Chapter 4

Astrid walked into the gym after sixth period, clad in her volleyball attire. She was the first one in the gym, so she took the time to practice her serves, sets, bumps, and spikes. Walking over to the cart full of volleyballs, she rolled it to one side of the net and began to practice. She started with her serves, first with underhands and slowly moving into overhands. Then she started to set the balls a few times before setting them over the net and moving onto bumping and spiking the ball over the net. By the time she was done, all the volleyballs were on the other side of the net, scattered all over the place. She was sweating and panting from not stopping and she bended over to place her hands on her knees.

"Aren't you going to pick those up?" Astrid whipped around and saw Hiccup walking into the gym. "Obviously I am," she snapped and she began to walk over to the other side of the net. "Okay, okay. No need to be harsh," he said with a smirk and raised his hands in a surrender pose.

"You're irritating, you know that?" she said, her voice tinted with annoyance.

Hiccup shrugged as he set his backpack down. He walked over to the cart and rolled it over to the other side of the net and began following Astrid with it so that she could put the scattered volleyballs in.

It turned out that Astrid was proven to be correct about the two fighting later on in the day. During the last half hour of second period, Hiccup had made a comment about how Astrid should change her hair up a bit instead of keeping it in her usual braid. She had taken it the wrong way and lashed out at him about how he was rude and could never keep his mouth shut. When sixth period had rolled by, things had only gotten worse. Astrid had complained about how Hiccup never did anything in the class and that had led to Hiccup yelling at her and nearly causing a fight between the two.

"Want to play a game, Milady?" Hiccup asked as Astrid bended over to pick up the last ball and placed it in the cart. She looked at him and crossed her arms over her chest. "You want to play volleyball with me?" He shrugged. "Why not? We've got some time to kill, don't you think?"

Astrid pondered over the idea for a moment before she shrugged and smiled. "Sounds good. I serve first!" He watched as she grabbed a volleyball and bounced it hard against the gym floor a few times before she trotted over to the other side of the net. Hiccup took off his hoodie, revealing his black athletic muscle tee that he had thrown on that morning. As he was throwing his hoodie aside, Astrid couldn't help but run her eyes over his arms that were made of lean muscles, indents showing where his biceps were and his broad shoulders. The tee was hugging tightly against his body to the point where she could make out his strong chest and lean abs under it and she could see his collarbone through the high collar of the shirt.

She didn't know how long she was staring for, but she heard Hiccup clear his throat and she snapped out of her trance. She glared at him when she saw him smirking at her and he rolled his eyes and made his way to get farther from the net. He got into his stance and watched as Astrid did an underhand serve, sending the ball flying over the net. He ran over and bumped it over to her side again and she set it over the net. Hiccup nearly missed the ball, but luckily, he slid on his knees, putting most of his weight on his right, and bumped the ball over. Astrid ran up and spiked the ball down onto his side of the net and whooped when it touched the ground. Hiccup couldn't help but smile at her cheerful attitude in that moment.

For the next twenty minutes, they played game after game, and in the end, Astrid won. Hiccup chuckled at her enthusiasm and walked over to her side of the net and picked up the ball. Astrid watched as Hiccup jumped up a bit and shot the ball into the cart that was across the gym and couldn't help but be impressed.

"You're really good when it comes to basketball," she admitted with a nod.

Hiccup smiled at her and shrugged. "I used to play in my free time and I used to be on the basketball team when I was a freshman." She gave him a puzzled look. "Why don't you play anymore?" He rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. "Um, I kind of lost the feeling to it. I guess I just stopped playing because I lost the feeling I got when I played." It wasn't a total lie, because ever since he lost his foot, everything had lost its spark to him.

"Well, you're really good. You should train the basketball team until basketball season starts," she joked with a crooked smile.

Hiccup was about to respond when an idea struck him. "Actually," he began slowly. "I could if I wanted to, but not the whole team." Astrid gave him a confused look. "What do you mean?" He smiled. "How do you feel about me training you in basketball?"

Astrid rose an eyebrow at him. "Train me in basketball? I wouldn't exactly think you'd offer me something like that, you know."

"I'm just trying to be nice," he said, repeating her words from earlier that day.

She rolled her eyes at him. "You don't have to train me, you know."

He smiled. "Well, I want to."

She thought about it for a moment before giving him a slight nod. "Okay. But how is that going to work?" Hiccup twisted his lips to the side as he thought it out. "We could stay here after volleyball practice?"

She shook her head. "The gym closes after volleyball practice. Or at least Gobber has to lock up most days."

"Well, you have only six classes, right?" She nodded and he continued. "We could meet here after our sixth period classes and practice throughout seventh period. Then we would just clean up before volleyball practice."

