Wow two chapters in the same month, can't even remember that last time I was able to accomplish that! Let's hope I can keep up this momentum at least for a little while, anyway, please enjoy!
Chapter 16: Unexpected Rescue
Astrid stepped into the living room, a scrap of toast hanging from her mouth as she shuffled through the various papers scattered about the dining room table. The TV murmured in the background, a weatherman giving the daily forecast. She grabbed a folder, her keys, and her wallet, stuffing them all away into her purse before moving towards the couch, where her jacket had been draped. Astrid took it and threw it over her arm, reaching for the remote she pointed it towards the television and stopped as the news reports began to play.
"Last night was reported as the fifth attempted bank robbery in Berk this month, of the five, this has been the second successful attempt, with the robbers making it out with under one thousand dollars in cash and valuables, though the number may change as investigators are still looking into the details. Many have been criticizing the BPD as with the recent rise in bank robberies they have yet to stop any, the three failed attempts only stopped because of the creature-riding vigilante known to the public as 'The Fantastic Night Fury'. Though officials are still calling this man a criminal, many concerned civilians are beginning to call him a hero." Astrid smiled as she listened to the news report, slowly chewing up her last piece of toast. "Only one culprit has been caught in connection with the attempted robberies and some speculate based on similarities in the techniques used that there is a co-" Her phone began to ring, loudly interrupting the newscaster, she quickly switched the TV off and threw the remote back onto the couch, before rummaging through her purse to pull out her cellphone.
"Hello?" Astrid answered as she walked towards the door. "Oh, Hiccup," she said as she grabbed a boot and slipped it on, doing the zipper all the way to the top. There was a long pause, and her previously calm expression began to slowly melt into something more akin to rage. "You what?!" Astrid cried out, as she stood in her entrance hall, phone pressed between her ear and her shoulder, a coat and a bag hanging from her arm, one boot on her foot, the other in her hand. "We're doing this today, you couldn't think of a better time to tell me this?" she asked as she glanced down at her watch.
"I know, I'm sorry, something came up at work and I have to be there right now."
She pulled on her other boot with one hand while hopping to keep her balance. "Why didn't you schedule the day off? I told you about this a week ago, we need you there to control everything! You have all the equipment!" The sounds of moving air could be heard in the background. "Are you driving right now? How early did they call you in?"
"Yes, I dropped off the equipment with Fishlegs, he already knows how to use everything, if you need anything else you can text me."
"Have you forgotten that you're the only one who knows how to identify the blueprints? Without you, we have no means to find them!"
"I asked Gobber, he said he could go in my place, he's been studying the plans remember? Honestly, with all his experience he'll probably be more helpful than I ever could be."
"Why is Gobber free when you're not? Isn't he your boss?"
"The head of the research department is my boss, and there are multiple projects going on here, the one they need me for isn't involved with Gobber's research," Hiccup explained, though none of it was true, of course she didn't know that.
Astrid groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Alright, alright, that'll work I guess."
"Look, I'm really sorry, I know I said I'd be there, but work really needed me today, it was unavoidable."
"Yeah, okay, I know, and I know you have a job and a life outside of all this but when you make a commitment to something, something so important."
"I know, I'm sorry...I swear, if I could be there, I would be there."
Astrid sighed. "Alright, well try and-" There was a thump sound as something landed on the roof, she smiled and looked upwards, pulling on her jacket on and moving towards the stairs. "Hiccup, I have to go, keep your phone close by okay?"
"Of course," he replied. "I'll see you later."
"Bye," Astrid said, hanging up the phone as she walked up the stairs and towards the upper hallway, where the skylight was. She shuffled a plant to the side of the hall table and climbed on top of it, reaching up to unlatch and open the skylight. Above her she could faintly see the silhouette of Toothless' head peak out in the darkness, his large glowing eyes looking down at her. "Hello there," she said with a giggle. Hiccup stood just out of view, he popped his phone into his pocket and closed the visor on his helmet with a soft click. The Night Fury appeared from behind Toothless, and he knelt down, reaching out a hand for her to grab. Astrid took it and used it to pull herself up and onto the roof of her house. "I didn't know I was getting a personal escort."
