Awakening of two individuals set in motion a cascade of epochal events, initially subtle in they impact but destined to reshape the very foundations upon which the world rests.

Toothless strode between rows of humans sitting on wooden perches, slowly so as to not tear his wounds open, curiously but warily eyeing and sniffing what they ate and drank. He kept a respectable distance, having already been shoved back by an angry human female, though he would have liked to taste some of their food and drink.

Liquid smelling of meat especially caught his attention, and after a while of crooning and gazing longingly at it (he was quite hungry at this point), the human guarding it relented and poured a portion into the depression in the wooden slab, which was then placed a body-length away. He purred at the human happily, despite how it stilled at the sound, before lapping at the weird, but incredibly tasteful food.

Now knowing the routine, he asked for several more dishes in the same way, some, around half of the humans, relented, while the rest drove him away with big, wooden things they held and used to tinker with the food. He snorted at the last of these occasions, food was to be eaten, not tinkered with!

Eventually his hunger was sated, and he set his sights on the female Twig liked, who currently dozed near the center of the big den. Exactly at this moment, a stubby but not quite as furry human caught up to him; evading this one while simultaneously investigating other things was a fun game! He forgot about it when he started eating though, but that only meant that game was already concluded, so he didn't lose when the human caught up to him.

The human nervously looked up to him, lowered his gaze, muttered something under his breath, inhaled... and started bothering him.

At first he was pointing at things and making noises; he mimicked them to the best of his ability for fun, and the human started hilariously bouncing on his heels and looking at Night Fury in adoration, as lesser creatures should. However, the noises and pointing continued until he grew tired of it and beyond, so he ignored the human and ran towards the female, reducing his speed to a stride when he neared.

She looked up at him, blinking sleepiness off, before scratching him behind the ear. The dragon purred deeply and laid his head on her lap, for the dual purpose of making access to his itchy spots easier, and keeping her in place so she would scratch him.

Bold, he decided she would be called. She had never hesitated, even when at their mercy on that tree;she just climbed onto his back by herself, though he'd taught her a lesson to respect him and his Twig shortly afterwards.

On a creative streak, he thought about names for others. Twig's sire got the simple Big, as he was the only human worth this word in any sense of the word that the dragon remembered. The funny siblings got Laughter and Crying for the female and male respectively. The older human missing half his limbs got Smelly for obvious reasons; the old short female got Wrinkled from equally obvious reason. And others...hm...mrr...

"Any success?"

Fishlegs shrugged, frowning.

"He paid attention, but got bored quickly, but Astrid... I…"

"Yes?"

"Maybe you should- should not tell your dad?"

This made her frown in turn.

"Why wouldn't I? He needs to know."

"B-bec…Astrid, do you forget who can stay on Berk permanently?"

Her eyes lit up in realization, Fishlegs nodded and continued.

"Exactly. I need to teach him Norse, otherwise, he would need to be it."

Astrid simply nodded. After a second, she shook her head.

"We need Hiccup for it."

Fishlegs blinked, surprised.

"Why? We just need to persuade the chief into... oh."

Fishlegs fell silent, and Astrid nodded.

"We need the rest of the gang onboard, and as much of our clans as possible, especially elders. If the worst comes to pass, Stoick will do alone, but that would result in more problems later."

Now it was Fishleg's turn to nod, he bit his lip, and Astrid raised an eyebrow.

"How? I don't think we could start from telling them that dragons are people."

"Just...try to start with presenting them as not a threat. This alone will take enough time for Hiccup to wake."

An unspoken 'I hope' hung in the air, and Fishlegs backed away from the awkward silence, Toothless, evidently feeling that something was wrong, nuzzled Astrid's chest, said shield maiden smiled and scratched his frills, but dragon only shook his head and looked at her intently in the eye.

"I hope we will be able to communicate properly soon, this all guessing is really awkward."

The night fury crooned softly and gave the teen girl a small lick. Her smile widened and Astrid returned to scratching the dragon, shaking off saliva absent-mindedly. Toothless, while relaxed, was keeping a keen eye on both her and the surroundings; really, he could guard this evidence instead of her with no problem.

