Summary: With her expiration date appearing soon after the battle with Itex, Maximum Ride is forced out of the flock, forcing her to leave her loved ones behind. But it seems the gods have plans for our favorite bird kid. Max is soon transported to a timeline where Vikings and dragons are at war with each other, and their only hope for survival just might be their weakest member. Join Maximum Ride and Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III as they do the one thing that no Viking has ever been crazy enough to do… train a dragon! Living with dragons? It ain't easy, especially when they're trying to kill you. But with enough guts, perseverance, and willpower, the two will show the world that humans and dragons can coexist peacefully!

Disclaimer: I still don't own Maximum Ride or How To Train Your Dragon!

"..." Regular Text/Human Speech

"..." Dragon Speech

'...' Human Thoughts

'...' Dragon Thoughts

{"..."} Character Narration

Finding a Dragon and a Bird Kid

In the Great Hall, Stoick and many of the warrior Vikings of the Hairy Hooligan Tribe were in a meeting discussing what to do about the dragon problem in recent events. As it turns out, after taking inventory, they didn't lose nearly as much food as they thought they had in this raid. It would barely set them back a week or two, come winter. All they needed to do was catch some more fish to compensate. But that was neither here nor there.

"Either we finish them, or they'll finish us! It's the only way we'll be rid of them!" Stoick declared.

He and his soldiers were looking over a giant nautical map that showed Berk and its surrounding areas. Stoick grabbed a large dagger as he continued to speak.

"If we find the nest and destroy it, the dragons will leave. They'll find another home!" he said before stabbing the dagger into a foggy area. "One more search before the ice sets in."

But the other Vikings weren't so sure about their chief's plan.

"Those ships never come back." said a random Viking.

"We're Vikings. It's an occupational hazard." Stoick said as a rebuttal before asking "Now, who's with me?!"

But the other Vikings were very reluctant to go to a place as dangerous as Helheim's Gate. It would spell certain death for all of them! Various responses came from the gathered men and women of these Viking warriors.

"Count me out!"

"Today's not good for me."

"I have to do my ax returns."

But Stoick wasn't worried. He had a feeling that these Vikings wouldn't be so willing to rush out to fight the dragons on their home turf, so he came prepared with a contingency plan.

"Alright. Those who stay will look after Hiccup."

That got them all to agree with him faster than a rattlesnake striking its prey. It's actually pretty sad when you stop to think about it, isn't it?

"To the ships!" shouted Phlegma.

"I'm with you, Stoick!" added Spitelout.

With their minds made up, the vast majority of the Vikings that had gathered began to clamber out of the Great Hall in order to prepare for the trip. And Stoick just stared at the sight with a bland look. True, he knows it was kind of a low blow to use looking after his son as motivation, but what else could he have said to get them to agree?

"That's more like it." Stoick muttered blandly.

He also, reluctantly, decided that all of these Vikings couldn't come on the trip to fight with him. Some of them would need to stay and look after the children and defend the village. Hiccup is a decent hand to hand fighter in his own right, having been training on his own for a while, but he couldn't defend a whole village by himself. And only Odin knows that the lad would willingly try to do so if push comes to shove. And Stoick knows from experience that, against a Dragon, hand to hand will only get you so far against their armored hides. Soon, it was just Stoick and Gobber left in the Great Hall with Gobber taking a drink of mead from his mug hand.

"Right. I'll pack my undies." Gobber said.

He stood up to leave, but Stoick had other ideas.

"No, I need you to stay and train some new recruits."

"Oh, perfect. And while I'm busy, Hiccup can cover the stall. Molten steel, razor sharp blades, lots of time to himself. What could POSSIBLY go wrong?" Gobber quipped.

Stoick took a seat next to his old friend and sighed. He looked irritated, burdened and unsure. But of what, I don't know.

"What am I going to do with him, Gobber?" Stoick asked.

"Put him in training with the others." Gobber replied.

"No, I'm serious." Stoick said.

"So am I." Gobber replied.

"He'd be dead before you let the first dragon out of its cage!" Stoick exclaimed.

But Gobber just waved him off with his remaining hand.

"Oh, you don't know that." he said nonchalantly.

"I do, actually." Stoick stated.

"No, you don't." Gobber fired back.

"No, actually, I do." Stoick said, a bit sterner this time.

"No, you don't!" Gobber exclaimed with just as much force.

"Listen! You know what he's like. From the time he could crawl, he's been… different." Stoick said, standing up and pacing around. "He doesn't listen to me! He's got the attention span of a sparrow! I take him fishing, and he goes hunting for - for trolls!"

