Sorry it took so long, guys! I've been really busy the past few weeks with the deliver of my monograph, but it's finally over now. I was also hoping to get more reviews, so you all should review more to get chaps faster! :D

Thanks, Ladipretender, for editing this chap so fast and for being so patient with me, geez, I didn't notice I left so many things still wrong even after I revised it, even the stupid stuff I knew were wrong but didn't see them...

Well, now, on with the chap!

Previously, Stoick finally found out the identity of the Strike Tribe's chief and was very happy to encounter his son again, but the moment didn't last long before Bork arrived with bad news. The Berserkers were spotted and their goal was to destroy the Strike Tribe, so the Hooligans join in the fight. Hall discovered Dagur's plan for attacking in broad daylight and dashed to tell his chief, only to see Hiccup and Toothless get knocked out of the sky by a flying bola.

Chapter 14

Counterattack

Dagur was deranged, therefore, he didn't fear much. Fear could hold someone down, but when the psycho man wielded it, there was nothing that could stop him. Dagur was insane and utterly thirsty for power, anything that got in his way was merely an obstacle he had to destroy. And by the way he saw things, Hiccup and his tribe were nothing but another big hindrance.

Dagur wanted one thing and one thing only: power. He wanted to be able to control everyone, everywhere, and to conquer other lands he had never even seen. But for that, he needed people to obey him, and in his twisted mind, he'd only have this through fear. Which meant he needed people to fear him so they would obey him. And he needed to be noticed, to be feared. It was as simple as that.

That was when Dagur started to decimate villages. Entire tribes were destroyed overnight. He gave them options though. Either they joined him and the Berserkers, to obey his every command, or they could all die. Obviously, most laughed at him. It was hard for Dagur to allow anyone to survive. If someone did, it was by sheer luck. He started with tribes like the one whose survivors joined the Strike Tribe, they weren't too big, like the Hooligans or the Meatheads, but neither were they too small.

When the smaller tribes heard about his doings, they usually had no option but to join the deranged chief. However, while Dagur was expanding his control through the exploitation of the fear of weak villages in the distance, the Strike Tribe started to get noticed. And soon, he also discovered that this community was made from a part of one of the villages he thought he had completely decimated. He was pretty angry when he found out, and worse, it was giving hope to those who were only following him out of fear.

Dagur didn't know this, but the problem with ruling by fear was that any spark of hope could unbalance his power. And when he sensed it, he knew he had to immediately smother said spark. He sent, at night, 20 ships to attack. The tribe wasn't very big and, usually, he would use around 15 for a village of that size. But that didn't go as planned; because he could have never imagined a few dragons and humans could do so much damage. Besides, Dagur didn't know about the Night Fury, and, invisible at night, it put the Berserkers at a distinct disadvantage. He had to retreat.

His reputation was severely wounded and he needed to fix it. A few months later, he gathered up his entire Armada for another attack. If, at thievery least he killed their leader and the Night Fury, tearing up apart the rest of the village in the process, he'd have his reputation back and maybe get an even stronger one after that. He had set his goal. And he'd do anything to achieve it.

That's why he was fighting Hiccup so fiercely, who was defending himself as best as he could. His fire sword was usually used to intimidate his opponents, but in this case, there was no effect on Dagur, he kept attacking him with all his might, not caring that he could get burned, or worse.

Hiccup was in a difficult situation. Not only because Dagur was strong and skilled, but also because there was something wrong with himself. Usually, Hiccup had 3 main advantages when sword fighting; agility, skill and his dominant hand. It was harder for a right handed to fight a lefty because it was completely opposite to what a person was used to.

However Hiccup could feel that his body was heavier than usual, was harder to move and his muscles would respond slower than he wanted. His nimbleness was compromised, and his skill matched as the opponent swung his sword so fast that Hiccup was struggling just to defend himself.

While fighting, his eyes spotted something. On a spot where his left arm wasn't covered by leather, his light green shirt around his elbow was slightly stained red. It was blood, he knew it, but how did he get that cut? It could only have been from the Scauldron. Which meant that venom must have entered his system and was slowing him down, especially his left arm that was starting to get sore. He didn't have time to worry about it, if he wasn't careful enough, he'd easily get stabbed and it would end all of his worries. Besides, the venom alone wouldn't kill him, they had a way to counter the effects of it; he only had to keep breathing until then.

