A Trip Through Time

Chapter 3

Hiccup

It had been a few months after the dragons had left to reside in the hidden world. It still pained Hiccup to think of Toothless; it still hurt like a fresh wound, but that didn't stop him from trying as best as he could to move on. He had his friends, his family, to support him, and he was there for them. Berk had been so much quieter without the dragons, and nothing felt right anymore. The pain only eased when Toothless and their dragons would come and visit them one every month, just for a day, but when they left, it was like Hiccup was losing his first and longest friend over and over again.

"Hiccup," said a gentle voice behind his shoulder. Astrid. He just gave a distracted smile and carried on with his work. "Hiccup," Astrid said again, this time giving his shoulder a rough shake. He looked up at her. She sighed and sat down on a chair next to him. "Hiccup, you know you can't hide in here forever. You know that one day you're just going to have to face the truth. Val and I can't be doing your duties for you, you know." And the truth was, Hiccup did know. His betrothed was right in every way, as usual. But she wasn't done yet. "You know what Toothless would want for you; you know he would want you to carry on normally." He sighed. He knew what she was saying was true, but he just couldn't. The wound was still just too fresh for him. Beside him, Astrid stood up, heading for the door. Before she left his room, she turned to face him and said, "maybe it would help take your mind off things if you came outside for a bit." She took in his hunched, lonely figure by the worktable one last time before she stepped outside and closed the door behind her.

* * *

A familiar roar and something that sounded like wing beats was what woke Hiccup up the next day, followed by the sound of something heavy landing down on his rooftop. A spark of hope suddenly flared up inside him as he raced downstairs and outside, taking in his surroundings. But to his dismay, he didn't see anything out of the ordinary, although he swore he could hear the sound of Toothle-

Something suddenly crashed into him and bowled him over. That something was big, black, and... started licking him. Hiccup looked up to see two large, familiar green eyes staring down at him. Eyes that he would recognise anywhere. "Toothless, you know that doesn't wash out!" he said fondly to the night fury, before slowly rising up with his arm around his dragon's neck. "How ya doing, bud?" he asked the dragon in between pets and strokes to his friend. "Everything going OK back at the hidden world?" Toothless burbled happily, indicating that everything was going fine, and then strode over and nudged Hiccup towards two strangers. Well, three, if you counted their huge, black, hulking dragon. There was a girl, about sixteen or seventeen, but something about her resonated a higher level of maturity, implying that she had been through tough times before. Then next to her was a guy, probably one year older than the girl, with dark hair and captivating blue eyes, who also seemed older than he actually was. They had arrived on their dragon, a massive black creature with amazing cerulean eyes. Hiccup looked uncertainly towards Toothless, who seemed to be communicating with the other dragon. They seemed to know each other fairly well.

While the two dragons were conversing and catching up, Hiccup decided to approach the two humans. "Um, hey there," he started hesitantly, "I'm Hiccup Haddock, the chief of Berk, and this is my dragon Toothless," he gestured to said dragon. At the word "dragon", both the guy and the girl frowned, as if the term "dragon" was not something they were familiar with. "Anyways, I'm just wondering who you guys are and how did you get here?"