Reminder: This story is rated T
"It's a good job Gró managed to hit his noggin' on his fall, 'tis a mighty painful break he has." Gobber says after starting to inspect Gró's leg. They cut off around the knee of his trousers and then cut a slit down the back of the detached cloth leg to remove it easily.
"Speaking of head injuries, we need to quickly patch up both of theirs." Sköld says, gesturing for Iðunn to start while he got ready.
Both Hiccup and Gró are laid out on the floor of the cave, head's propped up on someone's outer furs. The Vikings look at Hiccup's fully stitched up dark leather leg armour and decide it's easier to leave it on than try to cut through or remove it.
Sköld pulls out some gauze from one of his pockets alongside some leaves in small pouches and a jar.
He starts with Hiccup, taking small bits of the gauze and tucking it around the edge of his newly formed stump to create a small gap between the flesh and the clothing.
Tuffnut handed over a loop of belt from his jacket and helped to put it between the unconscious Hiccup's teeth, "Just in case he grits his teeth hard enough to damage them."
"Good idea" Sköld nodded while readying up a small salve of honey and a few choice leaves from one pouch, "Even though he's out, there's a small chance he may still chip a tooth or bite his tongue."
Ruffnut and Fishlegs meanwhile had encouraged Meatlug to spew a small lava ball in the corner or the room and had taken the wide, flat bladed knife from Hiccup's vambrace.
"The knife is almost hot enough Dad" Fishlegs informs Sköld, who had just finished applying the honey salve.
At the same time, Gobber and Iðunn have set Gró's leg back straight, and using one of their sheathed swords and more belts, fasten a makeshift splint to keep his leg locked straight.
"What if we fasten his other leg to it as well so he'll be easier to be moved for when we need to?" Tuffnut suggests.
"It'd be nice if there were a better way, but I agree with Tuffnut" Iðunn says, grabbing more belts to bind his legs together.
"It would be best if we had a nice flat, round cautery, but the flat of his knife will have to do" Sköld says, eyeing the rapidly growing pool of blood emanating from Hiccup's lower leg.
"I don't have any proper stump dressings on me either" Gobber says gravely, it'll to wait till we get back to Berk."
"I'll see what I can do with my salves." Sköld takes the glowing knife from Fishlegs, careful to hold the rear side of the wooden and leather-wrapped handle. "But first, keep his leg still."
As soon as the heated blade touched Hiccup's skin, the fully unconscious boy writhed and his breathing quickened.
Slowly over the next few minutes as the flesh on Hiccup's stump gets cauterised fully, the bleeding finally stops.
"He's lost a lot of blood", Ruffnut's thinly drawn lips expressing her hesitant pessimism.
"That he has, but his stump is clean, and as it's fresh he won't have to worry about gangrene."
"He's also lucky it 'twas below his knee" Gobber adds, "Easier to recover from and learn to walk on again."
"Sorry to interject with more negativity," Tuffnut inquires, "but uh, How are we going to get back to Berk with two incapacitated compatriots?"
Stormfly walks quietly behind Astrid through the wood from the side facing the sea towards where they expect Toothless to be. Gently jogging through the trees, Astrid stays light on her feet and a cautious hand hovers over her axe handle.
From beneath the tree-cover, the sounds from the rest of the island were massively muted, but the Jormung's roars and occasional small tremor kept their nerves high as they searched for the fallen Night Fury.
After a minute, Stormfly picks up a scent and chirps happily, taking the lead from Astrid.
Soon enough they find some suspiciously piled up foliage, and a soft, low warble emanate from it as they approach.
"Hey Toothless" Astrid says, stepping round and removing some of the smaller branches.
"Are you OK? How hurt are you?" Toothless taps with one back paw by his tail, and Astrid notices the branch piercing the tail fin and the rest of the tree resting on top of the dragon.
"Stormfly?" Astrid asks, and the Nadder wedges her beak under the tree, and levers it up and off Toothless' back.
Expecting to see some blood, Astrid is pleasantly surprised when the hole through Toothless' tail fin is only torn, dried leather. The abrupt removal of the branch had caused the hole to widen slightly and a split seemed to be forming down towards the taught, outer-edge of the fin. Looking closely at the fin she also noticed some other subtle differences between Toothless' two tail fins.
"A fake fin" Astrid realises aloud, "I'll need to get the story from Hiccup one day."
"Speaking of Hiccup, I assume he hid you in the foliage and went to find the rest at the cave?" to which Toothless warbles, sniffing the ground along the way Hiccup went inland.
