Chapter Text
The first time Hiccup reaches out to Toothless, Toothless doesn’t let Hiccup touch him.
Hiccup keeps reaching out. Until finally ducking his head and closing his eyes, hand hovering in the air, having to trust that it won’t get bit. Scales press against skin, and Hiccup lets out a breath, full of awe and disbelief. Toothless is out of sight again in moments, leaving Hiccup to look at the sunset-rosy sky, hyper-aware that nothing will ever be the same again.
What he wasn’t expecting: Toothless turning things around.
It happens the next day, after trying out the custom tailfin Hiccup brought, and they’ve climbed out of the lake they fell into after the unexpected test.
Hiccup gets to his feet on the grass, cold mineral-rich taste in his mouth. Though the chill soon sets in, soaked clothes making him shiver despite the sunniness of the day, he is still triumphant.
“It works! It actually works! I mean, it definitely needs adjustments, but...”
He trails off.
It needs adjustments alright—it needs to account for a rider. Toothless will be flying again if Hiccup has anything to say about it, but... Toothless can’t do it on his own. Guilt swirls hotly beneath Hiccup’s skin. The sunshine just seems cruel now. Watching the clouds in the blue sky, thinking of the ocean waves surrounding the island. Frozen lakes and the aurora from high angles. Pounding raindrops and thunder and lightning.
Toothless notices the change in mood. He cast off the water easily, unlike Hiccup. Toothless tilts his head with a questioning trill. And this is when it happens.
Toothless reaches out, snout first.
Hiccup scrambles backwards, surprised, putting distance between them.
Oh, irony. It’s the exact same situation as yesterday, only reversed. All Hiccup needs to do now is growl and it’ll really match.
Toothless’s snout twitches forward, like Hiccup might gravitate towards it.
“I should get back to the village,” Hiccup says. “Get started on those adjustments, right? The sooner you can fly again, the better.”
Toothless withdraws. There’s something deeply sad in his eyes, which is the last thing Hiccup wanted. But he doesn’t take it back.
Hiccup has very little interaction with people.
He has always known this as well as he knows night from day. When they’re being kind to him, people avoid him like a plague. Like uselessness is a deadly disease, and it’s catching. This goes for most of the adults, and also Fishlegs. Astrid doesn’t shy away, blue eyes fiercely glaring at him whenever he messes up, making sure to point out when he’s doing something wrong. As for the rest of the teens, they’re big fans of heckling and shoving.
When he was little, he used to tussle with Snotlout. Friendly tussling, not...what came after. It’s nothing more than a distant memory, now. Sort of fond, mostly painful. Not because the tussling itself had been painful—rather, because it hadn’t been.
As for Hiccup’s dad... They hardly ever see each other, and when they do, it’s usually after Hiccup screwed up and nearly destroyed the village. Again. Not exactly a hugging moment. Not that Hiccup wants them to get touchy-feely; the very thought fills him with awkwardness. Hiccup and his dad have never really been able to...connect. Stoick is dragon heads mounted on spears and effortless leadership; Hiccup is melting candles and charcoal moving across parchment for a new invention or simply because he saw something he found worth drawing.
For as long as Hiccup can remember, he’s been longing for someone to linger. Not just the kind of companionship he sees from the other vikings, the one he already lacks, the bare minimum that seems dissatisfying from a distance. Something deeper than that. Softer.
This is why he was never going to be able to maintain distance with Toothless. It’s a losing battle and he already realized it the moment he backed away from that first touch.
When they became friends—highlights including regurgitated fish, a gummy smile and two different drawing styles—Toothless didn’t know that he would be flying again. So he’s not being friendly because he needs Hiccup to fly. Toothless just...wants Hiccup, as Hiccup, which feels crazy. There’s no perfect warrior here and Toothless doesn’t care.
Hiccup, in turn, no longer cares about being good at dragon training or impressing the vikings. Which, ironically, is the moment that he does. But it means nothing to him anymore now that he has a friend who accepts him for who he is. It’s just a block of time that has to pass before he can see Toothless.