In that moment Dagur swung his sword so hard and fast that Hiccup lost his grip on Inferno, causing it to fall a few feet from him. His left arm was becoming numb. He could use the right hand too, he had been training for it, but wasn't half as good with it as he was with his left one. Now, he was weaponless and in the second that he was distracted, Dagur managed to make Hiccup tumble and fall backwards.

When Dagur approached, Hiccup managed to stop him by kicking his sword away with his prosthetic, hitting his hand in the processes and probably breaking at least one finger. But that didn't stop Dagur. He grabbed his dagger and tried to stab Hiccup on the ground, staying in front and over him to prevent his escape.

Hiccup did his best to hold and push away the dagger that was too close for comfort. He realized that Dagur knew he was hurt around his stomach; the blade was nearly there. Hiccup heard his dragon trying to break free to help him, and the muffled croons indicated Toothless had something covering his snout shutting his mouth, but he couldn't turn to see, all his attention was on the blade.

The ropes around Toothless started to rip and snap when the dragon heard his human's cries of pain. Dagur started complaining about how Hiccup was in his way and how he wanted to see him die slowly, but Hiccup wasn't really hearing him, all he could do was feel his gash reopening, getting wider and deeper as Dagur's blade made contact, determined to cause some real damage. Slowly, Hiccup's grip began to loosen. His strength was fading, his vision was getting blurry and his thoughts hazy. just when he couldn't hold on any longer, Dagur was finally gone, thrown away by a tail swing and Hiccup could breathe, relieved.

Hiccup looked up, expecting to see Toothless, but he found the Rumblehorn whose offspring he had saved before. The mighty dragon screeched in anger and started attacking Dagur, who barely had time to stand up after being jettisoned.

Stoick had never been concerned to see a dragon drop from the skies until the moment he saw the Night Fury falling. He searched for it, but, without knowing the place well and having to stop almost every minute to slay an opponent, it was getting difficult to reach where Hiccup had fallen to see if his son was still okay.

When he finally reached the spot the Night Fury crash landed, he saw a Rumblehorn attacking the leader of the Berserkers and his son trying to stand up, his right hand, placed over his abdomen seemingly covered with blood; his left hand was on the handle of the fire sword but it was retracted. The Night Fury behind him was almost free from a bunch of nets and bolas some Berserkers had managed to wrap him in before they perished.

Stoick didn't lose a minute, and was already by his son's side, helping get him on his feet. His father, seeing his wound was concerned and asked if he needed some help, but all Hiccup could do was nod and insist he was fine while walking to Toothless in order to use Inferno to liberate the dragon from all the ropes.

Hiccup reached into a small bag compartment on the saddle and took out some clean linen from inside. He always left a first aid kit in Toothless's saddle in case of situations like this. He used the white cloth to apply pressure to the wound, keeping as much of the red liquid inside of him as possible. Feeling weak, tired and obviously sore, Hiccup sat on the saddle and allowed himself to take air in and out for a few seconds, before he looked around and gasped at the sight.

"I can't believe it…"

"What?" Stoick looked around not understanding what his son meant.

Hiccup grabbed more cloth and wrapped it around his abdomen, trying to secure the pieces well enough so he wouldn't need to hold them all the time. He still needed his hands free in order to fly Toothless. Mesmerized, he managed to stand up so he could see the sight better.

"The dragons… they're fighting too."

"Son, they've been fighting from the beginning, are you sure you'll be able to keep standing like that?" Hiccup smiled weakly.

"You don't understand. I wasn't talking about our dragons; I'm talking about the wild dragons. The 'pet dragons' have human friends and they'll fight to protect them, but the wild dragons aren't attached to any human, they just live around our village on the island. Even so, they joined the fight to help us. Don't you see? We still have a chance to win." Hiccup explained watching it all unfold. "But, apparently, they're confused, they've don't really know what to do, they never done something like that and they lack strategy. That's why they're imitating other dragons of the same species that have human friends."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Look there, Eret is being followed by a few Thunderdrums and they're doing exactly the same thing as Windwalker." Hiccup looked at the shores and saw the various Berserkers ships there. "If only I had at least one Zippleback with riders, they could show the others how to make a really big cloud of smoke that we could detonate, almost destroying the majority of the ships in one blow…"

"Why you don't have any?"

"Flying a dragon is not easy. The minds of dragon and rider must be connected, but a Zippleback needs two riders just as close and willing to share one dragon."

"You mean like brother and sister? Like Ruffnut and Tuffnut?"

"Well, yeah, I guess they could do it just fine… They'd also need someone to cover them, since they'll be too close from the ships; I guess some Gronckle and Monstrous Nightmares could do this…" Then, Stoick gestured for the twins, Fishlegs and Snotlout to approach. "What are you doing?"

