Chapter 6

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Thought / Dreams / Event from the past

[Voice from the past]

"Dialogue"

Letter

Emphasis

Dangerous Tone

"Okay, let's run this over once again." Hiccup said as they hovered in V formation just outside the fog barrier of Helheim's gate; with Hiccup and Toothless at the front as they were the leaders, Skyring and Flarestorm behind them as they were the most agile after Toothless, and Bonecrusher along with Rainleaf at the back as they were the biggest in the group.

Sharpshot wasn't with them, Hiccup got the tiny dragon to send a letter for him to Berk, he wanted to tell Stoick that he had found out the reason why the dragons were raiding Berk and would put it to an end. Hopefully, if his Dad would listen to him, he could convince his Dad to stop killing the dragons.

"We will first shoot the volcano, to get the dragons out of it and lure the Red Death out of the volcano." Hiccup started as he looked at his dragon friends, "Skyring and Flarestorm, you are fast and agile, you will help me and Toothless fight the Red Death. Bonecrusher and Rainleaf, you are big and could intimidate the other dragons easily, you will lead the escaping dragons to a nearby woods, away from the humans, get them stay there then come back here to back us up." The dragons roared in agreement, Hiccup nodded, "Let's go then." He said before they entered the barrier of fog.

They flew to the volcano and circled it, Hiccup searched for a weak spot to attack, he found it soon after. "Alright!" He called for his dragon friend's attention, "All of you, shoot that spot." He pointed at the spot he found had a crack, they could destroy it if they attacked it with their fire balls, except for Rainleaf since she sprayed acid not fire.

The dragons fired at the spot, they saw that it began to crack and shot again, the rock wall crumbled under their shots. "Alright, we shoot once again and fly away as soon as the first dragon is out of there!" Hiccup commanded, they followed the order and shot the volcano again. They didn't have to wait long for the dragons to fly out of the mountain, "Get to the plan!".

Bonecrusher and Rainleaf roared and separated themselves from the group, they roared at the escaping dragons and led them away from the Nest. Hiccup looked at Skyring and Flarestorm, "I need you two to get that thing mad, distract it while I search for it's weakness!" He told them, "As soon as that thing is out of the mountain, shoot it!" The two dragons roared in understanding, Hiccup nodded at them and motioned for Toothless to fly up so he could observe better.

A few seconds later, they heard the Red Death roar in anger and the mountain broke apart, Skyring and Flarestorm flew from the falling boulders and hovered in place, as soon as the Red Death got out and noticed them, they began shooting at it.

Hiccup and Toothless circled above them and observe the situation, Hiccup was using his knowledge from Dragon Training to find out it's weakness. "Hm, heavily armored skull and tail, definitely made for bashing and crushing, best to stay clear of both, buddy. Small eyes, large nostrils, I think it relies on hearing and smell." He said out loud before something catching his eyes, "That thing has wings." He said to his dragon, "Come on, bud! Let's see if it can fly!".

Toothless twitched his ears to show that he heard Hiccup before turning and diving towards the Red Death, he shot his plasma blast at the thing's head, catching it's attention.

"Skyring, Flarestorm!" Hiccup called at the two dragons, "Get away! We will take it from here!" Knowing that they had reached their shot limit and unable to help anymore, they gave a short roar before flying away. The Red Death then unfurled it's wings and began flapping, "Well, it can fly." Hiccup said calmly before he and Toothless lured the Red Death towards the sea stacks to hopefully slow it down.

For something as big as the Red Death, it was slow, but it's strength was not a joke. So even with Toothless and Hiccup flew through the sea stacks and use them against the Red Death, it simply broke the stacks with it's body and was gaining on them.

Hiccup looked around to see if there's anything that he could use before noticing the dark clouds up above, an idea hit him. "Toothless!" He called his best friend, "Time to disappear, bud!" He said before leading them to fly upwards towards the clouds.

As they flew, the Red Death was closing in on them and Hiccup heard it inhaled to shot fire, "Here it comes!" He yelled before Toothless managed to avoid the volume of flame, albeit barely, before disappearing into the clouds a second later. They could hear the angry roar of the Red Death, letting them know where it was, "Aim for the wings, bud." He said to his friend.

Toothless growled in understanding before dive bombing towards the big dragon, he aimed for the wings and shot before flying away again before the Red Death could catch them. This repeated many times before the Red Death lost it and began firing everywhere.

"Watch out!" Hiccup yelled as they flew away, the fire gaining fast and caught Toothless's prosthetic tail fin, "Okay, times up." He said before looking forward again, "Let's see if this works." He then directed Toothless to a dive, "Come on! Is that the best you can do?!" He taunted the big dragon as they flew passed it, Toothless roared his own insult, they got the desired result as the Red Death diving after them.

