Alright guys! Here is Chapter 3 of The Waste of What Remains! Now, I really don't have much to say right now so I guess let's just get right into the chapter instead of me putting a wall of text before it.
Last time on The Waste Of What Remains...
Dawn was lying offline on Toothless' desk, where Toothless was making some required upgrades to the hardware and software of the robot.
Suddenly, Hiccup heard someone screaming far away and looked up, he looked at Toothless who was staring at the door.
"Let's just stay in here..." Toothless said and Hiccup nodded, that was probably for the best.
Eventually, the storm passed after multiple hours of waiting. They both fell into an uneasy sleep, with Dawn now activate and guarding the base.
After Hiccup and Toothless woke up, they waited for an hour or two until the puddles of radioactive rainfall evaporated back up into the clouds.
They quickly finished their leather armor, grabbing their swords and walking out into the dry hot sunlight of the wasteland.
And they found a dead and burnt corpse lying outside the gates to their base, wearing nothing but long torn pants and a broken wooden arm made from old pipes, wood boards, pulleys and gears.
"Who is this?" Hiccup asked as he bent over to touch the burnt corpse. Toothless quickly grabbed Hiccup and pulled him away.
No! Don't touch it. It's radioactive," Toothless said while holding Hiccup away. Hiccup quickly pulled his hand away from it, his skin tingling as he stared at the unsettling corpse.
"Woah, that was close. I could feel the radioactive poison literally tasting me before biting" Hiccup said sarcastically and Toothless poked at the corpse using his sword.
"Yeah, he's been dead for at least a day. This guy must have made the scream we heard earlier" Toothless remarked, using a rag to clean off his sword before holstering it.
"Where did he come from? And what's this prosthetic?" Hiccup asked, examining the man from a safe distance. Toothless then noticed a piece of brown dirty paper lying nearby.
He walked over and poked the paper with his sword just to be sure, then used his gloved hands to open the piece of paper and read the words inside.
"This man was a slave, being forced into working for...someone. This paper doesn't specify but it DOES give a location" Toothless said as he used his sword to point west.
"Toothless, what are you thinking?" Hiccup asked while Toothless looked over the corpse for a bit.
"I'm thinking...maybe we should see where this guy was going before he...well...burnt up," Toothless answered, gesturing to the corpse with his sword.
"Toothless, are you sure that's a good idea? I mean, we just set up the base and now you want to go check out where a dead man was going while leaving our base undefended?" Hiccup asked. Toothless shrugged.
"Dawn can protect it just fine, and plus we'll only be gone for a day or two, how much trouble can he get into in that amount of time?" Toothless said. Hiccup sighed.
"Fine, but if you get me killed, I'll come back from the dead and haunt you until the end of the world comes...again," Hiccup said. Toothless shrugged while making sure his sword was clean.
"I'm pretty sure I can handle that, come on, let's get going so we can get back before dusk," Toothless said while making sure they had everything they needed. They set off into the wastes.
"Are we there yet?" Hiccup asked. Toothless groaned.
"No, we are NOT THERE YET!" Toothless replied, and Hiccup shut up for five minutes...
"Are we there yet?" Hiccup asked again. Toothless growled loudly.
"Holy Thor! I am about ready to cut off my own ear nubs and SHOVE them in your mouth if you don't STOP ASKING IF WE ARE THERE YET!" Toothless yelled annoyed. Hiccup sighed.
"Alright...Are we..." Hiccup began and Toothless snarled loudly while raising his finger at Hiccup.
"If you finish with 'there yet' I WILL stuff my cut off ear nub into your mouth" Toothless threatened. Hiccup quickly shut up.
The two climbed up a hill, stabbing their swords into the ground and using them as leverage to pull them up to the top of the hill.
Once they reached the top, they saw a huge mountain with a base built into the side of it. The base was built out of hundreds of old pre-war materials and vehicles, all of them welded together to make a wall and then the actual base.
"Maybe this wasn't such a good idea," Toothless said. Hiccup turned to him while rolling his eyes.
"You think?" Hiccup asked sarcastically before an arrow whizzed by his head. They both looked back at the base to see thirty armed men and women carrying anything from swords and bows to guns and missile launchers.
