The boat gently drifts through the different landscapes of temple ruins to marshlands. Hiccup and Raya were standing over the table with a map of Kumandra laid out in front of them. There was only one more dragon piece left, and Toothless' tail was coming along nicely, it just needed a fire and that was something they tried their best to not burn the boat.
"Alright, everyone. Here's the plan." Raya started off as they tried to come up with a plan to get the gem. "The last gem piece is in Fang, the most heavily guarded of the five lands. Now, they're protected by an artificial canal that separates them from the rest of the world. The only way in or out is by water. Luckily for us, we have a magic water dragon. Now, the palace will be swarming with Fang soldiers. To sneak past them, we'll need to-"
"I got this, guys." Boun suddenly interrupted her planning. "I'll take care of the first wave. Tong will follow up with his giant axe of bad-axery! Then Hiccup and Toothless come in and shoot down that goatee dude and his dragon! And then come the Ongis and that crazy con-baby... lunging at Virana, taking the gem... who will toss the gem to the mighty Sisudatu... RAWWWRRR...and then..." he starts to mimic an explosion. "Bye-bye Binturis. Superflow plan, am I right?"
The con baby starts clapping with giggles at the plan.
"Uh, no," Toothless informed him. "I've seen boulders that flow better."
"Toothless is right." Sisu agreed with him. "Here's my plan. We infiltrate Fang, confront Namaari...and offer something nice and go, Hey. Want to help us save the world? Because all it takes is one gem piece! YES! I've been waiting for someone to ask me! Here ya go! Best friends forever!"
Everyone stared at her in confusion as none of them knew what to say after hearing that plan.
"Okay, I'd rather go with Boun's plan." Hiccup stated as he finished the tail. "Over here, Bud."
Toothless morphed into a dragon again and allowed Hiccup to attach the prosthetic tail to him. Sisu was a little confused and hurt by the statement from Hiccup and looked at him.
"What? Why?" Sisu asks him.
Raya sighed and knew she had to agree with Hiccup on this one. "Because, Sisu, this is Fang."
"Their blades are specially designed for the stabbing of backs." Tong agreed with them.
"If it weren't for them. Then none of this would have happened." Boun stated as he leaned on Toothless. "They're the worse." Toothless didn't like being a rest and moved, causing Boun to slip. "Yip!"
"If we're just honest with her, deep down, I got a feeling she wants to fix the world as much as we do." Sisu defended her argument.
"Sisu, people like that...they're not worth trying to trust." Hiccup stated as he finished placing the tail on his friend. "Trust me...I've tried it before."
"Really? When?" Sisu wonders.
Hiccup had a flashback moment in his head, but he shook it off quickly. "I...I don't wanna talk about it."
"Must've been a terrible experience if you don't wanna talk about it." Rays detected and decided to not push it. Hiccup has been opening up a lot more since she met him and didn't want to push him into telling her something. "That kinda furthest our point. You weren't there when Namaari betrayed me."
"We're sticking with Raya's plan." Hiccup agreed as he stood up, swiping the dust off of him from Toothless.
But then there was a sudden downpour of rain with clouds that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Toothless quickly covered his body with his wings to keep himself and Hiccup dry.
"What's with the downpour?" Raya asks Sisu.
"Come on." Sisu suddenly used the rain to travel as she grabbed onto Raya and took off. "I gotta show you something!"
Hiccup was a little confused as to what was happening and quickly ran and leaped onto the back of Toothless. "Let's go, Bud."
Toothless leaped into the air and the tail fin seems to be working fine and keeping up well. The others were left behind as they watched the four of them flying away from the boat.
"What do we do now?" Boun wonders.
"I don't know," Tong admitted.
Sisu carries Raya through the air as Toothless was keeping up slowly. Raya hugs Sisu for dear life. "Where are you taking me?"
The cloud parts to see where Sisu is headed: Heart. Raya hasn't been back here ever since the first night this all happened. Raya's eyes lock onto the Heart bridge where she saw the statue of her father still there.
Sisu flies them to the top of the temple opening. The gem chamber has crumbled, huge shafts of light now peek into it. Raya was placed gently on the ground as Hiccup and Toothless landed right aside them. Hiccup looked around and was a little surprised at the size of this place and all of Heart.
"Where are we?" Hiccup wonders.
"Home." Raya admired with a few tears in her eyes. "This is my home."
Hiccup was shocked and looked around in amazement. "Huh..."