Gobber puts his hand on Hiccup’s shoulder, complimenting him for another job well done after training and Hiccup doesn’t know how to feel. Gobber thinks he’s someone else; a Hiccup that has become a good viking, instead of even worse of one. When Gobber turns away and his hand slips from Hiccup’s shoulder, Hiccup is still unsure what he feels. The first word that comes to mind is loss.
He carries the feeling with him, all the way back to the cove.
Toothless can tell immediately that Hiccup has something on his mind.
Before Hiccup realizes it, Toothless presses his snout to the nape of Hiccup’s neck. It’s a gentle touch. The scales are rough against his skin, so close to his brown hair, and Toothless’s breaths are close and powerful enough to have the same effect as a breeze on Hiccup’s green tunic. Toothless warbles softly, comfortingly.
Hiccup doesn’t know how much time has passed when Toothless pulls away, apparently satisfied, heading for the basket of fish Hiccup brought to start scarfing them down. Perch and salmon; cod and herring. Surrounded by sunshine and glittering leaves, flowers perfuming the air.
Normally Hiccup would already be preparing for the latest tailfin test, but not now. Unconsciously, he reaches up and holds his own neck where Toothless touched him.
It aches more than if he would have been hit there with a bludgeon.
Toothless is not like anyone else in the village, and vikings aren’t big on lingering soft touches to begin with. But for Hiccup, even less so. Except his dad and Gobber sometimes, and even they only smack his shoulder or pat his back. Any lingering touch is avoided... At least, it used to be. Cheating at training has gotten the villagers to be friendly with him, but unfortunately their version of friendly usually ends up bruising. Because they’re strong, and he’s...well, him. They probably don’t even realize it. Ironic, considering what he’s been to them for the longest time. The useless, the weak, the runt.
But none of that applies to Toothless.
With every comforting touch, every considerate gesture—even the regurgitated fish, misguided though it may be—Toothless seems to say, someone has to worry after you; no one else seems to.
And it’s...overwhelming. Almost nauseatingly so. The kind of feeling you get when you haven’t eaten in days, and though you’re starving, putting anything in your stomach could have you puking your guts out.
He feels the lack stronger than he ever has.
It makes no sense, considering he’s already been dealing with it for fifteen years, and he now has Toothless to alleviate some of it, and yet. It has him in a poor mood, quick to snap.
The other teens seem to understand it as Hiccup being disappointed with himself. Like he wants to be even stronger in training, even better in learning how to kill. It’d be comical if he wasn’t so tired.
The true reason is this: he just misses Toothless.
The comforting sound of his warbling and the absolute silliness of playing tag together, leading to Hiccup laughing harder than he ever has in his life. But Toothless, obviously, stayed in the cove.
Except, it turns out, Toothless didn’t stay there entirely.
The Deadly Nadder they’re fighting doesn’t attack Hiccup; she just sniffs in his general direction, tilting her head curiously. It rained during the night; the stone is damp, the air humid. Hiccup nearly slips as he startles, finally realizing that it’s his scent that’s confusing the dragon.
Taking advantage of the Nadder’s inaction, Astrid takes a moment to put her axe near Hiccup’s throat, threatening that he better not get in her way again. Par for the course, really. But before Astrid can charge at the Nadder, the Nadder begins to charge at her.
Trying to help, Hiccup realizes, with absolute bewilderment; trying to help him. He’s noticed the dragons have begun regarding him oddly recently; because he never hurts them in training and because of Toothless’s scent, he now realizes. But this...this is new. Hiccup watches Astrid’s strong lunge with the axe, sunlight catching the blade and her blonde braid. Something that would have had him melting and pining before, but now only fills him with dread.
Hiccup exhales when he sees the Nadder’s eyes are still open, but the dragon is sprawled on the wet stone floor. Letting out a mournful cry, looking up at Hiccup. His heart clenches.
