Chapter 2: A Way With The Beasts
The Barbaric Archipelago, the Straits of Baldur
The water was still as the sky. Nothing was disturbing it. No fish, whale or shark swam in the blue, nor a bird in the air. With this being the edge of the Archipelago, no land was in sight.
But then a dark shadow of something large appeared below the watery surface. A ripple broke through the surface and then three rows of dorsal fins appeared. Bony and dark greenish brown. They clattered together like monstrous steel plates.
The water began to bubble and boil into steam as a neon blue glow ran up the spine of the creature underwater. A reptilian tail thick as a redwood tree rose out of the water before splashing back down. A muffled roar rang through the air from the submerged water before the rows of dorsal spines began to sink under the surf.
On this green Earth, in the ageless Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, under a sun that is billions of years old, reptiles like this one were once a common sight-65 million years ago.
Today, only one remains.
The Berkian fleet had finally returned home after nearly a month long voyage on another search for the Dragons' Nest within Helheim's Gate. Given that they were missing a ship and the other two looked barely seaworthy. Honestly, most of the warriors were wondering why their chief Stoick the Vast still thought these voyages would succeed? More often than not, most of the ships don't come back and they loose more and more warriors on the voyages than on dragon raids.
"Well, I take it that you found the Nest, at least," Gobber said to Stoick who walked off the first ship to dock.
"Not even close," Stoick said gruffly with a scowl.
Gobber's supportive smile disappears. "Ah, excellent." he muttered.
"I hope you had better success than me," Stoick said to the two-limbed blacksmith.
"Well, if you mean your parenting troubles are over, then yes." Gobber replied, getting a confused look from the chief.
"Congratulations, Stoick!" A blonde Viking woman said with a smile as she walks up to the chief. "Everyone is SO relieved."
Two other men walk past him. "Out with the old, in with the new, right?" One asked cheerfully.
"No one will miss that old nuisance," the other man said excitedly. "The village is throwing a party to celebrate!"
Stoick watched them walk past them in confusion. Now, there are only two nuisances in the village, Mildew the Unpleasant, a Village elder who complains about every little thing he thought he should complain about. And there was his clumsy son, Hiccup. Yet he can see Mildew up the pathway with a barrel of his cabbages. He looks to Gobber shocked. ". . . He's gone?" he asked. Did something happen while he was on the voyage that Hiccup died or did Hiccup leave Berk?
"Uh, yes," Gobber drawls to him before he continued walking. "Most afternoons," he added. "But who could blame him? The life of a celebrity is very rough. He can hardly walk through the village without being swarmed by his new fans."
Stoick was relieved that his son wasn't dead or that he left, but what was Gobber talking about? He grabs the blacksmith's shoulder. "Hiccup?" he asked.
"Who would have thought, eh?" Gobber shrugged with a proud smile. "He has this way with the beasts."
Stoick stared at him before imagining his son coming in first place in Dragon Training and he smiles slightly in pride under his thick beard.
It was finally happening. Hiccup and Toothless were flying in the clouds, above the ocean and on the other side of the island where no Viking could see them. Don't want to get shot down and have to explain to his dragon slayer of a father.
"Okay now, Bud." Hiccup says to the Night Fury. "We're going to take this nice and slow."
He looks down at his cheat sheet on the saddle. "Here we go. Position three-no, four." he said to himself before adjusting the foot pedal on his left. Both Fury and Rider glanced at the tailfin before the dragon looks ahead with a snort.
The two fly through the air and move to make a complete turn. Hiccup tugs on his cheat sheet before glancing back to the tailfin and sees it hold. "Alright. It's go time, it's go time." He says to himself before the duo dive through the clouds and towards the sea.
"Come on, buddy!" Hiccups says encouragingly as Toothless' left wing touches the water as they fly above it. "Come on, buddy!"
The ebony dragon looks up to the huge stone arc in front of them and Hiccup glances up nervously, as if expecting the sea stack to collapse on them. A bunch of sea birds fly away, scared by the arrival of the Unholy Offspring of Lightning and Death itself and the duo make it past the stone arc.
Smiling victoriously, Hiccup looks back. "Yes, it worked!" he cheers. Toothless speeds up. However, they could not change direction fast enough to dodge another sea stack in front of them and this results in them crashing against it. "Sorry!" Hiccup mumbled.
And then they crash into another stack as they turn away from the last one. "That's my fault." Whose fault would it be? The dragon who has flown all his life or the boy who had been flying for almost ten minutes? The dragon slaps his arm with one of his ear frills, a frown on his snout.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm on it." Hiccup said in exasperation with a glare of his own. He begins to adjust the pedal. "Position four, eh, three."
