Disclaimer: I do not own How to Train Your Dragon or any of its characters in any way, shape, or form.

Chapter 2

Wow. She really hasn't ever even looked at me. Hiccup thought to himself, as he flew home. Somewhat surprising really, seeing as we've been at the same school and even in the same grade for three years. Shaking off the sarcastic thoughts, he thought about the larger matter at hand. Astrid was his soulmate? The Astrid, one of the school's most prized athletes? Hiccup could barely run up a flight of stairs without tripping over his feet.

Still somewhat shocked about what happened, Hiccup landed on the top of a tall building, making sure nobody else was there. Sitting on the corner of the building, Hiccup looked over the large city. Maybe Astrid had seen someone behind him, and that was her soulmate? Maybe she got it wrong and it wasn't him? Hiccup thought those things, but it was more just him trying to convince himself that she wasn't his soulmate. It would be pretty great, actually, to have know you have someone there for you, but Hiccup didn't want to get his hopes up, just in case it wasn't him.

Looking down at the city, Hiccup watched as people walked down the street and as the cars drove past, everyone in such a rush.

After sitting there for a few more minutes, Hiccup got bored and took off, heading back home. There were people walking around his house, so he landed behind a few bushes near the forest and found his extra set of clothes, put in that spot just for that reason. Changing and walking out to his house, Hiccup went inside.

When he walked inside, Hiccup noticed that something was different. Heading into the living room, Hiccup saw his father, Stoick, sitting there. They never really had a proper conversation, and they would usually only say "Hey." or "Morning", or "Anything for dinner?". The last one wasn't very common though, as each of them usually got their own meals.

"Hi, dad." Hiccup said, looking at his father, who was watching TV.

"Hey." Stoick gruffly said, never turning his attention away from the screen. Hiccup walked past him, going to the garage.

Sitting down at his desk, Hiccup got started on his homework. There wasn't that much, since he had a spare during school. Pulling out a textbook, he started doing some of his science homework.

Science came easily to him, and he had no trouble finishing his homework.

He didn't have anymore homework, so Hiccup was left to think about the matter at hand.

Hiccup still couldn't get over the fact that she had never looked at him, even though they had had multiple classes together over the years. What's he going to say when he introduces himself?

"Hey I'm Hiccup. You don't know who I am, but I know you. Why? Because we've been in the same grade and school for three years and you never even bothered to look at me." Hiccup said aloud, thinking about what the conversation could be like. Well, hopefully not like that. He was still annoyed, though.

Wait. Astrid didn't know that it was him (Hiccup) who was her soulmate. She knew that it was Toothless, the town hero. It would be fine, except for the fact that nobody knew his secret identity, and he didn't plan on telling anyone anytime soon. Even his own soulmate.

Heading into school, Hiccup paid no attention to anyone around him, and headed to class. Astrid was in one of his classes that day, but it was later. Hiccup didn't know what he would do if he saw her yet, even though she still had no idea who he was.

Halfway through his class, Hiccup felt a tingling on his neck. Oh, great, Hiccup thought, as he excused himself, saying he had to use the washroom. Going into the washroom and thanking the gods that there was nobody there, he quickly took off his clothes to reveal his costume. Hiding his clothes in the vent, Hiccup jumped out of the window, and caught himself with his wings.

Spotting the trouble, Hiccup flew down to the area. It as a burning building, nothing out of the ordinary or too hard to help with. The firefighters had just arrived, and were setting up their equipment. Quickly flying into the building, Hiccup spotted a few people and carried them to safety. Going back in and pulling more people out, Hiccup had finally gotten everyone out of the building. Saluting the firefighters who were extinguishing the fire, Hiccup sped off, heading back to class.

Luckily, while making his suit, Hiccup made it pretty fireproof. He modeled it after a dragon, since he thought that dragons were pretty cool. If you looked closely, you could see little scales on the suit, creating a thin layer of extra protection.

In under 5 minutes, Hiccup flew back into the washroom, and quickly changed back into his regular clothes. He walked back into class, and continued on with his day.

Finally, it was the last class of the day: Health and Career Education 10. Yeah, Hiccup was in grade 12, and he was taking a grade 10 course. It was because HCE was mandatory to take before you graduate, so Hiccup, along with a lot of others, didn't take it in grade 10, and forgot about it until grade 12. So, Hiccup and a bunch of other grade 12's had to sit in a grade 10 course for the whole year, with a bunch of younger kids.

He didn't have to pay attention too much in the class though, since they were things that he had already learned.

Sitting at the back of the room, Hiccup sat back and relaxed through most of the class. When he looked to the side for a minute though, his eyes rested on Astrid, who was sitting in front of him. She was reading something on her computer, and he took a second to read it.

Toothless seen Helping People out of Burning Building

It was a short article about him earlier that day, but Hiccup didn't read any further. Why is Astrid reading about Toothless? Hiccup wondered. Oh. Duh. The thought, mentally smacking himself. He's - I'm her soulmate.