"You said you needed more riders. I think they can help you somehow."

"What? I'm not going up on any of those beasts!" Snotlout complained and crossed his arms, just before a Monstrous Nightmare grabbed him by the jaws, not strong enough to harm him, but as if to say 'don't call me beast or next time it will be worse'. "Get me out of here!"

"Put him down, boy." Hiccup requested gently and the dragon did just that. "So Snotlout got the Nightmare, that leaves the Gronckle to Fishlegs and the Zippleback to the twins."

"Wait, what? Me? Riding on a dragon?"

"Don't worry, Fishlegs. All you have to do is get on, hold tight and give instructions and the dragon will do everything. We don't have time for trust exercises or flight lessons, so you'll have to deal with it or we'll all end up dying here. I'll explain what you'll have to do."

"What about me?" Astrid said coming closer too, the Nadder which she had flown on with Hiccup following her. In fact, the dragon had been helping Astrid for a while now without the girl even asking for it. Astrid was amazed, but she didn't want any help, after all, she was a strong warrior.

"Some Nadders are already following Garth's dragon, Runa, but I'm planning something that's gonna need two groups of Nadders to lead."

Hiccup said and started explaining his fiendishly clever plan. First, to the twins. Hiccup was a bit apprehensive on relying on them; he remembered how they were, silly and rarely paying attention. They didn't seem to have changed one bit. However, they also liked seeing explosions and destruction, so maybe, telling them about the enormous damage the detonation was going to cause would be enough to persuade them to fulfill the task.

Next, he talked to his cousin. If there was someone that concerned Hiccup more than the twins, it was Snotlout. There were various reasons for that, for example, the issues he had following an order or formation and he didn't know if his cousin could put aside the bullying history to accept something his 'useless' cousin had to say. However, it turned out Snotlout was actually almost capable of being serious when it came to battles. Almost.

Then, it was Fishlegs turn. Although a bit frightened and all, he knew Fishlegs would actually try and do his best, he was a lot like Bork, always trying his hardest but almost never being recognized for what he did.

Hiccup considered the tasks simple. Snotlout would have to fly low and draw attention to the Monstrous Nightmares. The Berserkers still on the boats would attack them and, while they were preparing and reloading, the twins would come with the Zipplebacks, releasing all the gas they could. Since Tuffnut was on the sparking head, he'd have to hold the dragon so no one would ignite before they were supposed to. It all needed to be at the right time.

Fishlegs and the Gronckles would be right after. They'd help the Zipplebacks not get hit and maybe knock out a few Berserkers on the way, using their tails, obviously, if they released fire, the gas would explode. The gas could only be lit up when all the ships were covered by the green mist. The four Hooligans weren't giving the plan any credit, but they agreed to it anyway.

Meanwhile, Hiccup was flying on Toothless, with Astrid and the blue Nadder to his right.

"And what do I have to do?" She asked, struggling not to fall, but she noticing Hiccup seemed so tired it was hard for him to stay awake.

"Come with me. We need Garth and Runa too." He said as he saw the experienced war man fighting on the ground with his dragon. Toothless flew low and Hiccup told the man to get on the dragon and fly after him. In a few seconds, the three riders and their dragons were flying above the village, out of the range of any arrow they could shoot.

"What's going on?" Garth asked.

"We're gonna finish this once and for all. The wild dragons are joining too and they're following the ones with riders," His voice was pained. Garth took a moment during or after Hiccup's explanation to look around and notice what he said. "I want you and Astrid to fly low and use the Nadder's spines to draw them away. Try to separate quarrels and struggles, scare them away but be careful not to get shot. Just two Nadders wouldn't make much difference, but if a lot follow them, we'll be able to surprise the Berserkers and they'll run for their boats. And more importantly, use your spikes to surround them, give them no other path but to their boats. I'll try to lure them away as well."

"Aye, aye, sir." He responded and motioned Runa to fly to one side of the island. Astrid didn't move, though. She kept looking at the young chief with concerned eyes.

"Are you sure you can do this? You seem too tired…"

"Astrid, haven't I told you Toothless and I defeated the queen of the dragons? A mountain size monster? Believe me, we can handle it." He said with a small, cocky smile on his face and she felt something she'd never felt for him before; proud. She was proud of the new Hiccup she had just met, he was grown and he was stronger and more impressive than she could've ever dreamt of seeing him to be. But maybe a bit more idiot, too.