The dragon rises up in the air, away from the sea. Toothless lets out a victorious roar as he can finally get back in the air. Hiccup is just as ecstatic as his draconian companion.
"Yeah! Go baby!" he cheers in excitement as they fly past the mountain peaks. "Oh, this is amazing! The wind in my-!" Just then, the wind tears off the cheat sheet off its holder.
"CHEAT SHEET! STOP!" He screams, more to the paper than anything, as he manages to catch it in his hand.
However, Toothless obeys the command and the momentum carries Hiccup further up, off the saddle and his vest is unhooked from the saddle.
"NOOO!" Hiccup screams as he sees that he is not on Toothless' back. The dragon himself stares up to the boy in fear as he realizes what this meant. They both began to fall towards the ground.
Toothless roars in fear, twisting in the air to try and find his rider. Said rider is panicking at the moment. "OH GOSH! OH GODS! OH NO!"
Hiccup then manages to turn toward his dragon, but as the latter spreads his wings for stabilization, he ends up spinning out of control. "Okay, you gotta-you gotta-angle yourself!" Hiccup shouts over the wind, trying to calm himself down.
Toothless still spins out of control and away from Hiccup. "Okay, no, no, no! Come back towards me!" Hiccup shouts, reaching towards the dragon. "Come back toward-OW!" he cried out when Toothless' tail whacked him in the face.
The mountains appear behind them and Toothless managed to steady himself and Hiccup grabbed onto the saddle. He put the sheet between his teeth and pulled himself back onto the saddle. He hooked his vest back on and into position. He looks ahead and sees how close they to getting to the ground.
Gritting his teeth on the paper, Hiccup adjusted the pedal and pulled up just in time. Toothless spread his wings and saw the maze of sea stacks in front of them.
Eyes widening, Toothless lets out a roar of fear. Hiccup pulls the sheet out of his mouth but the wind makes it impossible to read. They get closer and closer to the sea stacks.
Frustrated, Hiccup throws the sheet away, deciding to just wing it! He presses down on the pedal and opens the fin. Toothless' eyes narrow in determination as the two dive into the sea stack maze.
It's almost impossible to see exactly how they turn, but even at such high speeds the two cooperate in sync so well they manage. Hiccup relies on instincts completely, changing the pedals' position to stabilize the dragon's flight and then again to enable them to barrel roll to avoid a low rock.
The two weave through the stacks seemingly with no problem even though they're both worried but focused.
After a few more turns, they exit from the other side, darting out of the fog and back into the open sky. They must have flipped Death off at least ten times in the past ten seconds.
It took a brief moment for Hiccup to realize just what happened. They just flew through a maze where they should have died and survived! The young Viking throws his hands into the air. "YEEAAAHHH!"
With a squeal of joy, Toothless celebrates by shooting a plasma blast that explodes in front of them.
Hiccup's excitement turns to resignation and exasperation. "Oh come on. . ." he moans before the fire engulfs them.
Hiccup stares off to the distance, soot on his face and his hair pushed back. He blinks his emerald eyes as he hears Toothless retching and he looks behind him on the right that the Night Fury had regurgitated a fish head and looked to him questioningly.
"Uh, no thanks," Hiccup said as politely as he can. He's not going to eat a regurgitated fish again. He holds up the fish he was roasting over a fire. "I'm good."
Toothless shrugged and turned back to his pile of fish.
Then Hiccup hears the squeaky hisses and chirps of Terrible Terrors. He glances forward and sees three Terrible Terrors flying and scurrying towards them. Hiccup looked to his Night Fury companion who growls and covers his fish with his paw. He growled at the yellow Terror that got close before a red Terror managed to snatch the fish head he had just regurgitated. The two Terrors fought over the fish head before Toothless saw a fish standing up from his fish pile. It was revealed to be a green Terror that managed to sneak into the fish pile.
Frowning, Toothless clamped onto the fish before the Terror could move further and easily pulled it out its jaws save for a few bits of fin. Toothless then gulped down the fish in front of the stunned Terror and laughed haughtily in its face.
The Terror spat the fin bits out and stomped his feet angrily while hissing. Hiccup felt concerned, Toothless felt amused. The Terror stood on his hindlegs and opened his mouth, the gas hissing in his throat, and Toothless just nonchalantly shot a small fireball down the Terror's throat. The little dragon fell down, his stomach expanding like a balloon briefly, and wheezed.