"Stay with me buddy. We're good, just a little bit longer." Hiccup said to his dragon as he noticed Toothless began to grow nervous, he focused on his hearing to the monster behind them, "Hold, Toothless." He said again before hearing what he was waiting for, "Now!".

They turned around and facing the Red Death's mouth, just as the Red Death about to shot at them, Toothless shot his plasma blast into the monster's mouth, causing an explosion inside the monster's body. They burst out from the clouds with the Red Death hot on their tail. It glanced forward and saw the ground rushing up, it opened it's wings to stop the fall, but the punctured, damaged wings couldn't do their job. The Red Death crashed into the ground and exploded.

Hiccup and Toothless couldn't enjoy their victory yet, however, as they need to get away from the approaching fire and avoiding the rest of the Red Death's body, like it's spikes and tail. They managed to avoid the spikes, but just when they were about to avoid the tail, Toothless's prosthetic tail fin broke apart. "No." Hiccup gasped in fear as he felt the tail fin went dead, "No!".

Toothless roared in panic and tried to move away but he couldn't, the Red Death's tail hit them and Hiccup got thrown from the saddle. Hiccup felt an intense pain from his left leg and the heat from all around him as he fell towards the sea of flames, the last thing he saw before losing his consciousness was his dragon diving after him.

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Astrid was sewing a saddle for Stormfly in the cove that day, with Rivera perching on her shoulders, when the said dragon focused it's gaze at the sky and suddenly shot up to the air. "Rivera?!" She called out to the dragon, surprised that her dragon would suddenly fly away like that.

Two months had passed and Rivera's wings had long since healed, her tiny dragon was always near her when she came to the cove, and would fly to a higher place when she was away, but this was the first time her dragon flew without giving her a warning like that.

She stood up and squint her eyes to look at her dragon, she then saw her dragon approaching another Terrible Terror that was flying towards the village. "Rivera!" She called to her dragon, "What's wrong?!" She watched as they crooned to each other like they were talking in their own language, before raising her eyebrows when her dragon and the other Terror flew to her.

The other Terror hovered in front of her while Rivera perched on her shoulders again, "Hello there." Astrid greeted the other dragon as she lifted her arm, the dragon saw her movement and landed on her arm, "Is there something that I can help you with?" She asked in confusion and curiosity.

The Terror squawked at her and showed her it's back, where a strange paper attached to one of the spikes. "A paper?" Astrid picked it up and saw that there were two words on it, 'To Stoick'. "A letter?" She asked to no one, "Who would use a dragon to send a let-" She stopped herself as a certain boy entered her mind, "Hiccup?" She asked as she looked at the dragon, "Is this from Hiccup?" She asked the dragon.

The Terror squawked and nodded it's head, Astrid's eyes widened in surprise, "Wow, Hiccup sent a letter to his own Dad through a dragon . . . wow, just . . . wow." She said to herself in awe, "This means that Stoick already knows that Hiccup befriends dragons . . ." She then looked at the dragon, "Alright, do you want me to call Stoick here? The one who is supposed to receive this letter?".

The Terror shook it's head, "No?" She asked in confusion, "You want me to take this letter to Stoick then?" The dragon nodded, she blinked, "Okay then, I will give this letter to him." She said with a nod. The Terror cooed at her and nuzzled her hand before flying away, possibly to where Hiccup was.

"To think that Hiccup could train a dragon to send letter . . ." She said with a shake of her head, "He is really something." She looked at the letter once again before looking at Rivera, "Alright, girl. I need to get this letter to Stoick, so see you tomorrow." Her dragon crooned at her and flew to a nearby tree, she smiled at the dragon before turning around and ran towards the Chief's house.

About a week after Hiccup left Berk, Stoick and Gobber had gone to visit the nearby village with a small group of Vikings, they said that they want to try and have an alliance with them, but Astrid had overheard them talking about searching for Hiccup. They returned two weeks after that, only to go again to another village two weeks later, it repeated like that ever since.

Astrid thought that Hiccup got a perfect timing, because Stoick and Gobber had just returned from their newest visit, so she could get this letter to the Chief right away.

"Chief, are you here?" Astrid asked as she knocked on the door to the Chief's house.

She waited for a few seconds before the door opened to reveal Stoick standing with Gobber behind him, "Astrid." He greeted her, "Is there something you need my help with?".

