Hiccup barely slept that night, though he still got enough shut-eye to not be shambling on the dock the nest morning. Leaving Toothless to sleep, he met the other riders as Earl brought up a cart to drag their things down to the ship.

They all loaded their trunks onto the cart and Earl gave them a nod and said "Capt'n's waitn' for ya."

They all walked down to the docks and found Captain Scott waiting for them next to a longboat, the dawn reflecting on the water and illuminating the ship in the distance.

"Well, let's be gettin move on!" shouts Scott

They all climbed in the longboat, Earl would bring their things in a separate longboat, and they pushed off towards the Grace.

They boarded the ship and immediately were greeted by Abigale "Well welcome aboard mateys!" she said

Scott finally clambered on deck and stood next to Abigale, then he said "Time to give all ye yer arms and assignments"

Fishlegs smiled then remembered something and said "We forgot the dragons!"

Scott waved a hand and said "We'll get them closer to sailin' hour, ye all still have to say goodbye to yer folks."

This placated them all "Alright, time fer yer assignments." Said Scott "Hiccup, yer me assistant navigator; Astrid, yer on lookout; Fishlegs, fer the moment I want ye to keep those Drachen from burnin down the ship; Snotlout, Ruff, Tuff, yer on riggin duty; and Mrs. Heather's gonna be in the sickbay. Any questions?"

Adrian came over and then passed out a pistol and shot to each dragon rider, along with a horn of powder, and handed each a sailor's cutlass. Hiccup was last in line to receive his weaponry, and when Adrian saw he had brought his Gronkle-iron shield he stopped dead, then began to shake visibly.

The riders backed away from Hiccup and Adrian and Captain Scott was about to say something when Adrian lunged forward and grabbed the shield, pried it from Hiccup's grasp and looked ready to beat him with it, a maniacal gleam in his eye.

Before any of the riders could intervene Scott shouted "Mr. Damaske! What in Legion's tights are ye' doin!"

Adrian turned to Scott and shouted "This is DRACHENEISEN!" he panted for moment than shouted "This was all stolen from my people during the War of the Cross! Why I ought'a!"

"What's Dracheneisen?" asked Hiccup, getting to his feet, looking more concerned than anything else.

Adrian turned around and Hiccup could see a vein pulsing unhealthily in his forehead as his left eye twitched uncontrollably.

Before Adrian could do or say anything else Scott turned him around and smacked him across the face. Adrian seemed to come back to his senses after that and shook his head for a few moments, then looked at Hiccup no longer with mania, now simply with suspicion.

"Where did you get this?" asked Adrian, his voice level and calm

"One of our Dragon species, the Gronkle, can regurgitate it when fed certain kinds of rocks." Fishlegs answered.

Adrian reddened and mumbled "Sorry" before quickly handing the shield off to Hiccup and walking briskly over to the stairs leading to the Gun Deck, and practically vaulting down the steps.

"What in Thor's underwear was that all about!?" asked Astrid

Scott signed and said "Adrian is from a country called Eisen, and their national treasures were all made of a metal called Dracheneisen, which means 'Dragon Iron'. He thought that this here was a stolen heirloom of his people. Ya see, most of Eisen's Dracheneisen was stolen during the War of the Cross, and now it's practically priceless."

"Alright" conceded Hiccup but he then asked "But why did he go, well… crazy on me like that?"

"Adrian's been through a lot, I trust that man with my life… but, he's seen things that no man should ever see, and he's got the scars to prove it… inside and out." answered Scott, then finished with "Now that's all I'll tell ye, as it not bein' me place to say another word about it."

Ten minutes later… Some of Scott's appointments were proving to be good ones, others… not so much.

Hiccup… "So Earl, how do you um, figure out where to go?" asked Hiccup

"Well" Earl began "Firstly at noon we use this littl' contraption" Earl pulled out what any sailor worth is salt would recognize as a Sextant "to find how far the sun is above the horizon, then we cross reference the number that this arm shows with our Waggoner, um… book of maps, and it tells us our latitude, or how far north we are, after that we measure our speed and use that, and how long we've been sailin' to find out our longitude, or how far East-West we are. Now ye get what I'm tellin'…"

Hiccup was still occupied with the Sextant, poking and prodding, this being the finest piece of ingenuity that he'd ever seen. Earl sighed and, figuring he'd be at it for a few more minutes, went to get the map of The Trade Sea's waggoner from his bunk…

Astrid… Astrid was breathing great gasps as she finally made it into the Crow's nest, as soon as she was inside she made the mistake of looking down.

"Okay, don't look down, don't look down" Astrid whispered, she wasn't afraid of heights when she had a pair of wings beneath her, but now… maybe a little bit.

"Lady Astrid!" she heard a voice from below yell for her, so she braced herself and looked over the side, it was Abigale.

"Ye left yer spyglass down here!" Abigale shouted

Astrid slapped a hand to her face, and began the climb back down…

Fishlegs… "Um, let's see… no, no this is too close to the hay, see if Hookfang snores then it'll all go up in flames. You might also want to reinforce this column, looks like if Meatlug hit it then it'd collapse." Said Fishlegs with a very scholarly tone.

The six sailors helping him sighed; this was going to be one long shift…

Heather… "So, what should I do first?" asked Heather of what seemed to be the most senior sailor in the sickbay.

"Well, first I think ye should check on ol' Herbert, broke is' leg last week, see if it got infected."

"Thanks" said Heather "Um, which one's Herbert?"

The sailor raised a saw from where he was washing off some dried on blood, and pointed to a sailor sitting in a box with a leg resting on several pillows, apparently reading some book.

Heather quickly scampered over to his bedside and said "Um, Mr. Herbert? I need to check your leg for infection."

The Sailor sighed and shifted his leg so it would be easier for her. She unwrapped the dressing and a foul, medicinal stench assailed her nostrils, she coughed once and then took another look, it seemed to be healing well. So she nodded and went to tell the head sailor about her progress…

Snotlout… Snotlout was currently hanging eight feet above the deck by his ankle, wrapped in a rope. He wasn't sure if this was the twins doing, but if not then he'd blame Loki.

Adrian walked by and, in pure annoyance, pulled out his pistol and shot clean through the rope holding Snotlout up by his ankle, Snotlout then falling eight feet to the deck and landing in a barrel of salted fish…

Ruff and Tuff… The twins seemed natural at their job, they scuttled like Spider-monkeys up the rigging and actually didn't make much a mess of it, hmm, maybe that Rum had affected them after all?