Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN THE PREVIEW PICTURE! IT BELONGS TO DisneyxFairyTale ON DEVIANTART! I also do not own any of the characters. All I own is the storyline.
WARNING: MAJOR CANON ALTERATIONS TO THE FROZEN MOVIE CANON PRESENT IN THIS STORY. IF YOU HAVE ISSUES WITH THAT, PLEASE DO NOT READ THIS.
"You're very welcome." Hiccup began briskly leading Anna out of the room, practically dragging her through the doorway (although not before grabbing a couple of the spare cloaks in the room to avoid them freezing to death). If he was being looped in to a side mission to save her sister before he could focus on saving her, then by the gods, he was going to go fast. "Let's find your sister before you—"
He stopped short as soon as he stepped into the hallway. On both sides of them the passageways were completely frozen over, large, imposing icicles sticking out of the floor and blocking any hope of exit.
"Well, that's excellent," he muttered.
"The window!" The next second Anna was tugging him toward the hall window and shoving it open. "We can slide down to the ground on the snow!"
He raised an eyebrow at her. "That sounds entirely safe."
She glared at him. "Well, what choice do we really have?"
Before waiting for any more input from him on the matter, she had clambered over the sill and jumped onto the expanse of snow. By the time he got out a "no, wait" she was already halfway down the roof.
Once she reached the ground she stood up with relative ease, seeming to have experienced no ill effects from the very steep slither. She gestured impatiently for him to follow. Sighing, he climbed over the sill and held his breath for the stressful few seconds of the slippery descent.
"Where even is Elsa?" he asked, standing up and brushing snow off of himself.
"The servants told me the guards captured her and she's down in the dungeons," Anna called back. "Come on! We can get down there through the side doors."
Hiccup followed her around the sides of the castle to the back. He noticed the wind seemed to have picked up, hurling snowflakes this way and that and gradually surrounding him in a white haze until he could barely see the outline of Anna's purple cloak ahead of him.
She stopped suddenly, letting out a gasp. Hiccup followed her gaze to an icy hole blasted in the castle wall.
"She got out," Anna murmured, looking lost on what to do about this for several seconds.
"So where did she go?" Hiccup asked, echoing what she was thinking.
"Judging by this snowstorm, she's probably still nearby."
She tried to raise her voice to be heard over the howling winds, but he could still barely make it out. He caught up to her, beginning to shiver violently himself as the bitter cold worked its way through his relatively unprotected body.
"Come on then, let's go try to find her."
He reached out and grabbed her hand, lacing their fingers together in an attempt to share what little body heat they both had left. He blushed a little, slightly worried about how she would take the gesture, but she reciprocated even more eagerly and squeezed his hand tightly.
Together they stumbled out onto the frozen fjord, looking through the sheets of white all around them for anything resembling a troubled young woman with ice powers. Anna called out Elsa's name as they trudged along, but her voice was starting to grow weak and feeble as she shivered uncontrollably against him. He responded by yelling Elsa's name as loud as he could, determinedly plowing through the raging blizzard.
Just because Elsa didn't have a clue who he was didn't mean she wouldn't answer. Hopefully.
Anna stopped suddenly, her eyes growing wide and alert. "Hiccup, that's them! I can hear them!"
He stopped and pricked his ears, trying to make out anything over the howling wind. At last he picked it up, faint but unmistakable: two voices, one male and one female.
Anna's grip on him tightened, and despite her practically having to hobble along she was somehow dragging him through the whipping snow at a very brisk pace. As her hand pressed into his, seeming to squeeze it tighter and tighter as they went (or was that his imagination? He hoped not), something suddenly occurred to him.
He would very much have liked to whack himself upside the head for not thinking of it before.
In retrospect it was so obvious…how had he not thought of it? Well, if he was wrong, he'd be in for a whole world of embarrassment, but it was well worth it in this case.
"Anna, wait." He ground his feet into the ice, leaving Anna to let out an irritated grunt as she was suddenly yanked backwards.
"What are you doing?" she snapped. "We have to keep going."
"No, no, wait," he insisted. "I think…I think I know how to save you."
To his dismay, Anna's hunched-over body didn't perk up with joy, nor did it sag with relief as she smiled at him. Instead, she only looked annoyed.
