How to Win a Dragon Race
Astrid couldn't believe what she was looking at. The short, scrawny, fishbone boy she once knew, was not that anymore. Instead he was tall, lean and, dare she say it, hot. His brown russet hair was longer and shaggy with two small braids at the back, the leg that was just wood and metal attached to each other was now more advanced and gave Hiccup good balance and style, he wore a black, soft, leather cloak with silver embroidery at the edges that covered his left side from shoulder to wrist and was connected to a silver buckle with the Strike class symbol on it, three layered curved metal plates rested on his right shoulder and a metal arm guard with a sharp and pointed tip at the elbow was laced to his right forearm. The vest he wore was black and covered with ivory dragon scales, a brown belt was wrapped around his waist and had a small pouch tied to it. A blood red sash was tied around his waist too and a small sheet of light metal diamond tessellates dangled from underneath the left side of his belt. Dark green trousers with multiple pouch pockets and a leather strap tied onto his right thigh holding some sort of contraption that looked like a sword handle and he wore tall black leather steel toed boots to top if off. He looked so different. Maybe Snotlout was right. Maybe puberty finally did hit him. She pondered.
"Hey guys." Hiccup greeted with his signature smile.
Everyone was speechless. His voice had deepened a bit, and Astrid was too occupied ogling at him with his new appearance. Then a small growl came from the storage of the boat and Toothless appeared with a gunny smile. The saddle on his back, was a new saddle with a new rigging's and a new tail to go with it, that was a bright red with a white skull on it. The Night Fury trotted up and stood next to Hiccup with pride.
"Hiccup?"
He young man turned to see his father staring at him in shock. Hiccup simply nodded in reply and stepped down the ramp along with Toothless and approached the Chief.
"Hey dad" he said.
At the same time both father and son pulled each other into a hug for the first time in five years. They crowd cheered at the return of their hero and all rushed to pat him on the back, shake his hand and pull him into a hug. When the crowd finally settled down a bit, Astrid came forward and greeted him back by grabbing him by his shoulders and kissing him full on the lips. Hiccup was startled at first but soon snapped out of it and kissed back.
They pulled apart and panted for air as everyone stared at them.
"So,um...hi?"Hiccup said lamely.
Astrid shook her head mockingly and punch his shoulder hard.
"That's for being an idiot"
"Then what was the kiss for?"
"To mark you as my idiot"
They both laughed at, but were interrupted as Tuffnut launched himself at Hiccup and embraced him in a tight hug along with Ruffnut. Snotlout and Fishlegs came over shortly did the same. Eventually, Stoick announced that they should celebrate the arrival at the square.
Hot food was placed on the buffet table, music was played, drinks were served and dancing occurred. The group were sitting at a table near the fountain, Hiccup happily listened as his friends told stories of what happened on Berk, while Hiccup was gone. Said hero, envied them. When Hiccup was on the isolated island there wasn't anything to do. Sure it was peaceful, but quite boring. He couldn't go on long flights with Toothless and explore other islands, no finding new species of dragons that lived in far away places, he couldn't even venture out too far in the forest on that island, because Gobber was afraid that the Trolls might get him. But, what he did get to do was study the new dragon species of the island and learn to train them. That was one of the very few good things about living on that island.
Hiccup listened as Astrid told him of their adventures, the dragon training academy and the new installments around the city, unaware of his father and mentor eavesdropping on the conversations.
"It's good to see my son again." Stoick commented. "And all grown up too."
"Aye. I gotta tell ya that it hasn't been easy for him. Was bored out of his mind on that island." Gobber said as he drank some beer.
"Really?!"
"Yeah. Lad would try to sneak out some nights and fly off to distance lands, just the quench his thirst for adventure. He succeeded a few times too."
Stoick sighed. "How can i make it up to him?"
"Well, i did hear something about a dragon race as a surprise for him. Is that true?" Gobber inquired.
"Yes it is. It's a new sport that Astrid and the others came up with. Helps blow off steam here and gives a little entertainment to everyone."
"Why don't you start it now? Hiccup's being a little sad over there." He gestured his hook hand to the table where the group was sitting at, Hiccup was listening to Snotlout, who had jumped up onto the table and reenacted a scenario of their travels. Everyone was smiling and laughing, but Hiccup; he had his eyes downcast and slight frown on his face.
"Alright. I'll go tell them to start it." Stoick said before he went over to Astrid and whispered something in her ear.
She smiled brightly and then proceeded to drag Hiccup away in the direction of the stables.
"Whoa! Astrid! What are you doing?"
"I'll explain when we get to the stables." She turned to look at the others. "Come on guys! That race isn't going to start itself!"
At the mention of the race, they bolted and ran to get their dragons.
The stables was very spacious and mounted in bedrock and stalls were separated by wooden walls. A large play pen sat in the corner for the baby dragons and Terrible Terrors, paint had been used to decorate the walls in Viking symbols and dragons housed every pen that they had been assigned to.
"Wow" Hiccup mused. "It's incredible."
"Glad you like it." Astrid stated. "Take this" She held out a small bucket of red paint to him.
"What's this for?" he asked.
"It's for the dragon dragon race."
"What's a dragon race?"
"While you were gone, things started to get boring around her so me and the others came up with dragon racing. We got the idea when Sven's sheep escaped from the pen on his farm and ran amuck through the village, and we were told to get them back. We made a competition out of it and one thing lead to another and we came up with dragon racing."
"Then what's the paint for?" Hiccup asked.
"It was your dad's idea. Thought it might give it a nice competitive touch to it. And also gives a warrior feeling. We use it as face paint and put some on the dragons too."
"Oh OK."
"Yeah, so get ready. I'll run through the course with you later."
