The King of Dragons (a httyd fanfiction)

Chapter 16-Battle Dragons

Astrid ran out of the arena, she looked out and saw the hundreds of ships. They all had armored men, some even had catapults on their decks. She began to head into the village as quickly as possible, where the chief had already started to get ready.
"Why are they here?" Astrid asked, dodging Vikings that were running past with their axes, swords, and maces.
"I don't know, but that horn means war," Stoick put it shortly as he began to yap orders.
"But why?" Astrid puzzled, "why now?"
"If I knew I'd say so, now go!" Stoick yelled, going to get his weapons for battle.
Astrid watched as he went off, she went to leave but was quickly met by the other Viking dragon riders. Fishlegs looked worried, while the others were excited for the fight that was about to come.
"What are we going to do?" Fishlegs asked, being the only other sane one.
Astrid looked out, seeing the boats sailing closer and closer to Berk. And she saw one near the back, it had a huge cage, big enough for any dragon on the isle of Berk. And she looked back to the group, "get the dragons."
The group looked a little shocked but quickly got more excited upon hearing this. They all started to the arena, grabbing their weapons on the way.
Hiccup was still in the arena, he had seen some of the armadas, and was not about to endanger the dragons if it wasn't his fight. It was also a great excuse to leave if he ran into Astrid and the others. He was feeling pretty good and that he was going to getaway. until he was about to put the bag on toothless, and out of the corner of his eye he saw the small group of Vikings walking in.
He let out a breath, putting the bags down and looking at all of them. He was going to stop them from doing anything stupid.
"So, what's your plan?" Astrid less of asked and more of demanded an answer.
Hiccup was expecting something else to come from her mouth, like 'give us the dragons' or along those lines. So when she was already expecting him to fight, he couldn't help but laugh.
"Plan?" He said between breaths, "I'm not fighting a battle you Vikings got yourself into."
"It wasn't us, hiccup," she countered, "I saw a huge cage on the biggest ship out there. And I don't think they are wanting to put all of berk's people in there."
The rider looked at her, and then realized what she meant. They had a cage for toothless. Hiccup was the reason Berk was being under siege. He turned away from the group and looked at toothless, he was not about to let them come and raid for his dragon, for his best friend. And hiccup made his decision.
He turned back around to the group and started to take charge, "get your dragons. Once we can get a real look at how many ships there are we can go from there."
Astrid smiled at him while the rest of the group did small cheers, and went to get their dragons.
Astrid went and mounted stormfly once she got her out of the cage. She looked to hiccup and toothless. The dragon did a small blast at the stone wall, leaving it scorched. Hiccup dragged his hand against it, picking up the residue from the mark. He wiped his hands over his face and eyes, the black soot acting as war paint.
Astrid gave a small smile, they were getting ready for a fight they may not win.
~
Once the group was up in the air, they saw the abundance of ships that were here. There were at least a hundred ships with both tribes combined, and more to go uncounted. Hiccup grimaced at the severity of the situation, gathering the group back closer to Berk.
"Alright, there are a lot of them but if we can take out the ones with catapults and the one with the cage," he told them, motioning to the ships with the large weapons.
The twins giggled in excitement at getting to destroy things, while Fishlegs nodded nervously to the fact he was about to fight in battle. Snotlout however just looked at the ships and let out a groan, "why don't we just destroy all of them? Who cares what's on it, they are all going to attack us anyway."
"Yes snotlout," hiccup agreed with much anger in his voice, "but the catapults will do the most damage to the village."
Snotlout let out a huff, but Astrid smiled, hiccup was at least thinking about Berk now.
"Now that there are no more questions, let's go," hiccup directed, as toothless began to dive down out of the safety of the cloud bank, and to the ocean. It surprised the ships, so as toothless began to fire at the boats, the Vikings on them had little time to respond. Many began to jump overboard as the deck set on fire.
Ruffnut and Tuffnut were the next to come down, letting out a primeval yell as Barf let out the explosive gas and Belch lit it up. It left the Catapult and boat in splinters, laughing as they flew off to explode another ship.
When Astrid has the word stormfly zipped down and shot spines into one of the catapults levers. It made it impossible to fire the Boulder, and it was followed by stormfly letting out a blast of fire at it. The catapult melted away, it destroyed the ship in the process.
"Good girl stormfly," Astrid encouraged stormfly who trilled in response, before going off.
Snotlout let out a little mutter of insults before soaring down. Hookfang let out a powerful blast at the first ship they ran into. There wasn't a catapult, but snotlout did see a bunch of nets and bolas light up as Vikings jumped overboard. He mentally praised himself before going to the next ship.
Fishlegs and meatlug flew down, as a Boulder came flying at them, the dragon ate the rock. She then spit up the molten mess left of it back onto the ship. It seethed a hole right down through the ship and it began to sink. Fishlegs congratulated meatlug as they began to zoom off.
Then things started to go wrong, as meatlug flew away, being the slowest of the group, she and Fishlegs were a target. Another ship had no catapult but the Vikings threw bola's and nets them. Meatlug had barely any time to respond, as a bola wrapped around her tail. She let out a whimper as she was weighed down closer to the ship.
"oh no," Fishlegs murmured before letting out a loud yell of, "help!" as a net was thrown around them.
Hiccup looked back, seeing his friend getting captured, and sped over to Astrid, who also went to answer the cry. he turned to her as they flew past sinking and blazing ships.
"you cut the bola's off, I can handle the net," Hiccup instructed as toothless started to get ahead of stormfly. Astrid nodded, looking at their trapped friend, she was not about to let her friend die.
Hiccup made sure the fake tail was in place, as he let go of the saddle and sat up. He pulled out his sword and reached it down as it lit aflame. it cut through the rope net as if it were it was butter. Astrid continued the rescue by stormfly using her tail spines to cut through the ropes, and the remains of the weapon fell to the ocean.
Fishlegs and meatlug were quick to get out of the way, as toothless began to fire at the ship with the capture weapons. hiccup watched as it sunk, and survivors began to swim to other boats. He gave his dragon a small pat, and toothless dove, plucking a Viking from the water.
"how many ships have capture devices," hiccup practically growled, getting further into his rage as the man didn't respond, "how many?!"
The man sputtered out a measly, "a-all of them," before he was dropped back to the unforgiving sea.
Hiccup pulled toothless up slightly, and they got out of range of any danger. Toothless let out a roar, and all the other rider's dragons came, even if the Viking was unwilling. They all looked at hiccup in confusion and a bit of fear.
"what's wrong, hiccup?" Astrid being the first on stormfly to get to him.
He waited a moment for the rest of the group to get there before speaking, "All the ships have dragon trapping weapons. only Hookfang and stormfly can get out of most of the restraints without help, So you two are focusing on non-catapult ships. Fishlegs I want you to stay near Astrid, they all seemed to be evenly spread out, so you won't have to stray too far from her and stormfly. Ruff, tuff, you're with Snotlout."
"Alright, Hookfang! let's go burn more ships!" Snotlout yelled out, as they dove back down, being followed by the zippleback and their riders.
"and what about you?" Astrid asked, more worried about hiccup more than he was about himself.
"don't worry about me," hiccup stated, "now go. We are getting too close to the island for comfort."
Astrid let out a very quick and small sigh before nodding, and flying back into battle with Fishlegs. Hiccup went to do the same thing, except he had no backup.