Hiccup chuckled as the Terror walked away in a swaying manner. "Not so fireproof on the inside, huh?" He then tosses his fish to the Terror. "Here you go."
He sees the little dragon's face light up in joy before gulping the fish down. As Hiccup sat back down to rest against Toothless, the Terror approached him like a cautious cat before nuzzling his arm and curling to rest beside him.
Hiccup looked down in surprise and awe. He had to spend a few hours to gain Toothless' trust to pet him. And this Terror had hardly known him for hard a minute and was already cuddling with him after he gave it a single fish.
Were all dragons like this? If given a chance?
He shifted to relax a little against Toothless before Toothless suddenly rose up to his feet. The three Terrors rose up as well and they looked out to the ocean. Hiccup looked ahead and saw nothing but sea stacks out in the water.
"What is it, Bud?" he asked Toothless when the black dragon growled. The Fury narrowed his emerald eyes at the water.
Hiccup looked out and noticed that three rows of sea stacks were closer than before. Wait, that can't be right. Rocks don't move.
The water's surface shifted and bulged before something enormous rose out of the water. Hiccup and Toothless looked up as the water fell down in waves. The sea stacks were not sea stacks at all. They were dark bony dorsal plates belonging to a large reptilian creature.
Hiccup couldn't really call it a dragon, part of his mind concluded as he stepped back in slight fear. It wasn't anything he had seen before in the Book of Dragons. The creature stood almost as big as the Great Hall front doors, which were about sixty-five feet tall. It had a round lizard like head, no wings, short arms with four fingers, large elbow spikes and human like hands, two large legs and a large tail dragging behind it as it stepped out of the water and walked out of the water.
Toothless growled as the large creature walked towards them. The creature simply tilted its head in response before leaning forward close to their level as it could. Then it stopped and stared.
Hiccup and Toothless stared.
The creature stared back and blinked after a long moment of staring at the human-Night Fury duo in silence.
Hiccup blinked and Toothless blinked back after a long moment of staring at the creature in silence. ". . . Uh. . . hi." Hiccup finally broke the silence. "W-What brings you here?"
The large creature simply exhaled and leaned forward to him. Hiccup slowly stood up and walked forward. Toothless growled in protest. "It's okay, Bud." Hiccup said softly and in reassurance. "If this big guy wanted to hurt us, he would have done it by now."
He looked back to the large creature that was now resting on the ground before him. They stare at each other, and Hiccup saw some emotions in the creature's eyes. There was one that he recognized for he had seen it himself. Loneliness. The creature stared back and saw the same thing. This young Viking may be human, but he did not have much of human scent like the humans he had met. Meaning that he was isolated from other humans.
He then opened up its jaws wide. Hiccup stared up at the jaws that looked as wide as ten bull yaks or more and filled with teeth tall as his father, uncle and Gobber stacked on top of each other. He swallowed nervously but was relaxed when the creature made no move to eat him in one bite like the time when the Thorston twins tried to eat bugs. He got a feeling the creature wanted him to come closer, so he slowly approached the creature's lower jaw. He looked at the teeth before him and then he saw a spear protruding out of the creature's gums beneath one of his large teeth.
"Oh, I get it." Hiccup muttered to himself. He approached the spear and tugged on it, but it wouldn't budge so easily. He heard the creature let out a pained growl when he tried to pull harder. "Easy, it's okay," he said to the creature softly. "I understand that it hurts but hold still and it'll be out before you know it."
He planted his feet on the tooth, and he tightened his grip on the spear before pulling with all his might. Slowly but surely, the spear was being pulled out before a low POP was heard and Hiccup fell back out of the mouth and on his back with the spear in hand.
The creature grunted before curling his lips and licking his bottom and gum with his tongue. He nodded in satisfaction before lowering his head down at Hiccup. Hiccup held up the spear before tossing it aside.
The creature, Gojira, grumbled with a grateful expression. Hiccup smiled before reaching forward and touched his chin. He curled his fingers and began to scratch at the scales that were long as his forearm. Gojira let out a low grumble like purr at his touch.
"Everything we know about you guys," Hiccup says to the large dinosaur sleeping before him as he ran his hand down its chin. "Is wrong."
Later that night in the forge, Hiccup is at his desk, he had just got done drawing the creature he and Toothless met and was now flicking one of his pencils back and forth absently. Then he noticed someone entering his room. Someone very tall and cannot fit through the door like Gobber or Hiccup can.