With this in mind, Astrid hummed thoughtfully, now reevaluating the dragon's actions as those of a person. She found them...amicable, or at least as friendly as any Viking could reasonably be expected to be, fighting for his closest friend and risking his very life in even the worst of circumstances, with pride he was ready to defend, strength and martial prowess backing him up; actually, on second thoughts, he could be even called virtuous, as ridiculous as it sounded about a dragon not so long ago called unholy offspring of lightning and death itself.

Eventually, Night Fury slipped out and back in between the now nearly empty tables, his attention drawn by an unidentified soft sound around the very last one. There was only one human here, and the sound originated from a wooden thing he was tinkering with.

The human looked up at him, halting the sound. Night Fury crooned softly at him, with the best imitation of the sound he could make.

The human tightened his lips and looked away angrily. Night Fury backed away, seeing how unwelcome he was, and strode towards Astrid only to find her asleep. Carefully, he prowled towards the door and opened it, having more than enough occasions to see exactly how it operated.

He flicked through the night like a shadow, torches' flames flickering from gusts of air from his wake, the green-eyed dragon unable to contain himself from speeding up his return to Hiccup's side.

The front door was locked.. The dragon snorted and surveyed the wooden den's outer shell, quickly spotting a sizable opening at the roof and leaping up to it.

The place he found himself in smelled strongly of Hiccup, likely his nook, especially considering the imitated shapes of many things including himself.

Night Fury silently stepped down the stairs, but froze upon hearing Twig croak loudly. Twig immediately began to breathe quietly again, and the dragon sighed in relief before going to the end of the bed in the main nook. He layed down curled up around the bed, his head resting on the high wooden support, so he could nearly touch him with his nose, while his tail went under the bed. Despite the awkward position, he slept well and long. Seeing this scene in the morning, Big only smiled and left them both at peace.

Then the dragon sensed change in Twig's breathing, and his eyes shot open.

He uncurled and sat down, overlooking the precious little one, and felt himself inhale deeply when Twig stirred. He shuddered from the tip of his tail-fins to the end of his nose as Twig woke, with excitement that exploded when a pair of green eyes opened slowly.

Hearing Twig's voice made him jump around the den ecstatically, before helping him to stand,and leading him to the door. His precious human briefly panicked at seeing dragons outside and ordered him to stay, while he buzzed with excitement, peeking out at the wholesome scene and jumping out when the new fake tail-fin was presented.

Before he knew it, they were shooting above and shouting happily. Despite having been grounded for just a few days, Toothless's wings had been itching all the time. And as for Precious, he was amongst the skies for a very short period of time, not enough for even the most mundane and monotonous flight to be boring.

After circling the village islet and performing a series of aerial tricks, the dragon's wings grew tired embarrassingly quickly because of those few days without use, and because he was still recovering from the fall during the battle…or at least, that's how he excused falling behind a mere spike-tail when she started to gloat.

The flight had been more of a tease than fulfillment, and now that they were back on the ground, it seemed like little more than fuel for rising frustration.

That is, if not for the happiness it granted his Precious Twig.

The same human that was making show yesterday looked at them with tightened lips.

"I see that my daughter failed to guard the evidence."

Hiccup raised both eyebrows.

"Astrid? How is it even possible? Are you sure?"

"Yes, because the night fury is here."

It was Hiccup's turn to tighten his lips.

"His name is Toothless, and he isn't a thing to be treated like a piece of evidence."

Despite the firmness in the teen's voice, the law-speaker only shook his head.

"And what is the evidence for that?"

Hiccup squinted, thinking hard, but he was interrupted.

"He outplayed me in Maces and Ta-AAAlons!"

Tuffnut managed to cease crying before it really began, and the law-speaker was the one squinting now.

"If that is so, let's go to the great hall and check it. I advise you to follow us as well, so there will be no doubts."

