Chapter Eleven: You Better You Bet
Special Thanks to Heartofadragon2014 for coming up with the name of Hiccup and Astrid's daughter. I hope that those of you who voted for a boy aren't too upset.
The Berserker tribe was miserable. Ever since Dagur had left, they've been living peacefully with a nice economy, and now they were doing nothing but training for battle under the ever-watching Dagur.
They knew that Dagur was preparing them to attack Berk, and they feared that most of the tribe would not make it back alive. Over the years after Dagur had been imprisoned, they've heard of the dragons Berk had acquired and how strong they've become as a tribe. They would've retaliated against Dagur, but he had tamed the Strike class monster and they knew that if they displeased Dagur, then he would send the massive dragon to deal with them.
It was the morning after little Anora hatched; Hiccup and Astrid woke up looking at the baby lying between them. They just didn't want to let her sleep in her own crib for her first night, and they were pleased to know that she didn't disturb them during the night.
"She should be getting hungry." Hiccup told Astrid as Anora began to open her eyes.
"I don't know how to go about that. Laying an egg didn't make me produce milk like a mother of a normal baby would." Astrid replied.
"We'll see how she takes to yak's milk then. If that isn't good enough for her, we'll have to improvise. You stay with her, I'll prepare her breakfast." Hiccup said. He got ready for the morning and filled two baby bottles for Anora, the first was just regular milk, while the other had a bit of fish blood mixed in.
It was a good thing that Hiccup prepared the second bottle, because their baby's dietary needs were slightly more draconic than completely human children. Anora suckled on the milk-blood mixture as if it was going to be the only meal she'll have.
"Wow, what an appetite!" Hiccup exclaimed after Anora emptied the bottle in one go.
"Yeah, kind of like Stoick's." Astrid replied. Hiccup let out a chuckle. Stoick always had a more than hearty appetite.
"We better get ready for the day. The villagers are going to want to meet her." Hiccup stated. He and Astrid prepared themselves and Anora for the day and ate some bread from Helga the Mace Menace for breakfast. After that, Hiccup had donned his armor with the Dragonstone inside.
"Toothless, why are you still human?" Hiccup asked looking over to the dragon-turned-human lying on the guest cot.
"I was about to turn back last night, but something inside me told me that I should wait." He replied.
Hiccup decided to drop it there and head outside with Astrid, the baby, and Midnightfire perched on his shoulder…
That would be provided if the village would let them out.
Just outside their front door there were villagers and dragons ready to celebrate the arrival of the Chief's firstborn child. The new parents were taken aback, as they weren't expecting to be mobbed. Still, Hiccup gathered his senses and announced: "People of Berk, meet our daughter: Anora Storm Haddock!"
Astrid covered the baby's ears as the Vikings cheered and the dragons cheered in their own way.
"Wow, dragon eyes, they're beautiful." Gobber told them.
"Dragon eyes? What happened, did one of you bang a dragon?" Snotlout called out, earning glares from everyone. Midnightfire went into a rage and pounced him. Nobody said or did anything to help Snotlout out.
"Next person who says anything that inappropriate regarding Anora's draconic features will be cleaning the stables as a Terrible Terror for two weeks… And by the way, Midnightfire bonded with Anora the day she was born, making Anora Berk's youngest dragon trainer." Hiccup announced.
"That seems fitting as her father is known as the Dragon Chief." Fishlegs stated.
With Whoshadow standing beside him, the Skrill stepped forward to take a closer look at the baby and she smiled, both of them smiled! It was a lovely sight, but after that moment, Astrid went around to show off Anora while Hiccup was going around the village to see if he was needed anywhere. Well Gobber asked him to take over for making saddles. These saddles were better suited for battle.
"Hey, Chief, you remember that bet you lost?" Claudette asked Hiccup as he finished up the seventh saddle he was working on.
"Yes, I take it that you came up with what I have to do for you now." He replied.
"Well, I was talking to Toothless, and he told me that he needed you to familiarize yourself with the ice tunnels. He already knows them like the back of his claws, so we agreed that since the Vikings have already worked themselves into a routine, we should have you turn into a dragon; and after you familiarize yourself with the tunnels, you, Toothless, Whoshadow, and I are going to race." Claudette told him.
"Come on, my daughter only just hatched. I want to be able to hold her, and who knows what Astrid would say about this!" Hiccup complained.
"Astrid told us that you should honor the bet. She'll take care of the baby, and Toothless will continue filling in for your position. You get today and tomorrow to stay human, but after that it's goodbye Chief Hiccup, hello Mr. Night Fury." Claudette replied. Whoshadow nodded in confirmation. Hiccup turned away shaking his finger at them, but said nothing.
For the next two days, Hiccup pretty much kept Anora to himself. He fed her, burped her, changed her diaper, gave her a bath, and even took naps with her. There was actually a point where he walked her around the village before spending a dinner at his parents' house.
On this day, at Toothless' request, Hiccup used Midnightfire's Dragonstone to turn into a Night Fury. He'd admit that it was nice to have a pair of his own wings on his back, but now he had to go into the icy tunnels to get familiar with them.
It was a complex network the Bewilderbeasts had created, and Hiccup was amazed as well as frustrated. The tunnels had a lot of forks, twists, sudden drops, and dead ends. He understood that the purposes of the tunnels were for the dragons to escape pursuing foes and hiding, but at some points it seemed to be overkill. The network was so complex that it took Hiccup most of the day to figure out several in and out routes, and even more time to commit them to memory.
By the time he was done with the tunnels, Hiccup hit the feeding stations to pig out on the fish. He must've ate twenty-five of them before he noticed Toothless and Astrid behind him.
"How're you doing, Buddy?" Toothless asked.
"To say the least, I can navigate the tunnels now." Hiccup replied, stepping away from the fish. Since Astrid was wearing the armor holding Hiccup's Dragonstone, Toothless didn't need to translate for her.
"Good, that's good to hear." Toothless stated.
"Should I tell Claudette that you'd be ready to race tomorrow?" Astrid asked.
"Yeah, my wings will be up to their full strength by tomorrow." Hiccup replied.
The next day, Claudette and Whoshadow were ready to race against Hiccup and Toothless. Team Skrill regularly wore blue and white racing stripes, while team Alphas were wearing red stripes. The course to the race was a simple one, it was mainly a test of speed, and Claudette didn't want to see Hiccup in 'warrior mode' as she was quite fond of her nose and he'd already given her face a scar.
"I know we've done this once before with Snotlout and Hookfang, but this still feels really awkward!" Toothless told Hiccup.
"Hey, I'm trying to pass a Skrill here!" He snapped. Toothless won't deny that Hiccup made a good Night Fury, and he'll admit that he made a good human, but to put them in opposite bodies and to have them race, they'll do a good job, but it just felt weird to them.
At the beginning of the race, Claudette and Whoshadow caught the first sheep, but Toothless intercepted it from her and later scored the first point. However, Claudette eventually stole the black sheep off of Toothless and won the game. Up until then it was a fairly even match.
"Hey Hiccup, you did nicely against a Skrill." Whoshadow stated.
I promise that the next chapter will be more interesting than this.
Please review, I don't care if it's on another chapter, just review, I enjoy your feedback.