He’s about to step forward and check where the dragon was hurt when he is interrupted.
“I’ll see to the beast.” Gobber is so casual about it. “You kids go home—that’s enough training for today. Good work, Astrid!”
Hiccup feels a burst of true resentment for Gobber, but it is quickly replaced with shame. Gobber doesn’t know better, and he’s been there for Hiccup more than Hiccup’s own father has, but seeing Gobber step up beside the injured dragon Hiccup still has the urge to tell him off. Because Gobber doesn’t actually care about the Nadder’s well-being, none of them do.
But then Hiccup turns his eyes on the other teens. They’re watching him.
He can’t tend this dragon, not the way he wants.
Fishlegs touches Hiccup’s arm—full of excitement, gushing over the Nadder’s spine shot earlier during training. A far cry from the comical way Fishlegs used to steer clear of Hiccup, someone big flinching away from someone much smaller; the way Fishlegs used to back away like Hiccup’s very touch is a corrupting force. Hiccup should be happy, receiving touch from Fishlegs now.
But that’s not what Hiccup wants.
Well, it is, but not for this. Not for dragon training. He wants someone to touch his arm and tell him he’s doing well: for refusing to kill a dragon and all his actions afterwards. He wants to hear that it’s not a betrayal. That Hiccup’s not what’s wrong, but Berk is for treating him this way.
Swallowing down the lump in his throat, he gives the Nadder one last glance. One that he hopes isn’t noticed by the humans, but conveys his gratitude to the dragon. Then he turns around. And walks away.
Past villagers who used to wish he was cast away at birth, but now grin and wave and slap his back. No one will miss the old nuisance you used to be, they say, sweating from a hard day’s labor, with grit under their fingernails. We’re all so relieved!
He hurries past rows of growing produce, slips into the forest as fast as he can. He walks past ferns and mushrooms underneath tree bark; past berry bushes and insects, until arriving at the cove. The first thing he does is hug his only friend.
After the tailfin test, the sun is already setting.
He should be going home. Instead, he has dinner. His first thought’s that no one will notice if he’s missing from the Great Hall, but unfortunately that’s no longer true. He used to wish for it, not sitting alone during the Great Hall. He stays in the cove.
No more raw fish, though, thank you very much Toothless, but cooked on Toothless’s fire, who only lights it after several attempts of coaxing him to. Toothless doesn’t get it at all, making it clear that he finds Hiccup very silly.
Toothless keeps that ‘oh-you-ridiculous-human’ expression as Hiccup continues to prepare his meal with practiced ease. Receiving scraps his whole life has him well-versed in which wild plants are edible, and how to combine ingredients that go well together. He doesn’t always bother—often finding himself without an appetite, feeling anxiety over the very act of eating. But here, with Toothless, there is none of that.
So he gathers wild strawberries; boils saltwater with Toothless’s help and collects the crystals of salt after the water evaporates; adds the honey and fresh produced dill that he nabbed from the Great Hall. He didn’t even need to be stealthy about it; no one minds him having food now. All this together makes for a strawberry salsa which he adds to the salmon filets he cooked earlier. It’s bursting with flavor, though Toothless seems to disagree when he takes an experimental bite, causing Hiccup to burst out laughing at the put-out look on his face. Yeah, Toothless really prefers his fish raw.
After Hiccup’s last bite, he exhales slowly. The feeling of a full stomach is uncommon too. But this time, Hiccup isn’t even nauseous about it. Only satisfied, a deep kind of satiated feeling that he didn’t know he was capable of. Not just from the food.
“Gods, Toothless. I didn’t know how lonely I was until I met you,” he admits quietly, leaning against Toothless, watching the sun hang low in a sky stained red.
He thought he did, but he was wrong. He was always longing to be different, because that’s the only way his community would ever accept him. He never longed for unconditional acceptance because he never thought he could have it. Never thought he was worth it, believing just as everyone else did that there just had to be something wrong with him, that he had to change to be properly loved.
