A/N: My third HtTYD one-shot :) Also, written back in January. Also, it includes a tiny bit of artistic freedom about Toothless' fire breathing abilities. Sorry guys, the story needed it :) Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own How To Train Your Dragon, nor its characters or locations.
When Something Goes Wrong
Toothless was anxious. Maybe not as anxious as Hiccup, but anxious nonetheless.
He had always been more intelligent than an average human would give a dragon credit for, and so he could completely understand what was happening. Astrid and Hiccup was about to have a hatchling – only, for humans, the whole process was a lot more complicated. Humans didn't lay eggs – their hatchlings, babies, as they were called, were born alive, which made everything trickier, more dangerous. As from a male's point of view, laying an egg didn't seem a big deal, and it didn't seem to put any strain on female dragons. And yet, he had heard horror stories around the village – mothers, dying in childbirth, children born dead. And it had been already hours ago that the woman, who came to help Astrid – the midwife, Hiccup called her – banned them from the bedroom, from where Toothless could still hear Astrid's painful gasps, grunts, and most recently, screams.
He glanced up at his human from where he was laying on the floor. Hiccup was sitting in the great armchair next to the fire, his shoulders hunched forward, his head in his hands, his hair falling in front of his eyes. He seemed completely motionless, yet his whole frame was shaking.
Toothless put his head on his paws. He hoped it would be over soon.
It was more than an hour later that the bedroom door opened. Toothless reacted faster than his rider. He looked up to the midwife, and immediately felt his heart sinking. Her face showed nothing but sorrow and sympathy. Something must have gone wrong. Something horrible must have happened.
By then Hiccup was on his feet, moving as fast as his prosthetic would let him. He didn't say a word; there was no need to. By the time Toothless got on his paws, his rider was already in the room. He walked slowly into the room, while nuzzling his head to the midwife friendly, thanking her for the help she must have done for his rider's mate. The midwife didn't follow him to the room, but closed the door behind him.
It wasn't a happy sight inside. Astrid, her hair in disarray, matted with sweat, in her weakest state he had ever seen her in, was weeping. Hiccup sat beside her, holding her close, trying to calm her, but tears were falling from his eyes, too. Seeing the two being that were the most precious to him in such a state made Toothless want to mourn, to cry with them, was he able to.
Then something else caught his attention: in the other side of the room, there was a small basket, filled with white linens spotted with red. He trotted over to examine it. In the basket there laid, he assumed, Hiccup and Astrid's offspring.
Only it – he could determine the gender – looked nothing like Hiccup or Astrid. It was small, as a hatchling should be, maybe even a little bit smaller than it was supposed to be, and, yet not even completely cleaned from the liquids of birth, it had nothing of that pinkish complexion which seemed to be healthy for humans; instead, it was rather grayish. It was also completely still – not a twitch of its fingers, nor the rising and falling of its chest, what would have indicated breathing.
It looked dead.
Toothless gently nudged it with his snout – nothing. He tried again, desperately – nothing.
He let out a painful wail. No, it wasn't supposed to be like that, the baby should be moving, should be alive.
In his sorrow, he didn't even know why, he let out a little puff of smoke out of his nose.
To his complete surprise, the little thing moved. Just barely, but it moved.
Feeling excited, overjoyed, and many other things at once, he repeated this action again, this time directly aiming at the baby.
And then the miracle happened: it started wailing, very quietly, but it did, it also was tossing around among the linens, begging for attention.
Toothless let out a loud cry in his delight. The baby was alive! He brought it back, he himself, there was no need to mourn anymore!
If the baby's voice wasn't enough, Toothless' cry did it: it caught Hiccup's attention, who turned to him, then in absolute disbelief, let go of Astrid, got to his feet, and walked over to the basket.
When he looked at the baby, first he didn't even believe his own eyes. Then he didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He picked up the softly crying little thing, held it in the air for a few moments, then cradling it to his chest stepped back to Astrid, who, while holding her baby, started crying again, only because of relief this time, not sorrow.
The next half an hour went in a blur, which Toothless watched from his spot in the corner.
Hiccup called the midwife back, who, much to Astrid's dismay, take the infant away, examined it, and claimed that it was extraordinary well, seeing what had happened to it beforehand, then cleaned and wrapped it properly, before handing it back its mother, who seemed not to get enough of it. She cuddled it, pressing it to her chest, kissing its head numerous times, while thanking the gods over and over. Hiccup was hardly doing better, he was just sitting next to his wife, holding her shoulders, staring at the delicate little face speechlessly, occasionally touching the chubby face.
It was only after both mother and child fell asleep – next to each other, since Astrid wouldn't have let the baby out of her reach now – that Hiccup went over to his dragon.
He knelt slowly next to his enormous friend as he lay on the floor, and wrapped his arms around the thick, black neck.
"Thank you" was all he said, his voice coarse from all that crying, but he didn't need to say anything else. Like during those very first days, dragon and rider understood each other perfectly, without words.
A/N: Surprisingly, this one is actually based on a true story. When he was born, Picasso didn't cry or breathed, and was rather grey, too, so the midwife declared him a stillborn. Then his uncle – it's not known whether intentionally or unintentionally - blew cigar smoke in his face – and the baby started wailing, coming back to life.