Astrid looked around to make sure no one was nearby before entering the house, "First, Chief." She started as she closed the door, "I had noticed that you and Gobber are hiding something from the village." She looked at them seriously, "I want to know what you are hiding." She figured that since she would give them a letter that was sent through a dragon, they might as well come clear with what they were hiding, things would be less awkward then.

Stoick and Gobber paled, "Uh, what are you talking about?" Stoick asked, feigning confusion.

Astrid sighed and shook her head in amusement, "Like Father like Son." She smirked, "You and Hiccup are really bad in acting casual when hiding something, Chief." She said smugly, satisfied when she saw the Chief grew even more pale, "First about the Nest." She began her reason for accusing them hiding something, "It's not a secret that you were obsessed in finding the Nest and destroy it so the dragons would leave, but then you suddenly said that you lost interest in finding the Nest." She raised an eyebrow at him, "It's absurd, Chief".

"It's not absurd." Stoick argued, "I just get bored in searching for the Nest only to fail every time, not to mention the chance of losing people when we go out to search for the Nest".

" 'We are Vikings, it's an occupational hazard'." Astrid quoted, "It's what you always said to the people." She smirked again, "And second, you said that you don't want for the Trainees to get stressed having to kill a dragon in front of the people, but you forget that the Trainees were all excited in killing dragons in front of everyone. It's not something stressful, Chief, it's something 'Cool' for them".

Astrid crossed her arms as Stoick gaped at her, Gobber even had his eyes widened and froze like a deer caught in the light, "It's because of Hiccup, isn't it?" She guessed, "He told you something that had changed your mind".

Stoick sighed as he knows that he had lost the argument, "He wrote me a letter." He admitted in defeat, he pulled out a paper from his vest and handed it to Astrid, "This is the letter he wrote for me before he left.

Astrid unfolded the paper and read the letter, she felt bad when she read the part about Hiccup didn't have any friends in the village, but she couldn't help but smile at the end of it. How Hiccup told Stoick to stop searching for the nest and how he left to search for the real reason behind the dragon raids, she found herself admiring the boy for that, and her respect for the boy grew once again.

"Hiccup is a genius." Astrid commented as she finished reading the letter, "To create a prosthetic tail fin for a dragon and trained him . . . he is perfect to be a Chief, to be a leader." She folded back the letter and returned it to the Chief, "You must be very proud of him, Chief".

Stoick smiled sadly, "I am." He answered softly but firmly, "But I'm ashamed of myself for not realizing just how great my Son is before he left." He sighed tiredly before looking at her, "So, you now know what we are hiding, are you going to tell everyone about it?".

"No." Astrid shook her head, "It would be best if we tell them after the raids stopped, so they won't have anything against Hiccup anymore." She then pulled the letter from Hiccup out of her small bag and offered it to Stoick, "Cheer up, Chief." She said with a smile, "This letter is from Hiccup, another dragon of his had delivered it for him".

Stoick and Gobber gasped in surprise before Stoick took the letter from her, he ripped the envelope and took the paper inside and unfolded it.

To Stoick the Vast,

Chief of Hairy Hooligans Tribe of Berk.

Dad, I have found out the reason why the dragons kept raiding Berk. They do it not because that want to, but because they have to. They have to raid us in order to feed a really big monster in the Nest, or they would be eaten themselves. By the time you read this letter, I would already engage in a battle against the monster, which I called Red Death.

I'm quite confident in mine and my dragons ability in defeating the Red Death and kill it, but in case I couldn't come out of this battle alive, I want you and Gobber to know that I love you. You are my Father, even though we aren't that close, and Gobber is like a second Father to me. I love you both, Dad, and tell Gobber for me that I love him too. I had said that I self-exiled myself, but I still missed you two, I hope you both are safe and sound.

If I win this battle, the dragons will stop raiding Berk, and the other villages for that matter, so could you please stop killing them? Could you please move pass your hatred of dragons for taking Mom away? Could you please release the dragons from the arena? They deserve to be free, it's not right to strip them of their freedom any longer.

They only protecting themselves, Dad, just like what we do. Please don't hate them for trying to survive.

I will contact you again in about a month or two, if three months passed and you still don't hear from me, it's safe to assume that I didn't survive the battle. If I don't survive, I want to say that I'm sorry for breaking your heart again. Please remember that I will always love you, you are still my Dad no matter what.

Sincerely,

Hiccup.

"No." Stoick shook his head as his hands trembled, "Oh Odin." He closed his eyes as fear filled his heart, "Please protect my Son".

Astrid and Gobber, who also reading the letter with Stoick, also closed their eyes and prayed with all their heart.

Please be safe, Hiccup.

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To be continued . . .

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