I hope the story's enjoyable so far. I'm trying my best to make sure the text gibberish doesn't occur again.

I can't promise I'll be as consistent as I've been over the last week. Sometimes I have trouble deciding where to take this story.

Chapter 3: What happens to me, happens to you.

Open Water/Found Shipwreck

"Camicazi?!

Hiccup recognized his friend from the Bog-Burglar tribe. It was a mostly female tribe that was pretty remote out to the West of Berk. The few times Hiccup had been there with Stoick, he made friends with the girl. Apparently Hiccup being different from most Vikings gained him some points with her. Lucky for him.

The Bogs were pretty unique themselves and seeing as how Stoick and Cami's mother, Chieftess Bertha, didn't get along for other reasons. it wasn't that hard to imagine the two heirs had a lot to talk about. Although, they hadn't seen each other for a few years, Hiccup's nasal voice and Cami's dirty blond hair put any confusion to rest.

"What in the name of Thor is going on here, Hiccup?!", the blond shouted.

Hiccup responded, "Well, I'm guessing some of your fleet was attacked and you are stranded here…"

"NOT A REAL QUESTION!", she screamed. Toothless was getting more edgy with the shouting. "And I was talking about you riding that dragon! Is that a Night Fury by the way?"

He nodded. "Yeah, why? Oh, right" Hiccup chuckled, realizing he was so used to Toothless by now, he often forgets this isn't a typical site to other Vikings.

"How? I mean… I heard about you getting banished over a dragon, but this is something I could never see coming. Wait, who is SHE?" Pointing at Heather who was trying to keep Toothless at ease.

"SHE is Heather," she responded, "and could you calm down? I'd rather not be thrown off an irritated dragon out here."

"Well, excuse me if I'm just a little flustered by all this!"

"Cami," looking back towards a sympathetic Hiccup. "Are you alright?"

That seemed to calm things down. "More or less, I suppose." She finally smiled.

Heather finally chimed in again. "I'm glad we all know or remember each other now, but would you like a ride out of here, Miss? The tide could take these rocks any minute."

"I would actually. All these boats are wrecked though. How are we supposed to…?" Hiccup motioned to his Night Fury. "Oh now hang on," said Cami, I like excitement as much as the next young Viking, but…"

Hiccup interrupted, "Great. Then you'll love this."

"Hiccup, what in the world have you been doing the last few years? I mean…"

"Cami, I'll answer whatever questions you want, but we should get you back home. Your mother could be worried." She knew he was right, of course, and finally conceded.

"Okay. But I would suggest we land on the heavily wooded area. My tribe sees a black dragon headed for them, anything could happen," Cami pointed out. "We go in the back way. I know all the shortcuts and hideouts, remember?"

"Of course. That was the only fun I had at the last Chieftain meeting Dad dragged me to." They both laughed at that and Hiccup took Cami's hand to Toothless. He growled as usual but he was getting more used to more people by now.

"This is really weird." Cami groaned.

"Yeah story of my life." Hiccup responded. "Just hold your hand there and let him come to you." Toothless does and Cami finally exhales. Toothless took an easy liking to this girl. Maybe he sensed her pain, like Heather's, or maybe he saw that Hiccup knew she was okay.

"It's a lot, I know." Heather said to her. "But it seems to follow Hiccup Haddock everywhere."

She and Cami laughed. "Oh I know better than most, girl. This guy's a surprise a minute. It keeps you entertained."

Hiccup rolled his eyes and groaned. "Okay, okay. Let's all laugh about me on solid ground. Climb up and hold onto Heather, Cami. Let's go, bud."

The three then flew to get Cami home, praying they would find some peace or at least some answers to their most pressing dilemmas. Hiccup imagined the Bog Burglar tribe wasn't very open minded about dragons either, but hopefully they were more so than his father. He couldn't keep moving like this and had to find a place to make base. He didn't feel safe bringing Toothless back to Berk. And it wasn't fair to Heather either.

Berk/6 months after Hiccup is sent to Outcast Island

The children were sitting around quietly eating lunch. Nobody really knew what to say as they all had different things on their mind. The chief's son, the rising star in class, had been banished for allegedly taking care of a Night Fury. There was little proof besides that note and tracks in the cove but Hiccup didn't actually deny it either.