He shrugged. "It was on the way, so I thought I'd save you the trip over," he lied, she wasn't on route, he had just wanted to see her. "Toothless is faster anyway."
Astrid smiled. "Well it beats taking the bus, that's for sure, my bike's been in the shop and I've not been enjoying the daily commutes."
He took a step back, bowing slightly as he gestured towards Toothless' saddle. "After you, milady." She giggled as she stepped forward and climbed onto Toothless, Hiccup soon followed, clipping the bungee cord to his belt. "Here, I added another for you," he said as he handed her a second cord attached to the saddle. "You can clip it to your belt."
"Thank you. Did you get this on the way over as well?" Astrid asked him.
"What? No, I- I got this earlier, not earlier today, earlier this week," he explained frantically. "I thought I should, you know, since you've been riding on Toothless so often and I didn't want you to fall off or anything-"
She smiled and shook her head. "I was only teasing you, Night Fury."
He cleared his throat awkwardly and signalled for Toothless to take off, without saying anything. Hiccup silently cursed at himself, when he was the Night Fury that's when he was supposed to be cool, all the dorkiness that was Hiccup was supposed to be gone, at least for a little while. Still, Astrid didn't seem to care, and really who was he to argue with that? For once in his life, he felt like maybe he had a chance with her, and he wasn't going to screw it up. The sun began to peak ever so slightly above the horizon during their short flight over, the city below was still quiet and there were almost no people on the streets.
"There," Astrid said from behind him. "It's right down there." She pointed down towards a small residential building, a few blocks from the river. "Land in that alley to the side of the building."
They swooped down and landed gently into the alley, the building was old, one of the few buildings in Berk that had managed to stay standing for over a decade. Gentrification had swept through many of the neighbourhoods, demolishing and rebuilding most of the structures in the city.
Astrid climbed down and took her phone out, sending a quick text message to Heather. "They're here already, Toothless you should-" Before she could even finish she turned to find Toothless shrinking rapidly, a funny smile on his face as his teeth retracted back into his mouth. She smiled at him, tucking her phone away. "Thank you."
Hiccup crouched to the ground and began packing up Toothless' fin and saddle into a duffle bag, once finished, Astrid looked to him and pointed to the front, and they both quietly walked around to the entrance of the building where Heather came to let them inside.
As they entered, Heather looked over the Night Fury cautiously, a sly smile slowly spreading across her face. She turned to Astrid and gave her a light nudge with her elbow. "Nice."
Astrid smiled and shook her head. "Stop it," she said playfully.
"It's nice to finally meet you, Night Fury," Heather said, clearing her throat.
He nodded. "Same here."
"This is Heather, I mentioned her a few times before."
"What is this place?" Hiccup asked, looking around as they headed towards the elevators.
"It's an old apartment complex, scheduled to be knocked down a little more than a week from now, normally there'd be a bunch of squatters in here but police always go through and scare them all out two weeks before demolition, standard practice," Heather explained, as he tried to press the elevator button. "No power in here, we'll have to take the stairs," she explained pointing towards the stairwell doors.
They all began heading up the dark winding stairs, Heather took out a small flashlight and used it to check each floor as they went, making sure they didn't pass their stop. "Everyone else is here?" Astrid asked.
"Fishlegs is, but Hiccup isn't," she said, her voice echoing as she spoke. "He sent me a message saying some guy named Gobber was to come instead, do you know him? It was only a text so I wasn't sure if it was genuine or not."
"Yeah I know him, don't worry he's trustworthy."
"Here," Heather said, shining her flashlight at the floor number, number fourteen. She stepped forward and opened the door, holding it for them as they walked into the hallway. There was a ping as Astrid's phone lit up in the dark. "What is it?"
She looked down at the screen. "It's Gobber, he's here."
"Don't worry, I'll go get him, the room is right down there, fourteen-eleven," Heather said before letting the door shut behind her, the sounds of her descending footsteps could be heard echoing down.