Toothless turns his head, looks at Hiccup. He knows what it is to be lonely, Hiccup is suddenly sure of it. And in his eyes Hiccup finds that Toothless hates the thought of Hiccup having shared that loneliness.
Toothless croons, mournfully, wings twitching like he wants to wrap Hiccup in a cocoon of dragon.
Hiccup looks at the dusk and thinks about winter. Snow falling, effortlessly covering everything in soft crystal. Chapped skin and bleeding lips; the taste of gamy wild meat. Elk and deer, seasoned with herbs. Disease, taking the weak. Disease that never spares him, and though he hacks out his lungs every time, he always makes it through. Probably out of spite. The villagers will whisper in the winter, not caring if he hears: he won’t make it through this one. This one, for sure.
He’s heard freezing to death is painless after the initial chill.
“I’m tired.”
It comes out as a tremble. Toothless wraps Hiccup in his wings.
At night, Hiccup goes to the cages; opens the one belonging to the Nadder and braces himself.
It might be a terrible idea—that Nadder might’ve been a fluke. He could get killed, and then who’s going to fly Toothless? But that’s the thing; by all accounts Toothless should have killed him, and Hiccup is still alive. He didn’t dismiss Toothless as a fluke, either.
The Nadder comes charging out. Hiccup steps back quickly. “Whoa.”
She sniffs him curiously, very big and very close.
“Hey,” he’s saying, nervously. “It’s, uh—me. I—I just wanted to—thank you. Properly. So...”
He holds out a fish. Raw cod.
Since the Nadder is so close and he doesn’t completely trust her not to bite his hand off, he throws it across the arena. She goes bounding off after it, but instead of eating, deposits the fish back in front of him. Her body language conveys excitement, but Hiccup doesn’t understand why.
“Oh, you don’t want this one?”
She nudges the cod with her snout, eying him expectantly.
“You do? I—oh. Oh, I get it.” He chuckles, leftover tension melting away just like that. Behold, the Deadly Nadder: fetch enthusiast. “Alright, we can play.”
He’s given an abundance of food now, surrounded by grinning faces. Even the thought of eating it all in front of them has him nauseous. They see something in Hiccup now that isn’t there, something that will never be there.
He’ll never be one of them. Once that thought filled him with despair. Now it’s relief. He doesn’t want to belong with the people who will extend the war as far as it will go instead of doing what Hiccup did and giving the dragons a chance. He doesn’t want to fit in with people who have never wanted him; they still don’t. They want a true viking and a dragon killer; at some point, they’re going to find out that Hiccup is neither.
So he leaves the Great Hall, claiming to eat the rest by himself as a part of his training process; but he goes to see the Nadder again instead. After a quick detour, that is, to get more fish. Pike this time.
“Ah—hello to you too,” Hiccup says at the enthusiastic greeting. She’s sniffing again, focusing on what he brought, “Oh, yeah. You’re curious about that, huh?”
It’s the chicken from the Great Hall. Cooked and seasoned with wild garlic. He wasn’t expecting the Nadder’s interest in this instead of the raw pike.
“I’m not really—not really a big eater. They give me so much more food now that I’m—well, anyway. You can have it.”
He’s barely finished the sentence when she’s already guzzling it up. What follows is a lot of happy squawking.
“Wow,” he says, easy smile on his face, instead of the forced ones from during his own dinner. “You really like that chicken. I’ll remember that. Um, I brought fish, but... Since you wanted the chicken instead... I wanna try something.”
Hiccup moves towards another cage.
Muttering to himself, “Just...bear with me, okay, don’t—freak out please.”
He opens it. Before the Terrible Terror can pounce, he exclaims,
“Fish!”
And the dragon pauses.
“Uh, here, have some—have some fish.”
He puts the pike down, in front of the cage. The Terror is hesitant going out, skittish like the fish will be snatched away any moment, but then scarfs it down just as happily as the Nadder did the chicken. Speaking of the Nadder, she’s not freaking out either—seems bored, even.
