Ghost's Reign Chapter 3: Phase Two, Time for Training, a How to Train Your Dragon + Big Hero 6 Crossover fanfic

Chapter 3, everybody! In which Fred goes whole Hogfly on this….

So Fred, nee Blue-Firescales, is very committed to the idea of a whole epic saga and has the habit of memorizing other sagas—kind of the draconic version of him quoting comics in canon. And yes, he's referencing Kung-Fu Panda and dissing on How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World. I swear I haven't seen prettier garbage since Avatar and at least Avatar didn't have previous canon that it dutched all to pot. :\

Dragonbite vipers are in reference to Wings of Fire, and are the most venomous snakes in Pantala. Also references to Darkest Dungeon, Pirates of the Caribbean, The Mask of Zorro, Kung-Fu Panda (again), and Iron Giant. In other news, Obake is not handling authority well. Onigiri are rice balls (or jelly donuts if you're a 4Kids dub *bricked*). The swords into ploughs is Biblical, by the way.

Older-Brother was really hoping for some quiet time now that he had assured everyone, once again, that Little-Brother knew what he was doing, if anything happens we'll just fry the whole nest, please everyone stay calm…it was exhausting work, something that Older-Light-Fury agreed with.

"Remind me again why we're doing this," she groaned, flopped down on a rocky outcropping high above the Yokai-nest.

"Because your youngest nephew, whom you love dearly, insisted," Older-Brother sighed, not opening his eyes. They were high enough above the Yokai-nest and in a position where they couldn't be easily gotten to, making him feel secure enough to actually try to catch up on his sleep.

It wasn't meant to be.

"There you are!" Blue-Firescales cheered, landing on the edge of the little outcropping. "Hey my dudes! They're up here!"

"Five more minutes," Older-Brother groaned, flopping a wing over his head. No dice, he could feel Little-Brother on his back, and their little outcropping was starting to feel very crowded.

"Hail hail, the gang's all here!" Blue-Firescales crowed. "So, now that you all are here we can discuss some matters of great import."

"Do what?" Greenscales asked. Older-Brother cracked an eye open, saw the Stormcutter's head tipped in a way that looked as confused as he felt.

"Get to the point, dingus," Swift-Strike snapped.

"Right," Blue-Firescales said, drawing himself up. "So. My friends, I have gathered you here today to discuss something VERY important that can't wait—"

"The POINT, I said."

"Right—ladies and gentle-dragons, we need to discuss Phase Two."

Okay, you know what, this needed his undivided attention so Blue-Firescales properly knew the depths of his confusion. "Do what?"

"Phase Two!" Blue-Firescales said, shoving his head forward to grin in Older-Brother's face. "The next chapter of our epic saga! Every great story has certain stages," he continued, arching back up and pacing back and forth as much as the space allowed. "Phase One was rescuing Little-Brother, defeating our old alpha, and taming the Yokai! Big deal, lots of explosions, proper Phase One. Phase TWO has us dealing with the repercussions of our actions, banding together and cranking our skills and style all the way up in preparation for the inevitable scaled-up villains who'll be coming from LEAGUES away to test themselves on us. We're the major threat to their evil schemes, guys, we need to be ready."

Older-Brother really hoped he wasn't the only one feeling hopelessly lost right now—look around…nope, not just him.

"I have concerns," Healing-Talons said.

"I do too," Older-Light-Fury said.

"Um…Blue-Firescales," Honeysuckle said, gesturing a little with a paw and her wings, searching for words that wouldn't be insulting.

"And while we're on the subject of easing into Phase Two—our new code names!" Blue-Firescales said.

"Our what?" Greenscales asked flatly.

"You know, the Yokai-names! Our saga will ring out as a shining beacon—two mortal enemies, banded together to make one flight! Our story will be legendary!"

"Okay…."

"So, we have to start using our Yokai-names to really drive the message home! To that end, I insist that I, Blue-Firescales, be henceforth only referred to as 'Fred.'"

Dead silence.

"I mean, I was with you up to that point," Little-Brother said. "But if we're going into a saga, I want my name to be Yokai-Tamer."

