Well, it's been a long time, no doubt. I'm not going to tire you all out with a long winded explanation on my hiatus before you even start reading this chapter so I'll leave it to the end. Without further adieu, here is the long awaited, and long overdue, chapter promised to you.

Toothless turned away from Stormfly, filled with so much rage, fuming with each misty breath he exhaled. He spread his wings and with strong strokes he shot into the sky, the snow and ice pattering against and sliding off his scales and wings.

He faintly heard voices, nearly lost behind the soft falling white snow. He didn't care, he only wanted to find Hingejaw and make him pay, make him bleed, make him roar in pain and beg for forgiveness.

His eyes narrowed on the shadows of distant dragons circling over the shape of Berk far away in the snow. He growled to himself, feeling the fire rising up his throat already, the heat melting the snow that stuck to his scales into slush.

"Toothless! Stop!" Hookfang's voice roared from behind. Toothless didn't even glance back, instead he tried to fly in a straight line, shaking his tail in irritation as his metal tail sail didn't open.

"Hey! Bro, wait!"

Hookfang's voice called out to Toothless again, followed by a voice that wasn't as concerned.

"YOU BLOODY IDIOT! COME BACK HERE THIS INSTANT OR I'LL GUT YOU MYSELF AND SPILL YOUR INNARDS FOR THE FISHES!"

That would be Barf. She sounded angry.

"HELP ME! SHE'S CRAZY!"

And that was Belch. The two of them were fast, Hookfang as well, but Toothless was faster. Would be faster if his damn tail sail would open. He could already feel his body being batted around by the freezing winds, his path unsteady without his sail to steer him. He snarled in anger and shook his tail roughly, making the sail open and close freely. He growled to himself, "Bloody useless."

He could already feel it, the heat of Hingejaw's blood as he sunk his claws into the Nadder's side, the bone sliding under his grip.

A strong sea gale blew into his side, sending him veering off to one side. He furrowed his brows and beat his wings desperately, trying to correct his flight, then another gust blew in from the other side, sending him careening away straight into a snow drift.

Toothless flailed in the pile of snow, trying to dig himself out, before claws wrapped around his legs and pulled him out, dragging him away from the snow drift.

He spat out a mouthful of snow and saw Barf and Belch in front of him, their green scales discoloured by the cold. Barf opened her jaws to let loose a torrent of insults as he turned and spread his wings to take flight again, but Hookfang was there, his black and red scales stark against the white snow, blocking the way with his long wings spread out.

Toothless snarled, "Out of the way! Move!"

Hookfang didn't move, instead he tried to calmly say, "Calm down, man, you need to chill."

Even without Barf's strings of colourful insults in the background he knew he would never calm down, not until he'd bled that monster.

Hookfang asked, "What do you even think you're going to do, huh? Kill Hingejaw?"

"Yes!"

"He's bigger than you!"

"I don't care!"

"He's got more experience than you!"

"I don't care!"

"You'll die!"

"I don't care. I don't care! I DON'T CARE!"

"No!" Hookfang beat his powerful wings once, showering Toothless with snow and dirt. Hookfang said with uncommon seriousness, "I won't let my best friend kill himself. I don't care what it takes," smoke began to bubble out slowly from his snout and the corners of his mouth, "you're not going after Hingejaw, understand?"

Toothless drew himself up as tall as he could and spread his own wings to make himself look bigger, still smaller than the larger Hookfang, and looked the Nightmare in the eyes, growling, "Think you can stop me? Think you can take me?"

Hookfang was much larger yet Toothless could see it in his ruby eyes, he was shaken by his friend's words, dripping with fury. They stared each other down, silently, smoke trickling out of the corners of their jaws, the only sound the screams of the wind and Barf's endless insults.

"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING?!" Toothless felt Barf and Belch's claws, actually only Barf's, latch onto him from behind and her voice screeching, "DON'T YOU DARE TRY AND RUN!"

She spun him around to face her and her brother, his half of the body was not cooperating with his sister's much. She narrowed her eyes at Toothless, her forked tongue shooting out for an instant as she hissed, "You insensitive little lizard, how can you even call yourself a Dragon?"

He tried to get up. "I don't have time for this! I need to-"

"YOU NEED TO SIT DOWN!" The claw on Barf's half of the body grabbed Toothless and shoved him into the snow roughly. "You're a heartless snake! You're a-an eel with wings!"

"I-"

"SHUT YOUR MOUTH YOU FUSTILARIC SCUM!"

"What does that even mean!?"

Barf glared at him. "You… I… You're so… so… ARGH!"

She sounded like she'd run out of words to insult him with. He glowered at her, "You're talking like I was the one who bled Stormfly, the one who deserves to die!"

Barf opened her mouth again to let loose another river of debilitating curses but her brother, Belch, poked his head in and interrupted her. "Relax, sis! There's a lot of bad vibes going on here," his sister made a remark about tumours as he looked at Toothless earnestly, "Why not I explain what my sister seems to have a bit of trouble communicating to you?"