Hiccup laughs, relieved. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s—that’s good, right? There’s no reason to... attack me.”
The Terror straightens, flying towards him. Hiccup shifts but before he can truly get wary the Terror is curling up on his shoulder. His heart clenches.
“O-Oh. You’re a lonely little guy aren’t you... And you were hungry. Good thing I didn’t bring any eel!”
His nervous laughter peters down when something occurs to him. Something terrible.
“Oh, my Gods I forgot about the eel.”
Yeah, he needs to fix that immediately. But not while there are other dragons in the Ring to also freak out at the eel.
“Okay you guys gotta—yeah, it’s time to go back, I just—I’m sorry.” The Terror really doesn’t want to go. The Nadder isn’t going as easily as last time either, but she’s already in the cage when the Terror is not. He pets the Terror on the head. “I know. I’ll be back, okay? Yeah. Alright.”
Alone in the Ring now, he opens a different cage.
The Hideous Zippleback is still pressed against the far wall, eyes—all four of them—wide and terrified and fixed on the eel still where Hiccup left it.
“Oh. Oh man, I’m so sorry, let me just—it’s okay!” As he’s holding up the eel, they make a noise that sounds part scared, part aggressive. He throws the eel as far as he can; he’ll take it out of the arena later. “It’s okay. There, gone see? You can...you can come out?”
But they don’t. They still looks so scared, but also grateful, and Hiccup feels sick. He knows it’s because most vikings would not have taken the eel back out. He knows it’s because they’re not used to being treated well and Hiccup regrets using the eel against them now, even though they probably would have killed him during training.
“O-Or not, that’s, that’s okay. You...take your time, and I’ll be back tomorrow, and again... I’m really sorry.”
Walking back from the arena, he comes to a stop at the turn to the forest. The thought of just—going back to his empty house... He’d much rather see Toothless. And really, who’s going to notice his absence? He just has to make it back in time for training and it’ll be fine.
In the cove, Toothless is really happy to see him—Hiccup doesn’t usually visit this late. It’s a good surprise, Toothless makes sure Hiccup knows it. This makes Hiccup smile, all the weight lifting off his shoulders. They curl up together to sleep.
Slowly Hiccup feels himself relax under Toothless’s wings. His eyes droop as he watches the night sky. His cheek presses into the fur jacket that he had taken off to lay on the grass.
The comforting feeling of Toothless’s touch lulls him. The clouds move away, making the moon visible again. Toothless’s wing shifts a little, enveloping Hiccup more closely. Hiccup closes his eyes, afraid to face this feeling, afraid of how attached he has gotten in so little time.
He would die for Toothless. He would do anything for Toothless including leaving behind the only home he’s ever known and the only parent he has left. Part of him longs for it, even. Just him and Toothless and the open sky. But that’s a dangerous line of thought.
There are things holding him back.
Moon obscured by clouds, the Nadder and the Terror are already out when he decides to take a chance on the Gronckle.
It’s a dragon he feels warier about, considering the fact that this is the first one he faced; the one who would have killed him if Gobber hadn’t intervened. At the opening of the cage, the dragon comes charging out. Not playfully like the Nadder. And headed straight for Hiccup.
“No, no no no wait!”
The Gronckle actually does, coming to a confused halt at the sight of the other dragons in the arena and ready to protect the human.
“Uh... Yeah, you—you see? We’re all just, you know, hanging out. You can—join us too.” The Gronckle comes forward hesitantly, but doesn’t try to attack Hiccup again. “Yeah. Okay. Phew.”
He opened the Zippleback cage too, hoping for them to come out, and they do after the Gronckle has joined the group.
“Hey, there you go,” Hiccup says, grinning when he notices they’re out.
They stop in front of him.
“Uh, um, you... You want something...? You want...” He recognizes the excited body language from the Nadder, and grins. “Oh, you want to play. Okay, I get it.”