"But doesn't 'Hiro' send a better message? The most terrible of the most terrible Yokai, gifting this name as a show of friendship, thus starting the bridge that would link the two flights!"

"I vote we have anyone BUT Blue-Firescales do the saga," Swift-Strike said.

"AHEM."

"ALL RIGHT—I vote we have anyone but FRED do the saga."

"Much better," Blue-Firescales said, nodding. "But I've already taken on the job this is non-negotiable sorry Gogo."

"Do what?" Older-Brother asked.

Swift-Strike huffed. "The blue stabby Yokai called me that earlier. Unfortunately within earshot of a certain idiot Nightmare."

"You know you love it," Blue-Firescales insisted. "And it totally works too, because you know you're ALWAYS on the go and actually she's been calling you that for a couple of days now I'M TOTALLY SEEING A BEAUTIFUL MOMENT COMING ON."

"Will you stop?" Swift-Strike spat, standing and bristling her spikes. "Look, Little-Brother, I get what you're wanting, but you're also asking a bunch of dragons to let in a bunch of dragonbite vipers."

"I'm sorry—I agree," Older-Light-Fury said, looking at Little-Brother.

"Aw COME ON, guys!" Blue-Firescales wailed, flopping his head on the ground. "We can't end our epic saga with 'and then they all flew away because it was tough!' LAME, my dudes!"

"Fred's right," Little-Brother said, now standing on Older-Brother's head and pushing an eyeridge down—most likely on purpose. "You all are just being whiny hatchlings—tell 'em Healing-Talons, we JUST got a couple of Gronkles and Yokai playing nice yesterday."

"I have concerns," Healing-Talons said, nervously grooming a patch of fur.

"LAME, Healing-Talons."

Healing-Talons looked up, seemed to realize he was on a different part of the conversation. "What if Blue-Firescales—"

"FRED," Blue-Firescales corrected.

Healing-Talons blinked. "What if Fred is right? What if there are others coming? Word will spread that Mountain-King is dead." Gesture a paw across the Yokai-nest. "And what kept other dragons away was the threat of the Yokai. They do seem to be trying…what if this news brings the wrong sort of dragon?"

Older-Brother stood, Little-Brother balancing, digging claws in that scraped against his scales.

"That's what I'm here for," he said, certain it would be making a much more impressive impact if he didn't have a little Night Fury on his head, but oh well. "I didn't fight Mountain-King because I wanted to be alpha—I fought him so we would be safe. If someone wants to come to us peaceably, then fine. If not, then they'll have to answer to me."

"You tell 'em, big bro," Little-Brother said.

Blue-Firescales was wide-eyed and apparently dazzled. "OOOH this'll be AWESOME this canto will TOTALLY move dragons to tears my dude that was beautiful."

"You're already started on this in your head, haven't you?" Greenscales sighed.

"CANTO ONE-FORTY-SEVEN!" Blue-Firescales bellowed, plastered against Greenscales with a wing out and gesturing, squinting at middle-distance. "Our intrepid band of heroes—forged in fire, scales hardened by trial, claws and teeth ready—in a quiet moment after the great Joining of Flights, do swear to uphold the peace and hold this alliance steady! The way is lit, the path is clear, danger lurks in every place; but this new nest will stand the test, and be a testament to…hmm, someone give me a good word that rhymes with 'place.'"

"Face," Little-Brother said.

"Race," Honeysuckle added.

"Space," Older-Light-Fury said.

"Case," Healing-Talons said.

"Hmm…face race space case…and be a testament to this unusual case! I don't know, it's all still in the planning stages," Blue-Firescales admitted. "Maybe I'll go with 'danger lurks at every turn'—that feels like it'd fit better."

"Earn," Little-Brother submitted.

"Yearn," Honeysuckle added.

"Learn," Healing-Talons said.

"Burn," Older-Light-Fury said.

"Now—aw come on, that's twice all the good ones were taken!" Greenscales protested. "The only one I can think of now is 'Fern' and that makes NO sense!"

"Don't worry bro, we've got plenty of cantos to go," Blue-Firescales assured him.