Looking at the whiteboard at the front of the class for a second, Hiccup saw that the teacher had written something down.

Soulmate paper: Write an essay with a partner about your soulmate timers, and what you think of them.

There were more details written down, about what the criteria was, and what they had to do. Write a paper about your soulmate timer? Seems awfully coincidental, Hiccup thought. Oh well, sometimes things just happen to be that way. Hiccup wondered who his partner would be, since he didn't have anybody he talked with in his class. He could probably do it on his own.

The teacher came and handed out sheets of information on the paper to everyone, and when she was done, she stood at the front of the room.

"Ok class, I'm not going to pair you up." She said, and the whole class groaned. Hiccup did too; he wasn't usually good at working with someone else, and was more independent.

The teacher started listing off pairs, always a boy and girl together. Hiccup waited for his name to be called, to see if he got a good partner.

The names kept going on, and Hiccup still wasn't being called. He started to get nervous as he realised Astrid's name hadn't be called yet, too. Things wouldn't be that coincidental, would they? Doing a project about soulmates with your soulmate, who doesn't know that they're soulmates?

Nope. Wishful thinking, Hiccup.

"Hiccup and Astrid" The teacher announced, almost finished.

Hiccup groaned. He wasn't living in a story where the author had to use a cliché way of getting two characters to get to know each other better, was he?

Hiccup looked over at Astrid, to see her looking bored and slightly annoyed.

Hiccup had never talked to her before (well, obviously, considering she had never seen him before), so he didn't know why she was upset. Maybe she had heard that he didn't like working with others, and was often seen alone.

Hiccup didn't really mind people saying these things, but people assumed he was useless, although he was getting the top grades in all of his classes. From this, he'd heard people call him "Hiccup the Useless", behind his back.

What Hiccup found amusing though, was that he heard a lot of his classmates talking to each other about Toothless, and how they thought he was so cool and brave.

He often liked to mutter to himself "Hiccup the Useless is the dragon Toothless", when he heard someone say "Hiccup the Useless"

Technically, he wasn't a dragon, but Hiccup really liked dragons and he somewhat looked like one, so he decided to call himself one.

"Alright class, you have 20 minutes right now to talk with your partner and get to know them, and organize times to meet up and work." The teacher said, interrupting his thoughts.

Hiccup glanced over at Astrid again, and wearily made his way over to her.

He sat down next to her, and awkwardly sat there for about 30 seconds, neither of them looking at each other or speaking. Finally, Hiccup mustered up his courage and said something. Hiccup hoped that she wouldn't notice that he smelled smoky and piece the two facts together.

"Uhh… Hi. I'm Hiccup." He awkwardly introduced himself, and Astrid turned her head to look at him.

"Astrid. I guess we're stuck with each other for the next couple of weeks." She replied, not looking too happy about the fact.

"Sooooo…" Hiccup dragged on the word, pausing for a second. "Shall we… Umm… Get acquainted?"

Astrid didn't look too pleased to be talking to him, or was just in a bad mood. She stated a few simple facts about herself, though.

"Astrid Hofferson. 17 years old. I live in Berk, have for my whole life. 5"5. I have two younger brothers." She said, saying the facts in a list, showing no emotion.

"Ahh. Well, that's not really what I meant… but…" Hiccup trailed off, before saying who he was, sarcastically.

"Hiccup Haddock. Also 17 years old. Also have lived in Berk for my whole life. I'm 5"8, and have no siblings. Although, I have a cat, if that counts." Astrid rolled her eyes and turned her head away, but Hiccup could see a hint of a smile on her face.

As fast as it had come, the smile left her face. Her blank expression back, she scribbled down some numbers onto a scrap of paper, then gave it to him.

Confused, Hiccup looked at the string of seemingly random numbers. After staring for a few seconds, Astrid said, looking at him as though he were stupid,

"It's my number."

Oh! Obviously, it's her phone num - what? Why was she giving him her number? Was she? Did she like? Hiccup sat there, baffled.

Astrid sighed. "For the project, stupid. So you can tell me when and where we should meet up to work." She said.

Oh. Yeah, ok that made more sense. Hiccup sat there for a second, a slight blush creeping across his face from his mistakes. Luckily though, he sensed that there was something that Toothless needed to be at, and quickly stood up.

"Ah. Um. I've, I've gotta. Yep. I've gotta run, bye!" He awkwardly said, in a rush. Stumbling over some chairs as he tried to run out of the door, Hiccup grabbed his backpack and fled from the encounter.

Hiccup ran out of the school, and changed behind the building, where nobody could see him. After hiding his bag in a bush, Hiccup flew off, glad that he had an excuse to leave the class.

Author's Note: Thanks for all of the follows and feedback! As someone mentioned in the previous chapter, this story is somewhat inspired by one of sunnywinterclouds stories, but isn't a carbon copy. Hope you're all liking how this story is progressing.

A follow, favourite, or review is very much appreciated, thanks for reading!