"What about Thursdays when everyone gets out?" she asked and cocked her hip to the side. "If I'm going to practice it has to be everyday besides the weekend."

Hiccup scratched the back of his head and looked at her. "I have an idea or a place we could go to practice, but it's not really an outdoor area..."

She gave him another puzzled look. "Where?"

"Um, I have a small court at my place, with a hoop and rack filled with basketballs. If you want, we could practice there on Thursdays, only if you want though," he explained and she thought about it and nodded. "Sure, why not?"

"Okay, so now that that's planned, when should we start?" he asked and saw that the other team members were already entering the gym.

Astrid smiled. "Tomorrow before practice."

"Wait, w-what?" he stuttered.

"I said, tomorrow before practice. Unless you're busy?" Hiccup shook his head and smiled. "Tomorrow's fine." She gave him that famous crooked smile of hers before she turned around and walked over to her teammates. Hiccup frowned wondering how they went from biting at each other's necks to making plans with each other.

It was just weird.

It was around four when practice ended and Hiccup was currently picking up the volleyballs that were scattered around the gym. Astrid was walking into the gym after showering and changing into her normal clothes in the locker rooms. She saw Hiccup picking up the volleyballs and decided to help him, much to his relief.

"Thanks," he said when they finished picking up the balls. "It gets kind of tiring in all honesty."

She chuckled. "Seems like it."

Before Hiccup could say something back, he heard Gobber yelling at him as he entered the gym. "Hiccup! Yer father wants you to call him when you get home!"

"Why?" he asked with a confused look. Ever since Hiccup had lost his foot, Stoick had been more distant from him and they rarely talked when they were home. It was only when Hiccup had asked to move out that they talked and the first time the man had taken his time to make the place perfect for his son. But after that, Hiccup couldn't remember a single time his father actually had a real conversation with him. The tension between the two was a small part of the reason Hiccup wanted to move out, and Stoick had known that or at least guessed. Yet he didn't actually know the main reason why, nor did anyone close to him.

And Hiccup wanted nothing more but to push that reason into the deepest and darkest part of his mind.

"...iccup? Hiccup? Hiccup!" he heard Gobber yell again, snapping him out of his thoughts. "What? Yeah?"

"Were you even listening to what I was sayin'?" the man asked annoyed. Hiccup shook his head and apologized and Gobber rolled his eyes. "I was sayin' that he just told me to tell you to call him when you get home. That's it."

Hiccup sighed and nodded. "Okay, I will." Gobber nodded and walked away.

Astrid frowned. "What was that all about?"

"It's nothing, really. My dad probably just wants to boast about new projects and such to me." Again, it was a lie. Stoick probably just wanted to know when he had to pay the rent for Hiccup's apartment or the phone bill.

"What do you mean new projects?" she asked as she walked over to get her bags. "Um, he kind of has a high position at his job," he said hesitantly.

"Oh, what's his position?"

Hiccup hesitated again and rubbed the back of his neck in that nervous tick of his. "He's...um, the CEO of Berk's Industry."

Astrid's sapphire eyes doubled in size. "The CEO of Berk's Industry?! Wait..." she paused and held out a finger at him. "Is your dad's nickname Stoick the Vast?" Hiccup nodded and she ran a hand through her hair. "Geez, wow. Okay, so you're basically one of the richest families in Berk."

"If you put it that way, then I guess so," he mumbled and she raised her eyebrows. "Wow, you're like really rich, but I would have expected you to act more like it. You know, because you're rich and all."

Hiccup sighed and shook his head. "No, actually. I get what you're saying, but whether you believe it or not, I'm not that type of person. Technically, I'm the opposite and I'd rather not let people know about the money I have."

"Why not?"

"Because then people are going to think it's a free invite to ask me to get them stuff, take them out, and all that being a fake friend to get what they want. If there's one thing you should know about me, it's that I'm not easy to get through or even be friends with right away. You really have to prove to me that you can be a real friend and not just some fake."

"So you have standards?" she asked as she walked over to the net and began to take it down. Hiccup shrugged. "You could say that." Astrid nodded. "How many real friends do you have then?" When Hiccup didn't answer, Astrid turned to look at him playing with the hem of his shirt. "Hiccup?"

"In all honesty, I don't exactly have a real friend," he admitted softly. "It's not that I don't socialize, well, maybe, but it's mostly because no one's ever really tried to get to know me or be my friend. I don't blame them, honestly. I don't let people in that easily and it would take a lifetime for me to ever share things with someone. Or even find someone who's willing to listen."

For the first time since she had known him, Astrid didn't see the sarcastic asshole that irritated her all the time. This time, she saw someone who needed a friend, someone who was...alone. Part of her wanted to go out and actually hug him and tell him that she would be his friend, but there was something that was stopping her. She couldn't pinpoint what it was, but there was something that wouldn't allow her to say the words she wanted to or even move towards him. It wasn't a thought, but more of an uneasy feeling–she was afraid, and yet she didn't know why.