"Well, not that this wasn't FUN, but I have better things to do," Swift-Strike said, standing and stretching. "Forgive me for skipping rhyme-time here."

"You know you love it Gogo!"

"I DO NOT."

Older-Brother sighed and flopped back down.

So much for a nap.

Obake's day saw more of the same aggravation the day before had—a frustrating amount of the same. Demands on the forge were fine—he could handle that one.

Demands for information on dragons and how he wanted the village run were more than he cared to deal with at the moment—why, why, why couldn't these idiots go back to avoiding him instead of looking at him like he had all the answers? He was clever enough, certainly, but he skipped the day they were handing out social skills.

It was aggravating enough that for most of the day-to-day villager needs he told them to go ask Carl—frustrating on a whole new level when Carl came over with some onigiri, was asked a question about running the village, looked Obake dead in the eye before telling the villager ask Obake, he's chief now.

Obake was seriously having to debate whether or not killing Carl would be worth it.

Turning around after taking note of their rapidly dwindling metals to find Momakase sitting crosslegged on the counter didn't help.

"What?" he demanded, glad he hadn't been by the forge itself at the time—jumping back into the fire would have been very undignified.

"What?" she asked back. "No new knives for me today?"

"I'm not certain if you've noticed, but I'm busy," he hissed, snatching the fresh stack of papers out from under her boot. Which, he was certain, she was aware of and had done so on purpose.

"Well excuse me. Any challengers yet?"

"No." And at this point he'd hand over the job and give them a pat on the back and a good luck you'll need it. "Now if that was all you needed…."

"Nah," she said, slipping off the counter and into the forge. "I was having a thought."

He evaluated her. "You do know that I'm the one in charge of this space, correct?"

"You're supposed to be in charge of the rest of the village too, but that hasn't made a difference. My thought is more along the lines of when was the last time you actually fought with a sword?"

Was she for real? "I believe it was last week—you might remember that event, dragons flying everywhere, me unseating Callaghan in the confusion, something like that."

"And once the shock wears off you're going to start getting challengers," she pointed out, leaning against the counter. "You're going to want to make sure you can hold them off, correct?"

"Bold of you to assume I wouldn't just give them the job."

"Bold of you to assume they wouldn't just kill you instead of asking nicely. Come on, we're going to the kill ring."

"For what?"

"To kill you, obviously—to make sure your sparring skills are up to snuff, you ninny," she said, slipping back over the counter.

"Right. Firstly, I have a door. Secondly, I'm terribly sorry but I am dreadfully busy—"

"Then be at the kill ring in an hour. Any longer and I come and drag your sorry tail there myself. Understand?"

"Unfortunately," he sighed, watching her head back down the street. Well, this would be a fun day….

Swift-Strike huffed as she padded through the Yokai-nest, tail at the ready and eyeing everything critically.

She could get where Little-Brother was coming from, she really could—he had gotten attached to the one Yokai, got it tame, and now thought they could pull it off with the whole flight. Their old alpha and the more vicious Yokai being chased off by the tame Yokai helped give this thought weight.

But it was also true that you could always expect a Triple Strike to sting, and she was just waiting for this nest of vipers to strike.

She would strike back hard if they did.

"I see you," she growled, causing a couple of Yokai to scurry away, muttering to themselves darkly.

Yes, she could very much see this ending badly. Sorry, Little-Brother, but this experiment of yours was doomed to fail—

Jerk her head up at the sound of something sharp impacting wood.

Hmm-hmm, maybe another Nadder was practicing with her spines—pad along, glancing through this verifiable warren that the Yokai called a nest, looking for the chance to practice herself.

It wasn't a Nadder though.

She couldn't help the sniff of disdain when she realized it was the blue stabby Yokai making the noise, practicing her own version of spine-throwing. A really useless version of spine-throwing, considering she had to retrieve them when she had thrown them all.

Not that useless, considering they down dragons, she reminded herself.

Blue stabby Yokai spotted Swift-Strike on her way back to her starting position. "Hello." Apparently couldn't think of anything else to say, went back to what she had been doing. Fair enough. And keeping a wary eye on Swift-Strike—she tipped her head so the Yokai wouldn't be in her blind spot, flaring her head spines to let her know I'm watching you.

