AN: Hello everybody! 2,388 words this time FYI. It's a 'lil bit of a filler but we learn something new about our characters and poke at their futures. So enjoy!

BTW. If I owned HTTYD the third movie would be out and we'd see a lot more Hicstrid in the movies. (Did I spell that right? :P ah, well)

Chapter 6

}Discovering Discoverable Things{

~Hiccup~

Staring at the reeds in my hands as I wove them into the end of a basket. I tied off the end with a piece of coarsely woven twine. I stood stretching and examined my work. Not my best but it will do. I walked to the edge of the cave where a few rabbit skins were lying in the sun. I crouched by them and poked at them with a finger. I had rubbed the skins with various dried herbs earlier. I huffed noisily and turned on my heel. Toothless looked up at me wide-eyed, ear flaps alert. I gave him a half smile and rubbed his head fondly before sitting in a pile of wood shavings.

"Why can't I go flying?" I groused quietly.

"You know perfectly why Hiccup." Astrid commented offhandedly.

"Doesn't mean I like it." I retorted quietly.

"I heard that." Astrid replied. I heard a quick shick as she carved a point on the end of a straight branch.

"Then you should know I'm miserable."

She tossed a quick glare my way and I immediately clamped my jaw shut.

"I never picked you for a smart ass Hiccup." She said casually.

I bit back a retort and stood up in a huff.

"Where are you going?"

"Anywhere. I'm bored out of my mind! There's nothing for me to do or look at here! I need to get out and do something! Anything!" I paced back and forth in the cave, tearing at my hair.

"Hiccup!" Astrid snapped.

I rounded on her. "What? What Astrid?"

She looked taken aback momentarily before regaining her composure. "You're going crazy. Calm down. If you need to do something go for a quick flight out over the island." At my exasperated look she added, "No landing. Exploring only from the air. Got it?"

"You could've said that earlier and saved both of us the trouble." I muttered.

"Do you want me to change my mind?"

"I'm going!" I picked up Toothless' flight gear and set it up. With much difficulty, might I add, seeing as he was bouncing around like an excitable dog the entire time I was saddling him.

I mounted him and tossed a look back over to Stormfly and Astrid, before we took off.

Looking out over the island I finally took the time to appreciate its natural beauty from another angle. The mountain cave we had settled in faced out to the East, overlooking clear waters and beaches that sparkled silver in the moonlight. Rolling hills forested by various trees, Birch, Oak, Willows. All creating a soft blanket of green that stretched from the base of the mountain to tickle the belly of the beach. A twisting cerulean river found its way from atop the mountain spring down into the ocean.

To the West however was a rather flat area, very few trees inhabited the area and the few that did were very young, barely saplings. What looked like dead trees were scattered about the area, clumped together and overgrown with greenery. Instead of the gentle slope downwards towards the beach was a sheer drop off, granite cliffs over looking a sea of grey-blue water.

"Would you look at that bud." I leaned over the side to get a closer look at the stumps and noticed the glint of metal shining in the undergrowth. "What Astrid doesn't know won't hurt her. Let's have a look bud."

Toothless made a sound of agreement in the back of his throat and gently sculpted his wings to glide to earth. We landed with a muffled thump in a fairly clear area. Looking around the dead trees seem to look less like trees and more like wooden posts. Burnt wooden posts. I dismounted Toothless and looked around curiously. We wandered through the green searching for clues. I ran my fingers over a fallen post. They came away stained with black. I rubbed my ash stained fingers together and stood.

"What happened here?" I looked over at Toothless, sniffing the remains of what I assumed was a small house. He pawed at something on the ground and cooed at me. "What have you got there bud?" I wandered over and crouched by what he was pawing. Something glinted dully through the dirt and undergrowth. "Looks like...metal."

I kicked at it with my boot, pushing the dirt aside. Toothless got the idea and dug up the dirt around it. Eventually the metal was dislodged enough that I could claw it out of the earth.

"Well what do you know?" It was the blade of an axe, poorly made and the edge was dull, but the metal was of good quality despite its dirty sheen. "If there's metal here, and weapons at that. That must mean there are people here. Or were."

Glancing around I noticed a slightly rounded, lumpy, dome-like structure that I hadn't seen from the air.

"Let's check that out hey bud?" We wandered over and I brushed past a curtain of vines and found myself in a very surprising place. A forge.

We spent several hours wandering the wreckage, scavenging bits of metal, tools and various other knick knacks I found useful. We gathered them all in one place and I wove a coarse net out of vines to carry our find back to the cave. Toothless gathered the rough edges in his paws and we took off, gliding lazily through fat clouds stained pink and orange by the setting sun.

Sun set. Realisation hit me in the face like a bag of hammers. Astrid. Shit.

The cave slowly came into view, a column of smoke lazily rising into the sky. Two figures were looking up at us, one obviously Stormfly and the other most definitely Astrid. Astrid was tapping her foot impatiently, arms folded and a frown on her face. Stormfly squawked before turning and wandering back into the cave. We settled outside the cave with various clanks and bangs that made me cringe.

"Where have you been? And what is all this?" Astrid demanded.

"Um...exploring? You should've seen it Astrid! There was a whole village, well, was, it's just ashes now. There's a forge and it's still in really good condition and look at all the metal and tools we found! I can make you a new axe and a saddle for Stormfly and tools and-" I blabbered, Astrid stopping me with a raised hand.

"So you're saying there used to be a whole village here but now it's in ruins? I think I heard my parents talking about a village that was burned to the ground by Romans a few years ago. It's strange though, from the sounds of it, the Romans could've taken over the whole archipelago if they wanted but after here, they just disappeared." Astrid mused, walking back into the cave towards a pair of skewered rabbits roasting on the fire. "I haven't forgiven you for staying away for so long." At my look of satisfaction she added. "I still don't know how to fly Stormfly and I can only survive here for so long."

