CHAPTER 53: Maneuvers
Hiccup was under no illusion - stopping Ancient domination over the Barbaric Archipelago was crucial to ensuring the world he created of peace, equality and freedom was protected, especially for the sake of all vikings. If Yurlin was to achieve victory in any incoming war, then everything that was accomplished prior, notably peace with the dragons, all of it would be eradicated and bleached away.
Which also made Hiccup consider an equally dark and horrifying thought - if the dragons, in about twenty or so years time came back and all they found was a greater Ancient Tribe that'd absorbed all of the archipelago with no other tribe existing anymore, including his own, it'd be like the world before it had never existed, the world that precisely allowed for the peace and freedoms that vikings enjoyed and still enjoy today. Hiccup was utterly determined to prevent that happening. Stopping Yurlin was an imperative, not a choice.
In about thirty years time he didn't want the dragons to come back and face a whole new world of darkness and barbarism, totally unfamiliar to them compared to what they had prior to initially going into The Hidden World, with none of the vikings they knew around either after they'd been either politically punished or absorbed into the Ancients forcefully.
When it came to Zephyr and Nuffink, Hiccup didn't want the threat of a militaristic dictatorship to shadow over their lives and potentially engulf New Berk. For everyone he loved, for the dragons, for all of those around him, he simply had to stop Yurlin in order to ensure the world as they knew it remained the same.
New Berk was preparing and building new huts, and these huts were being built well within the dense environments of the beautiful forests that the island contained. These huts were to be evacuation huts in the event an invasion was imminent. Hiccup was taking no chances - despite New Berk being as tall as it was, he didn't want ANY complacency and he didn't want to treat anything like it was stupid to worry about.
The whole of the archipelago was starting to make moves too. Many tribes fearful of an imminent conflict had started sailing their own vikings away with no obvious destination in mind. The Berserker, Outcast and Defenders of the Wing tribes were firmly on the side of the Hooligans.
Heather, Dagur, Alvin and Mala were all on New Berk talking with Hiccup about forming a military alliance. At this point, the whole archipelago was basically being divided up into sides - the side of the Hooligans and the side of the Ancients.
Hiccup, with Eret besides him, was talking to all the other Chieftans as they studied one giant map of the archipelago in a secluded hut. Hiccup was never one to pinpoint war tactics on a map, but it dawned on him that Ancient Island had never ever been mapped before because of how pacifist and hidden it was prior to Yurlin coming to power, which made him gather the Chieftans around to talk tactics.
"Alright," Hiccup said, "it's pretty obvious that the Ancients have never been pinpointed on the map before. Look at this, you can see everyone else but...the Ancients?"
Hiccup crossed his arms together as the other Chieftans studied the map.
"A pacifist tribe would do that to you," Eret said, looking over Hiccup's shoulder to the map on the table, "well, pacifist before it became an archaic dictatorship that is."
"I don't think any of us had ever heard of them before they turned into this, Hiccup," said Dagur, "you're not the only one out of the loop on them."
"I just would've thought back in the day we'd have at least come across them, they must have been genuine pacifists."
Hiccup was bewildered at the history of the Ancients. To go from being a pacifist tribe to the extent you're not once detected or found by the others, to a one man dictatorship harming its own vikings and committing acts of annexations, was a huge jump. It was bewildering precisely because it was such an opposite turn of events for them.
"Now here's the thing," said Hiccup, "these guys have been to our island a couple of times. They clearly know where we are at this point. We've been to their island a couple of times too for when I attended that conference."
"The conference, Hiccup, of course! they supplied a map to you laddy, did they not, for when you made the sail there?" Alvin recalled.
"The entourage took it off me when we got there. They knew exactly what they were doing, I don't have it anymore Alvin, so we're more or less stuck with what we've got, without any solid clue."
"Think about it Hiccup, these guys can't climb up this island, we're as tall as ten mountains. If they try anything, we've got the advantage I'd have thought. To scale up to this land without any dragons, to which there aren't anymore, is suicide. They'll never be able to invade," Eret insisted.
Hiccup nodded at that, and it was a good point. The Ancients were going to struggle to initiate an invasion of New Berk if they ever attempted one, not least because of how high the island stood. Regardless, Hiccup didn't want to take anything for granted - when it came to his friends, his family, everything he loved, he wanted ALL precautions and worst case scenarios to be taken seriously, hence the creation of hidden evacuation huts across the island.
"Oh god," Hiccup said, having a bomb of a realization hit him in the chest.
"What's wrong?" Mala asked, to which the others looked at Hiccup.
"Amid all of this, we've missed out one equation to all of it. One vital equation, an equation I hate but one we have to remember - Drago."
There was a small inaudible gasp across the room from the other Chieftans at the sheer mentioning of Drago's name. And it was another point that had to be considered. Up to this point, Drago had more or less been left out by both the Hooligans and the Ancients and it hadn't dawned on anyone which side he'd take.
"Can I be a bit of a daredevil Hiccup?" Dagur asked, gulping as he sought to come up with a very peculiar solution.
Hiccup turned his eyes towards Dagur.
"I know...I know this is an extremely sensitive area, I fully understand. But...what if we were to...you know...forget it, I can't say it."
"Say it, Dagur - I'm willing to listen to anything if it'll help us prevent the archipelago from having its proud history erased by being turned into a blueprint for an archaic cruel dictatorship, for the sake of my family and friends."
"Well...let me put it this way - Drago Bludvist was, as its claimed, stranded on that island with a wild dragon all that time ago right, you know after your big battle with him and Toothless after he was defeated - I remember hearing some chutterings that he had a change of heart after that. What if we were to gamble by potentially allying up with him to combat Yurlin?"