The blue stabby Yokai huffed, went back to throwing her spines…if the red dot in the middle was supposed to be where you hit, she was doing a good job…which wasn't really what you wanted to hear about dragon-murdering Yokai.

Maybe this was an intimidation game—well, that could go both ways. Pop a spine on her tail, snap it around—

Hit the one target right before blue stabby Yokai could throw.

Blue stabby Yokai froze—looked at her, evaluating.

"Not bad," she said finally, considering…threw another spine.

Swift-Strike's spine made it first.

"Hmm," Blue-Stabby-Yokai noised. "But can you hit multiple targets?" she asked, throwing several spines—

Now this was more like it—snap her tail around fully, dislodging some of the spines already bristling from the red dots on the targets. Not a fully-thought through motion, but she couldn't resist sweeping her tail low on the way back.

Blue-Stabby-Yokai jumped it easily.

She and Swift-Strike were evaluating each other now, considering…hmm-hmm, at least one was a challenge.

"I hope you realize," Blue-Stabby-Yokai said, tone sounding like yes let's fight. "That this means war."

Swift-Strike chittered her own challenge in return.

Excellent.

Obake was seriously debating the merits of not showing up at the kill ring as the hour wore on.

Unfortunately, with the metals dwindling he was having less and less of an excuse to do so—and the plan he had for the leather was something he wanted to work all the kinks out of first. And with him basically locking himself in the forge for the past three or four days, he had pretty much caught up with everything he really needed to do, which was worse—it meant that Carl would probably start trying to pry him out of here to go do…blech, chieftain work.

Hiro's little bark told him his thought had most likely summoned the man in question.

"Please," he hissed, not turning around. "Tell me the demo crew got more metals."

"You've already went through everything they could find," Carl said. "I've got them going through the wood and sorting what can still be used versus what's firewood."

Obake groaned under his breath, standing up. That had taken what, three days? Three days to go through the tribe's supply of metals. Unless he could convince them to melt down their swords into ploughs—unlikely—they were at a loss for a new source of the material.

Which meant that he no longer had an excuse for staying in here.

Carl gave an apologetic shrug at Obake's glare before consulting his notes. "So we're out of metals, we need to start gardens soon for a renewable food source but for that we need seeds, we need food in the meantime, preferably a rounded diet since just fish isn't going to cut it, and you still haven't said what it was we're going to do."

"I'm pretty sure I did tell you," Obake countered, casting around for a sword. Letting himself get beat like a drum by Momakase was suddenly very tempting.

"No, you told us what we're not doing anymore. There's a difference. Not raiding and not killing dragons is fine, but we need something else to do, and for that we need the chief to make the decisions. Where are you going?"

"Momakase has disparaging views on my abilities to defend myself," he said, Hiro climbing up his coat as he stalked off. "Right now, that sounds more appealing."

Carl kept pace. "Last I saw her she was near the kill ring with Gogo."

"With who?"

"This yellow Nadder she's been getting along with."

Of course.

"So while it's comforting to know you're working on defending yourself, there's still the issue of dealing with the problems piling up here," Carl continued.

Yes, he knew, and yes they were definitely a problem—no one had cared enough to manage resources on this island for well over a decade; there was literally nothing left. If there were edible weeds he'd be surprised.

"So I have a complaint—"

"Take a number," Obake ground out, not deigning Dibs with the attention needed to verify that he had run up to and was now following them. "I'm busy."

"Really?" Dibs asked. "Because you don't look it."

"He's going to meet Momakase for training at the kill ring," Carl said.

"And you needed to share that information because?" Obake snapped.

Dibs, meanwhile, looked concerned. "Are you sure that's even a good idea?"

No, but Momakase had insisted, and he wasn't getting any peace and quiet otherwise.

"It's fine," Carl assured Dibs. "Besides, he needs his horizons expanded."

Obake rounded on them both. "Did I ask for your opinions?"

Dibs looked like he wanted to answer, was silenced by Carl elbowing him. At least there was that.

Hiro made a curious noise as Obake headed back to the kill ring, ear flaps up and then back as he recognized the place.