Toothless didn't say anything in response, instead he glared at all three of them silently, before tipping his head slightly to Belch. He nodded, almost in relief, and said, "Long story short, you're an insensitive little lizard."

"That doesn't help at all!"

"That's the short story," Belch reminded. "Long story goes like this. Stormfly's off in a bad way, this, Hingejaw is it? Yes, he was obviously close to her, and after he does something like this she's probably feeling betrayed, depressed, humiliated, shamed and in a lot of pain. Now picture this, the first person who comes to comfort her, her closest friend." Barf growled softly at her brother and he corrected, "Her closest male friend, and she starts to hope, starts to think, I knew you'd be there for me, I knew you wouldn't leave me, and then he leaves her."

Toothless' disdainful snarl fell apart as Belch continued, "He goes off to do to Hingejaw what HIngejaw did to her, leaving her alone again. You got her hopes up and tore them away, how do you think she feels right now?"

Toothless groaned as he realised the truth of those words, the anger disappearing in an instant. He said sheepishly, "Probably… worse?"

"Obviously worse!" Belch exclaimed. He looked at him in shock, "We're her closest friends! You're her closest friend! You need to be there for her, you are the one she needs right now!"

Toothless groaned and hung his head, shaking it slowly and letting the snow slide off. "I'm so stupid! What do I do now? How do I fix this?"

Barf looked down on him with contempt, saying aloofly, "Isn't it obvious?"

Stormfly looked down at the frozen creek's surface, her face reflected back at her in the blue ice and framed with snow. She inspected her image quietly, turning her head so only the left side was reflected, the ugly tear along her neck startling her. Meatlug had helped her wash off most of the blood but it didn't make it look much better.

Meatlug, nearly buried in the high snow, grunted, "Don't worry too much, 'hun, it'll heal over."

"It'll scar," she pointed out.

"Scars fade," Meatlug said comfortingly. "Anyway, some Dragons like scars, you know?"

Stormfly stretched out her neck, scrutinising the cut anxiously. She sighed worriedly, "How am I going to face anyone ever again with this bloody… thing on my neck? What will I tell Astrid? What is she going to think about me?"

"You're overthinking all of this, 'hun," Meatlug said. "Just keep the cut clean, it'll get better, trust me."

She didn't feel very 'trusting' right now. Stormfly frowned and craned her neck around, trying to find an angle which hid the cut, a challenge considering how large and disgustingly conspicuous it was.

There was the soft sound of flapping wings, then the scrunching of snow, followed by an angry hiss, probably from Barf. Stormfly sighed and continued to inspect her reflection, soon enough more scrunching of snow, then Toothless sidled timidly up beside her.

He asked, cautiously almost, "Hey…"

Stormfly glanced at him passively, then turned to Meatlug on her left. She said softly, "Go and check on Barf, make sure she hasn't killed the boys yet."

Meatlug's expression became even more concerned, if that was possible. "Are you sure you'll be fine?"

"I'm sure."

Meatlug eyed Toothless suspiciously, before harrumphing and turning tail, walking away to a respectable distance with the others.

Stormfly returned to inspecting her reflection while Toothless sat next to her, awkwardly shifting his weight from one foot to another. She didn't even look at him when she said, "Go on then, I know what you're thinking."

He looked at her, confused. "Uh…"

She looked at him, upset, angry even, "Just do it, tell me you were right, I know you never liked him, tell me how wrong I was!"

Stormfly watched Toothless' face, looking as if he didn't know what to feel, but his impassiveness made her even angrier. She felt herself pulled out from her grey depression, snarling, "Tell me how wrong I was! Mock, laugh, say something! I don't care, say something!"

Toothless looked at her, his face a mix of unsure emotions, before he responded, "You've uh, you still got a bit of blood on your neck."

Stormfly glared at him, trying to keep the contempt on her face, trying to stay angry, but she felt a choking in her throat, her jaw began to quiver and she felt hot tears melting the frost on her cheeks into steam. She looked away, hung her head so he couldn't see as she forced out through her sobs, "You're such… an idiot…"

She didn't push him away when he shifted closer to her, she didn't shrug him off when he wrapped a wing around her to keep out the snow, she didn't move away when her tears stained his scales, she didn't say a word as she felt his warm, beating heart against her's.

Wooh, the awaited chapter is awaited no more, hopefully it wasn't too much of a let down considering the long wait, I wasn't exactly at top condition when I wrote this so forgive any lapse in legible writing.

As to my absence, it's simply because in my excitement to write the story something unprecedented happened, the story stopped 'clicking'. The parts stopped falling into place in my mind, the story kept splitting apart and growing in different directions but I couldn't make them work, you know? I just did a google search on the issue while I was writing this, #multitaskingskillz, and it seems I suffered from simple writer's block. Hopefully it won't happen again but que sera sera, whatever will be, will be.

Until next chapter then.