"Well, can't it wait a few minutes?"
"It'll only take just a second." He cupped her face in the hand that wasn't holding on to hers. To his relief, she leaned every-so-briefly into the touch. "I just…I was thinking, um…I know it's been a while and a lot of things have happened, and you're probably still kind of mad at me—and I wouldn't blame you if you were, honestly—but maybe if I just were to—"
It was at that moment that the winds suddenly cleared away, every swirling white snowflake seeming to freeze in place to reveal a vast frozen fjord, complete with half-sunken, iced-over ships and a thin dusting of snow scattered across what had once been ocean water.
And there, only a few meters away, was the figure of a woman in a blue gown, huddled on the ground. Behind her, a man in a teal cloak had drawn his sword.
Hiccup felt Anna's hand frost up, her skin becoming stiff and cold as it transformed to pure ice.
She's almost out of time. It's now or never.
"Anna, maybe if 'true love's kiss' would really work, then I could try—"
She was already gone, yanking herself from his grip and bolting across the ice. Whatever stunted stumble she had been doing before was long gone, replaced by a full-on sprint to her sister. He barely had time to shout for her to wait before she was long out of range.
So he did the only sensible thing to do and ran after her.
If she's going to let herself freeze until she defeats this creep with the sword, the least I can do to speed up this rescue is help her out.
Hiccup expected her to run up to the man and throw herself at him in a furious rage—kick him, punch him, yank his weapon away—anything but what she actually did. She let out a scream and flung herself in front of his sword, blocking her sister from the blow.
Her entire body seemed to crack, and suddenly she was turning bright blue, every flesh-and-blood cell in her body and every stitch of fabric in her clothing being replaced with solid ice. A massive wave of energy shot out from her, throwing the teal-cloaked man backwards and shattering his sword into a pile of bright, silver pieces.
Hiccup let out an anguished cry, doubling over like he had been struck.
The woman in the blue dress—Queen Elsa—stood up, crying out as she saw Anna and whimpering as she touched her frozen-over face. A blonde man in strange pointy boots, a sad-looking reindeer, and what looked like a sentient snowman (Hiccup hardly questioned it after discovering a magic time rift and seeing a kingdom covered in snow in the middle of July) had joined the scene, but Hiccup paid them no mind whatsoever. His eyes were fixed only on the ice statue.
He ran to her. He ran to her like he had never run to anyone before, practically shouldering her sister out of the way to look over her.
Elsa turned to look at him in confusion. "Who…who are—"
"A close friend," he explained quietly. "I used to come and see her while she was locked in the castle, so she'd have someone to talk to. I come from a long way away, and I was so happy that I finally found her again…"
He expected Elsa to scowl, to yell, to tell him to get out, but her blue eyes simply shone with understanding and she stepped aside to let him have a moment.
As he looked at her empty expression, something inside him cracked.
This is all my fault.
"I'm sorry," he choked, feeling tears begin to swell up as he reached out and rested his hand on her face. "I'm sorry I didn't try harder to save you. I'm sorry I didn't try harder to convince you that you needed to save yourself before you could save anyone else. I knew you were dying, and I just stood by and let it happen."
She had told him she had time, and he had made the mistake of believing her.
Why, why, why had he let her convince him of that? He knew Anna. He knew how often she completely downplayed her own hurt. He knew how often she insisted she was all right when she very clearly wasn't, all so that she wouldn't feel like a burden.
Why had he thought this time, with her understating her damning ice curse and insisting they help her sister instead, would be any different?
Stupid, stupid, stupid! He hunched over as his body racked with sobs.
"And if I…if I had had the courage to stop you and look you in the eyes and tell you I love you, then maybe I could have saved you. If I had had more faith and hadn't kept doubting myself that I could be the one to save you, if I hadn't been such a filthy coward, then you…you could still be here with me. I just couldn't…I couldn't tell you I love you. And that's why…that's why I'm telling you now."
In his anguish he leaned in and placed a soft kiss on her frozen mouth, too distraught to care about the way the ice burned against his lips. He kissed and kissed, not caring how strange he looked.
This was all he had left of her. A cold, frostbitten kiss.
Something seemed to shift underneath him.
He thought it was his imagination, but the lips on his didn't feel so cold anymore, or so hard. The ice on her cheeks seemed to be warming up.