Toothless morphed into a human so that he could talk and look at Sisu. "Sisu, why are we here?"
"This is where it all happened," Sisu explains to them as she walked ahead.
Raya looked around and remembered that night six years ago. "Yeah, I know. I was there."
"No, this is where it all happened 500 years ago." Sisu pulls down some foliage to reveal the dragon statues. The other three were confused as they walked over to the figures. "Hiccup, Raya, Toothless...I want you to meet my brothers and sisters. The real mighty ones. I miss them."
"I never knew they were here," Raya admitted in shock.
"See that classy-looking one over there?" She gestured to one of the other statues in the area. "That's Amba, I get my glow from her." She then looked to smother one around the room. "And that's Pranee - she's the shapeshifter." She kept going as she looked at the others in the room. "Jagan - fog." Then she gestured to the one in front of them. "And Pengu... he's our big brother. He brings the rain." She then decided to explain what happened here at the beginning. "We were the last dragons. All the other dragons had been turned to stone. We were drowning in a sea of Druun. But my oldest brother, Pengu, refused to accept defeat. This is where we'd make our last stand, united. So, one by one, they combined all their magic, creating the dragon gem. I don't know why they chose me. It could have been any of us. All I know is I trusted them and they trusted me. And so..." she then stopped as she knew that they knew what happened next with her tale of dropping the Druun. "When they put their faith in me, it empowered me beyond anything I could imagine. The same can happen with Namaari."
Rays sighed as she knew what she was trying to say. "I really wish I could believe that. I even thought we could be friends."
"After all of this, maybe you can be." Sisu ensured.
Hiccup sighed as he crossed his arms. "Not all people are worth trusting, Sisu..." both of them looked over at him in confusion. "Some people are stuck in their ways and won't change."
"Why do you think that?" Sisu wonders. "Who did you trust?"
Hiccup walked away and looked to Toothless, who nodded and knew they needed to know. He turned and knew Hiccup was okay with him giving this information away.
"We lied to both of you. Since the beginning." Toothless admitted.
Raya started to get worried when she eyed Hiccup. "What's he talking about?"
Hiccup sighed and knew it was time to finally tell them. "The last person that I trusted...before I met all of you...was my father."
Years ago, Hiccup was outside the arena after his father has just praised him for getting first place in dragon training. He knew he couldn't do this, kill a dragon after befriending one, but he needs to try and stop the fighting if he can once and for all.
Or he might just regret not leaving when he had the chance. He was gonna leave the other day, but then he realized they would still be left fighting dragons, the ones who are just trying to survive, and it's them who are the ones getting the food first.
So now he's going to stop the war if he can. This was the only chance he could find if he could trust the others with the secret of the dragons. He didn't know if he could reveal Toothless to them, but if all
"It's time, Hiccup. Show 'em how it's done." Gobber tells him as Hiccup is led into the arena and places the helmet on his head.
Hiccup goes in, as nervous as anyone could possibly be, if possible even more as everyone cheers him on around the arena. He goes to the stall holding weapons and grabs a shield along with a small dagger.
"I would've gone for the hammer," Stoick tells Gobber as they watch from outside.
"I'm ready." Hiccup promises as the doors open and the Monsterous Nightmare bursts out of its cage and attacks the roof, trying to break free until it spots Hiccup in the cage with him. Everyone cheers him on as Hiccup is approached by the Nightmare as he started to back away slowly. He just calmly drops the shield and knife to show that he means the dragon no harm.
"What is he doing?" Stoick and everyone wonder as they were mumbling amongst themselves.
"Hey, it's okay. It's okay." Hiccup promises the dragon and tries to calm it down and notices it's staring at his helmet. "I'm not one of them." He says before grabbing and tossing the helmet, leaving everyone in shock at what they witnessed.
"Stop the fight," Stoick said, standing up.
"No! I need you all to see this." Hiccup tells them as the dragon has already almost accepted him. "They're not what we think they are." A few tense seconds passed as the Monstrous Nightmare slowly started to lower its head toward the boy's hand. "We don't have to kill them..."
"I said...stop the fight!" Stoick shouted as he slams a weapon against the caged ceiling.
The dragon's eyes went to slits and it promptly started to attack the small human that had been trying to touch him.
Now, the dragon was sure that the small human had been trying to lure him into calmness so that the big humans could do a surprise attack. The Monstrous Nightmare goes to torch Hiccup as he runs away from the flames before he could get hurt.