Astrid used her phone as a light, checking each room one by one until they got to the end of the hall where fourteen-eleven was. She tried opening the door and found it to be locked, giving it a soft knock she whispered with her face close to the door. "Fishlegs it's me, open up."
There were some rattling noises and footsteps until finally the door slowly creaked open. Fishlegs stood in the room, he looked at Astrid first, then his eyes drifted up to Hiccup. He cleared his throat and jerked the door open wider to let them in. "Where's Heather?" He asked.
"She went to get Gobber, you have all the equipment with you?" He nodded and led her towards the other side of the room where the window was, a small table had been set up with various screens and computers on it, and there was a small telescope beside the window. "Where're the parts for Toothless?"
Fishlegs looked towards Hiccup then back to Astrid. "...Toothless?"
"Oh, of course, Toothless is the dragon," she said turning to the Night Fury. "This is The Fantastic Night Fury, and Toothless is there on his shoulder, he's in his smaller size right now."
Hiccup walked forward and extended a hand out to Fishlegs. "It's nice to meet you."
"Yes, nice to meet you too," he replied, shaking his hand, eyes shifty and nervous. "Did you, uh, want to let your dragon down on the table here? I can put the camera on him."
He nodded and Toothless climbed down Hiccup's arm and gracefully leapt from his hand to the table. Fishlegs moved in and began carefully placing the small camera and transmitter onto Toothless' back, delicately tightening each tiny strap in place, making sure nothing was loose. Toothless kept very still until it was finished, and then slowly moved around to get used to the weight of it.
"I'm surprised you're so calm Fishlegs, this is your first time seeing something like Toothless right?" Astrid asked him. "You should see him when he's full size, he's huge!" she said gesturing with her arms.
"Haha, yeah...I guess I'm braver than I thought I was…" Fishlegs said with an awkward laugh.
Hiccup approached the window and looked out, all of the other buildings were much newer and taller than the one they were in, but it was in a position where it had a view right between two larger buildings where they could see the river and outcast island. "How did you find this place?"
"Heather found it actually, she's been writing about Berk's real estate market for a while so she knows this city pretty well," Astrid explained. "I've got to hand it to her, this location was perfect; it's not too close to the river, but it's still within range of the transmitter, plus the island is in our direct line of sight."
Before Hiccup could open his mouth to reply, there was a quiet knock at the door, and Fishlegs walked over to unlock it for them. Heather and Gobber both entered together, Gobber's eyes quickly scanned the room until they came to find the Night Fury. "You weren't kidding, it's really him? Where's the dragon?" he asked looking over the room again.
"He's over here," Astrid said, letting Toothless climb onto her hand so she could bring him to Gobber. "He's in his smaller form right now, this is how we're going to get into their hideout without being detected."
Gobber ogled Toothless with wide curious eyes. "This is amazing...and he's intelligent?"
"Very, as much as you or me," Hiccup said taking a step forward. He looked over at Gobber and reached out to shake his hand. "I'm The Night Fury."
Gobber took his hand a shook it vigorously. "You certainly are, I'm Gobber, I had to come in place of Hiccup, I'm sure you'll meet him soon enough though," he said grinning.
"Yeah, probably…"
Astrid moved over to the window and looked through the telescope and out at outcast island. "We should get going soon, the sooner we get Toothless in there the sooner we can get him out again, is he ready?" she asked turning to look over at the others.
Hiccup took Toothless from Gobber and looked over him, making sure that Fishlegs had correctly attached all of the equipment, everything seemed in place so he nodded. "He looks ready to go."
Heather walked over to the monitor that they had set up and sat down in front of it. With a few clicks, she turned the camera on, and the monitor fizzled to life, the black and white image popped up on the screen. "The camera's working, I'll check the laser pointer…" she said grabbing a small controller and clicking it on, the laser shot out of a small light on Toothless' back and she was able to point it in various directions with the small joystick attached to it. "And it works too, I think we're ready to go, open the window," she said looking over at Fishlegs who unlatched the front window and opened it a crack.