At the mention of trolls, Gobber got a bit more defensive and caused his own stone false tooth to pop out of place and fall into his mug.

"Trolls exist! They steal your socks! But only the left ones. What's with that?" Gobber exclaimed, feeling confused about why Trolls only take left-footed socks.

Stoick sighed as he got lost in a memory of his childhood. Right after coming to an understanding about how and why Hiccup had been convinced that trolls existed. Being around Gobber for that long will apparently do that to you.

"When I was a boy…"

"Oh, here we go." groaned Gobber.

"...My father told me to hit my head against a rock, and I did it. I thought it was crazy, but I didn't question him. And you know what happened?"

"You got a headache?" Gobber offered.

Gobber fished his tooth out of his mug and used the bottom of it to tap it back into place, running his tongue along the tooth to make sure it wouldn't fall out.

"That rock split in two. It taught me what a Viking could do, Gobber. He could crush mountains, level forests, tame seas!" Stoick exclaimed before adding "Even as a boy, I knew what I was. What I had to become. Hiccup is not that boy."

"I know how you feel, but you can't stop him, Stoick. You can only prepare him." he said.

Seeing Stoick's confused face, Gobber stood up and continued what he had to say.

"I know it seems hopeless, but you won't always be around to protect him. He's going to get out there again! He's probably out there now!"

Stoick looked as though he was pondering Gobber's words. He has a lot of thinking to do before heading out to find the nest. However, he knew that simply putting Hiccup in Dragon Training wouldn't work. Not without him allowing himself to be severely harmed or worse.

Needless to say, as the chief of Berk returned home, he had a lot of thinking to do so he could get his affairs in order. And maybe try to have a little heart to heart with his son. Odin only knows they both need it after recent events.

The scene changes to a panning bird's eye view of the mountainous terrain in the forest, before transforming into a map of the terrain, a trajectory line and littered with crosses in different places. It then goes to Hiccup, looking down at his book in hand, charcoal pencil in the other. The boy closed his eyes and held his breath in hopes of finding what he was looking for. He opened his eyes, releasing his breath in a sigh, the area clear of the Night Fury, or signs of any dragon for that matter. The boy looked down and marked another cross on the map in his book using his charcoal pencil. Another failed location. And trust me, there are a lot of them. Hiccup scribbled all over the page in frustration, before putting his pencil in the book and slamming it shut.

"Oh, the gods hate me. Some people lose their knife or their mug. Not me. I manage to lose an entire dragon." Hiccup whined silently to himself.

In his ever-growing anger, the lad swatted away the branch of a tree, before it decided to 'return the favor'. How did it plan on doing this, you may ask? By hitting him in the face.

Hiccup looked up in anger to glare at the standing tree, or so he thought. Instead, he sees the tree struck down, snapped quite low down (in comparison to the tree's height, not the position of the trunk to the ground), fallen over a hill that has a large groove leading from the tree struck out by something.

Throwing caution to the wind, Hiccup began following the groove, touching a large, raised tree root along the way, up to the hill and looked over. A dark dragon entered his vision causing him to quickly hide away. He then grabbed his dagger and looked over again to get a better look. The Night Fury is tied up in the bola cords, tangled badly. Hiccup approaches as slowly and carefully as possible, using a large nearby stone as a form of cover, looking on in a combination of excitement and fear. At first glance the dragon seems dead; no movement, eyes closed, no sounds of breathing.

"Oh, wow. I did it. Oh, I did it. This fixes everything! Yes! I have brought down this mighty beast!" the boy exclaimed, feeling triumphant.

Hiccup put his foot on the Night Fury's leg, striking a victorious pose. But what he didn't count on was the fact that the dragon was alive! The dragon felt the light pressure, shaking his arm and moaning at the contact. Hiccup fell to the ground from losing his balance, before getting up again and pointing his dagger at the dragon's body. He takes a look at the Night Fury's face, sharp eyes of green taking in Hiccup's appearance. After regaining his senses, Hiccup began to loosen himself, rolling his shoulders as he prepared to thrust the blade into the dragon.

"I'm going to kill you, dragon. Then I'm – then I'm going to cut out your heart and take it to my father. I'm a Viking. I'm a Viking!" Hiccup declared, more to convince himself rather than the dragon.

The dragon moans, raising its head to look at Hiccup. Hiccup looked back at him before turning back, raising his dagger above his head. The Night Fury's huffed breathing quickens slightly. Hiccup made the mistake(?) of taking another look at the dragon, seeing the fear in its eyes. Hiccup momentarily lost his composure before regaining it, closing his eyes so he wouldn't have to see the fear and familiarity looking back at him. The dragon closed his eyes and dropped his head to the ground giving a defeated growl, accepting death.

