A Trip Through Time

Chapter 6

Kaiden

Oh no. He asked the question. How is he going to deal with what I say? Will he believe me? Will any of them believe me? I mean, I could prove it... Kaiden thought. A pit of dread started forming at the bottom of his stomach as he told Xira to follow Toothless back to the village. Where was Alex when he needed her?

Little did he know that while he was dealing with his own personal problems, Alex was having the time of her life with Hiccup's Viking friends Astrid, Fishlegs, Snotlout, Ruffnut and Tuffnut. They were all goofing around in the chilly winter morning - more accurately, they were doing a combination of weird - and dangerous - stunts to prove who's the better Viking. Well, technically only Ruffnut, Tuffnut and Snotlout were doing this as Fishlegs, Astrid and Alex knew better to participate in something so reckless as a competition that the twins came up with. As the two boys on dragonback (or draekonback, in Kaiden and Xira's case) came swooping down towards the ground, Kaiden could see Hiccup casting a worried glance towards where the twins and Snotlout were competing, before that worried glance turning into a mix of a frown and a glare. Before Kaiden could ask what was wrong, the older boy reached down to his left stirrup (or whatever you want to call it) and took his prosthetic out of it. To Kaiden's amazement and interest, he noticed that Hiccup's prosthetic was like a key to Toothless's saddle; Toothless couldn't fly without it and Hiccup was the only one who could ride him. Hiccup's previous movement was followed quickly by him pulling a lever below his foot, which seemed to keep the dragon's red tail fin in place. Kaiden was too distracted by the intricate complexity of the prosthetic tail fin and its rigging to notice that Hiccup had stood up on Toothless and looked like he was going to jump down. Was this guy crazy? They were at least thirty metres above the ground, so how was this dude going to jump down and survive? Kaiden was about to tell him to stop, but Toothless turned his head sideways and gave Kaiden a relaxed, laid-back look, as if the dragon was telling him that everything would be alright. But he still was scared to watch as Hiccup jumped off his dragon and... grew wings?

Upon closer inspection, Kaiden could see that it was flaps of leather that was tucked away in his suit. How clever. He, Xira and Toothless dived down, to find that Hiccup had already landed and was speaking to the twins and Snotlout. Kaiden was close enough to overhear something along the lines of 'no burning my house down'. What? He looked over to Alex for some guidance, but to his surprise, she wasn't where she was standing previously.

"The twins and Snotlout were competing to see who's the better Viking. One of the challenges was to burn down the chief's house," Alex whispered from behind him, giggling. Kaiden didn't exactly see how burning down the village chief's house would prove who the better Viking was, and he voiced his thoughts aloud to Alex. "Astrid and Fishlegs tried to stop them, but apparently they can't be stopped when an idea comes to their minds," she finished. Kaiden had turned around to see Alex standing next to Astrid, the former giggling away and the latter rolling her eyes and sighing.

Just then, Xiraxus came over, having finished whatever he was doing previously and nuzzled Alex with his giant head. He and Toothless had seemed to be chatting in a strange language, one that was clearly not Xira's native tongue. This dragon language (or dragonese, as Hiccup had called it) was not the skritchy, clicky language that Kaiden had gotten used to hearing, but this was a slithery tongue, and more strangely, Xira seemed very familiar with it. She had said something that was probably sarcastic, and Xira had replied out loud with a dry laugh and a sarcastic retort. Suddenly, everything went silent. The people, Toothless, even the animals went silent.

"What?" Alex asked.

OK, as usual, sorry I haven't updated in a while. Now I find that my updates on both of my stories are going to take longer and longer and longer... So I apologize for that. I mean, I'll try as much as I can to update and write fast, but with the end of the school year rolling around I really can't be bothered much. You can call me lazy, sure, but it's the truth. Hope you enjoyed!