Hiccup approached holding Toothless in his hands, he brought him up to his face and whispered to him. "You can do this, bud." Toothless cooed in response and he brought his hands up to the edge of the window, allowing Toothless to climb out through the crack and fly down towards the river.
Astrid kept her eye to the telescope, moving it ever so slightly as she followed Toothless' movements. "I see him, he's almost there," she said as she watched him.
"The video is clear," Heather said nodding. "Come and take a look."
Everyone shuffled over and crowded around the small monitor to watch. The quality wasn't amazing but they could see the island quite well as Toothless approached the small building. It was an old looking building, one that looked like it hadn't been used in years, by the signs and equipment scattered about it seemed that it had been a boat rental shop, but it was in terrible condition. The island was so small that it undoubtedly flooded often, and the way the building looked it appeared that it had only been half-finished before it was abandoned completely. While most of the structure looked extremely old, there were some repairs here and there that looked very recent, the new wood and metal used shined like gold in comparison to the rest of it. Toothless swooped around the building, looking for somewhere to get inside, he began descending towards a window well. There, through the cloudy, spotted glass was a small office looking room, it had shelves around the walls and a large desk with a man sitting at it. The man faced away from the window, but from behind Astrid could tell who it was, his large frame and ratty black hair was enough to give him away.
"That's Alvin there," she whispered. "This must be his office...the files could be somewhere in this room."
"Where do you think it would be?" Fishlegs asked scanning the screen over carefully.
Heather leaned in and pointed at something on the screen. "There…" she mumbled. "That looks like a safe doesn't it? Maybe that's where it is," she said pointing at what looked like a small safe at the bottom of one of the shelves.
Hiccup nodded. "That does look like a safe."
Alvin stood up from his desk, and shuffled out of the room, shutting the door behind him. "Now, use the laser pointer and tell him to go inside the room," Astrid said.
Heather grabbed the controller and pointed the laser towards the shelf, Toothless fired a tiny blast at the window, cracking it just enough for him to break open a small hole that he could climb through. Inside the room, he flew down towards the bottom of the shelf and landed on the floor, there in front of him was indeed a small safe, or from his perspective, a very large one.
"Uh…does anyone have any idea how to get that open now?" Fishlegs asked looking around.
Gobber shrugged. "If I was there and had the right tools I probably could, but I can't do it from here, I mean it's all about the clicks, and there's no audio."
"He can't blast it open?" Astrid asked. "He did it with the window."
"The stronger the blast, the louder the sound it makes, I'm not sure if someone would hear him," Hiccup explained.
"Guys he's moving," Heather said, and everyone turned back to look at the screen again.
Indeed, Toothless had begun to climb up the shelf at an impressive speed. "What's he doing?"
He continued up until he reached the top of the shelf where the opening to an air vent was located. Toothless blasted a hole in the vent cover and climbed through, running forward through the dusty vents.
Astrid turned to the Night Fury. "Do you know what he's doing?"
Hiccup shook his head. "No, I don't...maybe he heard or smelled something? I'm not sure…"
Toothless made a turn in the vents and continued on until finally he reached another vent opening and peered through the slits of the cover into what appeared to be a small lab. There was a man inside, he crouched over a small table, his back to the camera as he worked on something they couldn't yet see. Toothless paced back and forth in front of the vent cover. Eventually, the man moved away from the table and revealed another small dragon, it wasn't quite the same as Toothless was, but it was undoubtedly a dragon. It was brown and bulbous with darker brown bumps all over it's body, it's wings were similar to Toothless' but much, much smaller. The dragon did not look like it was in good shape, it's body was all curled up on itself and it trembled on the metal table while surrounded by strange instruments.
"Another one?" Gobber asked aloud.
"What's wrong with it?" Heather asked looking around at the others. "It looks sick."
Hiccup's face fell at the sight of the tiny dragon. "They're...experimenting on it?" he said not quite as a question, but not quite as a statement.