Stoick had brought his best hunters into the forest with him for days allowing little rest but they found nothing. Some came back injured, in fact, falling into the burrows of a Whispering Death. They narrowly missed being taken by it. People claimed the dragon, if there was one had just flown away, sensing the danger approaching. What could they think? Hiccup never mentioned the broken tail fin and they couldn't comprehend a dragon that would stay there out of loyalty. It was a feral creature to the Hooligan tribe, not a pet.

"So what exactly are we supposed to do about training now?", Snotlout asked.

"I don't think that's the most pressing matter here." said Fishlegs. "We all know how Alvin and the Outcasts feel about the Hooligan tribe. Now he has one to abuse at his own leisure and it's the son of the chief! Odin only knows what's happened to him there" Fish didn't like openly admitting it, mostly because he hated being a target of bullies, but he did care about Hiccup, even though they barely spoke. Hiccup was always nice to him and even shared new information they discovered about dragons or something on Berk once in a while.

Snotlout basically shrugged. "Yeah well, Hiccup should've known better. Protecting a dragon? Come on!" Truth is, Snotlout did care about his cousin, but he hated looking foolish in front of everyone, even though it was pretty apparent, along with his lack of smarts, every time real trouble started, he would panic. He just always counted on Hiccup messing up more or getting blamed. And it usually turned out that way.

Tuffnut interjected. "Oh NOW you believe the story? Stoick doesn't even know who left that note. He was probably sore that he couldn't find the dragon nest again and took it out on Hiccup out of habit."

Fish rebutted saying, "So he sends his son to an island ruled by his oldest rival? Really?"

Ruffnut added, "Yeah and where's the Night Fury anyway? They still haven't found it! For all we know, this was an excuse to get rid of Hiccup."

"That's pretty cold though", added Tuff. "I mean we wreck stuff all the time and our parents never had us banished."

A shrill and bitter voice came from behind them and said, "Probably because you and your sister make so much destruction everywhere you go, nobody will take you." They cringed to the familiar sound, turned and saw it was Astrid Hofferson. She spent the majority of her day tossing her axe into the trees even more so than usual, typically in frustration, because it's not like she needed practice with it anymore. She couldn't get any better. Truth is the gang was having a harder time than usual around Astrid. I mean the girl was always rigid and never really smiled. She'd been this way for years, but lately she seemed to have dragon fire in her eyes. The gang chalked it up to training being cancelled until they found the Night Fury on Berk. It was getting more fruitless by the day though, because it was wasting weaponry and the raids could happen any day without warning.

"Awwww. Thanks, Astrid." Ruffnut tried her luck and made a comment in jest because chaos was what she and her brother lived to cause. Big mistake.

Astrid turned and screamed, "Oh, Thor, THAT WASN'T A COMPLIMENT!" The entire table nearly fell with the gang as they shook from Astrid's yelling.

"Babe, come on, they always…", Snotlout began but then stopped with a sharp jab to the nose from the angry blond. He held his face for dear life as blood poured out and he looked up to see the red in Astrid's eyes.

"I TOLD YOU TO STOP CALLING ME THAT! DO IT AGAIN, AND YOUR HEAD COMES OFF!" Astrid was clearly in no mood for the Jorgenson "charm", the Thorston antics, and Fishlegs, well, he knew enough to keep quiet. "You have anything to say, Ingerman?" She turned, with the glare that may kill a Monstrous Nightmare, at the large boy as he shook his head from behind the table. "Good!"

'What is wrong with everyone around here?' Astrid was thinking.

They all waited until she went for food and sat far from anyone else before resuming conversation. "What did we do wrong?" asked Ruffnut.

Tuffnut responded with, "Well, we tipped over the Yaks on the ranch again, we painted all of Sven's sheep blue, we took Fishlegs' poems and posted them all over Berk, filled Snot's vest with the poison oak,…"

Snotlout and Fish both screamed "WHAT?!"

Ruffnut, "I meant what did we do to Miss Personality over there, stupid?" gesturing to Astrid, obviously.

Tuffnut, "That's Astrid over there, and her last name is Hofferson. And you call me stupid. HA!"

Ruff rolled her eyes and smacked the back of his head, which landed him into his plate. She was totally serious though. Astrid's fury had boiled over whenever someone even stepped too close. She frightened kids, her parents were constantly at odds with her, and she had worn her favorite axe to the very edge throwing it at whatever she felt deserved hitting. She had dropped it off at the forge earlier and hoped to get it the next day. Nobody could really figure out what the problem with her was lately. Of course, it didn't help that she refused any kind of conversation and people were too afraid to approach. Astrid was doing her best to avoid the issue because even she didn't want to discover what the problem is. Luckily she held no authority over anyone, unlike the other less than pleasant resident of Berk.

