Symphony of Shadows

36. Storm

A/N: Strap in, this is going to be a wild ride...:)

He was a mess. A barely lucid man simply going through the motions of life without actually living. Sleep deprivation made living pretty hard.

For the fifteenth time in a row, he'd managed to nearly wake the entire flock last night when he started screaming in his sleep.

Toothless's blood.

The chain.

Purple flash.

Screams. So many screams.

Hiccup hadn't realized how many men had been on that one ship, the one he blew up into smithereens. It haunted him to think about those men for too long, if they had families or loved ones they left behind.

So, he flew. He soared up on the clouds and jumped off Toothless at higher altitudes. He pushed them both higher and higher until the air was so thin, he felt lightheaded. When he was flying solo, it was hard to feel anything but adrenaline and fear. One wrong move and he would plunge into the freezing sea below or smash face first into a sea stack.

He couldn't think about anything in those moments, couldn't hear any screams except his own.

The only problem was that Toothless was tired. He'd exhausted the Night Fury and it wasn't fair so his best friend was on vacation for the day. That left Hiccup to his own devices which was never a good idea.

Now that he wasn't falling in the air all day, he could tinker with some of his inventions. During his ambush of the Berserker ship, his scale armor had gotten some wear and tear so he took to his hut to mend it. He opened up his leather chest where he hid his prosthetics from Toothless as well as extra Night Fury scales. The chest was handy when he needed to stow his more delicate tools and he rifled through the miscellaneous springs and screws in search of a specific wrench. His helmet visor had been hit with a mace and was now twisted to the left so he needed to unscrew it to fix the inner boning.

Hiccup mumbled to himself, "I'm sure I left it here somewhere..."

But he couldn't find it, not even on his desk or underneath his bed where it might've fallen.

Clang!

His brows furrowed at the noise as he searched for the cause. The sound was coming from behind his tent and he knew it was probably a dragon up to no good. A Gronckle rolled around the grass as his beloved wrench was tossed up in her claws.

Great, he must've left it out somewhere.

His hand outstretched, Hiccup slowly approached the dragon.

"Hey girl, it's just me. Any chance I could have that back?"

The dragon clearly did not appreciate his advances as she bared her teeth and went back to playing with her new toy but this time by gnawing on it. Oh no. Hiccup cringed as she started to heave and dumped a fresh pile of steaming lava on the wrench.

He sighed resignedly.

"Well, there goes that."

No wrench meant he needed to go to the market—so much for Toothless day off. He quickly changed his prosthetic and as he saddled up his dragon he felt a pang of melancholy at the fact that Astrid likely wouldn't be there. He didn't even want to think about how she viewed the dragon rider side of him after Yorgen's death. Hells, all of the archipelago was probably in uproar that he had almost killed Dagur, a tribe Chief. He hoped Dagur was at the bottom of the ocean from the explosion but knowing that piece of yak dung, he'd probably survived. Like a cockroach.

When Toothless landed at their usual spot, he mindlessly changed the dragon's tail to his solo flying one just like every other time. It ticked him off that he was back at the market so soon for only one thing but he needed to fix his helmet, it was the most important part of his suit. But he wouldn't be in and out in a short amount of time as the square was crawling with vikings he had never seen before. Burly vikings with weird clothing and a mean look in their eyes. He knew in his gut that they weren't from the archipelago. The closer he got to the stalls, the more it all made sense.