"Okay, then." She said before tapping the dragon and making her fly low, followed by other Nadders.

With Garth on one side and Astrid on the other, Hiccup started attacking Berserkers from the middle to make them run back to their ships. Toothless flying fast and hitting with precision.

Chaos began as the Berserkers were surprised to see all the dragons attacking in perfect formation, circling them to leave only one route out. Hall soon realized the plan and helped Hiccup by shooting more arrows at them and getting a few Hackatoos to follow him as well. The boy even found the time to ask his friend Sten to come along. Hiccup saw Dagur, weaponless, still fighting the Rumblehorn, so he told Toothless to fly lower and grab him, throwing him onto one of the boats.

No one needed to tell the Berserkers to take the route offered. They were warriors and they were fine with battles, even people and dragons together, but not when more and more dragons started showing up in a very strategic formation. There were Nadders from every side, a Night Fury at the top and now some Hackatoos and Snafflefangs too. Soon Thunderdrums, Changewings and Typhoomerangs and all the others dragon species were approaching as well. There was only so much they could do. In the middle of the run back to the boats, no one noticed the thin, green mist that was covering the entire fleet.

When the last Berserker entered their ships, Toothless shot another plasma blast and all the green fog immediately exploded. The explosion wasn't deadly, but it wasn't supposed to be just a warning either. It was strong and massive in extent, since the green fog was all over the enemies' ships, plus, Toothless kept aiming at other ships as he rocketed over them, firing the maximum purple blasts. The wood of some of the boats was already damaged and the blow was all it took to make them give in and start to sink. The surviving Berserkers quickly tried to swim to the still intact boats so they could frantically flee.

Dragons roared in triumph, shooting fire at the skies as if to claim the place as theirs. Toothless landed on the last possible point of the island, on the edge of a cliff, roaring along with them and huffing proudly. Hiccup dismounted and kept looking with great relief at the departing ships. They were sailing quickly to the north.

Hiccup didn't have time to count, but he estimated that only about a half of the fleet had resisted till the end. Maybe less, or so he hoped. The probability of being attacked again was low and he was glad for it. But unfortunately, he didn't know what Dagur had in store. Who knew? Maybe the psycho chief had something up his sleeve, and he was scared about it. Dagur was totally and completely mad and Hiccup didn't know how many tribes were already following him or how firm the mad man's control over them really was, but he wished and hoped it was truly over for the foreseeable future.

As the adrenaline started to dissipate from his system and his relief increased, Hiccup started to feel the exhaustion pulling at him. He was feeling hazy and dizzy as his vision started to fade. He was breathing rapidly, like he just couldn't keep his lungs filled with air. His legs were shaking and they suddenly gave away as Hiccup slowly started to faint. He could only feel the scaly head from Toothless trying to break his fall as he blacked out.

Flashback 14

"So… Let's just dump the bodies into the ocean?" Hiccup glared at Eret for his suggestion.

"No. We're gonna give them a proper funeral."

"Bu-but they're enemies!"

"I know, but they were also Vikings and they deserve some kind of a funeral." Then, he turned to Garth who was walking not too far away. "Garth, can you find us an old boat so we could start a funeral or one they might have left that could be used for it?" Garth looked like he didn't want to do it, for obvious reasons. These people had killed his entire tribe, after all. But at the same time, he didn't want to disobey because he respected the young chief. And Hiccup noticed it. "You don't have to do it if you don't want to, I understand, I just asked because you're the one who stays around the dock the most and you're the one maintaining it, as well as the ships. You're not going to do anything more than this."

"Okay then. I'll get a boat ready for it."

"Thanks" Hiccup replied, watching the man walk away to the docks. Shimmer landed with her human near them and she jumped off with a small smile.

"I just checked. We have people that suffered anywhere from small injures to severe wounds, but the healer said they'll all live. No one from our side died. A few injured dragons, though most are just scratches. Sten and Heather are taking care of them and Bork might help as soon as he gets back. By the way, may I send Stormcloud with a note to search forthem with a note so they can return?"

"Wait a few minutes, I just want to be sure the kids won't see anything they're not supposed to…" Hiccup sighed heavily. "At least, thanks to the Scauldron, we managed to put out the fire. I feared it might engulf other nearby houses…"

"Yeah, the flames were pretty high. By the way, tomorrow we'll have to build new feeding stations too…"

"Yes. But Hall and some close friends are going to start rebuilding his house tomorrow. I already talked to him, he won't have to do anything else until his house is finished."

"What about the forge? You'll need help to make all the new pieces for the feeding stations."

