Hiccup slept over in Rapunzel's room within the tower. He tossed and turned on his mat over the floor, but his body was too sore to sleep comfortably. Noticing a warm light, he looked over to see his friend was still up as well. She was sitting on the edge of her bed by a lit candle in her violet nightgown, trying to braid strands of her long hair.
"Can't sleep?" She asked while still focused on her task.
"Nope,"
"Me neither."
He forced his aching body up. "I am too sore, like, everywhere. I didn't even know there was a muscle here." He poked at the area under his armpit.
Rapunzel giggled. "Merida only wanted you to reach your full physical potential."
"Only that?"
"Okay, and watch you suffer a little." She gave him a cute smile, "But that's just how she is, tough love and all."
He let out a small chuckle. "Here, let me help you with that…" Hiccup sat beside her on her bed. She lit more candles along the counter for him to see and even held one on her lap.
"She's not like that with you though." He said as he undid the messy excuse of a braid to start over.
"No, we've become best friends. But remember, she didn't like me at first."
"Oh yeah, she thought you were all girly and prissy." He laughed a bit. "What was it she used to call you?"
Rapunzel laughed, and then bobbed her head from side to side with her eyes to the ceiling as she did a horrible Scottish accent. "Ye nothin' but a perfect lil flower child."
They shared a good laugh.
"But no, then she got to know me and found I wasn't all like that. I wasn't raised into royalty with a silver spoon in my mouth."
Hiccup had already braided inches of the blond strands. "Yeah, you were raised…here."
"Mhm...the Lost Princess." She looked down at what he had accomplished so far. "Hiccup, you're really good at this!" The blonde said pleasantly surprised.
"Viking braids," stated the young man, "And I saw how to do them better from Astrid. Is this why you stayed up?"
"No, this was actually more to distract me." She stared down into the candle fire.
"What's wrong?" Her friend asked, concerned.
"Nothing, I was just thinking about Eugene." It's been well over a week since she had seen her husband.
"You miss him?"
"A little…a lot,"
"I can check if Toothless is awake. We can fly you to Corona."
"Oh no, gosh no, no it's fine I…I don't want him to worry about me, and get involved in all this."
"He still thinks you're hanging out with Merida?"
"He does. Just a fun little getaway with my girl."
"I guess I understand. Same reason I don't want Astrid to find out about all this, this…" He grumbled in a spooky voice, "Impending apocalypse."
She let out a slight chuckle, and then went on to say. "Exactly, but aren't you a chief now? Don't you want to be there to protect your people?"
"I do, but I know the best way to save my village is to prevent this all from happening. And besides…I like it here." He smiled at the blonde princess.
She smiled back at him. From the moment they met, they shared a warm bond. With her sweet, bubbly personality, Rapunzel had always gotten along with everyone. Even with the worst of the worst, like the pub thugs. And mixed with his similar traits of loving and compassion, Hiccup had always found it easy to talk to her about anything, no matter how deep or personal. He spoke to her about things he could not share with Astrid, or things he knew Jack would make fun of him about.
The same went for Rapunzel. She could share personal things with Hiccup, especially about Eugene, that even Merida, her best friend, could not understand. She also admired how incredibly kind he was. So kind that he could not even bring himself to kill the most dangerous species of dragon and instead befriended it, or how his first instinct when face with war was to try to change the mind of the evil conqueror.
Rapunzel and Hiccup had always found supportive warmth within one another. They shared a trusting, comfortable friendship. They both also grew up an only child, so they both felt they were the closest they each had to a brother and sister, the special kind that never fight. Unlike Jack and Merida; they tended to bicker far too often.
"There," he let go of her long, now completed, strand of firmly braided hair, "all done."
"Thank you so much."
"Anytime. So, is there any particular reason you wanted a braid?"
She set the candle aside and leaped out of bed. "Yes! To do this," the princess held onto it in her hands like a rope, swinging it around. Rapunzel then whipped the braided strand down with a loud crack!
Hiccup flinched at the sound, and then gaped at the sight. She completely snapped a wooden floorboard in half. "I wouldn't want to get hit with that."
The blonde smiled with an adorable smug, and cracked her braid again like a whip.
"SHUT ET!" A heavy accented yell of irritation shot out from the floor beneath them. Merida was trying to sleep and it was passed the middle of the night.
After the initial jump into each other's arms from being startled, the two friends covered their mouths at an attempt to contain their snickering.
Out on a grassy cliff-side, floating stones revolved around the crossed-armed Warrior God. Rapunzel took a stance with her two daggers in hand. The little stones shot at her like bullets. She sliced through them all using the techniques he had taught her the other day.
"You pick up on the forms fast."
"Well I was already a pretty quick learner, but with Amaterasu, learning your ways is much easier."
"Ah that's right, your connection to the divine."
"Mhm," she nodded, "I have instant access to all your culture. It just sort of clicks for me."
"And that will continue to be valuable in our efforts. Be sure to keep the bond strong. Perhaps visit her in a session of meditation after this."
"Will do." The blonde smiled, liking the idea of meditating to unwind after long hours of training.
"Good, but as for now…let's see how your aim is."
Two small stones ascended high into the air, so tiny and so high that they could hardly be seen. Rapunzel squinted up into the sunny day, managing to get a clear enough look. She took down the small targets.
Trying to catch her by surprise, a stone came at her from the side, but the blonde's reflexes did not fail her. A quickly flung dagger pierced through the rock, cutting it in two.
"Excellent, now for something else…"
"Sure, I'm ready for anything!" She exclaimed eagerly.
Hachiman looked over to the others sparing a few feet away.
"This could go badly for you, Jack." Hiccup advised, smiling. His fiery blade collided with a frosty staff.
"Yeah okay, not a chance!" The Guardian mocked with a grin.