Hiccup felt like he was going to puke. His eyes widened and he promptly stared at the table with the map, his hands gripping the edges of the table like he was holding on for dear life, and Dagur quickly noticed the swift change in body language.
"I know it's a dreadful prospect, but just hear me out - if he's truly had a change of heart, why wouldn't he fight Yurlin with us to preserve the world as it is? especially since Yurlin and the Ancients despise and hate his existence?"
Hiccup looked up from the table, fully resolute on his view on such a prospect.
"I could never join up with a man who killed my father. Never. Drago Bludvist to me is still in the same league as Yurlin. Both of them are abhorrent and horrible vikings. And you're right, he tried to dominate the world with dragons, he enslaved the dragons and used them, he's a tyrant. I made that mistake once in trying to talk sense into him, I won't do it again. That mistake lost me my dad."
"Fully understood, Hiccup, fully understood - I was just trying to think of ways we could outflank the Ancients. You know the old saying...the enemy of my enemy is my friend?" Dagur said.
Hiccup couldn't comprehend any sort of alliance between his tribe and the Warlords. There was simply too much history there and the whole archipelago still hated Drago Bludvist just as much, if not more so, than Alfa Yurlin.
In terms of how dangerous they both were at this point, Drago was a lot weaker now because the dragons were no longer here - he no longer had his Bewilderbeast, making him a lot more powerless. Yurlin however was much more dangerous precisely because the dragons were no longer in the world anymore.
And that went to a much bigger point - the fact Yurlin's ideology and desires had nothing to do with the dragons separated him from Grimmel and Drago, both of whom had objectives relating to the dragons. And with the dragons no longer in the human world anymore, Yurlin was that much more dangerous. As Hiccup said not too long ago, he's never ever led his tribe to a conflict without the dragons before - if conflict breaks out between the Ancients and the Hooligans, it was to be the first time one broke out since the dragons left.
But despite all of that, Hiccup could never ever ally himself with Drago. He hated the man with a passion for killing his dad, and he felt like he'd be betraying his dad and family by doing it. He'd rather fight the Ancients alone with the likes of Dagur, Mala and Alvin with their tribes.
"There's not a chance I'd ever consider it. But even so, let's be realistic about this - there's no way Drago would ally himself with Yurlin. It just isn't gonna happen."
The Ancients for their part were now scrambling their moves to build up for their next course of action. Yurlin had turned his attention firmly to an island that was the home of one of the tribes that'd firmly allied themselves with the Hooligans - Caldera Cay.
Caldera Cay was the home island of the Defenders of the Wing tribe, and Yurlin's whole motive was no different to his previous annexations, but it also had the strangely consecutive addition of a motive - a female Chieftan. Much like the Wingmaidens, Yurlin considered female vikings in leadership positions to be liabilities vulnerable to enabling the 'unvikings'. Letting such tribes exist was not an option to him.
Yurlin was in the hall with his top military vikings, he too was studying a map of the archipelago. After hearing Hiccup's pledge to go to war, Yurlin was ready, totally unnerved by the pledge, to begin his next course of action.
"We're dealing with a very unique circumstance here, my leader. Three or four tribes versus our own? it's a big battle to have to consider," one of the military Ancient vikings said to Yurlin.
"I'm not in the least worried. I'm going to cook them up a soup that they'll all choke on!" Yurlin said, in an almost enraged tone aimed directly at the Hooligans and their aligned tribes.
"Our men are more than prepared to take Caldera Cay by force, however. It's not them we have to worry about, they're very much another Wingmaiden scenario. Women vikings? they're easy to overcome and conquer."
"I'm glad you see this from my point of view. All of the territories I've acquired thus far have been done with not a single arrow shot from a crossbow. I've already heard and addressed Hiccup's feeble and weak threats made our way, I expect he's just simply trying to talk up a big game. As I say, the soup I'll cook him will make him choke to death. He's all bark and no bite."
The top military Ancient vikings studying the map with Yurlin weren't so confident. They were more than confident with being able to take Caldera Cay with ease, and given Hiccup's promise to defend Caldera Cay and fight the Ancients if they attacked it, they were prepared to invade it on a war footing. However, fighting a conflict on a one versus three basis after the inevitable surrender of the Defenders of the Wing was suicidal.
"Caldera Cay is just over here," pointed the Ancient military viking, "our men will strike the island with no holding back and we'll quickly absorb it with as little resistance as possible. But as we said just now, we can't then be left in a situation where we're dealing with multiple fronts by multiple tribes."
"Do you think I hadn't considered that? our new-found 'friends' have already been engaging constructively with us in background negotiations, and I'm pleased to say I'll be ready to announce the new coalition in due course - the outside tribes won't know what's hit them."
"New found friends, my leader?" asked one of the military Ancients, even they didn't know about these so-called new friends.
"Indeed. Hiccup Haddock wants to threaten me with war, so I'm going to outflank that one legged weasel. He wants to treat me as his enemy rather than someone who could finish off Drago Bludvist and his scum of Warlodism as a way of avenging Stoick the Vast on his behalf? two can play that game - we've been negotiating with these 'friends' of ours for a couple of weeks now, and he'll soon come to regret his provocations towards us, threatening our sovereignty!" Yurlin proclaimed.
Whoever these new 'friends' were, Yurlin seemed like he was imminently about to announce an alliance of sorts of his own. And the word 'outflanked' couldn't be more of an understatement given the actual 'friends' he was set to announce the alliance with. Yurlin had already realized that a war having to be fought on multiple sides and fronts wasn't doable - precisely why he's gone into this alliance to which NOBODY but Herrick Herald knew who they were.
Hiccup and the whole archipelago were soon about to find out.