Hiccup gave himself one final push to try and drive the blade home, but then lowered it on his head in defeat. He cannot kill the Night Fury. He took a few steps back and turned to the village.

"I did this." he mumbled.

Turning back, he once again looked at the trapped dragon. A few huffed, ragged breaths escape the creature. Hiccup looked down in shame and defeat, not believing what he was about to do now.

The dragon's eyes shot wide open, glancing back as it heard cutting sounds. Hiccup had grabbed his dagger and was cutting the ropes apart to set it free. One of the ropes broke and he proceeded to cut another. The back legs of the dragon moved slightly, shrugging off a couple, subtly enough not to be noticed by Hiccup. The second rope is cut. Fast as lightning the Night Fury reacts, grabbing Hiccup and pinning him against the ground and rock.

Hiccup looked up frightened, gazing into those sharp green eyes, no longer scared and observing but powerful and furious. Hiccup seems smaller, looking up in fear and desperation, almost identical to how the dragon looked before. It growled in anger, baring its teeth and rising up, looking like it's about to strike.

But rather than attacking, the Night Fury bent down and gave an ear-splitting roar, before leaping away. Hiccup could do nothing more than look on in surprise. The dragon tried to fly away and did so, but its flight pattern seemed off to the observant boy, hitting some rocks and cliff walls before disappearing from sight, roaring all the way.

Hiccup puffed out a sigh of relief, slumping further down the rock, if that was possible, before picking up his dagger and getting to his feet. Taking one last look towards where the dragon disappeared, he turned around, walking toward the village. He only managed five steps before he noticed something in the sky. It was a bright burning light that glowed orange in the cloudy sky above Berk. He didn't know what it was, but it sure was pretty to look at.

At least until he realized that it was falling in his direction.

"OH GODS! OH NO!" screamed Hiccup.

He ran as fast as his legs could carry him which got him out of the way fast enough to avoid getting crushed and incinerated by what he now knew was a ball of fire falling from the sky, but the force of the impact was enough to send him flying a-ways. He grunted as he hit the ground hard but didn't feel anything broken. Slowly, Hiccup picked himself up off the ground and glanced at the crash site. Whatever fell out of the sky, it sure wasn't normal.

"Whoa…! What was that?" gasped Hiccup, trying to catch his breath.

He didn't think it was a dragon. He may not know as much about them as a more experienced Viking, like his father, but he knew enough to know that dragons don't just explode like that! He thought about going back to the village and getting help, but then again, he doubted anyone would believe a word he said. If they didn't believe him about how he shot down a Night Fury, then they certainly wouldn't believe him when he said that he was almost crushed to death by a falling ball of fire. So, he pulled out his dagger and, against his better judgment, went to the crater to investigate. Even though he was nervous about what he might find, his heart thumping rapidly in his chest, Hiccup couldn't help but wonder what he might find.

Maybe this was one of those falling stars that Gobber used to tell him about when he was eight.

As he neared the crater the smoke began to fade, but the heat was still high. He looked down into the crater, and what he saw baffled him, and put more than a little bit of fear of the wrath of Odin into him.

Lying in the crater was a girl who looked to be about his age, but taller than himself and most of his fellow Viking teens. Her pale skin and golden blonde streaked hair that fell in a pool of golden curls mesmerized Hiccup, though her clothes looked kind of strange. Nothing like what you typically see in the archipelago, so he could tell that she wasn't a Viking. At least, not until you get to the pair of bird wings with brown and white feathers growing out of her back!

Was this perhaps a literal Valkyrie that fell from Asgard? Or was she something else?

Questions for later.

Hiccup wasted no time putting his dagger away and climbing down into the crater and trying to help her. But the second he put his hand on her shoulder, he had to pull back as her clothing and skin was burning hot. But Hiccup wasn't smarter than the average Viking for nothing, and he was nothing if not determined. He removed his bearskin vest and used it as a protective layer to wrap around the strange girl, being careful of her wings, before picking her up as best he could and carrying her back to his house as fast as he could.

And for once, he didn't care if he got an earful from his dad about staying inside.

***To Be Continued…***

Ending A/N: And there we go, one brand new chapter for this story! I hope you guys and girls out there like it. Now, I'm going to update at least two more of my other stories before shifting my focus back to The Phantom of the Empire. I am determined to finish that story! Anyway, please don't forget to leave a review for this chapter, and I'll see you all in the next update!