He starts a game of fetch with a stray rock, but it didn’t occur to him that the Nadder would intervene before the Zippleback can get to their prize. After the Nadder deposits it in front of him, the Zippleback gets a hold of it before Hiccup can throw it again. They begin to headbutt it back and forth. When it falls, the Gronckle promptly eats it.
The Nadder clamors for Hiccup’s attention, impatient and wanting another object to fetch. But the Terror and the Gronckle want cuddles, and the Zippleback is having great fun, and it’s all getting way too rowdy for comfort. Their attention is overwhelming, in a strangely good way, but the noise...
“Whoa, guys, guys, don’t—you gotta be more quiet. If anyone finds out about this...”
Dragons are far more intelligent than the vikings think, because all of them catch his meaning and quiet down instantly.
Another pang of guilt hits him. This can’t go on. Yet he’s hesitant to actually free them—the ultimate treasonous move. He won’t be able to stay here if that happens, and his dad is still out looking for the nest. The thought of never seeing him again, despite everything...
It hurts.
The next visit to the cove, something unexpected happens. He approaches Toothless, but Toothless huffs, turning his head away.
“Toothless,” Hiccup says, surprised, eyes wide and heart clenching with fear. “What—what’s going on?”
Toothless’s head turns back to Hiccup, and he makes a show of sniffing exaggeratedly only to huff again. Hiccup relaxes slightly.
“What, you—you can—catch the scents of the other dragons on me? Wow, that’s—wait, are you jealous?”
Toothless turns away again, in a definite show of petulance. Hiccup feels the rest of the tension leaving him, bursting into surprised laughter, which only worsens Toothless’s mood.
“Oh, come on. Don’t pout. You’re still my favorite.”
This causes Toothless to steal a glance at him, eyes wide, only to remember himself.
Hiccup laughs. “Oh, yeah you are. Just feel it.”
He pounces on a static Toothless, giving the firmest hug he’s got. Which isn’t very firm at all, of course, especially not to Toothless, but still.
“Yeah, are you feeling it yet—whoa!”
Hiccup lands on the soft grass with a hard thump, Toothless on his chest. With the new angle, sunlight is getting into Hiccup’s eyes, temporarily blinding him.
Toothless moves quickly, and that’s when Hiccup gets a bunch of saliva on his face; Toothless licking in a frenzy. It tickles, so Hiccup laughs, and Toothless only keeps going with more fervor—like he’s marking Hiccup as his.
At night Hiccup finds himself in the Ring again, but before opening any of the cages... His eyes linger on the only one he hasn’t opened yet.
“It’s...not really fair to leave one out,” he justifies his crazy plan to himself out loud. Slowly stepping forward. “I’ll just... before the others, yeah, it’ll be...fine. Totally fine.”
Before loses his nerve, he quickly opens the cage of the Monstrous Nightmare.
“Time to come out now, big guy,” he says nervously, which is exactly what happens. Explosively.
He backs up quickly, before the Nightmare’s fire goes back out, eyes zeroing in on Hiccup.
“O...kay, yes, you’re very big.”
The Nightmare creeps forward, slowly. Like stalking prey, maybe, or like a curious dragon. Hiccup likes to think that he can tell the difference now.
”...You...actually don’t seem all that aggressive...when no one else is, anyway. Can I just?”
Hiccup reaches out his hand. Almost immediately, he can feel the Nightmare’s scales beneath his fingers.
“Wow,” he breathes. Just like that. “Wow, you’re amazing.”
Red scales illuminated by the moon, rough underneath his fingers, he has to swallow a lump in his throat. The Nightmare’s eyes are bright and curious as they gaze at Hiccup.
Finally, he admits to himself that he’s being selfish. Waiting for his dad to get back. When Stoick returns, it’ll be close to the final exam, where this Nightmare will have to die. Freeing this dragon and all the others will be a lot more difficult with all the fighting vikings back on Berk. His best chance to do this is now.
It’s the right thing.