Growing Pains

Chapter Six: Breakdown

Finn had always liked fire. The crackling sounds it made, the sparks that danced above it, the way everyone's shadows were always oddly warped and elongated by its light... fire was always a source of fascination for him and ever since he was small, he enjoyed staring into its depths and taking it all in.

Now, fire was a harsh, destructive force capable of decimating the village and snuffing out life. The Haddock boy could scarcely believe that the charred wood upon which he walked early the next morning had once been sturdy homes for dozens of his fellow Hooligans. It certainly didn't seem possible that only 24 hours ago, this had been a cozy section of the village or that there had been four people living and breathing and going on with their day blissfully unaware that it was their last day on Berk, their last day ever.

Finn watched his father as they walked through the village together. Hiccup's face was paler than usual, his eyes firmly set on the road ahead and falling upon those already helping with the rebuilding and, though it made Finn sick to his stomach to think about, retrieving the bodies of those who had died. In addition to Aud and Curt, one other couple had been killed in the blaze. They were elderly and had been taking a nap at the time. It looked like they had died instantly, so quickly it was unlikely they even knew what had happened until they had awakened in Valhalla. Their daughter was living on Brawn and had just given birth to a son days before. Finn had overheard them telling Gobber that they were going to visit her and meet their first grandchild. They had been so excited but now...

Finn shook his head. There was no reason to get sentimental. It wasn't like they were his grandparents after all. All four, no, five of them had been dead for years. He knew how heavily that could weigh on someone's heart. But now was no time to show weakness, not with so many people looking up to him and his father. He couldn't let them down. As his father and grandfather had always said, "a chief protects his own."

Hiccup and Finn entered Mara's now crowded house. A section of the roof was scorched but everything else seemed to have been undamaged. This was truly something to be thankful for because Mara had never been needed more. At least thirty people of all ages were being treated by Mara and several of her helpers. A teenage girl named Tori, who was scarcely older than Finn, was getting some of her most intense on the job training. She was changing the dressings on Ruffnut's burns. Tuffnut was in another corner of the room with Svala, whose shoulder had a nasty burn on it but who otherwise looked okay. Ava slept peacefully, completely unharmed. Finn knew that they had been very worried that the smoke would have made her sick but Mara had assured them that she would be perfectly fine. Svala had saved her life when she had used her body to shield her baby from a falling beam, hence her own burns.

"Is there anything I can do?" asked Hiccup the moment Mara bustled up to him.

Mara smiled at him for a moment before pointing to the far corner, where the Jorgenson and Larson families were huddled. "Would you change Erick's bandages? And Finn, would you do Snotlout's?"

Both Haddocks agreed without hesitation and made their way to the corner. Hiccup wanted to cry when he caught sight of Erick. The boy had obviously not slept well and seemed to be in a state between sleeping and waking. He flinched horribly when Hiccup gently placed his hands on his shoulder but Magnus assured him that it was okay. The remaining Larson daughter was crying silently on Gustav's shoulder. She and Aud had had their fair share of squabbles but they had truly cared about each other. Lara and Nikolas didn't seem to be there, which struck Hiccup as odd but he didn't think too hard about it.

Hiccup was silent as he tended to Erick's burns. He was as gentle as possible but the boy still flinched to the touch. As he worked, he could hear Finn talking to Snotlout and Heather.