The man returned to the table, once again blocking their view of the dragon. Fishlegs backed away from the monitor and looked out the window. "We have to do something, we can't just leave it in there, they're torturing it!"
"Toothless can't do anything while that guy is still in there," Astrid said. "If we want to save it we have to distract him somehow." she looked around the room and grabbed her bag and a set of binoculars before hurrying towards the door.
Hiccup rushed after and grabbed her arm. "Where are you going?"
"I'm what they're after if they see me maybe they'll be distracted long enough for Toothless to get that dragon out of there," she told him.
He just looked at her for a moment without speaking. "...I'll come with you."
Astrid nodded and they both ran out the door, down the stairs, and back onto the street. She began running full speed down the street towards the river, Hiccup did his best to keep up with her, but he inevitably lagged behind slightly, Astrid was always a good runner. Once she reached one of the taller buildings right by the river she stopped and waved him over. "Here!" she called out as he caught up.
"Why…are…" he spoke through gasps. "We…going in….here?"
"They'll be suspicious if I just run over to the river and start waving my arms, but if we get to the top of a building and pretend to spy on them maybe they'll send some men to try and grab us," she said knocking on the glass door of the building, the man at the security desk walked over and opened the door for her. "I'm so sorry sir," she said to him, her voice suddenly sounding much softer and more effeminate than it usually did. "My brother and I lost our keys this morning and I just need to go get my spare, it's upstairs."
"I'm sorry ma'am, we're really not supposed to-"
"I know, but I really can't be late for work and it's just once, I'll owe you a favour, please?" Astrid said, her blue eyes staring intently at him.
"Well, I…"
She touched his arm and smiled at him. "I won't tell anyone, I know you're very good at your job, I see you here all the time."
"You do?"
"Of course."
He glanced around at the empty lobby and nodded. "Alright, only this once," he said opening the door and letting them both in. "But don't make a habit of it."
"Of course not, thank you so much," Astrid said as she led Hiccup into one of the elevators and pressed the button for the roof.
He turned to look at her awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. "You don't do that a lot do you?"
"What? Flirt?"
"Yeah."
She shrugged. "Only in emergencies."
"Oh."
"Why? Does it bother you?"
Hiccup could feel his face heating up. "What? No, no I was curious that's all."
The elevator pinged as it reached the top floor, and the doors slid open. They rushed out into the hallway and down towards the big shiny doors that led to the rooftop area. Astrid pulled out her binoculars and crouched down at the edge of the roof, looking out at the island. She took her phone and dialled Heather's number without looking away from outcast island. "I'm at the top of one of the river-side buildings, it shouldn't be long now, this spot is completely visible. If they're not complete idiots they'll notice pretty quickly. "
The sound of Heather letting out a short laugh could be heard. "Yeah, well, let's not get our hopes up."
Hiccup crouched down beside her and looked out at the building on the island. "I think someone's coming out, look to the east side," he said pointing.
Astrid moved her head slightly. "You're right- I think someone spotted us, what do you see on the screen?"
"Nothing, he's still- wait, hold on someone else came in...they're leaving together, I think it worked! Fishlegs turn on the laser," There was a long pause where no one spoke, and Astrid watched as more and more men began exiting and moving towards the back of the building where she couldn't see them. "He got it! Toothless got it, he's carrying the dragon back now!" Heather exclaimed.
Astrid moved both the phone and the binoculars away from her face and turned towards the Night Fury. "We did it, Toothless got the dragon out," she said to him, a wide grin spreading across her face.
Hiccup's face lit up and he lunged forward to pull Astrid into a hug. She was shocked for a second, but quickly returned the gesture and wrapped her arms around him. For a moment, Hiccup held her not thinking about anything but the dragon, but then he realized what he was doing, where he was, and he quickly pulled away. "Sorry," he mumbled quickly.
She laughed. "You don't have to apologize."
"Well, I shouldn't have…" he cleared his throat awkwardly, turning away. A deep blush came over him, and he was glad she couldn't see it.