Many mutters with variations of "We trust you law-speaker" rang out from the crowd. Only a dozen people followed them, including Stoick, other teens, and some exhausted Vikings.

Hiccup sat down to the table with the game board, and Toothless sat on the opposite side on his haunches, Hiccup made his first move, and Toothless reached down to the pieces with his mouth.

"No! I will move them, don't do it!"

The law-speaker blocked Tuffnut's way with his arm.

"No, the dragon will play by himself."

Night Fury decided against using his mouth and instead gingerly pushed pieces with his claw, the law-speaker tensed, but shook his head.

"One move could be just mimicking or coincidence."

This thought evaporated after a second, third, fourth and fifth different piece was moved by the dragon perfectly in accordance with the rules of renamed chess game, the law-speaker blanching more and more with each one.

As the game neared its end, and Hiccup managed to finally, after an extensive and exciting duel encouraging cheers which attracted more villagers, beat the dragon, the law-speaker was completely rigid safe for his chest, and as white as the realm of Hel itself.

"So that...that i- is proven. Night furies are not animals."

Part of the crowd froze, as if only now realizing the consequences of what they had just watched with such keen interest, but most were only slightly surprised instead of bewildered. The law-speaker inhaled and exhaled deeply several times before continuing.

"As this matter has been confirmed, we should move onto settling the legal status of this dragon, and by extension other dragons, assuming that the species is deemed intelligent enough next week in the great hall, it would require a prolonged Ting. Do you agree to call for it?"

Both the chief, the elders present, and every other viking nodded, leaving Toothless severely disoriented.

"Come on bud, we have a lot to do."

The dragon followed him regardless, but they stopped as soon as they exited the earshot range of other humans.

"Just how much do you understand Norse?"

The dragon only blinked at him, Hiccup rubbed his palm in response.

"So not much. Well, I guess you will be going through an extensive teaching program."

The dragon obviously failed to understand nearly the entire sentence, as expected, but combined with Hiccup's wide gestures it was enough to discern what will happen to him, and he whined.

"Now bud, you need to know it, it is very, very important. We need you as an example."

She screeched, suddenly torn out of her very pleasant dream with a particularly handsome but weirdly behaving male. She arched her back as something leaped at her, trying to counterattack but being roughly pulled down, her head pinned to the ground by...by...

…others like her?!

Just as she shook off her bewilderment and was about to resume her resistance, a human started binding her, and at the same time she was pounded on the head with a force that left her hazy for far too long.

The dragoness growled from behind bared teeth, unable to use them because of the thing put on her head while she was disoriented, and thrashed furiously, but was lifted into the air despite all her efforts, her paws closely tied to her body, and her wings were stuffed into a bag far too small to open them properly, and additionally tightened with leather belts, rendering all of her efforts completely useless.

It didn't take long to spot where they were traveling to, there were so many like her there, humans, and, obviously, weird things that humans dragged with them everywhere they came, placed in a depression between several mountains and covered in foliage for whatever reason.

Those ones were... cages. Three of them in fact.

The dragoness ceased her efforts, trying to discern what was even happening there. Her kind helping humans capture more of her kind?! But why would they do it!?

Before she managed to reach any conclusion, they reached their destination and she was placed on the ground with surprising care. The dragoness managed an enquiring warble to the closest of her kind, who responded in a rushed, skittish voice.

"Quick, submit."

The word wasn't backed by aggression as it should have been; instead, it was backed by fear, which made far less sense Why would he demand submission if he was scared of her?

It took her a few precious seconds to realize that it wasn't fear directed at her, but at something he was staring at over her wing shoulders. She couldn't follow his gaze: her head was leashed to a pole in front of her, just like the rest of her was to other poles, leaving her unable to do as much as roll in any direction.

"QUICK SUBMIT OR NO-FLY!"

He cried to her in panic, and she growled inquisitively, now also feeling fear dripping into her.

Then she screamed.

Some time later, the abnormally big, grey-scaled dragoness whimpered in her small dome-shaped cage, pressing her tongue through the muzzle awkwardly and to the place where her right tail-fin should have been. Her body shook all the time, mourning the great loss and her grim unavoidable destiny."

