Ghost's Reign Chapter 34: Running Pursuit, a How to Train Your Dragon + Big Hero 6 Crossover fanfic

Chapter 34, everybody! Obake decided an extended vacation was in order.

Get-out-of-dodge bags, AKA GOOD bags, are a survivalist trick, and it's advised that everyone have one—mostly packed against natural disasters, although the survivalist 'fiction' I've read also advises having them against socio-economic collapse as well (quotes because every single one I've read reads more like how-to instructions than actual fiction please give me the plot and sell me the instruction manual separate).

Tadashi glanced back several times after Obake had given the order to speed up—well, order wasn't quite accurate. Desperate plea, maybe. What was back there that had spooked him so badly? This was the Yokai that faced down foes and outsmarted enemies much bigger than him routinely—this made no sense.

Nor did his relief once the island was gone from sight, sagging down against the saddle as well as his injured ribs would allow. Tadashi eased up a little, gently slowing to give Gogo an easier time of catching up—

"Don't," Obake muttered. "Just—don't."

Okay fine—flap hard a couple more times before coasting, started angling when the first new island came up. The one with all the weird little hissing things, if he recalled correctly.

"No," Obake said. "Just—keep going. Call it—" Glance back. "Call it a test of Night Fury endurance."

Call it a test of Night Fury endurance of BS, more like. "Little-Brother, what is going on?"

"I…I don't know," Hiro said, paws shifting on his neck and telling him Hiro was looking back at Obake. "This is…it's like that time, before you came back…when he was trying to convince me to fly off." Tipped his head a little so he could see his little brother's concerned expression. "That…I don't get it. He was going back to a bad nest…maybe I do get it. He didn't have any way to get away before."

What this was suddenly shocked through him. "He's running away. He's running away and using me to do it."

Hiro nodded. "Except I don't know WHY—he doesn't HAVE a reason to run away this time."

Tadashi huffed. "Well I'm not staying away—both alphas gone? That's a mess waiting to happen."

"Older-Light-Fury won't let that happen," Hiro pointed out. "And…I don't know, maybe he needs some time to himself."

"Can't he have his personal time without using me?" Glance back. "Swift-Strike isn't going to be able to keep up with us like this." He shouldn't have told her to wait—he should have asked her to be right on his tail, just in case.

This was going to be problematic.

"Little-Brother, I'm going to need you to fly back and tell someone what's going on," Tadashi told Hiro.

Hiro shook his head firmly. "I'm not leaving Obake like this—I did once because someone distracted me, and he went right into a bad situation. Whatever this is, we have to help."

Oh good grief. Angle down to aim for another island coming up—back up when Obake nixed that one as well. "So now what? I fly until my wings fall off?"

"You hush you're fine. We just—" Glance back in concern at Obake. "Maybe, once he's had a day to calm down, he'll feel better. We just…I guess we just be there for him."

Be there for the murderous Yokai—right. Huff, glance back again. Yes, there was no way Gogo would be able to catch up with them.

Sigh, turn his attention forward again. Just…like Hiro said. Someone had to help.

He just wished that someone wasn't them.

It became very clear, very quickly, that Night Furies could easily outpace Deadly Nadders.

Yeah, Momakase knew this to begin with, you didn't get a moniker like offspring of lightning and death for going at the speed of Gronkle, but trying to catch up with something going at speed was frustrating, especially if you didn't know if you were heading in the right direction. Gogo seemed to know what she was doing, she'd have to trust her on that point, and in the meantime all she could do was press herself tightly to the saddle to cut down on drag and mentally review how they could do this better if they had to take off again. Maybe…what were they called? Get-out-of-dodge bags?

And Obake was definitely getting out of dodge, whatever that saying meant—if it weren't for Gogo's frantic behavior, she would bet that Obake was just trying to get as far away from Jian as possible. Just take a few days away from doctors that drugged the tea to ensure that someone actually took his medication.

It was when they landed on a small island that obviously had no resources and no Night Fury that evening that she had to admit that Gogo wasn't catching up with Tadashi today. And the way that Gogo collapsed said she had been pushing herself to even get that far.

