Hey guys!

I based this on a concept that I had thought of while driving to work one day, stuck in traffic, and reading a book on psychology. I wondered to myself, "PTSD must have been really common back in the Middle Ages. What if Astrid had been affected? What if the change of perspective after the battle affected her so much that she couldn't adjust?"

Thus, this story was written.

I wanted to explore how Astrid would react and I want to give you fair warning on the dark mood of the piece. It does get fairly sombre and angsty so don't say I didn't warn you!

Please enjoy, and be sure to read the note at the bottom!

Smile As You Kill

When she slept, she dreamt of compulsion, of bliss. She dreamt of the pulse of leathery wings, of pastel sunsets, and of the seemingly ill-fated harbinger that had started it all.

Had she known that climbing up onto that beast and wrapping her arms around the boy's waist would have haunted her months afterwards, she may have simply chosen to fall hundreds of feet to her death with no crutch to catch her. The ten seconds of mind curdling fear would have been better than the slow torture she was trying, and failing, to avoid.

She sat up from her bed with a sigh, and tossed her blonde fringe out of her eyes. There was no use trying to sleep any longer, not if her dreams were going to be disturbed by the very thing she wished to deprive herself of.

One flight, one singular flight, had been all that it took. And now, almost five months later, she was still stuck in his unintentional chokehold, hook line and sinker.

Nothing had prepared her for the shock of that crucial summer evening when every little tenet in her life had come crashing down around her. One minute she was running for the village, another, and she was holding onto a dragon for dear life. She hadn't realized what it had meant at the time, but hindsight was always 20/20. When she had clambered onto that dragon's back, she changed the world.

Astrid was no optimist, of this she was certain. But at that moment, that vital moment when she had floated above the Northern oceans, the young warrior maiden couldn't help but wonder if there really was something more to her existence after all. She wasn't prepared to pigeonhole all of the emotions she had felt up there, head in the clouds, but it hadn't felt like the elation she felt when capturing a boyish elk on the end of her axe. It had been something else all together, and at that moment in time, sitting straight in her bed on a windy winter's night, she hated it.

Renouncing all pretences of sleep, Astrid tossed the layers upon layers of quilts off her body and swung her feet around to touch the floor. The house was quiet, and trusting her intuition, the sun wouldn't rise above the horizon for another half dozen hours. And try as she might, she just couldn't drag herself away from it, the flight, the realisation, the heat of his skin against hers...

'Please, just let me show you...'

And oh, how he had.

The experience had been irrevocably life altering, and it bothered her that she had been affected so permanently. The idea of intransience frightened her more than she was willing to admit; she reckoned that she be forgiven if she waxed poetic every time she paced her bedroom floor thinking about it. It disgusted her how exceptionally obsessed she was about simply resting her chin on his shoulder again and watching the horizon creep closer and closer from his prodigious perspective. It was like catching a glimpse of the sky from his eyes, and seeing things in a way she had never bothered to see things before.

Unfortunately, she wasn't exactly at ease with having the basis of every belief she had ever had ripped out of the earth, roots still writhing for soil. Hadn't he known what he had done to her? Did he know now? Did he care? She had been actively avoiding him since her moment of weakness at the crest of the hill near his cabin. Too overcome with emotion, the young warrior had captured his lips in a spontaneous embrace and she had let it bother her ever since. Even now it brought a creeping blush to her cheeks as she stalked the floors of her bedroom, her hands drawn up in fists at her side. She figured everyone had forgotten about it, but the way he would stare at her sometimes from across the way assured her that he still remembered, and like an old wound the feeling kept coming back, haunting her.

And gods, the looks he would give her. She paused in her stride and leant against the posts of her bedstead, cursing her circumstances for the umpteenth time.

She fought to keep him away, hoping that the forced separation would keep her lingering feelings at bay. It wasn't working, but Astrid was no exception to the character trait that all Vikings encompassed by blood. She would continue to keep on trying, fighting and fighting against the glimmer of firelight in his eyes as he gazed at her from across the Great Hall, against the scent of fire and stone that lingered as he quickly passed by. She wouldn't be able to stop herself from looking back, eyes wide as she noticed his perceptible, albeit faint limp as he continued down the village alleyways. He had grown last time she had seen him, and the hobble was getting more and more noticeable as he lengthened in height. She had no way of knowing how much taller he had gotten in comparison to her; she refused the draw to go anywhere near him.

Her heart shuddered momentarily and she bit her lip as painfully as she could to counteract the feeling. She didn't do lovesick pining very well, and the self conscious thing was beginning to grate on her nerves.

Astrid restarted her restless pacing, running her fingers through her loosened hair. Gods, her life was irritating. The winter storm that currently raged outside had been wrecking havoc for days and days on end, forcing the Vikings of Berk to stay confined in their homes. Astrid hadn't seen the light of the sun since Tuesday, and from what she could tell in her sleep addled state, it was probably early Saturday morning. She needed out, but most importantly, she needed a reprieve from the thoughts and memories that never wanted to leave her alone.