He looks to the door and recoils upon seeing who it was. "Dad!" It was his father, Stoick the Vast. "You're back!" He closes his notebook and tries to frantically cover up his drawings of Toothless and the dinosaur like creature. "Uh, G-Gobber's not here! So-"
"I know," Stoick says gruffly as he forces his way through the door. "I came looking for you."
"Y-You did?" Hiccup said in surprise. Stoick had never come looking for Hiccup unless he's heard that the boy has been causing trouble in the village. Usually, he just waits for Hiccup to come home if he wanted to talk.
"You've been keeping secrets," Stoick stated.
"Bah-Uh-I ha-have?" Hiccup stammered, clearly not expecting that. He leans on his drawings to hide them better.
"Just how long did you think you could hide it from me?" Stoick asked with a glare.
I mean, with the fact that we don't talk a lot most of the time, I thought I'd have about a year or so. the sassy part of Hiccup thought snarky. "I-I-I-I don't know what you are-" he tries form a sentence, but Stoick cuts him off.
"Nothing happens on this island without me knowing." Does that include all the pranks the Thorston twins have pulled on everyone? Stoick sits down, still towering over Hiccup. "So, let's talk. . . about that dragon."
Hiccup almost slips off his desk as he slumps. "Oh gods," he muttered. "Dad, I-I'm so sorry. I was going to tell you, but I-I just didn't know how-"
And Stoick cuts him off again but this time he was laughing hard and loudly. Nervous and confused, Hiccup laughs along with him. "Y-You're not upset?" he asked.
"What?! I was hoping for this!" Stoick says with wide grin. For your son to tame and befriend the deadliest dragon of them all?
"Uh, you were?" Hiccup asked.
"And believe me, it only gets better." Either they're talking about two different things or Stoick tamed a dragon in his youth. Hiccup was starting to think that for just a second before his father spoke again. "Just wait until you spill a Nadder's guts for the first time!"
Oh.
"And mount your first Gronckle head on a spear?" Stoick suddenly playfully hits Hiccup in the shoulder, but his playful hit sent Hiccup flying into a basket behind him. "What a feeling! You really had me going there, Son!" Stoick says as Hiccup struggled to pull himself out of the basket, his father unaware of this and continued to ramble in excitement. "All those years as the WORST Viking Berk as ever seen!"
Hiccup froze and looked up at him shock. He didn't just say that right? It couldn't have been true right? Surely not even his father saw him as the worst Viking in the village. Worse than Mildew? The Twins? Right?
"Odin, it was rough!" Stoick went on. "I almost gave up on you! And all this time you've been holding out on me? Oh, Thor Almighty!" He lowers his voice. "With you doing so well in the Ring, we finally have something to talk about."
Hiccup finally managed to stand straight but shuffled back and forth on his feet. Stoick still held his smile as he scooted his seat forward.
. . .
. . .
. . .
Stoick's smile dropped as he reached behind him. "Oh, I brought you something." he said softly. He pulls out a dark gray helmet with curved horns. He adjusted one horn and held it out to Hiccup. "To keep you safe in the Ring."
Hiccup felt surprised but touched. "Wow. Thanks." he whispered softly as he ran his hand over it. "Aye, your mother would have wanted you to have it." Stoick replied. "It's half of her breast plate."
And just like, the mood is changed. Hiccup now felt uncomfortable as he moved his hand away from the helmet as Stoick taps his own. "Matching set. Keeps her-Keeps her close, you know?"
Hiccup placed the helmet on the desk. "Wear it proudly. You deserve it. You held your end of the deal." Stoick said firmly.
Hiccup stared at his father before deciding to act tired. He stretches his arms and let out an exasperated yawn. "I should really get to bed."
Stoick nods. "Yeah. . . Yeah. Good-Good talk." he says awkwardly as he moves to stand up.
"Yeah, yeah, I'll see you back at the house," Hiccup said nervously. "Thanks for stopping by. . ."
"I'm glad I stopped by." They end up talking over each other.
". . . And for the. . . the breast hat."
"Glad you like the. . . the hat." Stoick clears his throat as he stands up. The two Haddocks look at each other awkwardly. "Good night." Stoick bids on his way out.
Hiccup nods good night and the Chief squeezes his way out the door. Once he's gone, the boy sighs and shakes his head while placing his hands on his hips. Well that went well, he thought to himself.
Outside, Stoick sighs to himself with a nod and his hands on his hips. That went well. He thinks to himself before he moves to walk away, accidentally knocks some stuff down. He adjusts his helmet, makes sure no one saw him before leaving.
So what do you think? I thought it was a good way for the Dragon-Rider duo to meet the Godzillasaurus. Their friendship will be explored in the next chapter.