"I know. I have a lot of work to do tomorrow. Right now, all I want to do is set a boat of Berserker's corpses on fire and go to bed…"

Soon they managed to put all the corpses on a half torn up Berserker boat and let it set sail. Hiccup, Camicazi, Eret and two more men from his original group shot the incendiary arrows at the ship to send their souls to Valhalla. The night after that was silent and eerie. Everyone was tired and all they wanted to do was go to sleep. When Bork, Heidi and the kids came back, Hiccup asked for Heather and her sister to keep patrolling just in case and in the morning, they'd change shifts.

Two days later, the feeding stations were almost completely redone since the entire village helped out, including the dragons. But that didn't mean Hiccup had any less work to do in the forge. He had to make all the things they'd need. New nails for the houses, new saddles and weapons to replace those ripped off in the attack, everything but the wood for the feeding stations and Hall's house. He was swamped.

"Need any help?"

Hiccup stopped pounding the sword into shape and looked at the door to find Hall.

"I told you to work on your house. You don't need to help here until you're settled in again."

"I'm fine. Freya and I are staying at Sten's for a while. I'm gonna need some new clothes though, so I'll go to the Meathead's Market Day tomorrow. I just wanted to check if you needed a hand, I know you're probably very busy. And don't worry about my house, Sten and Eira are helping me rebuild and they said they didn't mind if I helped you a little."

"Thanks, Hall. You really didn't need to do it."

"Of course I do. I'm worried about this whole situation. They were pretty tough and I know the whole village is scared."

"Me too…"

"I know… It's just harder for us because we saw people we loved and cared for killed because of them." Hall explained as he increased the fire and got a half-made saddle on the table to finish it. "I can feel the tension in everyone from my original tribe. We actually thought we'd be free from them because of the dragons and all…"

"I understand, Hall." Hiccup stopped pounding and stuffed the metal in the hot flames once again. "But the problem is that they're not the only enemies. I've always wanted to find a place where people could live in peace with the dragons. I kinda forgot that people can fight people too."

"You're talking about the Outcasts?"

"Yeah… I think there are fewer Outcasts, they might not attack directly like the Berserkers, but I don't know. I think it's better for us to keep an eye on them too. Alvin is not stupid and I think he's only waiting for the right moment to strike or something. We need to keep out guard up and that's why I'm implementing patrolling shifts from now on."

"But even if they did attack, they have less organization. They're more into the kind of 'every man for himself' kinda thing, right?"

"Yes. They're not a community like us. They have a leader, and Alvin has this position because the Outcasts respect and fear him, but if someone decides to walk away and people follow, they can get really divided. I'd like that to happen, if they separated, the chances of them attacking would be very slim."

Hiccup concluded his thoughts and petted Sharpshot, who entered a few moments before Hall, seeking company. Toothless was in a dark corner of the forge trying to sleep but finding it difficult with all the clanging of metal inside.

"It would indeed…" Hall trailed off sadly and sighed heavily, "Why people have to do this? You know, fight each other? It's so ridiculous…"

"Because we're Vikings and roughness is in our nature, I guess. Diplomacy is not something most Vikings have ever heard of. But I think it also has something to do with a lot more reasons. Some people just disagree and others are just mean and want power. If there's a reason for that or not, I have no idea…"

"It's just that we're the same species, we shouldn't be fighting. We managed to make peace with dragons. The world should be a better place now… Yet, there's always something to spoil…" Hall complained and Hiccup remembered he was just as naïve as him. He believed once that when he showed people a dragon's true nature, they'd change. It wasn't as simple as that, obviously.

"Don't think too much about it, Hall. It will lead you nowhere."

"But I'm happy there's still good, willing people too. When we lost our tribe, for a moment, I doubted there was goodness in the world and then you showed us everything and gave us hope again. Thanks for that."

"Thanks, but stop adulating me and keep sewing. I don't want compliments."

"Sorry, I forgot you get embarrassed by them…" Hall said in a teasing tone but it didn't make it less true.

"Just shut up and work." Hiccup rolled his eyes and took the sword out once again from the flames before he started pounding it again. It was going to be another long day of intense work, however, his day just got a little more interesting now.

So, they finally got rid of the berserkers, but now Hiccup is very injured, and some things are going to change... And I hope you guys liked the interaction of the canon characters with the OCs, I'm trying to balance it so it won't get boring.

I really want to know your thoughts of this chap or what you think will happen next, so just leave it in the box below for me in a review! :D

Itban Fuyu