She thought she had done a pretty good job so far of keeping her personal turmoil at bay, although in all honesty she wasn't sure if she would be able to keep it up much longer. She certainly couldn't talk to anyone about her...her poignantly revolting longing for the village's dragon superman.

So she had continued on during those lonely months, cool as an Icelandic cucumber, that is until she was tossed off the back of her dragon after the barrel strap of her saddle failed some weeks ago. She had fallen from nearly twenty feet in the air and barely had time to pull herself vertically before she crashed onto the ground like a stone. Cushioned only by the snow, she landed first with her ankle and then with the rest of her body without having so much as a second to prepare herself. A torrent of pain shot up her left side as she rolled down the snow bank to a complete stop, clutching her ankle as she fought to quell the urge to scream.

And of course, the only person to have witnessed her demise had been the boy she had been trying to avoid, and of course he had treated her with the utmost gentlemanly care despite her frigidity. She had fought him tooth and nail when he suggested he carry her from the winter woods into the streets of town, but it had only taken a few words from his quicksilver tongue to convince her otherwise.

He had felt down her leg with feather light movements to determine whether she had been hurt anywhere else, and Astrid had only barely contained herself from practically killing him with her glare. Ignoring it, he gently pried the sheepskin boot from her injured ankle and grazed his eyes over the swollen joint for a moment, carefully propping her boot against her calf before getting to his feet and leaving to find splinting material. He returned within minutes and tossed the wood to the ground, immediately noticing how her body refused to stop shivering from the cold. She fought so hard to keep herself from moving but he noticed anyway, and instantly she was being covered in the bearskin cape that had previously adorned his covered shoulders. She took it begrudgingly and pouted as he helped wrap the fur around her, reassuring her all the while.

He untied and fished his leather belt from beneath his coat and sliced it in two with his dagger, using the strips of fabric to tie the splints into place. He rubbed her calf after he was finished and asked her if she could still feel her toes, and she nodded, if only barely. She hadn't said a word to him since his inconvenient appearance and she was determined to keep her silence. She hoped it would deter him, or maybe even upset him, but the boy only smiled and gently brought his arms up beneath her knees and her underarms, cradling her against his body in a motion far too intimate for her frozen disposition. She let out a small sound and Hiccup immediately faltered in his pace, his eyes wide and concerned as he peered down at her.

Fifteen minutes later they were entering the village and within another five he had brought her to the resident healer on the mid levels of the town. He explained what had happened to Astrid himself, since Astrid was pouting like a petulant child on the cot beside the healer. He gazed at her one last time before bidding the healer farewell, gracing Astrid with one of his crooked smiles that nearly stole the breath from her lungs.

Speechless, she let him leave without saying thanks.

Astrid tugged on her winter jacket, common sense long forgotten. She needed to get out of here. She needed to leave now.

It had only taken her a few moments to realize what needed to be done. The ache in her ankle still persisted, and all of the pacing she had done had only reminded her of him with every single step. She needed the numbness of the snow to dull her senses. She needed the thrill of blood pumping through her veins to make her forget. She hefted her axe over her shoulder and snuck out of the house as quietly as she was able, and chose to face the snow.

The wind shrieked like a banshee straight out of Hel all around her. She stepped off of her doorstep, and although a part of her was frightened out of her mind at the prospect of losing her body in the snow, a far larger part of her was overjoyed with the prospect of losing her mind.

It was the perfect diversion, and with the grace of a heron and the sheer willpower of an ox, Astrid was soon within the comfortable confines of the bordering forests. Had she been paying attention, she may have realized that she had been instinctively moving uphill, but whether she recognized it or not, it didn't matter. She was alone, she was free, and pushing her body beyond its endurance was the only way she knew how to forget.

Her body ached as she tossed her axe into the closest tree and the joints of her muscles screamed in protest as she sought to retrieve it. Over and over again, she hurled her axe and reclaimed it from the hide of her enemy but soon it simply wasn't enough, wasn't quick enough, wasn't tough enough, wasn't extreme enough to block out all of the facets of reality that sought to tear every single one of her barriers asunder. So she drove herself harder until she felt practically nauseous with it, and she had thrown almost every layer of winter protection from her bones. Sweat poured off her skin and drenched her cotton shirt until it was sopping with her efforts; starlight began to dance before her eyes and suddenly she couldn't hold herself up any longer. With one final movement, the final dance of her axe, Astrid collapsed onto the trodden snow.

She was too tired to cry out for help. Even if she had had the strength within her, she wasn't sure if she would have anyway. And as she lay face down in the snow, cheek pressed in a battle of fire and ice, she smiled and thanked every god in the skies for killing her, if only to reprieve her from her thoughts. She grinned and let her eyes fall out of focus, a sense of calm pervading her senses. She no longer felt the creeping cold that slowly invaded her body; the lack of feeling in her limbs never broke through the cerebral ecstasy of a past long forgotten, wiped from the barracks of her tortured memories.