Hiccup bent down next to Toothless and scanned the stables and saw the other riders, smothering paint all over their dragons head and faces. He looked down at the paint bucket in his hand and got the idea of it.
"OK bud, let's get this on you."
He dipped a nearby paintbrush into the bucket and started painting Toothless. He started by painting a curved V on the Night Fury's forehead and moved onto his wings and brushed on thick curved strips onto them and the small fins just behind the wings, his tail fins were next and Hiccup covered the undamaged fin in red paint to match the new tail; making it seem like Toothless had two whole ones again, and finally his legs were painted with one thick stripe and one thin stripe going around the leg.
"What do you think, bud?"
The Night Fury looked at himself, by spreading his wings, swinging his tail to the front so he could see and examining each paw by lifting them up. He purred at the new look and then made a growling noise at Hiccup.
"Yeah, don't worry i'm next."
Hiccup dipped a finger in the bucket and took it out and drew it across his cheek twice and again on the other cheek. He now had two horizontal stripes on each cheek as his face paint.
"You guys ready?" Astrid called.
"Yeah, we're ready." Hiccup answered.
"Wow! You guys look great!"
"Thanks Astrid."
"Come on. I'll show you the route and explain the how the race goes."
Astrid, Hiccup and Toothless walked to a wooden table and laid out a map of Berk over it, tracing the course route with her finger.
"OK, we start from the platform on top of the clock tower then we head down to the docks, pass over the square around the audience barracks and through the stables and start all over again. We do ten laps. Now, the sheep that Ruffnut and Tuffnut painted coloured targets on are the sheep you take and have to put them in your basket otherwise anyone else can steal it off you. They're worth one point. On the last lap someone will launch the black sheep into the air and the basically anyone can win if they get it, cause it's worth ten points. You got all that?"
"Yep. Seems pretty straight forward." Hiccup replied.
"OK then, lets head to the starting point."
They all took off to the clock just as it struck noon. On one side of the clock tower were three wooden platforms and one the other were two, each platform was colour coded. Black was for Toothless, blue for Stormfly, Red for Hookfang, Green for Barf & Belch and White for Meatlug. The same colours were used for there baskets that were at the stands where the citizens waited for the race to start. Sven's sheep had already been set free and were now eating grass all around the city.
A horn in the distance blew and all the riders raced off. Hiccup and Toothless decided to stay in the middle and observe how the others did it for the first lap and get familiar to the course. Astrid got the first point for that lap, and when Hiccup had analyzed enough information as they flew through the stables, he and Toothless got into the game.
They spotted Snotlout on Hookfang and was holding out a sheep to Ruffnut as an offering by the palm of his hand. Hiccup clicked the pedal on Toothless' saddle and sped ahead of the others.
"Hey! I got a present for you!" Snotlout claimed to Ruffnut.
Just as he was about to pass it to her, Toothless zoomed between them while Hiccup snatched the sheep out of his hands.
"Why, thank you, Snotlout!" Hiccup called back to him.
They raced ahead to the stands and Hiccup through the sheep into his basket.
"That's one point to Hiccup!" Stoick announced.
The race carried on, and everyone tried to get the most points. Hiccup was in the lead at six, Astrid four, Ruff and Tuff three, Fishlegs and Snotlout none. The real competition was between Hiccup and Astrid. Having been attending and winning races for two years, she felt like she should best Hiccup since he didn't have any experience in this; yet here he was beating her by two points. She tried to snatch sheep off him but always failed doing so, by him barrel-rolling or Toothless suddenly moving off in another direction.
It was now on the last lap and the Black sheep had been launched. Fishlegs grabbed it before Astrid, and tossed it to Ruffnut. Losing distance between the them and the baskets, Astrid stood up on her saddle as if she were on a surfing board, and jumped onto Barf & Belch and took the sheep out of Ruffnut's hands then jumped back on Stormfly. Breathing a sigh of relief she was now in the lead and win the race. By being distracted of her winning, she didn't account for what happened next.
Hiccup was at the back of the group and an idea had formed in his head. He grabbed a lever on Toothless' saddle and pulled it back, shifting the fake tail to automatic. He pulled up along side Snotlout and jumped off Toothless and onto Hookfang's back then ran down to his wings and slid down them as they beat down and jumped when they went up, then landed himself on Barf & belch and proceeded to run up the dragons back and onto Belch's neck then hopped onto Tuffnut's head and leaped off and landed on Stormfly's back then ran up to the side of Astrid's saddle. He spun, as he ran, in an anti-clockwise motion while moving forwards as quick as he could. While spinning he reached the sheep and he pushed it back and it slipped from Astrid's arms and caught it. He then jumped from the saddle and hopped back onto Toothless, just as the baskets were coming up. When they reached the baskets Hiccup threw the black sheep into his basket without hesitation.
"That's sixteen! Hiccup takes the game!"
The whole of Berk cheered in joy and excitement. Astrid flew slowly across the finishing line and landed on a nearby platform then looked up and saw Hiccup hovering in the air with a big smile on his face. He then glided down to join her on the platform along with the others.
"How did you do that?"
"I've never seen that before"
"You gotta show us how you did that!"
They all whipped out comments and questions of the stunt he pulled and quickly told them he would show them one day and teach them that move. The whole of Berk ventured up to the square, still bombarding Hiccup and congratulating him for winning his first race on his first go. Drinks were served and food passed around, children chased Terrible Terrors and the dragons happily snacked on the fish they were given. Music was played by a small band, including Gobber on the panpipes, playing a light and cheerful-
'BOOM!'
The sound of an explosion made everyone stop and drop what they were doing and immediately turn their attention to the explosion coming from the eastern part of the island.