Stoick hadn't been in a very good mood as of late, either. I mean his name alone gave that impression but he was working people to death to find a dragon he couldn't even confirm was there. He ordered projects on the island that were distracting people from their actual duties, he changed his mind about how they were set up every half a day, not to mention he had twice as many complaints from residents who came to the Great Hall where they were supposed to air grievances. He was so fed up with it, he cancelled them and claimed he needed strategies for dragon hunting.

"Eh, Stoick?" He heard a familiar voice outside his door.

"Yes, Gobber?" Stoick groaned.

"I need some more help in the forge. They're all complaining to me about their weapons. The next raid could happen any day and the kill ring isn't exactly up to date."

"So get some of the young ones to fix the ring. I need the adults to collect food and build the boats." Stoick said with a grunt.

"That reminds me. When do ye want to start up training again for the kids once the ring is finished? The young-ins are gettin' antsy if I'm not wrong. I don't know if it's escaped yer notice, but Miss Hofferson is scarin' people lately. She checks in on her axe every hour and I'm runnin' out of excuses."

Stoick relented on the subject of unruly children. He had plenty of time. "I'll talk to Gunner and Hilda and see what they are going to do about their girl." Gobber knew Stoick would put that off as long as possible, though. "What is with everyone's children around here?"

Gobber sighed. 'I'm sure that will work as effectively as last time', he thought. "Alright, appreciate it," He said, feigning relief. Gobber didn't dare bring up Hiccup in this house, although he knew it was the reason for the delays at the forge. Gobber had been working with the other kids to fix the ring with little success. Snotlout had no attention span for it and was busy trying to make poses and give lousy one-liners to Astrid AGAIN, Fishlegs did his best but he had to do most of the cleaning, not building, why? Because the Thorston Twins would start something but then destroy it after getting into arguments about who had a better construction plan. They were both wrong. As for Astrid, she did most of the work but you could tell her heart wasn't in it and her short temper with the rest didn't help. Gobber missed Hiccup when it came to this type of thing. I mean the boy's inventions had caused some messes, but he was a hard worker and always kept trying his best. The good far outweighed the bad when it came to building things.

That wasn't the only problem though. The five dragons in the kill ring were unusually agitated as of late. They would screech in their cages for hours, make tiny fires, bang against the bars, or just wail like they were in pain from all of it. And they did it all hours of the day, sun or moon. Nothing appeased them, not extra food, not even abuse. They wanted out. It was if they sensed something was wrong, but there was no way to know. And Stoick didn't care much anyway. Dragons had no rights there.

Needless to say, Berk was in need of some good news, sadly they weren't getting any for a while.

Berk/Month 10 of Hiccup's banishment

It had been a quiet day on Berk and it was enjoyable, but what many didn't realize is sometimes it it is TOO quiet.

The Hooligans were awoken by alarms and night guards bellowing, "DRAGON RAID".

Everyone awoke and moved to their posts. Herd guarding, fire safety. and dragon killing. However something was unusual here. People could hear the shots but the dragons were nowhere near the homes or the fields where the livestock and rations were kept. Every dragon there was firing shots into the kill ring where the others were locked up. To say it was unusual was an understatement. The number of dragons was small as well. What was going on here? Were they confused or responding to the cries of the caged dragons? Stoick and his tribesmen had no time for questions they immediately went to the ring, which was half destroyed already, and the dragons in the sky could not be seen by the villagers, but the shots were extremely precise. Fire, sound waves, barbs, and lava fell from the sky and Stoick had no idea what was happening. The attacks were having no effect. Why were they…?

All of a sudden, Stoick heard loud roars and explosions in the village. Other dragons had moved to the populated areas now. They took livestock, large portions of fish, and set fires in precise places. The store house and the forge. Gobber had run in panic and people couldn't get their weapons fixed, which was bad enough because there weren't many to start with due to lack of help. They had to wait out the storm now. The dragons had the upper hand and had actually drawn the strongest fighters away from the most important areas by attacking the kill ring.

The dragons left by the time Stoick and his forces returned from the ring. The children were putting out the remaining fires. By the time the smoke cleared, there were no serious injuries but over half the village's rations were gone and all the boats were destroyed. The kill ring was in ruins and the already depleted forge had been chewed apart. Stoick had no words for this. This entire thing seemed coordinated, as if an army had attempted an invasion, but it was dragons, not people.