Astrid placed her hands on his shoulders, causing him to look towards her again. "Really...you don't have to apologize," she said, leaning in and giving the front of his helmet a kiss. When she leaned back out her kiss had left a smudge mark on the glass. She looked at the smudge and then back up at him. "Sorry."
Hiccup smiled. "You don't have to apologize."
The faint sound of Heather's muffled voice could be heard and Astrid suddenly remembered that she was still in the middle of a phone call. She put the phone against her ear. "Sorry, I'm here, what's up?"
"You might want to get out of there, we can see them taking a motorboat over to the river bank, if they get there before you get down they'll be able to corner you in the building."
Astrid looked over the edge at the river, where a group of men had piled into a small motorboat and started to move towards their side of the river. "That's not good."
Hiccup took the phone from Astrid and pressed it to the side of his helmet. "Is Toothless back?"
"What? Night Fury? I, uh, yes, yes, he's flying in right now."
"Take off all his equipment and put on his other fin."
"His other fin?"
"Yes, I left a duffle bag there, it should be by the door, inside is a saddle and a fin, if you just put him underneath it when he's small he can grow into it," Hiccup explained.
"Hold on, you're kind of muffled...where is the bag?"
"By the door."
"Go grab that bag there...yeah...yeah that one, okay so we just put him underneath it?"
"Take off his small fin and the camera first, then put him under."
"Okay, okay got it. Yeah he's- holy Valhalla he can get big! Uh...does that window open any more than that? Okay well maybe we'll-" There was a loud crashing sound. "I guess that works too...okay he's heading towards you now."
"Great. I'll give you back to Astrid," he said handing the phone to Astrid.
She took it and put it back to her ear. "You should pack up and get out of there, once they notice that we're gone they'll start searching the surrounding area."
"Okay, will do, we can meet at our usual spot?"
"No, take the others to my house, we can't take the dragon to a public place."
"Alright, see you there."
"Bye," Astrid said hanging up the phone and tucking it back into her bag. "Do you see him?"
Hiccup nodded. "Yeah, he's right there," he said pointing off towards the opposite side of the roof. They both moved to the other end of the rooftop as Toothless came flying in, swooping down and landing right in front of them. He warbled at them, holding his head up high and puffing his chest out. "Yeah, yeah, you're a hero, you can gloat about it later okay?" Hiccup said as he climbed onto Toothless' back.
"You did great Toothless," Astrid said, giving him an affectionate pat on the side and climbing on afterwards.
"Don't say that it's going to go straight to his head," he joked as they jumped up into the air and flew back towards the city centre.
"You sure you got everything?" Heather asked, looking back as she held up a large box of equipment.
Fishlegs nodded. "Yeah, I got the dragon, the transmitter, and the receiver, you've got the monitor, the controllers, and the battery pack, Gobber has the telescope and the-"
"Is this important?" Gobber asked, holding up a black duffle bag.
"Yeah that's Hic-" Fishlegs cleared his throat and coughed. "That's the bag that the Night Fury keeps Toothless' fin in, we should take that too, we can bring it back to him."
Gobber nodded as they continued on down the stairs. "That fin...where did the Night Fury get it from?"
"The fin?" Heather asked. "I'm not sure, Astrid never mentioned that to me, until now she was the only one who had contact with him. I'm assuming he must've made it, I don't know anywhere you can buy something like that."
"Yeah…" he mumbled. "Yeah, me either...he doesn't know Hiccup does he?"
Fishlegs looked over at him, or as best he could in the dark stairwell. "Why are you asking about that?"
"I'm just wondering."
"Don't be silly, Hiccup's never met the Night Fury, other than us he doesn't have contact with anyone else, given his situation with the police he's very careful about who he meets with," Heather said flashing the light up at the floor number as they passed. "C'mon, we need to hurry, they could be searching the area right now."