"Look, stragglers!" A man in black and gold painted metal armor yelled while pointing at Toothless and Hiccup.
The two brothers prepared their swords and charged into battle. The man in metal armor grinned while pulling something out.
Hiccup stabbed his sword straight through someone's neck, then using his feet to remove his blood covered sword from the guy's now dead body.
Toothless spun around while keeping one foot planted firmly, his sword slicing off heads by the dozen. Toothless then sent his sword flying straight into a man's skull, killing him instantly.
Toothless removed his sword from the man and then turned around to find twenty more men and women ganging up on him. He gripped his sword tightly and charged...
Hiccup turned around to see the man in gold and black metal armor striding up to him confidently. Hiccup swung his sword only for the man to just grab the blade and smirk.
"So confident in your abilities and your brother's scales...how cute," The man said before using his boot to kick Hiccup across the hill, his sword now in the man's hands.
Hiccup quickly got up and charged the man with a yell, pulling out a steel dagger and preparing to plunge it deep into the man's chest, only for a fist to hit him in the face.
"There, now was that so hard?" The man asked sarcastically as Hiccup collapsed unconscious on the dirt and sand hill.
Toothless turned around to see Hiccup hit the ground with a thud, a large bruise on his face and his armor somewhat torn.
"NO!" Toothless roared and charged the armored metal man, only for the man to use Hiccup's sword to slice at Toothless.
One long bleeding wound ran from Toothless' neck to the top of his head, going over his eye and slightly messing up his vision. It was god damned painful as all hell, and Toothless clutching his face while dropping his own sword.
"Pathetic," The man said and punched Toothless right in the gut, causing the half-dragon to collapsed in pain.
The man kicked Toothless down the hill, Toothless hit a rusty car at full speed causing multiple pieces of metal to pierce his scales and cut up his armor.
"GRAB THE BOY! Viggo will be happy to know of this new development. I will keep this sword for myself, it's pretty good" The man said while admiring Hiccup's sword.
Two guards quickly picked Hiccup up roughly and quickly dragged him away towards the base, while the man looked at Toothless who was unconscious.
"Ryker, what about the other boy? The scaly one?" A soldier asked and the metal armored man-Ryker growled.
"Leave it, it's useless to us," Ryker said and walked off, the soldiers following behind, leaving Toothless for the irradiated and mutated birds to feast on.
Hiccup woke up with a cough, feeling like someone had dumped something very wet all over him.
He tried moving only to find himself in rusted metal chains, and looked down at himself to find see armor removed and only a red shirt and dark blue pants remaining.
The metal chains dug into Hiccup's wrists, causing him slight pain but no more than the wounds on his body.
"T-Toothless..." Hiccup mumbled while his eyes adjusted to the dark room, which had Ryker and another man standing in front of him.
The other man was wearing dark blue and black armor, with no weapons showing on his armor or body.
"If you speak of the other boy, he was left to die. By now the irradiated dogs will have eaten him alive" The other man said and Hiccup struggled against his chains.
"N-No! He can't be dead! No!" Hiccup yelled while struggling against the chains, and Ryker laughed.
"Viggo, what do you say we break in this new slave for our army's manufacturing division?" Ryker said to the other man-Viggo and they nodded while smirking evilly.
"Yes Ryker, how about that. We do need a new slave, considering the previous worker slave that we let go hunting with our soldiers escaped and tried to find a safe haven from us" Viggo said and Hiccup coughed loudly, struggling again in another fit.
"Did that slave have a prosthetic arm?" Hiccup asked and Viggo nodded.
"Ah, so you found Slave number five-hundred and six, is he still alive?" Viggo asked. Hiccup shook his head.
"N-No, he died in a radiation storm," Hiccup said. Viggo seemed to think unemotionally.
"Ah, such a pity, he would have been a good slave for another five or so years," Viggo said and then turned to Ryker, who was holding a whip and a metal bar that had a sharp edge.
"So, can we get to torturing and beating him in now? I'm itching to make this boy here slave number seven hundred and sixty-three" Ryker said while cracking his knuckles, and Viggo nodded.
"Yes brother, torture away," Viggo said and left the room, Ryker laughing as he raised the whip in front of Hiccup's terrified green eyes.
