Hey Guys! It's Ed up here! How are you doing? I'm about to take a Cambridge Examination (CAE to be precise) and what excercise is better than writing a fanfiction?

So, I want to thank you all for the reviews and for the favorites and everything else! You are truly amazing, guys.

I'll leave up to Zach to answer the reviews you gave to his chapter, alright? He'll contact you by PM. And the same thing shall I do wne I answer to the reviews in my chapters.

I hope you'll enjoy this chapter! Bye!

Chapter 2 – Funeral (Ed)

When Hiccup woke up, the first thing he noticed was that he wasn't in his beloved bed. This one wasn't even nearly as soft and good smelling as the one that his mommy made for him every evening, right before he slipped in his pajamas, brushed his teeth and went to sleep. He sniffed the air and registered that the whole place he was in reeked of medicines, alcohol and disinfectant. The child opened his eyes, his vision slightly blurry. From the light, or rather the lack of it, he understood that it wasn't exactly midday. Everything was dark and he couldn't recognize where he was. The dim, faint light that filtered through a door, was just enough for him to see that the whole room was covered, from the floor to the ceiling, in green, marble tiles.

The breath of the five year old started to become heavier, shallow as fear seeped into him, like it could only into a child. That place was making Hiccup panic and he started trying to move frantically, but he found out that he was hugged to something. When he turned around, to see that he was laying next to his big brother, Hiccup sighed loudly in relief.

If he was with his big brother, he was safe.

He scooted closer to Jack, when he felt something tap against his foot. He jumped back, scared, at first. Then he looked down: around his brother's right leg there was a curious thing that he couldn't quite name. It looked white, even if it was not easy to tell in the darkness, and, judging from what he felt against his toes, it was hard and cold. It slowly dawned on him that the thing was a cast.

'What?' He thought, surprised. 'Why does Jack have a cast around his leg?'

Hiccup was honestly unsure of what to think: he had no idea of the reason for which his brother's leg was wrapped into that thing. It was slowly that his brain brought back to memory everything that happened the day before- It all came back in a sad, demoralizing, horrible sequence: his and Jack's seasonal jumping game, Jack's tripping and falling down in the wrong way, the horrible snap that, even now, still echoed in his ears, the fear that Jack was about to die during the rush to the hospital and…

"M-mom?" he whispered, his voice cracking and his breathing becoming unsteady and heavy again. "Mum? Tell me it was a joke… i-it must be… I don't like this joke. Please come out…"

The childish heart held the foul conviction that it was all a prank, one of those things that children would have understood when they were older. He firmly believed that his mom was going to abruptly burst out from behind a wall and start laughing, while Jack would unwrap his leg from the cast and start jumping around as he liked to always do, sneering at him because he fell for all that absurd thing. His childish mind, for as smart and sharp as it was, just couldn't and didn't want to accept the idea of his brother getting hurt, the idea of his mother being gone forever. But the more time passed, the harder it was to try and keep pushing the truth out of the borders of his mind.

Before he could even realize it, a chocked sob escaped his throat and a tear was leaving a moist, salty trail down on his cheek. "Mommy…" he wept gently. "Don't be gone, please… I need you…"

There was no answer. The silence, broken only by the almost inaudible, soft sobs of the five year old child, was oppressing. He called for his mom a few more times, hoping every time that, hearing her little kid cry, she would have come back.

When, after a minute of his desperate, useless calling, he felt a hand on the top of his head, for a second he thought that his wish had come true, that all his prayers had been fulfilled. But that hand was weird: it wasn't as warm as his mother's, neither was it as big.

"Hey Hiccup, what's wrong?" Jack, the morphine in his blood having run out, had woken up. He carefully pulled his younger brother closer to him, minding his own broken leg, and started caressing the other's hair. "Don't cry…"

Hiccup looked up at Jack, his eyes as teary as human eyes could get, his smallish body shaken by sobs and whimpers. "Mo-mommy is…" Hiccup shook his head and cried harder. He clung to his big brother tightly and continued shaking his head. "I want my m-mum…" he bawled. "I want my mum… I don't want her being gone…"

Jack's eyes welled up with tears as well. He wanted their mum too. He wanted her soothing words, her smiling face, that always seemed to lift everybody's mood, her warm hugs and soft kisses, that never failed to make every injury better, to make everybody feel loved. He wanted their mum too. But he couldn't let his weakness, his sadness, his pain show. He couldn't let his tiny, little brother see him crying.