"Well, how about tomorrow we start your flying lessons? Just a few beginning exercises then maybe we could do something else afterwards." I suggested, sitting amongst the metal and fishing through it.

"Like what?"

"I dunno, go down to the village? A walk? Make something useful? Plan our journey from here?" I picked up a piece of light metal, thin, probably quite easily bent and shaped.

"What are you doing?" Astrid asked mildly amused, removing the rabbit from the spit and placing it on a hastily carved wooden plate.

"Thinking."

She half smiled and divided the rabbit into several pieces, placing some onto a second plate and pushing other bits to the side for later. She broke some bread and hard cheese, placing a little on each plate.

"I'm going to find out eventually." Astrid said nonchalantly and handed a plate to me. "Stormfly ate when we were out and I caught a few more rabbits," she nodded to several small dark shapes hanging from the ceiling in the back of the cave. "She caught a small deer. That's its skin there." She gestured to a skin I hadn't seen earlier. She looked sideways at me, an intelligent light glowing in her eyes. "You could make something from the leather."

I nodded thoughtfully. "We'll have to call in at a village or trading port sometime, I know while I might not grow you will and won't want to wear ill-fitting clothes. There could be useful things that we need and gods know we'll need it." I thought for a moment. "Especially if we're going to be pulling stunts like the other night."

Realisation splashed across Astrid's features and it was soon mirrored on my own face.

"Oh gods what if they saw us?" I exclaimed, "they could be hunting us right now and we wouldn't even know!"

Astrid set down her empty plate and frowned, deep in thought. "If we're going to be getting up close and personal to Vikings we're going to need to make sure we're not recognised."

I nodded catching her idea. "We'll need disguises. Hoods can be pulled or blown back. Helmets can fall off...masks! We'll use masks! I can make us both something that will hide our identities and protect us during flight and battle." I scrambled to my feet and rifled through my bag, disturbing Toothless from his sleep. "It's alright bud, go back to sleep." He grumbled moodily and turned away, hiding his face under a paw.

I sat across from Astrid again and flicked through my notebook for a blank page. Finding one I quickly set to work, drawing a basic shape before glancing around, looking for inspiration.

Astrid regarded me curiously before shaking her head and fiddling with a pale blue scale. I looked between Astrid and the scale. The scale and Stormfly. Stormfly and Astrid. An idea flickered to life and I sketched a few rough shapes. A mask, covering the whole face bar the mouth. The top of a birds sharp beak where the mouth would be and narrow spikes, crowning the back edge of the mask similar to a Deadly Nadder. A band would wrap around the head and hold it in place even upside down. I held the book at arms length and looked between Astrid and the mask.

Astrid frowned, "what are you doing?"

"Thinking." I added a few ideas for materials at the side, wood, metal, leather, dragon scales etc.

"Let me see." She crawled forward on her knees and plucked the book from my fingers. As she read I watched her eyes widen ever so slightly and her lips part. She caressed the page with her fingertips and then looked back up at me. "It's beautiful." She gently handed it back to me. "Draw something to match."

I took the book in my hands, shocked beyond belief. No one had ever said my drawings were beautiful before. Turning back to my book I sketched something else, the basic shape of a two handed axe, similar to Astrid's old one except the butt was embedded with a Nadder tail spike.

"Here." I handed the book back to Astrid and she took in the sight with awe, asking for more.

Shakily, I drew the basic form of a person, slowly filling out details. Tights, fur boots. A fur and leather skirt studded with spikes. Fur armbands. A waist length cloak. A short sleeved top and a hooded fur mantle, clasped at the front with metal. I jotted down notes for materials and colours, vaguely noting how it was coloured similarly to Stormfly. Letting out a quick breath I handed it to Astrid and drew my knees up to my chest.

She took it, confused somewhat, by my nervous behaviour. I watched as she took it in, a small smile curling her lips. She looked back to me, eyes bright. "I love it. Now draw something for you."

"W-what? For me?" I stammered, barely managing to hold the notebook in surprise.

"Yes for you. You're the one riding the Night Fury. People will be wanting to shoot you down. You. Not me. You need a disguise too." Astrid reasoned in a tone that left no room for argument.

"It should be dark, like Toothless." Astrid continued, "something, sleek and light that won't slow you down. But, it should reflect you too."

I felt my cheeks pink in embarrassment and focused my gaze on the blank page. Slowly, an idea formed on the page. A full-face mask, with eye-slits and simple slits in the lower half for breathing. I looked over at Toothless and took note of the rounded spikes on his back and head. I incorporated three separate lines of spikes, curving from the front to the back. I jotted down a few notes; dark brown and black, leather and metal.

Turning the page I started on a suit. High topped leather boots, soft and fur-lined. Dark trousers, fairly formfitting. Sleek leather gauntlets and a long sleeved tunic. A leather vest, similar to basic armour and leather shoulder pads. Looking over it I wasn't quite satisfied, but it will do for now.

"What about this?" I asked timidly and handed it to Astrid.

She examined both pages critically before nodding in approval and handing it over. "Practically screams Night Fury." She gave a small smile and stood. "Better get to sleep if we're going flying tomorrow."

I watched as she walked over to Stormfly and curled into the warmth of her wings. A smile tugged at my lips and I turned out to the sky, watching the inky black twinkle with a thousand diamonds.

Vaguely I wondered where Asmund was, curious as to why we hadn't seen him in the days that had passed since we met. I shrugged it off for now and resumed my sketches.