick had Toothless chained to his ship. Hiccup had been horrified by what was going on while the Vikings had left, including the teens, and he had needed time to adjust before he'd headed out.
He'd tamed a Nadder. He took her to the nest and with her help, he managed to free Toothless and together they attacked the Queen. She had already laid waste to the Vikings of the Hairy Hooligan tribe. Hiccup and Toothless had worked together to kill the enormous behemoth, risking their lives to end the war.
And they did.
The Queen was killed, using the same trick Toothless had used against a Terrible Terror, except this time Toothless used a full plasma burst. The Dragon was killed, plunging into the ground when her wings were torn apart.
After that Hiccup had left, leaving the Hooligans to their fate. He had no place with them and he had the whole world. He yelled that to them when Stoick had called up, begging him to come down. He even called Hiccup 'Son.'
"I've got the whole world; lands to see, people to meet, dragons to save…. And a whole lot of flying to do!"
And he had.
He had visited the Roman Empire, seen the coliseum, whose legends had reached even Berk.
He had witnessed the building of the Great Wall of China.
On a visit to the jungles of India, he had ridden a lovely 'elephant,' and Toothless had nearly gotten into a fight with a water dragon (crocodile) because Hiccup had made the mistake of going too close.
Visiting a large land, Hiccup had met a people who called themselves the 'aborigines' and he had learnt a great deal from them.
Hiccup had no idea how long he planned to travel, and if he was frank he did not care.
He had no place on Berk, one day he would likely return, but not yet.
Berk was no longer his problem.