"Ye boys are both outta yer heads!" Merida separated them with the downward swipe of her medium-sized sword.
Toothless was near them, only he was too busy rolling around on the soft patch of tall grass to care about watching the fight.
The three continue having fun with their energetic sparing match until Hachiman called them over. They withdrew their weapons and headed up to the deity and the blonde princess on the edge of the cliff-side.
"Hiccup, could you join us for a moment?"
"Um, okay sure…"
Hachiman began to train Rapunzel in hand to hand combat. This was where her recently practiced Tai chi came in; she found most of the moves similar, only now she had to execute them much faster. Her instructor demonstrated a simple counter by flipping over Hiccup. Rapunzel practiced it, nailing the takedown. Their friends started snickering as soon as he hit the ground.
"Ow…why am I always the test dummy?"
Jack knelt in, "Ironic, huh, big brain?" he jested, knocking on his pal's head.
Toothless decided to joined in, delivering playful feline jabs onto his fallen companion. Hiccup laughed, blocking his head and turning from side to side. "Oh, you wanna go, bud? You want some of this?" he returned mock punches at the amused dragon.
Frost jumped back in on the fun. "Tag team!" He and Hiccup wrestled all over the grass with Toothless pouncing up and down beside them. The boys rolled over until Jack sat on top of the brown-haired rider.
"What are we doing?" Hiccup was starting to suggest something, "We're on the same side here…" They looked over at the Night Fury.
"Get the dragon!" Jack screamed, pointing his staff.
Toothless squealed as the boys piled on him.
Rapunzel rushed in, "I got you, Toothless!" She twisted long amounts of her hair around her braid, making a firm rope, and whipped it across Jack's behind as if it were a wet towel.
"Yeeow!" He jumped up clinging onto his cheeks.
Rapunzel giggled.
"Oh you're gonna get it." He grinned and began chasing Rapunzel in circles, waving his hooked stick in the air. The young blonde skipped away, laughing. Hiccup and Toothless kept pretending to duke it out while their friends ran around them.
Hachiman stood next to Merida. She was enjoying the sight as Hachiman asked her, baffled. "How on earth do you get anything done?"
She just cackled at him. "Oi, come here…"
He leaned in as she whispered something in his ear.
The others continued horsing around when suddenly a large shadow cast over them. Hachiman had bent a large blob of mud over their heads.
"Oh boy," Jack stared up, already bracing himself for what would come next.
The blob of mud splatted onto them.
"Eewwww!" Rapunzel screamed out.
Merida and Hachiman laughed out loud with their hands on their bellies.
"Get 'em!" Hiccup shouted.
They all tackled over both Merida and Hachiman in a great big heap. The laughter accumulated upon the rough dog pile.
The Winter Guardian of Fun covered all the mud in a coat of fresh snow. He climbed on the top of his curve-ended staff and threw a snowball at Merida's face.
The sparkles dissolved away as she laughed it off, patting down her own snowball. "Ye better run, Jack."
"Hiccup, help me out, pal!"
He walked up next to Jack, making himself plenty of ammunition. Merida jogged up next to Rapunzel. "Let's show the boys how it's done!"
They started launching snowballs at each other.
"Us boys have a god and a dragon on our team." Hiccup boasted.
"You are sorely mistaken, rider. The dragon is with me." Hachiman chuckled as Toothless jumped beside him in agreement. The Night Fury swung its tail, sending a massive splash of glistening white powder onto the boys and girls.
It was an all-out frenzy with flying chunks of snow across a cliff-side of joyful screaming, running, and laughing. The Warrior God could not recall the last time he had had this much fun. They all carried on with their play until they took a break for lunch.
The next day, Merida assisted Rapunzel with her hand to hand combat out by the tower. The Scottish princess even learned a thing or two, herself. She was far gentler with training her best friend, unlike how she always was with Hiccup.
Speaking of the boy, he and Jack had ventured into the forest. They climbed a large, thick willow tree while continuing a conversation.
"It really has been fun hasn't it?" Frost cheated every now and then by using his flight while the young Viking struggled onto the farther branches.
"Painfully exhausting sometimes, but yeah still fun."
"That's only because Merida works you overtime." He smiled.
"Ugh, tell me about it."
Jack floated down in front of his friend. "Hey, didn't she used to have like a crush on you?"
Hiccup's cheeks flushed red. "Uh-what, where did you, I mean-like umm-"
The Winter Guardian let out a loud laugh. "Hah! I knew it! No wonder why she's so hard on you."
"Shh! We don't talk about it. It was a long time ago."
"What happened?"
They sat facing each other on two separate branches, completely capped by the curtains of hanging emerald leaves of the large willow tree.
"It was complicated, but nothing really happened. I was always with Astrid, so nothing could happen and I don't know, it was just-"
"Complicated"
"Yeah"
"Well I think it's amazing that you're still friends, and it never affected the team. I mean I hardly noticed, I was just joking."
"Jack!"
Laughing away, "Hey, you were the one who went ahead and admitted it."
He turned his head to the side, embarrassed. "Can we just forget about it?"
"Sure thing, heartbreaker."
Hiccup glared at Jack's playful grin. "Good to have you back to your normal self, Jack."
"Tell me about it. I mean not to get too serious but with Elsa okay, I can finally relax. I hated the idea of losing her like that."
A comforting smile formed on the brunet. "But you did it. You brought out the good in her, like you always do."
"Yeah…you know one of the things I loved about her was that I never had to worry about her. If anything, she always worries about me." He gave a slight chuckle. "But with people even as powerful as her, people like us," gesturing to Hiccup and himself, heroes. "There'll always be others who are worse…"
"All the more reason people like us have to stop them."
He stared up at his best friend in confidence. "Yeah,"