A quiet warble to the side caught her attention, and the sight induced fresh fear. The same male that attacked her, and who so frantically wanted her to submit, was standing there awkwardly with ears pinned to his neck tightly and wide eyes showing an expression of both pity and guilt.

The dragon gently purred towards her and showed his own asymmetric tail. She made a double take; he was flying not so long ago, did... did humans do it to him after her?

"Fly."

The male opened his second tailfin with his paw, and it went limp the second he stopped holding it, this tailfin was strange... it wasn't made of flesh, but of one of those weird human things.

"Human healed tailfin?"

He shook his head.

"Tail-fin submits to human."

She squinted at him.

"Tail-fin doesn't submit to kin."

Now she understood: humans controlled those tail-fins, and they couldn't, which meant...

Dragon swayed his head down and then up, seeing her widening eyes.

"If you want to fly, submit to human."

She outright recoiled and hissed from the other end of the cage. He slumped and whined, stretching his paws towards her pleadingly.

"Submit!"

"NO!"

"If you submit, you can fly, get more food, and less bond, and…"

He wriggled instead of finishing, and she only growled, uninterested in what he had to say. Nothing will persuade her to... to obey those monsters! She remembered what they did, now she remembered, her head swirling from returning memories, one leading to the other, her growl deepening more and more with each.

Then, it died down, and she purred at another set of memories.

"You... want?"

Blinking, she asked, not knowing what he was saying for a time.

"What?"

"To mate?"

She eyed the dragon, now actually analyzing him properly. He had dark purple eyes and was nearly completely black, with only four very dark grey, meandering stripes on his sides, two on each, coming from his lips all the way to his tail-fin base. He was smaller than her, as with nearly everyone she had ever known. But he was quite muscular, with stronger paws than most, maybe even than her. He had glistening scales, so he cared for himself, or rather had some close friend, because he couldn't possibly reach all his body by himself.

In short, a very handsome male.

So Mater-Fulgur actually considered it, but then a wayward thought stopped her.

"It would be a bad place for a hatchling."

The dragon looked at her as if she grew a second head, but he understood the meaning of her words and responded shortly after.

"Better be than not be."

This was... surprisingly thoughtful, but she huffed anyways.

"When we will be free."

The dragon growled, frustrated.

"We are never free! No fly, no hunt, no live, submit and fly and hunt, resist and no fly, no hunt, and... and mate for those that submit."

Mater's pupils turned into slits, and the male backed away slightly.

"Not me, not if you don't want! Most don't, but some Blackhearts do. Submit, and they can't, submit!"

He was caring for her, she realized, and her heart swelled with gratitude despite everything happening around her.

After a while her eyes caught sight of other Nocta Furaes, a few pawing at the ground impatiently and looking at her, while others eyed them in turn with distaste or ignored the entire commotion altogether. Humans sent them some glances but weren't particularly focusing on it, except for one that glared straight at her, she growled at it and it sheepishly turned its eyes away from her.

"How?"

He scratched at the dirt for a while before responding.

"Next day, you submit, it's obvious. Now they can't do anything, but if you don't-"

"I understand."

The dragon exhaled with relief and left her to her own devices, or rather thoughts, because all the restraints were still on and she couldn't do anything while unable to move her limbs.

Falling asleep was very hard when so vulnerable and recently maimed. In fact, it was impossible, and she was awake the next morning just as she had been the whole night.

The entire pack stirred to life. Dragons yawned wide or grumbled in sleep as beams of sunlight hit them before standing up and shaking, humans crawled out of furs they cradled themselves in for the night. Then the dragons consumed a quick dish.

And it was filled with things that repulsed her. And no, it wasn't eels, nor humans destroying food before eating it; it was how some humans demanded pleading from her kind before feeding them, and how they obeyed without as much as a humiliated twitch of eyelids.

It was now that she fully realized that they were truly and well broken, too hopeless to believe that they could be free ever again. Even worse, accepting this fate of servitude, seeing her own kind in such a state was a terrible thing to behold, to know that they could really be reduced to tools and toys serving the whims of humanity.