Am I melting her? He wondered anxiously.
The stupidity of what he was doing suddenly dawned on him like a ripe slap to the face. Well, that's what you get for kissing an ice stat—
The thought didn't have time to finish itself before the lips were suddenly kissing him back, and there were hands on the back of his head pulling him in closer.
He stiffened in shock, briefly opening his eyes to see the smirking blue eyes of Anna staring into his and the fiery orange hair he remembered. Before he could process what was happening, she had dramatically dipped him and was kissing him in the most theatrical style he had ever been kissed in (which admittedly wasn't very many times—the only other kiss he'd ever had was the one he shared with Anna on top of the bluff when they were 16—but he still appreciated it).
When at last she seemed satisfied, she pulled him back up. He opened his eyes to see her smiling at him.
He smiled back, quickly breaking into a relieved laugh. "Y—you're okay! You're back!"
"True love's kiss!" the sentient snowman screeched from behind them, although there was an unmistakable note of confusion in his high-pitched voice. Hiccup reminded himself that he was definitely going to have to ask Anna about where this character had come from when all was said and done.
Anna looked around briefly, seemingly to check that Elsa was okay as well and that her ex-fiancé was no longer a threat, before replying. "Yep, I'm back!"
She pulled him in for another kiss, this one shorter than the last but still plenty enough to make his stomach flutter.
When she pulled away, she looked at him so fondly that he thought he might melt.
"It was you," she whispered. "It was always, always you."
"Well, uh…if you'd have said something about that back by the fireplace, you could've saved me from having to watch you turn into an ice cube!" he teased.
"Right…about that…heh heh…" She rubbed the back of her head, giving him a brief uncomfortable grin before her expression turned more serious. "I just…didn't believe that sort of love even existed, after what Hans did to me. I didn't think anyone would ever really love me, so I didn't actually think there was any way to save me. But of course I wasn't going to tell you that. I know how stubborn you can get, and I thought you would have just walked around in circles trying to cure a curse with no escape clause."
Hiccup groaned. "But it literally did have an escape clause."
Anna snorted. "Yeah, but where are you supposed to find 'acts of true love' lying around? I figured I was already doomed, but that didn't mean I couldn't warn my sister about Hans before I froze. But I didn't say anything about me. I didn't want you to worry."
"Anna!" Hiccup glared at her. "I could've saved you way sooner if you hadn't just given up!"
Anna gave him a guilty look. "I didn't think you could ever love me, or…or anyone could. Not after how Hans made me think he did and then just went and tried to get rid of me. I love you, and I always kinda hoped you felt the same way…but I didn't think that mattered anymore. I thought it was all just some…naïve kid's fantasy, at this point. But you, I…I couldn't stand to think of you spending all of the short time we had together being angry or worried or upset or something that I was going to die. I didn't want to cause you more pain than I already had to."
"But you can't put people through pain like that unless they love you," Hiccup pointed out. "So wouldn't that thought process just prove to you that I love you?"
"Um…" Anna bit her lip, looking suddenly embarrassed. "I…guess I didn't think of that."
He rolled his eyes, shaking his head. All water under the bridge now, he figured. Although he had to admit there was something touching about Anna being so determined to spend the last hours of her life doing something heroic and making sure no one was worried about her.
That's why he loved her.
"Hey." He turned to see a very relieved-looking Queen Elsa giving him a warm look. "I'm…still not sure who you are, but…thank you. You saved my sister."
Hiccup bowed awkwardly, growing suddenly embarrassed. "Well…thank you, Your Majesty, but I'm not entirely sure it was me who saved her. I mean…she literally threw herself in front of a sword for you. That's true love if I've ever seen it."
"You mean…you think I saved myself?" Anna sounded both puzzled and delighted at the notion.
"It's possible!" he told her, grinning.
"Anna…" Elsa looked at her sister in slowly-growing amazement, as if it was just processing what had happened. "You sacrificed yourself…for me?"
Anna turned and grabbed both of Elsa's hands, cupping them affectionately in her own. "I love you."
"An act of true love will thaw a frozen heart!" the sentient snowman exclaimed helpfully.
"Love will thaw…" Elsa mused. Her smile widened as something seemed to dawn on her. "Love. Of course. Love!"