He had to be strong. He had to be strong for his little brother. He had to look out for him, to protect him.

So he choked his tears back.

"I know, Hiccup. I know…" Jack whispered, trying to pull out a soothing voice. Having failed miserably in his attempt, since the best he managed to pull out was a voice that was even more wobbly than Hiccup's, he continued. "But… she's gone now. And we can't change that. But she's always going to be with us. She's never gonna leave us. She's going to be right here." Jack touched Hiccup's chest, placing his hand right above where the brunet's heart was, causing the younger to look up at him. The sight of Hiccup's face, covered with tears and crossed by sadness, made Jack's stomach churn: his little brother, his beloved Hiccup was so sad and he looked so worn… and all because of him.

Jack felt as if a hand had just squeezed his heart, as he realized the full guilt that he had in what just happened: it was him who had recklessly jumped down from the roof of their mansion, it was him who made their parents hurry out of the restaurant and push the pedal to the metal on the road, it was his fault if his dad, worried for him, had driven his car too fast and didn't notice the red light, or whatever it had been that caused the accident, and crashed into the truck that was casually driving down the street. It was his fault if his mother died. It was all his fault. He had a hard time not to start screaming out loud in that moment, not to follow his younger brother into the weeping, not to leave Hiccup alone. The way of tears seemed so inviting and easy that he was truly tempted to walk it.

'No! No, no, no. That's not what mum told me to do! I have to look out for him.' The thought came sudden and strong into Jack's brain. His subconscious was right. He had to help Hiccup. He somehow pulled out an uncertain smile and directed it down at Hiccup.

"She's always going to be in our hearts, you know Hic?" Jack said. "She'll never leave us. And she wouldn't want us to cry. She'd want us to smile as she liked to do in every moment of the day."

"How can we smile without mommy?" Hiccup whispered, his tears slowing and his sobs calming down just a bit even if he clung to Jack tighter.

"Let's not think about mom being gone, hm?" Jack answered, his smile more solid by the second. "Let's think to every cool thing we'll be able to do while she's not here to keep an eye on us, alright hatchling?"

"Like what?" Hiccup didn't seem convinced at all.

"Well, we can drink all the hot chocolate that we want, not just two mugs each. Or we can play hide and seek until later than 9 PM. Or we can… uh… play videogames for all the time we want. Oh! We can sleep in on Sundays, now. And we can make a mess out of our room!" Jack suddenly had an idea. "But, most important of it all…"

"What? What is most important?" Hiccup asked, completely thrilled by then. Fortunately for Jack, even if Hiccup's brain was way more developed than the one of a child his age, his attention still remained the shifty attention of a five years old.

"Nobody can stop me from stealing your nose!" With that, Jack played the old 'got your nose' prank on Hiccup.

The little boy, not expecting such a sudden thing, started giggling, a few tears still running down his cheeks, until the soft laughter completely erased the tears and chased the brunet's sobs away, taking his mind off of those sad thoughts.

After a good five minutes of playing, though, Jack had to hush Hiccup because his laugher was becoming too loud and they seriously ran the risk of waking up any other patient in the ward. They came down with an agreement: if Hiccup behaved and promised to sleep, Jack would have given the nose back.

"Do you really think that she'll be with us and look after us from somewhere else, Jack?" Hiccup asked calmly, burying his face into his brother's chest. "Do you really think she wouldn't want us to cry?"

"Yes, Hic. To both." Jack stated. His smile slowly flattened into a neutral expression, since the brunet couldn't see it anymore. "I know that for sure."

"Then I promise I won't cry anymore."

"You are a really good boy, Hiccup." Jack whispered, patting the other's head. "Come on, sleep now. It's going to be a hard, long day tomorrow. They'll have to bury her, do you remember? And we want to be at our full energy to say our goodbyes to mum."

Hiccup nodded slowly and sleepily, as he snuggled up to his brother, seeking the most similar thing he could find to the comforting warm of his mother. Jack wasn't the warmest thing ever and he, obviously, wasn't his mother. But he was better than nothing, anyways. "Sing me a lullaby, Jack."

