I'm currently away from home so I have lots and lots of time to spend writing yay! But this will also be the first birthday I've ever spent away from home :'( On the other hand, I'm now in a country where my birthday is a national holiday yay! Even more time to get some writing done :D

I hope you enjoy!


Chapter 3 : Toothless

The engine hummed as Hiccup sat in his idling car on a quiet residential street. The sun was setting and the streetlights had already started coming on. He leaned forward in his seat so that he could get a better look at one of the houses from his car window. The lights were on, of course, of all the nights he could get home early, he had to get home early tonight. Hiccup thought of just going home, he was tired from a long day at work and he really wasn't in the mood to talk to anyone, but he really didn't want to have to drive back tomorrow. He took a deep breath, put his car into park, and got out.

It felt like a while since he was last here but everything looked just like it always did. Hiccup walked up to the front door and pulled out his keys, unlocking the door. He stepped inside and as he shuffled his shoes off he heard loud booming footsteps moving towards him. "Hey dad." Hiccup said without looking up.

Hiccup's father, Stoick, was a large man, much larger than Hiccup. With his bulky build and his big red beard he shared very little resemblance with his son. "Hiccup...you didn't tell me you would be visiting."

"I'm not, I just need something from my room."

"...I heard there was a breakthrough at your office."

Hiccup nodded. "Yeah, they got it to work a couple days ago."

"...Well that's good."

"Yeah."

There was a awkward silence for a short moment before Stoick spoke again. "...I guess I should let you get to it then."

"Right, yeah." Hiccup said as he moved towards the stairs and starting climbing up to where his room was.

The relationship between Hiccup and his father had always been kind of awkward and strained. Hiccup was often the type to push boundaries, and his father never knew how to deal with it, he still didn't. It didn't help how much time Stoick spent at work and how little he spent at home.

Hiccup opened the door to his room, it was pretty much the same as it was since he moved out after graduation. All of his stuff remained completely untouched, comic books still neatly stacked on their shelf, rolled posters in the corner right where he left them, even his trash can still had the same garbage that he had left behind. He opened his closet and from the back corner he pulled out a small glass terrarium. Hiccup had briefly owned a pet turtle as a child and he still had the terrarium that he had kept it in. The rocks, fake plants, and other similar items and been tossed inside. Hiccup picked up the whole thing and walked it back to his car. He couldn't be sure what the creature needed for a habitat, but once it was able to move again he didn't want it to be able to just run around his apartment. The terrarium was his best solution for the time being.

Hiccup set everything up as soon as he got home. He spread the rocks across the bottom of the terrarium and placed down a few of the plastic plants. He then gently placed the creature inside, left a few more pieces of chopped up hotdog for it to eat, and put the lid on top.

Hiccup looked at it from through the glass. "Goodnight." He said with a small smile.


Hiccup made his way down the halls of the lab until he reached the chemical lab, he walked inside, and found Fishlegs typing away at his computer, brows furrowed in concentration. Hiccup knocked against the wall. "Hey, you want to go for lunch?"

Fishlegs looked up, a little surprised by Hiccup's presence, before glancing at his watch. "Oh, yeah, sorry, I got caught up in my work."

"Don't worry about it, things have been pretty crazy around here." Hiccup said casually leaning against the wall. "Everytime I look something else has changed and I need to start all my work from scratch."

Fishlegs got out of his chair, grabbed his lunch, his laptop, and a messy bundle of papers. "Okay, let's go."

Hiccup cocked his eyebrow at Fishlegs. "You're bringing your work? I can wait if you need to finish something."

"No, no need, I want to show you something." He said shaking his head and walking towards the door. "Come on, let's go."

They walked over to the staff cafeteria which was mostly empty, most likely due to how busy everyone was, and they sat down at one of the tables. Fishlegs dumped all of his things down and began sorting them all, pushing papers around into piles and moving his lunch bag off to the side.

Hiccup just sat there for a while, watching his friend shuffle through the mess of documents and reports. "Are you going to tell me what all of this is or what?"

He looked up and nodded, an excited grin slowly creeping onto his face. "They found a new molecule in the room."

"...yay?"

Fishlegs frowned. "Yes, yay. A brand new organic molecule from an alien location, this is huge!"

"You're the chemical engineer, not me. I don't know anything about this stuff."

"Well it's huge." He said looking around at all the papers scattered across the table. "We might be able to understand whatever lifeforms exist through the machine better by understanding this one molecule."

"Where did they find it?"

"It was in the air, and it seems like it's of a pretty high concentration in their atmosphere. So whatever it is it must be an integral part of the life over there." Fishlegs explain as he looked over a document.

"Over there? Do we even know what over there is?"

Fishlegs shrugged. "They still haven't told me much, but everyone is pretty sure it's a Einstein-Rosen bridge. Where it leads, we're still not sure. An alien planet maybe?"

Hiccup stood up and moved to Fishlegs' side of the table to look around at all of his work. "If it was a alien planet, how did they know it had life on it? How could they possibly know that before opening the machine?"

"Maybe they didn't."

Hiccup shook his head. "What are the chances that the first planet they open the bridge to just happens to have life on it, and not just any life, moving, breathing, life."

"We don't know that yet." Fishlegs corrected. "We haven't actually seen it, so we don't know if it can move or breathe."

"...Right, right."