The queen waved her arms around briefly, and the snowflakes frozen in place began to drift up into the sky. The loud sound of cracks filled the air as the ice below them began to give way.
"Uhhhh…Your Majesty?" Hiccup gave the queen a concerned look. "It's great you're ending the eternal winter, but shouldn't we get off the ice first?"
In response, the ice below them broke apart and melted to reveal the wooden slats of a boat, slowly rising out of the fjord.
Well, that was awfully conveniently-placed.
As the snow spiraled away up into the sky, he turned to Anna. He wasn't sure he had ever seen her smile so brightly, the trail of freckles across her nose practically glowing and her eyes glittering with all the wonder and excitement that he remembered so well. She let out a tiny delighted giggle, and though it cracked with a snort in the middle, he wasn't sure he had heard any better sound in the world.
He bit his lip, looking uncertainly at the ground. It was beyond him what he could possibly do to deserve a girl who went around throwing herself in front of swords to save her sister and smiling no matter what kinds of trials and tribulations life threw at her.
"Anna?"
"Hm?"
"Do you really love me?" He was starting to worry it was only something said in the heat of the moment, a blurted-out exaggeration to go with Anna's characteristic impulsiveness. After all, if she really had loved him all this time, it was beyond him why she had gone and gotten engaged to someone else. Or perhaps she loved him as she loved her family…the same way she loved Elsa.
He supposed it was probably the latter, and he shouldn't get his hopes up.
She took hold of his hands, turning him to face her.
"I do love you. And I never gave up hope that you would come back to me."
"But what about—"
Right on cue, a groan sounded from the other side of the boat, and all heads turned to see the man in the teal cloak getting to his feet. The funny blonde man in the pointy boots had, until now, been watching the interactions between Hiccup and Anna unfold with thinly-veiled disappointment (Hiccup let out an inward groan at the thought of more competition, but at the end of the day he could hardly blame the guy for liking her. Anna sure was acquainted with a lot of interesting individuals, he noticed, be it a sentient snowman or a guy with a reindeer companion).
The blonde man started to march meaningfully toward the man in the teal cloak, seeming enthused to finally have a chance to prove himself to Anna. Hiccup followed suit, eager to beat this odd reindeer fellow to driving his foot into the asshole prince's private areas, but Anna turned and gave them both a warning glance. She marched up to the prince as he hoisted himself up with the boat railing.
"Anna?" he asked, gazing at her in confusion. "But…she froze your heart…"
"The only frozen heart around here is yours," Anna said calmly, words dripping with thinly-veiled malice. She turned, looking like she was about to walk away, before changing her mind at the last second. She whipped around and sent her fist sailing right into the prince's nose, hitting him with such force that he was knocked right off of the boat.
Hiccup leaned up against the boat railing, laughing giddily. That was, to his way of thinking, the finest punch that he had ever seen delivered, punched delivered by Astrid Hofferson included. Astrid had thrown some pretty fine punches in her day, but none quite that forceful and precise and filled with such pure, unadulterated rage.
And never had he felt more clearly, blissfully, and shamelessly in love then he did in that precise moment.
She could probably have knocked his teeth out, he thought, grinning stupidly.
Elsa beamed at her sister proudly, and Anna rushed forward to wrap her in a tight hug. She glanced up at Hiccup over Elsa's shoulder, offering him a soft smile.
After she pulled away from Elsa, she bounded over to him. "Oh, you don't need to worry about him," she said chipperly, glancing back at where Hans had flown over the ship railing. "To be honest, I…well, I think I only ever thought I loved him and agreed to marry him because he reminded me of you. And I figured if I never saw you again…" Her expression grew suddenly sad. "I figured this was…this was the next best thing."
"Really?" He looked away shyly, feeling his cheeks go bright red. "You…you liked him because he reminded you of me?"
"Really really. I mean, I liked him a lot—but I think I only liked the parts of you I saw in him. And that wasn't even the real him!"
She turned and glowered at where Prince Hans had fallen off the boat.
"Well, it does seem like you have a thing for guys with auburn hair and green eyes," Hiccup teased her.
Anna's lips scrunched into a pout. Oh, she was adorable when she did that.
"Oh, shut up!"
"Anna."
