HTLANF: Race to the Edge

Chapter 6 ~ Dragon Eye of the Beholder (Part 6)

I hesitantly landed on the Reaper once Hiccup and I reached it and whimpered. The energy this ship was giving off was not welcoming in any way. I felt Hiccup scratch my head as he dismounted and I whined.

"I know love. I know. It feels off to me too, but we'll be in and out I promise." Hiccup reassured me and I nodded just barely as my earplates were flush against my head.

Hiccup and I slowly made our way around the ship looking at everything and keeping an eye out for anything out of the ordinary.

"This boat is definitely not from the Archipelago. These carvings, the design on the sail...I've never seen anything like this." Hiccup commented as we got a closer look at the designs put into the vessel. He brushed his hand against a metal cage near a door. "And this metal..."

I sniffed at the cage and whined backing away from it a bit. Hiccup looked at me then back at the cage skeptically.

"There something in there Kala?" He asked a bit curious, but also nervous.

The both of us slowly looked inside of the cage to see what hid in the shadows. A bird flew out of the cage towards us to try and scare us away. It worked. Hiccup and I let out a yelp and a screech respectively as we ducked away from the cage as the bird passed us by.

"Okay.." Hiccup said as the both of us took heavy breaths to calm our nerves. "Was not expecting a bird of all things to be in there.."

I nodded in agreement and let out a small whine. Guess the both of us were more worked up than we first thought if a bird flying out of an old cage spooked us. Then again, with the surrounding area and just the aura of the Reaper it is reasonable to be jittery.

Once the both of us were calm enough we slowly entered the rest of the ship to see what was hidden within. We kept an eye out for any traps as we went along and I cut a rope that almost grasped Hiccup's foot. He noticed and smiled at me thankfully.

"Thanks love." He said softly then looked at the cut rope. "Okay. Nobody goes through this much trouble unless there's something on this boat that they don't want found."

We continued cautiously through the ship and avoided all the traps we came across. I used my tail and claws to activate or move aside the traps that came into my line of sight.

The farther we got, the more jittery I became. I jumped a bit when I heard something clatter to the floor in a cage. Hiccup and I turned our attention to the cage and I whined as the object came into view. It was the bones of a dead dragon. I couldn't even tell what species.

"Dragon bones...I'm so sorry you had to see this milady...Whoever commanded this ship was certainly no friend of dragons. Let's get out of here, yeah?"

I nodded stiffly and nudged him forward gently, keeping him from a loose plank that I could tell was part of a trap. He smiled softly and allowed me to lead him away from the cages.

After a couple minutes, we reached the Commander's quarters. The door looked just as detailed as everything else on the ship, but it seemed that there was more time and effort put into just the door itself compared to everything else.

"You think you could get this open love?"

I crooned nervously and released a plasma blast towards the door. When it made contact, the door flew off its hinges and landed on the other side of the room. Hiccup scratched my head and entered the quarters looking around. I followed him cautiously.

The amount of items in the room were surprisingly very few. It seemed like the commander had packed everything away and took it all when they abandoned the ship. The only things that were left behind was a skeleton holding something that looked to be important sat in an old chair positioned behind an old desk.