After they assesses the situation and all the charred parts of the building had fallen, everyone looked to Stoick, who had no words for such an attack. He and the village couldn't blame this on Hiccup. He was a thousand miles away. Random pleas from villagers were piling on as Stoick then yelled them to be quiet. "Alright, alright! Enough"

"Gobber, you and the children gather what's left of the weaponry and store it in the hall." He ordered. "Sven, Mulch, take the rest of the rations and pile them there too to get an official count on both. I'll get word out to Oswald, Bertha, and Mogadon and see if they can spare any rations and spare hands for help."

The work had begun and the children were cleaning out what was left of the forge. There was a back door to it. "Gobber, what's this back here?", asked Astrid.

"That's Hiccup's work space. He went back there a lot to plan for the next shipment and just to draw when his work was finished", Gobber responded.

Hiccup wasn't around so they didn't see the harm of looking around; not like they respected privacy anyway. Astrid and company didn't expect to see half of what they found. Schematics for the weapons the tribe had, the water suppression system they used for the Hall and the store house, sketches of areas around Berk Hiccup had drawn from memory. What was most peculiar was a drawing of a saddle, but what for, they wondered.

Astrid saw something on the desk that gave her mixed feelings. It was a cloth on the table with a note that read "Astrid's birthday". What was inside the cloth was a new axe. The detail was incredible. It was sharpened to perfection and had the emblem of Berk on one side and a shield maiden crest on the other. It had a sapphire jewel on the back tip of it. Anything like this took at least a couple weeks of work.

Her birthday had been last month, but since Hiccup was gone and I guess he kept this secret along with a lot of other things, it was never given to her. She was speechless by this, took the axe with her, and confronted Gobber.

"What is this doing back there, Gobber? Did you tell him to make this for my birthday?" Astrid wanted answers and fast.

"Oh, that's what he was doing after hours in here. No, Astrid, he never told me about that. Judging from the look of it, he finished it weeks before he left and kept it hidden back there. Perfect design, too. I'm jealous." Gobber knew Hiccup's attention to detail and couldn't imagine how this axe could look any better. It suited the girl perfectly. "If I'd known, I would've brought it to you like I did the last one he made…ooh" Gobber let that slip out. Hiccup made it a point not to share who made what with the village. He feared mockery and rejection in everything to what his name was attached. After a lifetime of experience, who could blame him?

"What's that mean?" Astrid wondered. "You're saying Hiccup made my last axe too?"

Gobber saw no point in hiding it now. "Yes, lass. He also made the fire suppression system over the storage house and Great Hall." She and the other young ones didn't believe what they heard. The boy who could barely lift anything invented most of their hazard equipment. Suddenly, Astrid couldn't look at anyone and ran home, She dreaded being seen with tears in her eyes and tried to cover it with anger. "Well, everyone's good at something I guess. Better late than never. Out of my way!" The front she put on fooled Gobber, but the kids looked upset for her. Stoick caught sight of her running home with a weapon and asked Gobber what was going on?

"She went into Hiccup's work area and found his birthday gift to her" Gobber replied.

Stoick's stale response to this was. "Figures. Boy was always daydreaming." This didn't surprise Gobber at all. Deep down, Stoick felt bad about everything but his pride wouldn't allow it to show. He decided to assess what was left of the wreckage and then head to the Hofferson home later.

Somewhere up North/Few hours later

A young girl climbed off the back of a four-winged dragon in an icy fortress and patted it on the head. "Thanks, Cloudjumper. You can go back to sleep" She was followed closely by a small group of dragons that had stayed high above the clouds of Berk earlier. Unfortunately, there was a taller woman waiting for her, with arms crossed, knowing almost immediately what happened.

"Young lady!" said the woman.

"Please don't, Mom. I'm too tired." responded the girl.

"I'm not surprised, Revna. Flying all night to a land of dragon slayers attempting to free other dragons. You were lucky to save the Night Fury AND not got caught in that lightning storm last time you took it out", yelled her mother.

"So sorry. I had to get it off that island. It was helpless there. And the poor thing kept screaming to get out to that other island. He knew the boy needed help and would've risked dying to get to him if I didn't help."

"I know why, dear, and I admire your bravery, okay? But you can't keep exposing yourself. It will catch up to you eventually and could risk everything here." said the woman.

"The boy is like us, Mom. I consider it worth the risk, especially since he's my brother!"

The story will stay on Berk for a while. I'll jump back to Hiccup and company eventually.

Any questions let me know