He took a breath, feeling his heart speed up. Well, if he didn't tell her now he was never going to work up the courage to.
What do I really have to lose, anyway?
"I, ah…I told you while you were a frozen ice statue, but I'm not entirely sure you remember that. But I love you."
She looked at him doubtfully, and he felt his stomach drop. Maybe she was going to change her mind, say she hadn't meant what she said earlier and that it had been said on nothing more than a passing whim.
As much as he loved her impulsiveness, it was going to be the death of him eventually, he was sure.
But she didn't take back what she had said.
"Do you mean it?" she said instead.
"Well, why wouldn't I?" He gave her a slightly puzzled look before laughing awkwardly. "I mean…I've had two years, I've had plenty of time to think over it. I should have told you a long time ago."
"But Hans said…"
So that's what this was about. The fiancé who had thrown her away at the drop of a pin. The fiancé who had shown her the first care and affection she had seen since Hiccup left, only for him to leave her to die and tell her he had never given a damn about her at all.
No wonder she was terrified.
He knew he could promise her over and over that he would never hurt her like that, but it would all just be words to her. It would take a long time to recover from that sort of hurt.
And as much as he wanted for her to be the happy, optimistic, bright-eyed girl she once was—as much as he wanted her to feel safe and secure being with him, and to never have to worry her pretty mind about him suddenly deciding he was finished with her—he knew this was the sort of wound that would have to heal on its own time.
His face hardened in determination. No matter if she didn't believe him when he told her now that he cared about her, he would show her. No matter how long it took or how hard he had to try.
"Anna, listen to me." Hiccup looked her dead in the eyes, turning her face toward him. "Whatever that bastard told you, it's just a load of bullshit. He's the sort of person who gets some…" He gestured wildly at nothing in particular. "…some sort of twisted satisfaction out of hurting people. And you weren't any exception. He wouldn't have any issue making up all sorts of untrue things to hurt you. I'll bet half of what comes out of that slimeball's mouth is just lies made up to further his own plans or push people down beneath him. You don't really have any reason to trust anything he tells you. All right?"
She bit her lip, seeming to consider what he was saying, and then nodded.
"Look, I don't know what he said to you, but I'm telling you right here and right now that you mean the world to me," he went on. "And if he made you feel alone…don't. There's tons of people who care about you! Who wouldn't?"
Gradually, a tiny smile began to creep over her face.
"Well, an hour ago, I didn't think I believed in love anymore. But maybe now I can start to."
She pulled him in tight for another kiss.
The blonde man with the reindeer was disappointed, to say the least.
Anna had gone over and thanked him profusely for helping her earlier (apparently she had convinced him to take her up the mountain to where Elsa was? Hiccup had to admire how ballsy this guy was, if nothing else), as well as explaining the situation and how she knew Hiccup to both him and Elsa. Anna assured the blonde reindeer man she would pay off the sleigh of his she had apparently ruined (why was he not surprised Anna had accidentally crashed some random guy's sleigh?) and had warmly told him "don't be a stranger!" and "keep in touch and let us know if you ever need anything!", which he seemed to appreciate. He thanked her as he returned her quick hug, but he still looked like a recently-kicked puppy.
Hiccup couldn't help but feel bad for him. He couldn't blame any guy who got a crush on Anna, even after only knowing her for a little while. In fact, it seemed harder to him to not to get a crush on Anna after knowing her any significant length of time.
But as he stood at the gates to the castle, hand entwined with Anna's as they watched the townspeople skate around Elsa's new ice rink, he decided he had waited far too long for this to let himself be eaten up by guilt over the hurt feelings of a man who had known Anna less than a day.
Eh, if Reindeer-Man could develop a crush that fast, he could replace it with another one just as fast. It wouldn't be long before he moved on.
Toothless sat beside Hiccup and Anna, biting his rear end absentmindedly. Anna couldn't stop giggling about it.
"Toothless, that's gross!" she called out, sticking her tongue out.
Hiccup smirked. "He doesn't care. Dragons have much lower hygiene standards." When Toothless looked up briefly to glare at him, he rolled his eyes. "What? You do!"
Anna looked back and forth between the two of them and grinned. "Won't you two stay for a while?" she asked. "You should come skating with us!"