Momakase patted her, started a fire from some of the deadfall from the scraggly trees clinging to the island, managed to collect a few crabs clinging to the rocks and hiding in cracks to roast in the fire. Gogo revived enough for Momakase to tempt her with both raw and cooked crabs—she tried both, ended up preferring to crunch through the raw ones but taking the centers of the cooked ones once Momakase had picked the meat out.

"Do the shells do something for you, or what?" she asked Gogo, who gave a weak trill before laying her head down and looking like she was trying for sleeping heavily. Really wished Obake was here, she could ask that question and listen to him nerd his postulations like well maybe the shells help to make their scales tougher like Gronkles eating rocks for their fire, or maybe it aids digestion, or maybe it's just that they can't get the meat out so they just eat it whole—that sort of thing, like his guessing that dragons operated like they were bees or ants and they just had the bad luck to be near a nest with a demanding queen.

Hug her knees to her chest, throw some more sticks on the fire, eye the last cooked crab and debate on whether she wanted to eat it now or save it for breakfast…finally stuffed it in her pack to cut down on the temptation. Shivered a little from the sea breeze—they were really kind of exposed here—

Gogo flopped a wing over her before curling around her, resting her head on the fire and smothering it.

"Of course you're fireproof," Momakase sighed, curling up against Gogo's side…had to take a minute to register where she was, that a dragon was willingly letting her up against her side, under the wing join where a stab would do the most damage—

Curl tighter against her as the dragon's heat sank in. "Good dragon," she muttered, feeling herself drift off…felt a smile tug at her mouth. "Betcha anything the boys didn't eat as good as we did—Obake has to take like three days to design a trap before he catches anything."

Gogo made a soft warbling noise—

Eye suddenly snapped open—

She leaped up, sending Momakase tumbling—squawked and barked in a direction before cantering back to her and crouching down, evidently wanting her to get back on.

"I'm guessing you have an idea," Momakase said. "Are you okay to fly?" At Gogo's insistent bark: "All right, but if you crash us in the ocean I'm stabbing you."

Gogo huffed as she got on, took off with renewed vigor—couldn't tell, but it felt like they were heading in a slightly different direction than they had before.

She wondered what the Nadder had figured out.

Tadashi had eventually come to rest on an island that Obake felt was far enough away that they couldn't be immediately tracked down, forested enough that they wouldn't be immediately seen from a ship or from air. Obake had collapsed in exhaustion, woke up to find Hiro curled up against his chest and Tadashi curled up around them both with his wing tented over them.

Why Tadashi had picked this island became clear rather quickly—it was overrun by rabbits. Obake had spent the day rigging up various traps and the evening eagerly skinning and cooking the rabbits he had trapped, happy at the change from fish for once. Hiro was apparently happy too, stuffing himself on the offal (and kidneys and liver, Obake could afford to not be eating every bit for once) and ignoring Tadashi growling and trying to get Hiro to eat some of the ones the Fury had caught. Laid the furs out on the rocks, debating on whether or not he did a good enough job to make something of them and deciding to figure that out in the morning.

The furs weren't disturbed then, which told him there were no predators on this island, which probably explained why there were so many rabbits (new ones had gotten into the traps, even). Wouldn't take too much effort to send a hunting party here and—

He shut down that line of thought quickly—none of that mattered because he wasn't going back there and playing at chiefing, he was leaving, full stop, period, end of discussion.

Tadashi refused to be saddled again, though, and Obake was still feeling too poorly to press the issue. Clean up the next batch of rabbits, examine the furs as the meat cooked…honestly Momakase was better at this than he was.

Reminded himself that he wasn't getting beaten up daily anymore, stretched out on the saddle for a nap after his meal, Hiro curled up against him…wasn't exactly napping, his mind wouldn't allow for it…finally sit up and look back the way they had come.

They were still much too close for his tastes.

Check the traps again, bundle up the rabbits, beg and wheedle Tadashi until he finally acquiesced, glance back again once they were airborne.

"Are we going for a Sunday stroll?" he demanded of the older Night Fury—got an ear flap to the face for his trouble. "Fine, just get us out of here."