"Yes, well, hopefully this time I won't nearly die," Obake told him, heading down the slope—

And then having to remedy that last statement, considering all the fire and screaming coming from the pit up ahead—especially when he reached the grate and looked in.

Because as near as he could figure, Momakase and Gogo were doing their best to kill each other.

"Wow," Dibs muttered. "And here I thought they liked each other."

Which was usually the error in Dibs' judgment, Obake mused, watching the two fight and wondering if he should get involved—probably not, he wasn't feeling motivated to do so, and if Momakase bit it he wouldn't have to show up for this "swordfighting lesson."

He was also minimally motivated to assist because the longer he watched, the less convinced he was that these two were genuinely angling for murder—especially considering how each attack was a carefully timed near miss. It looked dramatic enough, he supposed.

Especially when it ended with Momakase in Gogo's mouth, knife tip touched to an artery in Gogo's neck.

"Let's just call this one a draw," Momakase said, voice muffled a bit by dint of coming from Gogo's mouth. Gogo warbled something, opened her mouth and took a step back.

"Oh boy I'm glad it's you and not me," Dibs said, scurrying away.

"I have concerns," Obake said, addressing Momakase.

Momakase spun her knife, grinning. "Well I needed someone who was challenging in a fight and willing to spar. You're going to have to really work to be diverting on this level."

"Joy," Obake noised, before tapping Hiro on the head. "Go sit with Carl."

"Gee thanks," Carl said, sounding sincere as he watched Hiro jump from Obake's shoulder to his arm. Obake decided he wasn't going to grace that with a response, instead standing on the trip switch to send the gate rolling up. It clicked up a few inches but didn't budge, which reminded him that the door and its workings were on his to-do list with him out of metal. Joy.

"All right, let's get this over with," he sighed, stepping in through the hole Tadashi had blasted through.

"Careful, I might just humor you and do so—losing your head would do it," Momakase jeered. Gogo huffed, went over to sit against the wall, eyeing everyone critically—chittered at Hiro when Carl reached the stands where Dibs was.

"Oh, you mean that wasn't the plan? Silly me for thinking otherwise."

"At least you already understand your position," she said, twirling her sword. "Okay, so before we start, what do you know about swordfighting?"

"The pointy end goes into the other guy."

She froze. "You're not serious."

"That is the extent of my knowledge, yes."

"How did you even make it this far? How did you even beat Callaghan?"

"As I recall, he was very distracted for about ninety percent of it, so I'm going with a combination of Divine Grace and dumb luck."

Momakase had to actually pace away, muttering to herself—Obake shifted his weight, wondering how long this was going to take—things he had to do and ideas and concepts were currently piling on themselves at the back of his head, feeling like they were weighing him down, pressing against his eyes and ears, doing a very good job of dragging him away from this moment as he at least tried to parse through them.

"Okay," Momakase sighed, stalking back to him. "So we're actually going to have to start with a lesson zero."

"I'm sorry, what?" he asked, not ready for the sudden whiplash of being brought abruptly back to the here and now.

Momakase was glowering at him now. "Do you at least know how to hold a sword?"

"Usually I leave that to you."

"Oooh," Dibs managed, before Carl elbowed him.

It would explain why Obake was suddenly on his back with all the wind knocked out of him though.

"Maybe we should start with self-defense," Momakase said, glaring down at him.

"Usually I have that covered," Obake wheezed.

"I'm sure."

What followed was at least a sun mark's worth of torture, which mostly seemed to consist of Momakase beating the living daylights out of him under the guise of 'teaching him something about fighting.' And then promising more tomorrow.

Honestly, Obake was very surprised he even managed to make it back to his own bed.

"Hrrrh," Hiro noised, pawing at his shoulder.

"I'm not moving," Obake muttered into his pillow. "And if she comes calling, I want you to bite her."

Hiro huffed a noise that was hopefully an agreement, plopped down on Obake's back (oohhh, there went a few vertebrae), sounded like he was sleeping soundly within moments. Great, at least someone had a decent enough day.

Because as far as Obake was concerned, the whole day was a complete failure.