Hiccup snorted. "Are you kidding? I'm not going anywhere until I figure out how that ridiculous magic rift works. You think I'm about to risk losing you again for gods-know-how-long?"
Her eyes glinted with sudden understanding. "So…you'll be here a while, then?"
"Hey." He squeezed her hand a little tighter. "I accidentally abandoned you once. I'm not about to do it again."
In response, Anna squealed and hopped up and down a couple times. Hiccup's chest warmed at her unrestrained excitement.
"Well, I'm sure the trolls here can help us figure out what kinds of magical shenanigans are going on here," Hiccup amended. "But I don't think there's any rush. Besides…" He grinned mischievously. "I told you I'd take you to see the world as soon as the gates opened for Coronation, didn't I? I'll have you know I'm not going anywhere until I follow through with that."
Anna let out a delighted screech, practically knocking him over as she abruptly pounced on him and wrapped him in a tight hug. "You remembered!"
Hiccup froze briefly, feeling his face grow hot.
"Well, obviously," he said after a second, trying to sound as nonchalant as he could. "I already had the whole trip itinerary planned in meticulous detail! You think I'd put in all that hard work for naught?"
"Wait, did you actually?" Anna pulled away and looked at him hopefully.
He awkwardly rubbed his hands together in embarrassment. "Ah no, I was just…I was just teasing you." Upon seeing her crestfallen expression, he gave her a reassuring smile. "But that means we can plan it out together, right?"
To his relief, Anna seemed to take to this idea quickly. "Yes!" she squealed, hopping up and down a couple times. "That would be so fun!"
"Exactly!" He nodded eagerly. "See? We've got so much we have to get done! You can't send me away just yet."
"Good, because I want to see you try to skate first!"
Without warning, she grabbed him and shoved him out onto the ice, eliciting an alarmed yelp from him. Her smirk broke when he suddenly grabbed hold of her before she was out of reach, pulling her out with him.
"Wouldn't dream of it without you, m'lady!" he teased, smirking.
She gave him an anxious look. "Hey, Hiccup, uh…I can't actually ice sk—AAH!"
In the next second she lost her footing and started to slip wildly. Hiccup tried to catch her, but as soon as he grabbed on to her they both went crashing down onto the ice. Anna let out a surprised "Umf!" but she landed on top of Hiccup, his body taking the brunt of the fall.
"Ow," he muttered understatedly.
Anna made a face. "Sorry! I'm sorry! Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine," he grumbled. "Get off though, you weigh a ton!"
"Hey!" She tried to glare at him, but soon a smile was creeping its way through. Unexpectedly she burst into laughter, giggling uncontrollably at her own clumsiness. Hiccup joined in, and soon they were an enormous, obnoxious sniggering pile in the middle of the ice rink.
Hiccup couldn't remember the last time he had felt this light and elated inside, minus perhaps the sharp ache in his back and the painful cold of the ice slowly creeping in through his shirt.
A loud snort interrupted their laughing session. Hiccup looked up to see Toothless rolling his eyes and shaking his head.
"What?" Hiccup gave him a reproachful look.
The dragon responded with what sounded like an impatient grunt.
"You want me to shut up and kiss her already?" Hiccup guessed, raising an eyebrow.
Toothless looked at him like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Or at least, that's how Hiccup chose to interpret it.
Either way, he was happy to oblige—both right then and for many, many, many more times to come.
When she pulled away, he grinned up at her.
"I think I'll be staying for a good long while, Anna."
WELCOME TO PART 2, where you will hopefully get your heartstrings tugged and get temporarily anxious before remembering that 90% of my fanfictions have happy endings!
Now if you're thinking "Okay Ultra, no way in fuckin hell would Hiccup be dumb enough NOT to think of kissing Anna to break the frozen heart spell! Like why wouldn't that be literally the first thing he tries when he finds out about it since they were quasi-dating when they last saw each other/he still has a huge obvious crush on her? WHY DID NEITHER OF THEM SUGGEST IT? THE FOOLS!"