They continued down the stairs and to their cars, loading up everything and driving off towards Astrid's neighbourhood. Luckily they were able to get everything out fast enough and there were no run-ins with any of the outcasts. Back at her house they reconvened, where the dragon was at the centre of their attention, the poor creature was so weak it couldn't even move on its own, whatever Alvin's men had done to it, had caused it significant harm. The group all stood around the dragon, watching it as it laid helplessly in a bundle of old sweaters Astrid had gathered up.
"What did they do to the poor thing?" Heather said shaking her head solemnly. "Maybe we should try bringing it to a hospital or something."
"No, I don't think that's a good idea," Hiccup said. "If this gets out who knows what'll happen, you've already seen the reaction people have had with Toothless, and even if they're not scared there will be a line of scientists ready to try and dissect him."
Fishlegs paced in circles around the room. "We have to do something, look at him, he's in pain, he's going to die if we don't!"
Astrid stood staring down at the dragon, one hand on her chin, the other drumming fingers on her elbow. "There's one person who might be able to help us...but I don't know how she's going to react to this...it might not be a good idea to tell her," she rambled to herself.
"Who?" Hiccup asked.
"A biologist, her name is Gothi."
Gobber turned to look at Astrid. "You know Gothi?"
"Yeah, she came over to the lab as a consultant once, Finn asked her to look at the dragons right after they came through the machine, she was supposed to come a few more times but then the attack on the lab happened," Astrid explained. "How do you know her?"
"Old colleague of mine, she used to teach biology at the university, she's a very smart woman, I didn't know she was still accepting work, she's got to be what? Sixty?"
"Seventy, actually, seventy-one."
"Why would you be concerned about telling her?" Gobber asked.
"She's, she's like my uncle, very focused on research, if we tell her she might only be interested in dissecting the dragon, I barely spoke to her though, so I really can't know for sure," she said to Gobber. "Do you know how she would react, you said you were old colleagues."
Gobber stroked his beard. "Mmmhm, it's possible that's what she'll think, but especially since we only have two living dragons I doubt she'd jump at the chance to kill one of them. Something so rare like these guys...she'd want to preserve them."
"You're certain?" Fishlegs asked.
He shrugged. "I wouldn't say certain, but I'm pretty sure."
"We have to take that chance," Heather interjected. "If we don't find someone who can help it'll die anyway, if the only risk is it dying then we have no reason to hesitate."
Hiccup nodded. "Heather's right, we have to at least try."
"I've got her number right here," Gobber said pulling his phone out of his back pocket. "I can call her over if you want me to."
"Call her, ask her if she can come today," Astrid said before looking towards the Night Fury. "But you should go, it's better if she doesn't know about Toothless, or you, it'll only put the two of you at risk."
"You want me to leave?"
She nodded. "It's better this way, we don't know if we can trust her yet, and there's no reason for you be here, the rest of us can handle this on our own."
He hesitated. "...I guess you're right."
"I'll open the skylight for you," she said leading him up the stairs and into the upper hallway.
"I'll be on the rooftop tomorrow," he said as she climbed onto the side table and unlatched the window, pushing open. "Same time as always, tell me everything that happened then."
"I will," Astrid said offering a hand to help him up, he took it and stepped up onto the table with her. It was a small table and with the two of them standing on it at the same time, they had to stand very close. When she looked up at him their faces were only inches apart.
"Should we talk about it?"
"Talk about what?"
"Don't do that, you know what."
She smirked. "Really? You want to talk about it?" He shrugged. "You're a funny guy you know that? I guess it figures, you're not of this world."
"...I should go…" Hiccup mumbled.
"Yeah," Astrid agreed.
They both just stood there for a while, staring at one another, until finally Hiccup slowly broke away his gaze, grabbing onto the roof and pulling himself out of the house. On a knee, he peered back down at her and she looked up at him. "But we'll talk about it right?"
She laughed. "Alright, tomorrow we'll talk about it."
Whew that was a long one, but yay Hiccstrid is finally starting to come into play, let me know how you think their relationship is going, I have some interesting things planned in the future for them so stay tuned ;)
And if you have any comments, questions, concerns, or cries of anguish please leave them in the reviews! Bye!
