In Lieu Of A Tail

5. Well-Laid Plans, Who Needs 'Em?

After fully waking up, Hiccup had breakfast with his dragon. They decided they couldn't stay on this tiny island for much longer, and hunted for some extra food before Hiccup re-packed his gear and they prepared to take off. When they had lurched into the air, Hiccup started muttering to himself.

"Gotta find a decent-sized island, that is preferably uninhabited by other Vikings, and where we can both live safely, and..." His mutterings reached the sensitive ears of his Night Fury companion, who growled in irritation. 'Why was his hatchling over complicating this? Their goal was simple: find a medium-sized safe island to live on, nothing could be easier!' He grumbled again, humans were strange, he really needed to find a better way to communicate with his hatchling.

Toothless spotted an island that looked fairly promising, and – sensing no other humans or feral dragons – crooned at his rider to halt his pointless mutterings.

"What's up, bud? Do you think that island will work?" An agreeable grunt was his answer. He adjusted his foot pedal in tandem to his dragon's tail-fin to glide down to the ground.

They touched down in the centre of the island- a large clearing surrounded by lithe trees bursting with leaves of every shade of green. The dragon-human team scouted the island for anything hostile or dangerous – they found no indication of danger, however they did find hints that wild dragons were around. Luckily, the wild dragons didn't seem as rabid as the ones that used to raid Berk, and were content to leave them alone.

"This is it Bud, our new home!"

**********

Within a week the pair had found the perfect place to build their home, it was actually the large clearing that they first landed in. It was perfect because with it being in the middle of the island – it could only be seen from above, thus only by dragons and their riders. During this week they had started building their home, from the ground up. It would probably take a month or so to complete it, but when it was done it would be large enough for dragons to live in as well as humans, and would have a forge attached. Both Hiccup and Toothless were excited for it to be completed (though Toothless was probably more excited by the fact that when it was done he wouldn't have to do any more heavy lifting).

**********

It had taken two months – and no small amount of effort from both parties – but Hiccup and Toothless' home was finally finished. During those two months, Hiccup had managed to increase his strength, stamina and endurance – building a house with only a dragon to help was very hard work – and had begun to learn what he called dragonese (the language of the dragons). He was by no means fluent, but he could hold a simple conversation, and was learning very fast.

"What should we do today, Toothless?" Hiccup asked in dragonese.

"I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count." Toothless replied with a gummy smirk on his face.

"Flying?"

"Obviously, Hiccup."

"Oh Toothless, never change." Hiccup laughed, shaking his head gently and smiling.

"Your dragonese is improving." Toothless noted.

"Thanks bud, I hope I can perfect it soon, I want to be able to understand all the wild dragons around here perfectly."

"You'll be fluent soon enough, you happen to be a very fast learner. Besides, whether you can speak and understand dragonese or not, all the dragons love you because you don't try and kill them." At Hiccup's raised eyebrows he rolled his eyes. "And you have a natural affinity with them, blah, blah, blah. Can we go flying now?!" The dragon moaned in the most impatient growl possible.

"Yeah, yeah. We can go flying now, but then you're teaching me more dragonese!" Hiccup replied.

"Yeah, sure. Can we go already?!"

"Okay, okay, I'm coming!"

The boy mounted the dragon and they leapt into the sky, climbing up high to play in the clouds, free falling and gliding and spinning. They performed dizzying and ridiculously dangerous stunts – that somehow never ended badly – like the lucky fools they were.

[Several months later]

Hiccup was truly an excellent student, this was proved every time he mastered something new, this time it was dragonese, and he found that it was second nature to him now. Toothless said it was because he had such a good teacher – the dragon himself, obviously – but even he couldn't deny that Hiccup was an excellent and dutiful student. This was proved further when Toothless began helping the boy improve fighting and self-defence strategies, and he improved by leaps and bounds within days – he was by no means the perfect warrior, but it was a start.

After beginning his training with Toothless, Hiccup decided he needed some armour and weapons, and so began designing a couple ideas. His ideas consisted of an iron he had recently discovered – it was incredibly light and strong at the same time, he called it Gronckle Iron – with thin leather on top, and a mask that resembled a dragon's face.

He also created a lightweight shield with a Night Fury design on top and a sword that had a retractable blade – he got the idea from Toothless' teeth – and could ignite because of the Monstrous Nightmare gel on the blade.

Toothless was impressed by his hatchling's ingenuity, and surprised he could actually pull it off. He was relieved that, if it became necessary, Hiccup could fend for himself and that although the boy had a very skinny and small stature, he could use it to his advantage in a fight – having incredible agility and impressive speed (for a human of course).

Hiccup was always taming dragons around the island, and Toothless knew each and every one of them would give their lives for the boy. All of the dragons considered this place a nest, and the teenager was treated as a nest-mate, he was one of them. Hiccup loved every second, and was always ready to help a brother or sister of wings and talons.

One day, Hiccup and Toothless went flying closer to Berk than usual, and found themselves caught in a flock of dragons that grew by the second.

"Get down!" Toothless growled lowly, he had forgotten all about the Queen in his time with Hiccup on their island.

They flew silently to the nest, a dormant volcano in the middle of the Barbaric Archipelago, and entered like a shadow, unseen and – Toothless prayed – undetected. Hiccup watched in silence as food was dropped into the foggy depths, smartly holding back his sarcastic 'It's satisfying to know all our food has been dumped down a hole' until he didn't feel like he was probably going to die. A Gronckle flew over the hole, hovered there, and regurgitated a single, small fish into the darkness. It scratched behind its ear with its right hind leg, and then a deep rumble sounded from the depths. A mouth appeared with startling speed, jaws open wide that swallowed the Gronckle with a single gulp.

"We have to get out of here, bud." Hiccup whispered as quietly as possible. Toothless nodded and backed away from the ledge, before taking off and flying as fast as possible through the tunnels and away from the Queen. Hiccup looked back once to see the cavern in chaos and a Zippleback snapped up before the monster's jaws retreated from view once again.

When they returned to their island, Hiccup and Toothless were both rattled. Only one thought was present in Hiccup's mind, and he said it in such fluent, furious dragonese that Toothless's eyes widened in surprise.

"That monster must be destroyed."

AN: I'm posting this at 2:30am what is wrong with me? Also, anyone know how I can make chapters transfer to Wattpad (copy and paste) from the Microsoft Word app without losing the bold and italics? Please let me know what you think about this chapter and please vote!