"What?"

"The one that mum always sung when we couldn't sleep. Sing me that lullaby."

Jack smiled and kissed the top of Hiccup's head. "Sure thing, hatchling." He said, before starting to sing gently, with a surprisingly soft voice. Hiccup had to admit, in fact, that his brother sung quite well, even if his mother was on a completely different level.

"My little smallish love

My dear child

Fear not in this dark night

For I'm here

I will always be with you

I will always protect you

Sleep now in this black dark night,

Sleep now, sleep it away

You're with me and we shall wait

The sunrise"

Jack sang. When he was done, he noticed that Hiccup had fallen asleep. He sadly smiled down at the napping figure in his arms. 'Look out for each other.' His mum's voice echoed into his head, bouncing off the walls of his brain. "I will, mom…" He whispered to himself, curling up around Hiccup as much as his broken leg would allow him to do. "I promise that I will."

Jack finally allowed the tears, that he had wanted to cry earlier, to come and stain his face. In the darkness of that sad night, he decided that he would have carried, from then on, both his and his brother's sadness. He wouldn't have allowed anything that he could fight to hurt his little brother. Anything. With that in mind, he cried himself to a sleep without nightmares, but without any dream either.

When Jack woke up the morning after, he didn't have Hiccup in his arms.

In fact, his little brother was sitting next to his bed, dressed in a black shirt that didn't fit him at all, and a pair of black trousers. "Morning, Jackie…" he hummed when he saw the white haired boy waking up. "How are you feeling, today?"

"Pretty good." Jack joked. "For a guy with a broken leg and that has to go where we have to go to."

Hiccup's expression visibly saddened, as he nodded. "Dad said that he'll be waiting for us in front of the main doors. You have to wear this…" The brunet tossed a bag on Jack's bed.

When the older one opened it, he saw a black tuxedo and a white shirt, as sober as a shirt could be. Jack sighed and, with the help of his little brother, he slid on both the shirt and the tuxedo, having some difficulty with the pants.

One hour later, they were sitting on the first of several rows of chairs (Jack was on his wheelchair) in Berk's common graveyard. A priest was blessing their mother's coffin, before trusting the earth with her body and the Heavens with her soul. After the coffin had been lowered into the hole, that had been dug into the ground for that purpose, Stoick stood and grabbed a handful of dirt, cobbles and humus, throwing it in the hole. Hiccup and Jack followed and did the same.

"Good bye, mum…" Hiccup whispered sadly as he sat back on his seat, watching other people throwing their handful. He watched the others' long procession, holding to his brother's arm. He kept sniffling and rubbing his eyes for a whole minute, before he found the courage to weakly squeak out a call for Jack's attention.

"What is it, little one?" Jack asked.

"I-I know I promised I wouldn't cry anymore b-but… C-can I do it only for this once?" Hiccup's lips were shaking, as well as his shoulders.

The white haired boy smiled softly and pulled his younger brother to sit in his lap, ignoring the sharp wave of pain that shot up his broken leg as Hiccup's foot accidentally bounced in his cast, and hugged the child's nose into his shoulder.

Hiccup's childish tears once more found easy way out of the brunet's eyes and flooded, wetting Jack's shirt. This time, it took just a minute for the brunet to calm down, but after he did, there was no way he would move from his brother's lap. His father pleads were useless: he just wouldn't let go of Jack.

"Jack, tell your brother to get off." Stoick said with a sigh. "He'll hurt your already broken leg even more."

"Dad, it's fine. Really. He found a nice settlement so that he doesn't hurt me and he keeps me warm. I'm okay with carrying him." Jack replied, shrugging carelessly and ruffling Hiccup's hair with a smile on his face. "Ain't that right, hatchling?"

Hiccup nodded and stuck his tongue out at his dad.

"Alright, fine. Just be careful." Stoick conceded. "Especially you, Jackson."

"Don't worry, dad." Jack said, then he added with a whisper. "I'll look after him."

Oh... poor babies... *hides face and whispers to self* Don't cry Ed, don't cry...

*coughs* Alright! See you in the next chapters! Leave a review!