"I can't wait until they find it, it's going to be a massive breakthrough once we have a alien lifeform in captivity."

Hiccup laughed nervously. "Won't that be exciting."

The screech of a moving chair startled them both and they glanced over to the far end of the table where an old man was mopping the floor.

"Afternoon Mildew." Fishlegs said waving to the janitor. Mildew just shot them a quick glare before moving to the next table. "Sheesh, that guy is always in a bad mood, what's his problem?"

"Who knows." Hiccup replied shrugging. "So, anyway, did they assign you to study it or did you just find out from the others?"

"I've been assigned to study it." Fishlegs said grinning. "I'm so excited right now, this is the kind of thing I really wanted to work on when I started here." He then shuffled through some papers and handed one to Hiccup. "Here, look at this, it's the information about the molecular compound."

Hiccup took the document and scanned it. "It's really long."

Fishlegs nodded. "It's a really complicated molecule. We still don't know if it will have a negative effect on humans, that's why their being so careful about going back into the room. So far it seems alright but better safe than sorry I guess."

"...A negative affect? Like what?"

"We're still not sure, but we have to be cautious of any foreign molecules." Fishlegs explained. "I wouldn't take the risk personally, we don't know very much about it, but Finn insisted on pushing forward as fast as possible."

"Well they don't call him fearless Finn Hofferson for nothing."

Fishlegs chuckled. "Yeah I guess you're right, well as long as I'm not the one going in, it's not a problem for me."

"You want a coffee? I'm going to grab a cup." Hiccup asked standing up from his chair.

"Sure, thanks."

Hiccup walked over to the coffee machine and grabbed two mugs from the cupboard above his head. As he poured coffee into the first cup he peered out the door just as a blonde-haired girl walked by. He knew who it was immediately and moved to the doorway to see where she was going. It was Astrid, she was beautiful as always and Hiccup couldn't help but steal the occasional glance. She had long golden blonde hair that was always fashioned into a braid that she left draped over her shoulder. Her body type would be best described as fit, she was slim but toned at the same time.

Astrid and Hiccup has known each other since grade school but despite Hiccup always noticing Astrid, Astrid never really noticed Hiccup. She was the niece of Finn Hofferson, the head physicist and the guy in charge of their whole operation. Hiccup obviously had no complaints when he found out that he was going to be working for her uncle, especially knowing how close she was to him. Her visits to the lab were relatively common, though Hiccup rarely interacted with her during her time there and when they did it was very brief and usually had to do with work at the lab or her uncle.

Hiccup stole another glance down the hall at Astrid, she paced and wandered down the halls as if she was lost, which was strange since she had been to the lab many times. He moved halfway into the hall so she could see him. "Hey, Astrid, are you looking for something?"

She looked up at him. "I'm looking for my uncle, he asked me to drop some documents off." Cradled in her arms was a large bundle of papers. "He always asks me to drop stuff off here but never tells me where he is." She groaned in annoyance.

"I can take them to him if you want." Hiccup offered.

"Thanks, but no thanks." Astrid replied. "I was told to only give this to him personally, apparently it's very important, and also very secret."

Hiccup nodded. "Right, of course. Well, good luck."

"Thanks." She said walking back down the hall.

He sighed and leaned against the door frame as she walked away. Astrid was one of those girls, the kind that was popular, the kind that was admired by everyone, the kind guys always liked. Astrid was Astrid, and Hiccup...was Hiccup. He knew he didn't have a chance back in grade school, and he knew it even better now. Hiccup moved from the doorway and filled the second mug with coffee, returning to the table.


The front door swung open and Hiccup walked inside, dumping his bag onto the floor and stumbling inside with his shoes still on. Work was a nightmare, it was non-stop work and lots of overtime. Everyday started to feel like a marathon. Hiccup walked to the kitchen and grabbed a bag of leftover fast food and placed it on the table.

He looked at the terrarium, he had left it on the kitchen table since it was the only spot big enough in his apartment. The creature sat curled up under the rock-shelter that was inside, it's large green eyes looking up at him. "I guess you're probably hungry." Hiccup said quietly to it, standing up and moving back to the fridge. No hotdogs, he sighed. Most of his food had been eaten and he hadn't found the time to go shopping lately, work was now seven days a week. Hiccup moved over to the pantry and shuffled through the old and forgotten items until he came across and old can of tuna. "This will have to do." He said grabbing a can opener from a nearby drawer.

After opening up the can, Hiccup took the top off of the terrarium and grabbed a small amount of tuna with his fingers. He watched as the creature slowly crept out from underneath his shelter and stared up at his hand. It was hungry, it hadn't eaten all day. Hiccup dropped the meat and it fell right in front of the creature. It dove forward and gobbled up the tuna with impressive speed and immediately looked up at him with a face that said "More." He grabbed another bit of meat from the can and dropped it inside, again the creature ate it very quickly, this time licking it's lips. Hiccup laughed "You're actually pretty cute." He grabbed more tuna, this time attempting to get the creature to eat straight from his hand. It did so quite happily but once the meat was all gone it tried to eat one of Hiccup's fingers, the creature didn't have any teeth so all it did was squish his finger between it's soft gums. This did not work at all and only made Hiccup laugh more.

"You can't eat me, you're toothless."

Thanks for reading, please leave a review I really appreciate them!