A/N Hi! I hope you all enjoyed the last chapter.

Review Replies:

Zoha Ven: Thank you! Yes, 'the lion , the witch, and the wardrobe' from the chronicles of Narnia. The teens met Percy, Annabeth and Sarah because Stoick introduced them, I suppose, and I think they made very good friends already. I mean...tying Snotlout to Stormfly's tail? Hee hee, priceless. Yes, it is after Defenders of Berk but before Race To The Edge (as evidenced by Dagur still being imprisoned). It's sort of a mix of the books and the franchise and my own imagination. They are the franchise characters, though. The book characters are simply ridiculous. Except for Camicazi, perhaps. Sarah did answer the bard question, actually. And even though Fishlegs does not want to be a bard in the franchise, he is a bit of a poet. "Don't waste your time, boy, nothing rhymes with 'empty'". Oh, that was funny. Yes, this will all be from Sarah's POV. There will be both Hiccstrid and Percabeth. I'm not sure how long they'll be there. Of course Sarah's mother will be worried. What mother wouldn't? Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure Sally Jackson would be worried as well... I don't think everyone will have to be saved from something, Sarah's just trying to get home. But that could easily change! Imaginations are funny things.

Flaming wolf ki (guest): That is a wonderful idea! Perhaps it should be a sequel though, and not a chapter in this story? Because this story kind of already has a course, and a sequel would make more sense than a random chapter. Thank you for the idea!

Chapter Five

I woke to find a pair of green eyes and a pair of grey eyes watching me. I slowly sat up. Percy and Annabeth were already awake. Percy was watching me with a sleepy look on his face, but his eyes looked wide awake. Annabeth was inscrutable.

I sighed inwardly. I really didn't want to do this. I did it anyway. I used my gift.

I checked Annabeth's emotions, reading her like a psychic.

Mistrust.

Apprehension.

A bit of fear.

Anger.

Nervousness.

I winced a little. It was always hard feeling emotions that weren't your own. I'd only ever told one person about my gift, and he...

I shut that thought off before it went further.

"So," I said. "Why're to two looking at me like I'm the prime suspect?"

"You are." Percy said.

"Of course," I said with a smile. "What would you like to know?"

Annabeth's eyes narrowed a bit. "A lot," she answered. "Like, how exactly are we famous back home? Where are we? How did we get here? How do we get home? How do you know so much about this place? Who are these people?"

"And how come the food's so bad?" Percy chimed in.

I smiled as Annabeth gave Percy a glare.

"Well," I said, "those are all excellent questions. Shall I answer them backwards or in the order you asked them in?"

Annabeth gave me a look.

"In order, then." I said cheerfully (though in my opinion it was far too early to be having any sort of conversation. All I wanted to do was tell them to shut up, roll over and go back to sleep. I was NOT a morning person). "Well then. You are famous back home because your Camp Half-Blood record keeper. Rick Riordan, has written up all your adventures, the adventures of the Kane kids, and is in the process of writing Magnus Chase's adventures. He has published them as fiction. You guys have legions of fans, and Camp Half-Blood T-Shirts are selling to mortals like candy. You two are like, one of the most popular couples in the series."

Annabeth turned slightly pink, and Percy looked at me with a slightly confused air. "Wait a minute," he said. "How did Rick know about everything? I mean, he is the record keeper, but still."

I nodded. "I was wondering about that too. I mean, some of the books are actually written in your first person point of view, Percy."

"What!?"

I snickered. "Don't worry, you're a very funny guy. Your personal observations are even funnier than your slightly ridiculous comments."

Percy stared at me in horror. "Um...okay. But seriously, WHAT THE HADES? You mean all the stupid things I thought about the gods are all in PRINT!?"

I gave my best I know something you don't know smile.

"Why, yes!" I said. "And by the way, Aphrodite is way too shallow to read them, so she'll never know what you said about Calypso, so she'll never curse you or anything!"

I re-thought my statement.

"Hopefully."

Percy glanced at Annabeth, then back at me in rising disbelief.

"Hopefully?" He growled.

"What exactly did you say about Calypso that might offend Aphrodite?" Annabeth said in a dangerous tone.

"And we are not done!" I said quickly. "I haven't answered all you questions yet!"

Annabeth gave Percy a short glare before turning to me. "Okay, then hurry up and answer them."

