I have returned! After having the Macintosh taken from me, I have emerged triumphant with another laptop that is slower than molasses in January . . . Yay! The last chapter was more like a rest period between action, this chapter I am confident that there will be action and you will enjoy! If you end up not enjoying it, please review or message me telling me of your concerns and complaints. If you do enjoy it, you already know what to do. Thank you. Glory to Verbatim!

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Not httyd, not even the chair I sit on while writing this!

Four days, four long days and Toothless didn't seem to be recovering. Apparently Karma had messed him up worst than Hiccup had originally diagnosed; well, technically it was the roof caving in that had hurt Toothless, not Karma himself, but he was the one that had caused Toothless to roll around up on the rafters. Upon further speculation, Toothless had sprained one wing and cracked the other, dislocated one of his two fins below the wings, and had assorted bruises riddled beneath his scales. All in all: he was miserable, laying in front of the hearth at the Haddock home trying to stay still to keep from hurting himself further. Hiccup's poor fingernails had been chewed raw with worry, for Toothless, for Karma, for his wife Astrid because she had fallen out of her wheelchair again, for everything that wasn't right in his understanding.

Hiccup had abandoned his drinking with Gobber just to sit at home with Toothless, and stew around in his heart and mind for answers. He patted Toothless on his shoulder, careful not to touch any of his injuries, and received an appreciative groan from his dragon. It was getting to be lunch time; he stood up and walked to his Viking style kitchen, which consisted of exactly two pots a frying pan and a shelf of seasonings ordered by no order at all. He pulled a couple of fish from their fish barrel and flopped them into the frying pan, walked over to the hearth and expertly placed the skillet on the coals.

"You gonna just sit here all day?" Astrid said, wheeling down the ramp that had replaced the stairs. Her blond hair a little messy from sleeping, she was starting to look unhealthily skinny again. She knew what this was about, and wanted nothing more than to tell her over-thoughtful husband to buck up! It was just a fall, it didn't hurt because she couldn't feel in her legs anyway; Hiccup was just worrying tirelessly. What he should be putting his mind to is to help with the young village vikings in their dragon training! He had skipped out on it four times!

"Look at me Hiccup, I'm here, I'm fine, Toothless is not going to disappear while your gone-" Astrid took a deep breath, "SO GET OUT AND DO SOMETHING USEFUL!"

That seemed to do the trick of breaking his thoughtful stupor, jolting him as he pushed the frying fishes around in the pan. He looked up at her, she looked down at him; his shoulders drooped as her jaw tightened. His eyes were baggy with fatigue, hers were burning with fierce annoyance. She rolled down to the first floor and rolled next to Hiccup at the hearth.

"How can I teach when I'm distracted?" Hiccup asked, to Astrid it seemed more like whining.

"Think about it, you kept it in real well when you were a kid." Astrid retorted, her undertone screamed "condescending!".

"I'm worrie-" Hiccup started before being viciously cut off.

"Then let it worry, but stop sticking around here feelin' sorry for yourself, and get out there and train some kids!" Astrid hollered before softening her tone and leaning over to give Hiccup a hug "thats for caring about him," she then slammed her fist into his gut with rock shattering force, he crumpled with the blow "and thats for sittin' here like a pansy!"

Hiccup stood up slowly, and silently hobbled out of the house on his squeaky leg. Astrid turned to the fire and flipped the fish in their pan, smiling at her triumph. She could have these little joys now and then; falling off of Toothless hadn't completely disabled her. The clouds had been really beautiful before she hit the ground . . .

(switch)

Gobber sat at his forge, hammering away a broken hay scythe; the first smith work he'd done in ages. As he doused the hot tool in a bucket of water he looked at its long handle and remembered something. That's what was botherin' me, I forgot to put a fishin' pole in with his supplies. Oops, well that's too bad.

(scene change)

It had gone on for the past few days now: the black thing would waddle into my clearing, give me a fish and make me eat the whole thing raw! It didn't even let me light a fire! Not that I could anymore anyway, my little feud with the gods had left me without the square of steel to light anythin'. I'd tried to stand today, my whole body had given out the second it rose from the earth. What ticked me off most of all was not that I was hurtin', but that I was relying on that dragon to bring me my meals. I should be able to take care of myself, dangit!

I'd shooed the thing off a couple of times, but it would never truly leave! It'd just come back with another fish, couldn't it tell that I was getting sick from the raw meat? Whatever, once I'm feeling better I'll get my own fish and cook it to my friggin heart's content; I'd started on a fishing pole, grinding a strong branch against a rock until it was the desired shape and thickness. Twine had become a problem until I found a loose strand in the rope I had been supplied with. Now the only thing was to wait until I was finished healing, there couldn't be more than a few days left till I could stand upright.

(two days later)

Glint came earlier than usual this morning, sporting two fat trout. Yeah, I gave him a name, "it" was just too hard to keep track of; I named him after the shining twinkle that my steel striker made when he had me throw it away. I was determined to find another means of lighting a fire if it killed me!

"You'd better be eating one of those, 'cause I can't take more than one of your slobbery mouthfuls." I joked at him, he just gave me the look of "yeah right, like I'm giving both to you". I just chuckled to myself as he dropped the floppy package into my lap, I picked it up and took a bite without even cleaning it off. It was getting easier to down the iffy meals Glint kept bringing me but I truly missed a cooked meal even if it was fish.