At last, two humans neared her, one of them with an enslaved—no, ensnared—Nocta Furae at his side. The dragon's stare was somehow worse than despair or even resignation; he was content, and it sent a quick shiver of icy fear over the boiling lava of her anger that she suppressed relentlessly.

Nevertheless, the human caught her gaze and snickered, while the other human opened her cage and the dragon dragged her out by the neck. Her paws were released, but nothing else, and several other humans and dragons were standing at the ready nearby.

The human pointed at the ground, and his mount submissively touched his snout to the ground, lowered his wings, and tucked his tail closely, looking much smaller than he really was.

She stood still; intellectually it was obvious what course of action she needed to take, however, her neck muscles did not move, nor did her wings or tail. The dragoness gritted her teeth tightly, recalling the humiliation those subdued dragons were subjected to—their obedience and resignation, and now, contentment.

To think that a dragon can be content with such a life, of being led on a leash, ridden, and obedient to a human made her sick.

No. Just...no. She should, but she just...couldn't. Not with her memories of those monsters' deeds and very nature, and with the knowledge that it wasn't inevitable, that there was an alternative, that there was—IS hope.

Eventually, the human shrugged and others closed in around her. She growled and took a defensive stance as she could, even with how futile it was. Suddenly, her paws were punched and she landed on her side. It was the same dragon that did this, she realized, pinning her down, and she stopped in her struggles, trying to wrack her brain at just what she was doing.

She had panicked because of...memories. Okay. It was really necessary to get hold of those things.

A few dragons neared, but they were shushed away by humans—by humans! Dragons! Three dragons in total took their place, and she was leashed to them, or were they to her? Standing in a circle around her, one female eyeing her intently in an uncomfortably intensive way, one male looking around most of the time but stealing some glances at her, and the second male being indifferent, thoughtfully looking through the nearby bush.

"This one big, strong, pretty," purred the slender, yellow-eyed female with pitch-black scales, only to have the first male finally get his gaze on Mater-Fulgur for longer than a second. But still, he looked away from her eyes.

"Yup.. biggest female I've seen in... ever."

The remark of the silver-eyed, modestly-sized, and very dark red male drew the attention of the second, who blinked and looked at them both, squinting and trilling before speaking in a light, breeze-like voice.

"Could you both please not address this...person as if she's a piece of landscape?"

They both rapidly nodded, and the dragoness in question rumbled quietly, ignoring the weird antics of the small group.

"Thanks."

The pair of crimson red eyes attached to a body covered in white scales—no, it was just hide—turned to her. The male tilted his head with contained curiosity, humming.

"Why don't you assert yourself?"

"If they would continue anyways I would be unable to back this up with any threat in this... state. So it would be pretty pathetic."

The male's eyes brightened suddenly.

"Well well well, you have quite the mind, don't you?"

Then they darkened and he sighed, looking disappointed.

"And yet you failed to grasp the severity of the situation you are in, despite receiving a warning."

She snickered, wings rustling in their uncomfortable predicament.

"I do, I just... couldn't do it, not with certain things in mind."

Now he was yet again inquisitive.

"What do you mean? Humans are deep down just like all other beings really, doing what they can to satisfy their needs and defend what they care for."

A low growl was made reflexively by her body.

"But their very nature demands them to subdue everything, but that isn't the point. I lost a lot of what- who I care for to them."

The dragon nodded solemnly, in an almost ceremonious way, before stepping closer and giving her a small nuzzle.

"Well, I sincerely hope that you think it through soon. There is really no gain from resisting, and…"

He trailed off as four humans neared and climbed onto the backs of the standing triplet, two on the second male's, and they took off, lifting her into the air along with them.

She didn't really understand why this change was happening, since the other Nocta Furaes were taking the now-empty cage she was in with them anyways. That is, until suspension in an upright position made her uncomfortable, and then the leather belts of her restraints pinched her because of her weight resting on them, before turning to slowly intensifying pain.