I smiled again (resisting the urge to throw my pillow at both of them and go back to sleep). "Well, we are on an island called Berk, in the Barbaric Archipelago. This is the domain of Vikings. And I believe we are in the time period when Rome was in power."

"You're kidding, right!?" Percy said in alarm. "Rome!?"

I rolled my eyes. "Relax, Jackson, Rome doesn't come near Berk until the very end of this story." I sighed, a deep feeling of sadness coming over me. "Only God knows why the Romans had to destroy the Vikings completely. Anyway, I have absolutely no idea how we got here. Must be some kind of cruel joke by the gods on your part. As for me..." I glanced up at Percy, then looked back at my hands. "I have no idea."

"Why did you just look at Percy that way?" Annabeth asked. Again with the dangerous tone.

I looked up, confused. I checked her emotions with my gift again.

Jealousy.

What the holy cheesecake?

I burst out laughing. "Oh, Annabeth, you really think..." I broke off, choking on my laughter. When I could breathe again, I gasped out, "Are you kidding? If I really had a fan crush on Percy or some stuff like that, this really would be a cruel joke by the gods." I started laughing again. Bitter this time. "No. I don't have fan crush on any half-blood, living or dead."

Percy looked confused.

I coughed a bit and said, "Moving on! I don't know how we get home. Maybe there's a purpose here we have to fulfill, maybe there's some sort of spell or something somewhere, maybe it's a question of speed..."

I trailed off, thinking of the TV show The Flash. Maybe not speed, I decided.

"And?" Percy prompted.

"And," I replied, "I know so much about this place because Hiccup wrote down all of his adventures in twelve volumes and threw them in waterproof boxes into the sea when he was an old man. A woman named Cressida Cowell has been finding them, translating them, and publishing them as fiction. The problem is, she's not a very good translator. Either that or she's purposefully mangling the facts. But by some miracle, the Dreamworks studios back home got almost everything right, it would seem. Almost everything. They don't know the fate of this place very accurately. Nor the fate of the dragons. Or Hiccup's inheritance. Or his future suffering."

I realized my voice had started trembling a bit and my throat was tight. It seemed that now I knew this all was real, the horror of the dragon riders' future was really getting to me. I cleared my throat and continued.

"These people are the inheritors of a great and painful destiny. They, but Hiccup in particular, are supposed to make the world grow up."

"The world can grow up?" Percy asked with a funny tone. "I thought Gaea was a grown-up."

I laughed. It hurt.

"What I meant was that they are to make this age pass. A new age of the world will begin with the destruction of the Viking tribes and the extinction of the dragons."

"Can't we stop it?" Annabeth said. "Can't we save them?"

I sighed. "Annabeth...even if we tried, the destiny would pass on to Hiccup the Fourth and his generation and there would be no evasion of it anymore. These things come in threes. Hiccup the First evaded the destiny, passed it to Hiccup the Second. Hiccup the Second evaded it by passing it on to the Hiccup we met yesterday."

"Hiccup the Third," Percy said.

"Yes." I said sadly. "If he knew...well, he would have three choices. One would be to take on his destiny. To love it. To flaunt it. But he can't. He loves dragons. He could never be excited about killing them. Another choice would break into two facets. He could evade his destiny by passing it on to Hiccup the Fourth, either by abandoning humans completely and living as a dragon, or by abandoning dragons completely and never having any friendly contact with them again. The third choice.."

I hesitated. It was a choice, but it was a terrible one and I didn't want to even say it.

Percy and Annabeth could probably tell from my face that the third choice was a bad one.

"What's the third choice, Songbird?" Annabeth asked.

I looked down at my hands. "To take himself out of the picture. To send himself to Valhalla."

"What's that?" Percy asked.

"Valhalla is like the underworld, or its actually more like heaven. The best and bravest warriors go there after..."

"Oh."

They got it. I could tell by the silence.

"If he did that, he wouldn't be saving anything or anyone." I said. "The destiny would still pass to Hiccup the Fourth. But this Hiccup wouldn't have to do it. There's nothing we can do Annabeth. The destiny is his."

We sat in silence for a while, until there was a knocking on the door and...uh oh...Hiccup poked his head in.

How much did he hear? I thought frantically.

None at all, it seemed. He was cheerful as he told us that dragon training would start after breakfast and we were welcome to come if we wanted. We smiled and nodded, but I could tell that Percy and Annabeth were thinking the same thing I was: This wonderful place is going to be destroyed.