In the cove, Toothless suddenly perked his ears up at the sound of his human's voice raised in fear and immediately began a frantic search for a way out. He jumped at the walls of the cove, scrabbling for a hold of the smooth rock to crawl out.
After a few attempts, he jumped while using his wings for a boost, and firmly dug his claws into the high ground he was aiming for. It was a last-ditch effort, but it worked and Toothless was soon sprinting, flapping, and jumping through the trees to come to his rider's aid.
As he reached the arena, the dragon blasted an opening in the top half to allow himself entry. The blast had also provided the added benefit of creating a cloud of smoke, which concealed his rider from the bad dragon's angry gaze, and afforded Toothless an advantage, as he could see better in the smoke cloud than his larger opponent.
Hiccup couldn't see much of the dragon's fighting, but when the smoke cleared, he was on the opposite side of the arena from the Monstrous Nightmare, with Toothless standing protectively between them, ready to attack should the Monstrous dragon make an offensive move on his rider.
The situation was not helped when the arena was swarmed by Vikings, who took care of the Nightmare quickly before heading for the Night Fury, ready to kill.
Hiccup tried to tell his dragon to leave, but Toothless wasn't going. Hiccup thought fearfully of what would happen to Toothless if the swiftly approaching warriors managed to reach them, and he realized what he would have to do.
Sure, it would mean abandoning his village, and everything he's ever known, but it would mean keeping his first true friend out of danger.
He jumped onto the saddle, clicked the prosthetic tailfin into place, and took off just as Spitelout reached the place they had been. He flew out of the arena and almost left right then, but instead guided Toothless to curve around and land on the caged top of the arena.
"Dad!" Hiccup shouted so that he could be heard by the people on the ground, "This is what I was trying to show you. They aren't evil, mindless killers. We could coexist if we just tried!"
Stoick looked up at his son with an outward expression of rage, "This is what you've been hiding from me? This is what you've been doing all this time?! I thought you were one of us! But you're not." only a select few people, those who knew the chief very well, could hear a slight note of sadness in his voice as he said the final few statements and the last shout. "You're no Viking...you're not my son."
From the ground, no one could really see Hiccup's expression, and although many guessed, no one could truly envision the forlorn, shocked, or slightly resentful emotions that were present. Faster than most eyes could follow, the dragon and his rider were gone as they flew off into the distance, leaving everyone behind.
As far out in the distance, Hiccup and Toothless fly away from the island he once called home. He had to leave, otherwise, his best friend would've been hunted down and he'd be banished formally and officially.
Toothless cooed as he looked up at his rider in worry. Hiccup smiled as he patted his best friend on the head and knew he had made the right decision.
"It's okay, Bud. This is for the best..." Hiccup promised as they flew off into the sky.
Raya and Sisu were shocked by the tale and were shocked that it was his father who drew Hiccup away from his home. They understood that Hiccup came from a bad place, but this was information that changed everything.
"I trusted that my father could trust my judgment and he tried to kill me." Hiccup stated as he held himself.
Raya walks over to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry."
"That's why I started to become distant. Why I am cautious about who I trust." Hiccup explains to them and tears up. "Because the one man I thought would understand and trust my judgment... he betrayed me."
"I understand that now." Raya had to admit she never knew what she'd do if her father did something like that. "But...maybe this could work. And I know that if Namaari does try to betray me again, you'll be there."
Hiccup sighed and wonders if this was a good idea but also knew that he would watch over Raya and keep her safe. "Alright. You have a plan?"
Raya thought about it and reached into her vest where she pulled out a small Sisu-shaped figure. "I might have an idea."
As they started to make their way out and to the boat, Raya wanted to make a quick stop at the bridge. When they did, Raya found her father and placed a flower head inside of his hands.
"Do you think that he would recognize me?" Raya wonders. "So much has changed."
Hiccup walked over and placed a hand on her shoulder to comfort her. "I know he will."
Raya smiled at him and he smiled back. He started to close his eyes as he lean in towards her as Raya mimicked his action. The two were a few centimeters off from making contact when Toothless decided to mess with them.
"Come on, kids. Time to fix the world." Toothless said as he transformed back into a dragon.
Hiccup and Raya shook off what was happening as he nodded and climbed onto his back. Raya wondered what to do when Hiccup patted his dragon's back, inviting her to join him. Raya decided to go with it as she walked over and climbed on his back. They then took off into the air and started to make their way back to the others. They needed to fill them in on the plan and hope that they agreed to it as well.
This had better work.