He had never screamed this much in his life, and most likely never would again.
Hiccup was pushed into a huge room by Ryker, his body covered in newly created scar's. Hiccup was wearing a torn black tank-top and black worn pants.
"Meet the other slaves, figure out your position and then when the bell goes off GET TO WORK! I'm not gonna tell you twice" Ryker said and kicked Hiccup straight in the back, causing the young man to hit the ground.
Ryker left the room as a woman ran up to Hiccup and helped him up, the woman having blond hair and blue eyes.
"Hello, what's your name?" Hiccup asked casual and woman made sure no one was listening.
"Masters don't like us having names...but we have them in secret...I'm Astrid" The woman- Astrid responded. Hiccup coughed while sitting down, Astrid sitting down next to him.
"And your name is?" Astrid asked and Hiccup took in a deep breath.
"Hiccup, my name's Hiccup" Hiccup responded and Astrid nodded while gesturing to the rest of the slaves in the small cell.
"Snotlout, Ruffnut, Tuffnut, Fishlegs, Dagur, Heather, and...Gustav" Astrid said while gesturing to each, saying Gustav and Snotlout' names with annoyance.
"How long have you guys been here?" Hiccup asked and Astrid shook her head.
"Since as early as we can remember, our parents are dead for sure and any of our fellow family members are also slaves or dead" Astrid said. Hiccup sighed while looking around.
"Don't worry, I know how it feels to miss family," Hiccup said while thinking of his father, mother and brother.
"Who do you miss specifically?" Astrid asked curiously. Hiccup sighed while sitting there.
"My father and mother, both who probably died. And my brother, his name is Toothless..." Hiccup said while thinking of Toothless, probably injured and alone out in the hot wastes...left to die...
"Toothless is an odd name for someone, so is Hiccup" Fishlegs chimed in. Hiccup chuckled.
"Well, our family has a history of being bad at naming things so it sorta is a trend amongst us," Hiccup said with a shrug, and then looked up at the ceiling in despair.
"Oh gods, please let Toothless be alright," Hiccup said, knowing that the wasteland might kill Toothless...or that he might already be dead.
"I'm sure he'll be alright, come, let's get some rest before we start working in an hour," Astrid said and Hiccup nodded while lying down on the cold stone floor, begging above all for this to just all be a bad nightmare.
Toothless woke up with a shuddering cough, blood dripping from his mouth. His entire body was aching in massive jolts of pain, the equivalent of someone hitting a nail with a hammer.
"H-Hic..Hiccup..." Toothless moaned before coughing up a good amount of blood. He looked down at his torso to find a rusted metal pipe going right into his side.
Toothless heard thunder ring out in the distance. He coughed and spotted his sword nearby. He grabbed his sword and started crawling his way towards a nearby cave.
The cave wasn't huge, it was really more of an overhang with a good amount of shelter underneath it, but it would keep him safe from the rain.
He collapsed into the safe spot as the rain started falling, Toothless took in a deep breath while looking at the pipe in his abdomen.
He grabbed some cloth from a storage pack on his arm and took a few quick deep breaths before pulling the rusted metal out. If it was left in he would get poisoned from the rust and have absolutely no chance of survival.
"FUCKING HELL!" Toothless roared in pain while clutching the massively bleeding wound, regretting his choice. He quickly pressed the cloth to the wound and then started bandaging himself up.
Once he was sure the bandages were safely secure, he started pulling little pieces of rusted metal out from his scaly hide. A particularly big piece was stuck in one of his wing's membranes, and he had to pull it out.
Toothless took three deep breaths before pulling the hunk of metal out and hissing in pain, he threw the metal away and finished up bandaging his body.
After that, he watched the rain fall with deep breaths as he clutched onto his sword tightly, watching the sunset on the day.
"Hiccup...I...I'm...coming...stay a-alive...please" Toothless moaned and quickly fell asleep while hoping that he would safely make it through the night to see the next sunrise.
Alright! That is a wrap on Chapter 3 of The Waste of What Remains! I hope to have Chapter 4 out sometime in the future, but who knows with my writing system and stuff.
Alright, this is JustANormalHTTYDFan, over and out.