Instead, she found herself giving him a sad look and saying, "I'm sorry, Hiccup."

The green-eyed boy waved it off. "It's fine really, I have Toothless and Sharpshot by my side."

"Who's Toothless and Sharpshot?" she asked, smiling a little at the names. Hiccup chuckled. "They're my pets, or basically my non-human best friends."

Astrid gave him a curious look. "What's with the names?"

He grinned. "I'll explain that another day, Milady."

And for the first time again that day, she found herself not minding the nickname.

Hiccup walked into his apartment to be greeted by Toothless, who stood on his single hind leg and placed his massive paws on Hiccup's shoulders to lick his face. He still couldn't believe that Toothless towered over him by three inches because of his gray wolf genetics. He laughed as Toothless licked his face before he hopped back down onto his three legs and followed Hiccup upstairs to his bedroom.

He placed his backpack at the foot of his bed and went to go change into some comfortable clothes. When he came back, he suddenly remembered that he had to call Stoick. He took his phone out of the smaller pocket of his backpack and quickly dialed his father's numbers and waited for him to pick up. After three rings, he heard Stoick's deep voice at the other end.

"Hello?"

"Uh, hey dad. Gobber told me to call you?" Hiccup said in an unsure tone.

"Ah, yes. Um, I was meaning to discuss something with you son."

"Discuss what?" he asked, now suddenly interested.

"So, I think you understand the importance of the company and my position, correct?"

"Yeah?" he drawled out.

"Well, I'm not going to be the CEO for the rest of my life," he heard Stoick chuckle a bit. "So, I was going to get you into training and getting to know the company more so that when you're of age, you'll take over my position for me."

Hiccup widened his eyes and paled. "W-What? Dad, look. I appreciate the offer, but being the CEO of Berk's Industry isn't for me."

He heard Stoick sigh over the phone. "Hiccup, you need to understand just how important this is. You need to be prepared to take my position when you're ready–"

"What about the things I want to do later on in life?" he snapped.

"What other things?"

"Things I want to do. I don't want to take your place as the CEO of the industry. Maybe I have other plans for myself, have you ever thought about that?"

There was a long silence until his father spoke again. "In all honesty, no. It just never really occurred to me on what you can do...now. You know, since..."

Hiccup frowned and felt his blood boil with anger. "So basically you're saying that you never thought about what I wanted to do, just because I lost my foot? What, because I lost all those scholarships and now you have to spend your money on me going to college? Because apparently, everything I do has to involve my fucking foot?"

"No, Hiccup, that's not what I was saying–"

"No, that was exactly what you were saying."

"Son, stop. I'm just simply saying that the things you were best at did, in fact, involve your foot."

The green-eyed boy faltered a bit and he closed his eyes for a moment before he spoke, but he suddenly found it hard to breathe. "Well, you know what? I'm sorry for not being able to prevent the incident that made me lose my foot. I'm sorry for not being able to do sports. And I'm sorry for being such a big disappointment in your life."

"Hiccup, no, that's not–" Stoick began quickly, realizing what he had just said, but Hiccup cut him off.

"I'll talk to you some other time, bye," and with that, he ended the call and chucked his phone onto his bed. He sat down at the edge of his bed and put his head in his hands as he tried to even out his breathing. But his breathing didn't even out and he felt himself breathing in quick short breaths as he clamped his eyes shut. When he opened them, all he saw was a hospital bed and shadowy figures coming towards him. He watched as their hands reached out and pinned him down on the bed, grabbing him everywhere and gripping his left stump painfully. He felt his mind going in and out of focus from reality to imagination and he suddenly felt a cold sweat all over and he could have sworn his vision was becoming blurry. He widened his eyes when he began to gasp for air, his hand flying to his chest as he tumbled off the bed and onto the ground, curling himself up into a ball.

Memories and words were all that took the trigger his anxiety attacks, everything coming back to him in one big wave. He didn't know what to feel or what to say, all he knew was that everything led back to losing his leg and that other...thing. He tried to hold his breath, but it didn't work and he found himself blinking back tears that had begun clouding his vision. He began to lose all sense of his surroundings, not even noticing Toothless coming over to aid him.