She was hissing and beginning to whimper when they finally landed just as the sun fell into twilight. Soon she was again leashed to poles stuck into the ground a while before. The dragoness tensed, but this time nothing was done to her, at least, not immediately.

"So you want her?"

The female asked the second male.

She half-closed her eyelids and interrupted.

"Could I please know your names?"

The soft-spoken male purred happily and introduced them.

"I am Moonlight, she is Pitch, and he is Scab."

She purred in response before giving her own name.

"I am Mffh."

Moonlight tilted his head, and she tried and failed again before surrendering.

"I can't pronounce it with this thing on my head."

"Pronounce? What do you mean? Every sound necessary for our tongue, even the expanded version, is completely possible to make even when restrained. Most gestures as well, or at least enough to make it possible to deduce with minimal effort."

She sighed, her stare turning vacant and happy for a while.

"Even after all the progress we had made, it was still far easier to adapt an already existing tongue with all the terms and words we wanted rather than adapting them all to our own."

Pitch trod in place impatiently.

"So you want her?"

He growled a little, sending Pitch a look that could kill. The female backed away an entire body-length.

"Do you really need to interrupt such fine dialogue to ask for this?"

"I-It isn't what you want as well?"

After retorting she cowered in fear, as if the dragon was about to kill her. But he only closed his eyes and pointed his snout at the moon, inhaling and exhaling several times before looking again at Mater.

"Since my dear Pitch brought this topic back, would you like to mate with me?"

The dragoness exhaled slowly.

"This is the second offer I've gotten in two nights. Do you lot really find yourselves that starved of it?"

Moonlight snickered.

"Others would get anyone, but I want someone that is pleasant in more than just body, and you are intelligent."

"I would have nothing against it, if not for the fact that I don't want my hatchling to be maimed."

After looking at her thoughtfully for a while, Moonlight turned to Scab.

"You like to exist, son?"

"Yes, obviously dad, it is better to be than not to be."

Satisfied, he looked back to Mater.

"It wasn't voluntary on my part, Pitch can testify to it, but because of that Scab exists, so I worked this out. I am sure that our young will be of the same opinion as him."

'Will be' wasn't a term that seemed to give her a choice. Could this charming male be capable of that? There was something going on below the surface too, with this how submissive his mate was to him, though 'I worked this out' instead of 'we worked this out' suggested that he could have taken revenge on her in some way or another...

"No."

This 'charming' dragon was bound to be far worse than he seemed, but even now, the mask stayed on.

"Son, I think you should finally have your first time."

Scab cringed.

-"But dad…"

"Oh, I am sure you can persuade her while having the entire night in private. You are quite sweet, you know."

The young dragon groaned protractedly at what was undoubtedly fatherly teasing, though she wasn't comfortable with being the tease.

Scab slumped under his father's amused gaze.

"Fine."

Mater's glare targeted at Moonlight was as cold as the far north she was forced to spend so many years in. The albino Nocta Furae hummed in satisfaction while returning it, indifferent.

"Yes, very intelligent, though a bit too... perceptive."

There was no response, not even a reaction when Scab nuzzled her back and barked to the nearest human. Nor when she was turned on her back or when the tent was erected over them.

Silence followed.

The dragon awkwardly lay at her side, very mindful to not touch her. In any other situation, it would be amusing.

"Hrrr, I-I won't. Don't worry."

"So why? He seems like someone very hard to fool."

"You said maimed, not crippled, and... and I heard gossip about packs of our kind that did the impossible many times and I think that humans try to skid below their watch. We usually fly at night and close to the ground. We were out during the day only because of a skirmish with some dragons, I think they fear that we will tell them about us. I ask each newcomer, but you likely don't know more than anyone else anyway…"

She giggled grungily. The boy really was sweet.

"You have no idea who you stumbled upon, little one."

"I am not little!"

She laughed.

"I-I promise that if you don't stop, I-I…"

"Calm down. Yes, I am part of the Blitz, and not just anyone, you see…"