Okay, well…I'll try to explain myself here. Yes, yes, a lot of it was for plot and drama, and the fact that the story would be over in like 5 seconds and wouldn't be nearly as deliciously angsty if Hiccup just kissed her. BUT I actually thought this one out! So Hiccup doesn't suggest it because 1) He just kind of automatically assumes Anna's way out of his league for him to ever be her "true love"; even though he does love her, he doesn't know if The Fates/True Love Police would deem him worthy of being her official true love and whatnot 2) Combination of the reason above and Hiccup just being real shy about saying "hey I still got feels for you" and being worried that she'll turn him down because her getting engaged to Hans showed that she moved on and 3) The two reasons above kind of accumulate on a subconscious level and on a conscious level yes, he really IS dense enough for kissing Anna to break the curse to just…not occur to him XD
Anna kinda explains why she didn't suggest it at the end but basically to summarize 1) Kinda the same as Hiccup, shy about it and scared of rejection, also it would be a double-whammy for her since getting rejected by the guy you love and freezing to death immediately afterwards would really suck and 2) She stopped believing in romantic love and didn't think anyone could really love her
PROMISE THEY WEREN'T JUST BEING IDIOTS
Anyhow I kind of like the idea of Anna basically giving up her last chance at being saved to go and warn Elsa about Hans…and she's a very selfless person, so it's definitely something I can see her doing in…the slightly-altered timeline that this story takes place in ^^;
I…meant for the scene where Hiccup kisses ice statue!Anna to be all dramatic and tragic…my apologies if it seems a bit dumb ^^; I guess out of context, a dude making out with an ice sculpture IS pretty funny. But poor Hiccup's not really fully in his right mind.
So was it the kiss from Hiccup that unfroze Anna? Or was it jumping in front of Elsa, like the original movie? UP TO YOUUUUU! Lol I didn't want to fuck with the movie's message of "non-romantic love can cure curses too" too much lest people come after me with pitchforks XD So us Hiccanna shippers can interpret it like "THEIR PURE AND WHOLESOME LOVE SAVED THE DAY" but people who are annoyed with romantic love only ever being the thing to break curses n shit can just go with the way it was broken in the original movie.
Okay but that aside, if you don't think Anna is the type to dramatically dip boys when she's kissing them, you're dead wrong. This girl is the most hopeless of romantics and when she's feeling especially feisty she 1000% dips boys underneath her when she's kissing them, no matter how tall or heavy they are XD
And if you don't think Hiccup would basically get cartoon hearts floating around his head when Anna punched Hans in the face, you're also just wrong XD
Oh man, poor Kristoff…I guess I really did kinda screw him over here, didn't I? D: He was just subjected to an especially prevalent case of First Guy Wins, it seems. Buuuuut he was canonically crushing on her in the movie, so I wasn't gonna just do away with that since I've made enough changes to this timeline as is, and I didn't want canon Nazis to get on me about changing stuff I didn't have to. I wouldn't feel too bad for Kristoff though, if I continued this story he'd probably just end up hooking up with Elsa eventually.
WELL THAT'S THE TRUE ENDING TO DRAGON-RIDING IN ARENDELLE PROMISED OVER 2 YEARS AGO! I HOPE YOU LIKE IT! Then again, I've waited so long that your expectations have probably been built up very high and you're reading this and groaning like "Ugh, she just put Hiccup in the movie and had him cure Anna's frozen heart? HOW LAME!" I mean…I don't know what to tell you except that I have other Hiccanna fics planned/in the works that are a lot more…erm…original, I guess, so this is definitely not the last Hiccanna fic I'll ever write. For what it's worth, this was always intended to be the ending and I didn't just get lazy…it was a weird form of wish fulfillment at first (WHY COULDN'T HICCUP DEFY THE LAWS OF ANIMATION AND SAVE HER IN FROZEN, DAMMIT!) and also just being kind of sad that a bunch of people have made youtube edits of this sort of thing but they were either short or unfinished, and then it occurred to me "HEY, I COULD JUST WRITE THIS AND MAKE IT INTO A DRAGON-RIDING IN ARENDELLE SEQUEL SINCE PEOPLE WANT ONE ANYWAY!" So there you go folks, efficiency XD If anything, this entire series (Dragon-Riding in Arendelle, Wherever We'll Go, and Act of True Love) was more kind of an experimental piece to get a feel for writing their dynamic and figure out what things they would really connect on so I can transfer that to my…more important Hiccanna stories XD
I'M SORRY FOR THESE LONG AUTHOR NOTES, MY GOD I AM ACTUALLY THE WORST