"Anyway," Astrid continues, "Can you walk?" She asks Toothless, gesturing with her hands.
Wearily, Toothless manages to get his legs underneath and supporting himself, and the three of them set off towards the shore.
Toothless looked around confused, knowing the way his Hiccup had gone had been the opposite direction.
Noticing the Night Fury's concerns, Astrid explained "We saw a cave on the flight over here by the shore, so we'll use that to hopefully get further in-land and avoid walking into the Jormung."
Seemingly satisfied, Toothless continues plodding forwards, ignoring his injuries as much as he could but still walking slowly and carefully.
After a few minutes ambling, they made it to the Cave they had seen before, and looking inside the tunnel seemed to be big enough for even Stormfly to walk through without needing to duck.
Stormfly cocked her head at Astrid as if to say "After you".
Rolling her eyes, Astrid heads in the cave first, one hand on her axe but walking confidently into the tunnel with the two dragons behind her.
Once they are around 30 paces inside the cave, the light from outside barely illuminates where they are standing, and the stalactites and other sedimentary formations cast pitch black shadows into the deeper reaches of the cave.
"Hey, one of you mind illuminating some of the way?" Astrid asks the two dragons which look between each other.
"Yeah I know neither of you are Stoker class - but maybe shoot a bolt into the cave?" she suggests.
Stormfly steps forwards and sends a magnesium blast straight down the way they were going to be headed. None of them had considered just how bright the blast was going to be however, and with their eyes barely adjusted to the dark temporarily blinded Astrid and even made the dragon's close their eyes and wince.
"By Höðr's life!" Astrid yells, recoiling from the blast and blinking rapidly as her vision slowly begins to clear and return.
"Ok, new plan. Toothless, how about you shoot the blast this time?" She says still rubbing her eyes and holding onto Stormfly's saddle to guide herself through her half vision.
After only a few meters further into the cave, Toothless lets out a low growl and blasts to the side in the cave. A small Terrible Terror darts out, blowing small bits of fire as it scuttles down towards a tunnel leading to the side of the main cave. The Terrible Terror's breath allowed them to see that the main cave itself was essentially a wide subterranean passageway which ended soon.
Multiple paths lead out from it, and through the last floating white spots in her vision Astrid started to attempt to figure out which was the most likely to go towards the centre of the island.
Recalling the island's geography was unnecessary however, as Stormfly sniffed the air, confidently chose a path and lead the rest onwards.
Astrid had always found it curious from all of Fishlegs' conversations about how despite the Deadly Nadder was the epitome of the Sharp Class, and even the icon Bork the Bold himself used - Fishlegs was determined it's primary feature was it's tracking.
Upon seeing her beautiful turquoise dragon so at home tracking down the lightest scents, it was easy to see why, and made her agree more that the dragon classifications may need a reworking.
'I'm sure Hiccup would love to nerd out about that with Fishlegs once we get back to Berk', she smirks to herself imagining the two excitedly chattering away at the edge of the great Hall. The way Hiccup's emerald green eyes would sometimes catch the bright glint of the fiery torches or candles along the tables and help bring his whole face to life, warming his rosy cheeks and complementing his Auburn hair.
A cold draft and faint light pulls Astrid out of her thoughts, and suddenly Stormfly squawks, urging them onwards.
The rest of the Vikings were all huddled around the two incapacitated men, ensuring all their wounds were properly tended to - when a loud dragon call echoed up from one of the tunnels leading down.
Jumping up and drawing their weapons, they face the darkness - unable to make out even how many possible tunnels are down the far end of the large cave let alone if anything was there. The ceiling got shallower the further into the cave it went, which was partially due to how the stalactites got taller and even connected to stalagmites on the ground in some places.
A soft drip of water had been the only other sound in the cave, but now they heard a pair of dragon footsteps, talons catching slightly on the rock.
"That call sounded like a Deadly Nadder" Fishlegs' whispers, his voice unintentionally starting to echo around the room.
"Fishlegs?" Astrid's voice rises from a tunnel mouth.
At hearing Astrid's voice, everyone relaxes, Sköld and Gobber immediately getting back down to resume their check overs.
"Yeah, over here 'Strid." Snotlout calls, but more seriously than is typical of him.
Appearing from the darkness with exasperation evident in her voice, "How many times Snotlout? I've told you..."
Her once careful, silent footfalls forgo any stealth and gain an urgency unheard of as she sprints towards the downed Vikings.
A/N:
Hope everyone has a fantastic Snoggletog!