Toothless whimpered as he nudged his owner with his nose and prodded him with his paw. He noticed the change in Hiccup's breathing and ran over when he saw his hand flying to his chest as he fell onto the ground. Understanding, the mixed-breed ran downstairs and grabbed one of his loud squeaky toys in the form of a hedgehog and ran back upstairs, but not before letting Sharpshot hop on his back. He ran over to Hiccup and placed the squeaky toy in front of him. Sharpshot moved so that he was on Toothless's head and kept his balance as the dog used his massive paw to press down on the toy, emitting a loud squeak. Hiccup jumped when he heard the loud noise, not realizing that he had held his breath when he heard it. He looked down at the hedgehog toy before he looked around him and finally let out his breath. After his breathing evened out after a few moments, he looked up and saw Toothless and Sharpshot's heads tilted to the left as they looked at him. Sharpshot squeaked from the top of Toothless's head and Hiccup breathed a sigh of relief.

He sat up and gently rubbed Toothless's head and then Sharpshot's as he smiled. "Thanks you guys." Toothless barked in response, startling the rat as he hopped onto Hiccup's shoulder. Hiccup laughed softly and scratched the little guy's head. "How you managed to know what to do is beyond my mind, but it worked," he said and looked at both animals.

Toothless tilted his head again and placed his massive paw on Hiccup's knee. The green-eyed teen smiled at him before he began to laugh when Sharpshot started to climb all over his face, his little nails scratching softly against his face. Toothless pushed Hiccup down onto the floor and plopped his head down on his chest, causing him to groan at the massive dog's weight. Hiccup watched as the dog's soft brown eyes slowly began to close, and he felt Sharpshot making his forehead a bed as he walked in tiny circles and curled up in his spot, putting his head in Hiccup's auburn locks.

Hiccup smiled to himself, knowing that as long as he had Toothless and Sharpshot with him, he wouldn't need anyone else to make him happy.

Astrid walked into her house, exhausted from practice. She walked up the stairs to her bedroom and set down her bags before she flopped down onto her bed and looked up at the ceiling. She felt her phone vibrate and when she checked she saw that it was a text from Scott.

Scott: Hey babe I just moved into my parents basement. U should come by sometime and check it out(;

She rolled her eyes and didn't respond, instead tossing her phone to the side. Her eyes wandered back up to the ceiling and she found herself thinking about the green-eyed boy. Astrid frowned, but she couldn't help but keep thinking about him. She didn't know what it was, but something about him just caught her attention.

Was it his skills in sports? His intelligence? Or his extremely good looks?

She widened her eyes. Did she really find Hiccup attractive? She shook her head to get the thought away because she had a boyfriend, maybe not the best, but she wasn't like that. Yet, she couldn't help but let her mind wander back to today in the gym when he had opened up to her, just a bit. And also when he unintentionally showed off his lean body to her without even knowing it.

But the way her heart felt when he had admitted that he didn't really have anyone to call a friend, as if someone had been gripping it, made her question something. Should she be his friend or at least try to? She wanted to try as much as she denied it to herself, but there was something that was stopping her. She knew there was something about him that she was afraid of, but she couldn't figure out what. It was a new feeling to her–being afraid wasn't something Astrid Hofferson felt. She was fearless, everyone knew that nothing or no one could make her afraid.

But Hiccup was a different story, and she didn't know why.

Astrid then remembered that he would be training her with basketball the next day and the following weeks to come until basketball season rolled around, and suddenly, she felt herself genuinely smile at the thought. Not because she would be getting better at basketball, but because Hiccup was going to be the one training her. He had offered to train her without her even asking to and he was dedicating the time to make her a better player because he wanted to.

And that made her smile grow even more.

A/N: Da-da-da, training's here. Sounds like I should have titled this story How To Train Your Basketball Player, right? Frankly, that was one of my options as the title before I posted this story. But, the title I chose will fit the story more once I get things running again (Get it? Get it? No, okay...). Anyways, as you can see, Hiccstrid is pretty bipolar when it comes to the two of them, but it'll get better eventually. So some things went down here with Hiccup giving Astrid a view into a small portion of his life, Stoick causing Hiccup to have an anxiety attack, Toothless and Sharpshot saving him, and Astrid having a slight change in attitude.

Just a note: Hiccup, Astrid, and the gang are currently sixteen and while they look the same from the first movie at that age, I'm making them all look the way the did in RTTE/HTTYD2. They're all currently Juniors, but I'm just making them all hit puberty earlier than in the franchise, hahaha.

I'm extremely surprised by the amount of views, follows, favorites, and reviews this story has so far with only three (now four) chapters up. Thank you guys again for your support on this story, it means a lot.

Okay, so I'm thinking of doing this thing where after every chapter, you guys guess or come up with theories on what's going to happen next or something that I point out in my author's note. You can leave them in the reviews or even PM me about them. This isn't a contest or anything, it's mostly for fun and to see how creative you guys can get, and I'd love to see what you guys think. So, let's hit off the guesses and theories with the last part of the chapter:

What is it about Hiccup that you think makes Astrid afraid of him or afraid of becoming his friend?