Tadashi huffed but didn't change his speed, and after a while Obake had to figure that this was how he flew to conserve energy, especially if there wasn't an end destination in mind. In retrospect, he was lucky that he hadn't flown Tadashi until he dropped out of the sky in exhaustion, but the idea of staying there—

You can't kill a ghost.

Tried a few different methods to entice some more speed out of Tadashi, which only resulted in another ear flap to the face—glance back again as Hiro scolded the bigger Night Fury. Calculating flight speeds…comparing it to the last ill-fated trip he took, by now they were well out of the Ghost Archipelego.

Still not far enough.

Look forward again, desperately willing Tadashi to go faster—he had thought that when he finally decided to do it he'd be feeling…he didn't know, lighter, maybe, free and happy that he was gone. This didn't feel like that, felt more like a rabbit being chased by hounds with no saving warren in sight.

And worse, with some of the Yokai on dragonback…if they didn't get a good head start now there was a real risk of someone tracking him down. Carl or Jian with the intent to drag him back, Helga or Calhoun with the intent to off him where no one could see…not that that'd be a problem, it wasn't like anyone back there cared—

The Yokai descending en masse, battling the Moss-Huts for the purpose of retrieving him—

You can't kill a ghost.

…he was just the revenant whose good graces they wanted to stay in.

Tadashi eventually angled toward an island appearing in the distance, one with tall rocky slopes and lots of straight pine trees mixed in with the rest of the foliage—dropping down to the ground landed them in a green twilight, sounds suggesting the island at least had birds and water.

"Well…if nothing else we've got a day or two of rabbits to tide us over," Obake observed, looking the little clearing over. Rocky wall wasn't so steep that they couldn't climb up it, the area they were in was relatively flat and sheltered, ground sloping away into wooded valleys around them. It would be intriguing to explore the area for a day or so before moving on.

Cleared a space, ringed it with rocks before searching for sticks and twigs to burn…was this such a good idea? It'd tip anyone tracking him off that someone had been here…would have to make sure to cover his tracks more effectively.

If anyone was looking for him.

That was a question—either they were out hunting for him or they weren't—but why would they want him? Because they were afraid he'd go off and fetch the other ghosts? Please—if he had that power he would have done so long ago—when a whole village decided that a child was a threat and did their level best to torment him—and what was the difference with the Yokai, pray tell? Just more of the same, no one would—

"Hey you!"

Start, sticks he was feeding the fire with flying—fall back, looking around wildly—look up at the sound of pebbles rolling—

Gogo was perched higher on the rocky wall, Momakase leaning off her saddle and cackling down at him.

"You!" he gasped, trying to process this as Gogo hopped down, chattering at the excited Furies.

"Me," she replied, lightly hopping off the saddle. "So what's all this then? A vacation?"

Oh no, he was not doing this. "What are you doing here?"

"Following you," she said, watching Tadashi rip a rabbit free of the saddle and fling it to Gogo—the Nadder gobbled it down before flopping down with a sigh. If he had to guess she had been flying hard to catch up with them. "By the way, I would have liked to find out about the rabbit island sooner—hey we keep that island to ourselves, huh? Corner the market back on Yokai, pretty sure there's plenty of people who'd stab for a rabbit."

"I'm—ugh," he groaned, rubbing his temples as Momakase took several of the rabbits and briskly started skinning them. "Why are you here?"

"Pretty sure I answered that question."

Glower at her. "Carl sent you, didn't he."

Momakase held a couple of fingers apart, squinting a little. "Actually it was mostly her," she said, indicating Gogo. "She seemed to think you were off having fun without us. Carl did send your prescription along, if that makes you feel better."

No it did not. "Well you can go back and tell him I'm not interested."

"Not hardly, Gogo's exhausted. By the way, since I'm busy with this you can take her saddle off, right?"

Oi vey. Look at the dragon in question, finally lever himself up and drag himself over there, grumbling the whole way—this was not what he was looking for, he didn't want company on this escape plan, most certainly didn't want to feel relieved that she was here—

He had to ditch her somehow.