Today I was going to do it, I was going to walk out of this dreary clearing and get a blasted fish of my own. I grabbed onto my tree shelter for a quick support and hoisted myself up onto my legs; they wobbled for the longest time before something seemed to lock in place. I took a couple of steps satisfied that I didn't so much as teeter in doing so, Glint eyed me interestedly for a few seconds before snapping up the remains of his meal. I picked up my fishing pole from its hiding place in my tiny shelter, and started hobbling to the beach. I found a rock big enough to sit on and sat, uncoiled a ton of line from the makeshift spool on my pole, and cast my line out into the oncoming tide of the sea. I had baited the hook with fish guts from my leftovers, and already felt a tug on my line.

Two successful casts later, I heard paw-steps behind me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Glint staring at me in wonder before stomping off. A few seconds later, I heard a resounding snap and more pawing. Hearing Glint breathing behind me, I cast my line while not looking his direction and, to my utter dismay and horror, the stalk of a young palm flew after it; he had chucked a tree at my line! The young tree-wood sunk, tangling itself with my line as it fell through the water's abyss; I could tell seeing as my brand new fishin' pole had caught a miraculously heavy catch and had flown out of my hands and was dragged into the depths below. Glint stared at me, smiling sheepishly, I glared at him, wishing I still had my knife.

-dusk

It was following me, I had screamed at him, stomped and called him useless, yet he was stalking me through the beech forest. I had doubled back, feinted, ran serpentine, even army crawled, but I would hear him rumbling through the trees ten yards behind me. I liked that fishing pole, now I have to go and take all day to make another one! He should have known that it would do that, why did he do it anyway? I thought harshly, then remembered what dad had said to me on one of my first pranks: "You knew he would do that! Why did you do it anyway?". The answer was natural: to make mom happy, to make her smile. What did Glint hope to accomplish by doing something as idiotic as that? Who was he trying to make smile? Obviously not me!

I saw a loose stone in my path and kicked it in frustration. I smiled as the hopeless little object skipped into the distance. I picked out another, slightly bigger, rock, and sent it hurtling with my foot. I practiced went around, kicking bigger and bigger rocks, wandering off the path in doing so. I was so absorbed in my rampage of rock punting, that I didn't think as I kicked the biggest rock around which was in fact not a rock at all; it was quite organic. In a split second I was on the ground, being held there by an enormous scaly paw that covered half my torso, and staring into the orange, slitted eyes of my good acquaintance the striped Timber Jack.

My eyes were riveted to its own; taking good note of the blue shiner that was blossoming out from its left eye, presumably the spot where I had smacked it in my blind escapade of rock whacking. I tried to squeeze my way out of its grasp, but what resistance can a cat receive from a mouse? A shriek arose from the woods behind me that steadily gained pitch and volume, I recognized it as the warning that a Night Fury gives before a blast of flame (Toothless had made that sound on one of my crueler jokes).

I was right: a blast of violet flame erupted across the clearing, exploding on the bridge of the Timber Jack's nose. Ow, that must have hurt! I sympathized slightly with the poor dragon, this must not have been his day-pardon, night. Its paw was off me, I was free! Two rolls and a sprawling attempt to get up later and I was up and running across the clearing, as short lived as it was. I turned to look back, the clearing was in a blaze, T.J. (timber jack) was flapping his wings madly, rapidly lifting off the ground in pursuit of Glint. Once it was a good forty feet up, another blue flame cracked at its left shoulder just below the wing, then another blast, and another! Before my eyes the huge dragon fell from the sky like a rock, and the noticeably smaller Glint had done it!

I whooped as T.J. hit the ground near me hard, scales flying with the impact. It was one such scale, a tiny little black thing, that shot past my face brushing my right eye in its flight. Or, at least, it only seemed to brush past. I blinked, startled by the little flash of black that passed my eye, and felt something warm trickling down my face. I'm crying? I thought as I pulled my hand up to wipe away the "tears".

Maybe it was the blood that had pooled in my hand the moment I went to dry my eyes, or maybe it was the thin black line surrounded by crimson that ran down my vision, I didn't know; the only thing I did know was that pain was slowly pushing its way into my head. It started as a slow heartbeat like throbbing, then little lances of searing ice stabbed their way through my inner defenses, and now it felt like someone was taking a bread knife and raking it up and down over and over!

Glint appeared next to me, as if by magic, looking at me like he was hysterically sputtering "ohmygosh ohmygosh omygosh, are you alright! what happened; how do fee! Does it hurt! WHAT SHOULD I DO!" as he dodged left and right, trying to find every detail. I was on my knees now, as if the pain were pulling me towards the ground below. Breathe, just breathe, I counseled myself, taking in wide gasps of the smoke riddled air.

"Oh gods-" I whimpered, covering my eye, trying to staunch the bleeding. The agony was mounting into the pounding of a spiked war hammer against my soft eye-flesh, and as such I did the only thing a boy my age would do: I screamed, or shrieked to be precise . . .

Dun dun dun . . . and this time I mean it!

You know how it only hurts once you've realized that you've been hurt? I tried to capture that as well as I could in this chapter. If you liked it, review, I love to hear it. Hate it? then tell me why. Please just give me feedback, it doesn't matter what kind to me, and who knows, your ideas may just get into the plot somehow. I check everyday, so don't worry about not being heard.

Karma: Dang you! You had my eye sliced!

Me: Don't complain!

Karma: Push the review button, I want this man to suffer!