She smiled.

She registered nothing as a set of legs swarmed somewhere in her bleary vision, felt nothing as a pair of arms engulfed her and yanked her upwards against his cushioned chest. His grip never gave up as he sought to press her closer to his body, horrified as he ran his gloved palms over her exposed, waxy skin. He pressed her frozen cheek to his in an effort to warm her with his own body heat, his heart pounding with a mixture of emotions.

She was still smiling.

"Gods Astrid, what were you thinking coming out here at night, in the middle of a snowstorm no less!" He cried, the fear unmistakable in his voice. Her eyes, glazed over and lifeless, stared upwards at the darkened sky, her head resting like a dead weight on his shoulders. He turned his head and caught sight of her, crying out in a mixture of anguish and horror. He scooped her up within his arms and ran as fast as he could, hastened by the fading pulse that fluttered at his fingertips.

And somewhere up above, Astrid was flying.

She was back amidst the honeysuckle clouds, floating on a salty updraft of gentle summer wind. Somewhere nearby she could feel him, a constant source of warmth around her body as she continued to soar into the horizon.

Hiccup tore the door open and faltered in his stride, exhaustion taking over his overtaxed limbs. He fell and used his body to cradle her as they made contact with the floor, his body absorbing most of the impact. He groaned but nevertheless persisted, kicking the door closed with his prosthetic in what proved to be one of the most painful movements of his life. He bellowed in agony as the leather straps of his fake foot tore into his skin and muscle, momentarily taking over his vision with white stars.

"Gods..." he croaked, rolling over with all of the strength he could muster. He had to get Astrid over to the hearth, where he could hopefully warm her up enough that she would return back to consciousness and come to her senses. He dragged himself to his feet and, despite the shooting pain in his calf, brought Astrid into his arms and set her down in front of the fire. He collapsed beside her and gingerly unstrapped the prosthetic from his lower leg, grimacing all the while as he unbuckled the leather from the lacerations in his skin. He tossed the metal leg to the side and rolled up his pant leg, ignoring his injuries for the meantime as his thoughts reverted back to the absent girl beside him, prone on her back and deathly pale.

Unable to return to his feet, he hauled himself over to the bench on the far side of the room and dug out all of the blankets he could pile into his arms from the cupboards. He laid the thickest of the woollen blankets onto the floor for her to lie on and lifted her, but not before noticing the drenched state of her shirt and leggings. With an uncomfortable gulp, he propped her body against him and began stripping her of the sodden fabric, exposing her so only her breast wrappings and her shorts remained. Embarrassed, but confident that she wouldn't kill him for saving her life, he began piling blankets one by one on top of her, pausing once and a while to reposition her or press his palms to her frostbitten cheeks. Her eyes were still foggy and clouded, lost in a fantasy where reality was nothing but a half remembered dream.

And she was still smiling.

Brushing her damp hair back with his fingers, Hiccup couldn't help but want to do everything in his power to warm her up, and return her to the land of the living before she was lost all together. He stripped himself of his winter coat and jacket and crawled in beside her in nothing but his tunic and leggings, pressing every part of his slender body that he could against her. He took both of her hands into his own and rubbed them until he felt some warmth return to her fingers. He continued to knead her arms, her torso, anything at all in order to thaw her, and within a half hour she was beginning to return to a normal temperature. Hiccup sighed in relief and propped himself up so that he could watch over her absent features in hopes that her soul still resided within.

He combed his fingers through her hair as gently as he could manage, and called out her name several times to coax her from her slumber. Slowly her eyes began to blink and she began to pant for breath, disoriented and panicked as she started to come to. He held onto her hand as she grasped for the evasive tendrils of consciousness, screaming out with no voice as the intensity of the pain shot through her thawing limbs. She writhed against him and he held onto her closely, whispering sweet nothings into her ears to try and calm her. Her fingers convulsed as she tried to reciprocate the action, her body restarting a million and one functions it had paused in order to preserve her. She couldn't believe the pain that exploded behind her eyes as she continued to return to consciousness, helpless to the torture that wracked her bones.

Her resurrection continued until the worst was over and, feverish and exhausted, she slowly began to become acquainted with her surroundings. Hiccup had released her by this point and was returning to her now, a cup of warm water in his hands. Missing one limb, he dragged himself back onto the blanket and propped her up onto his body without her barely realizing it, and helped her drink from the mug.

She tossed her head back onto his shoulder and groaned when she was finished, painfully aware of every screaming nerve in her body. Hiccup continued to reassure her quietly, rubbing her shoulder gently with his free hand. He let his fingers roam the lines of her collarbone as she fought to open her eyes, blinking blearily as she tried to focus.

"Hic...cup?" She rasped.

"Astrid," he whispered, frowning as his fingers continued to roam her body, "What were you thinking, going out into a storm like that? And in the middle of the night?"

"I..." she let out a breath of air, fighting her foggy memories and her puzzled conscious, "It's the only way I know how."

Hiccup paused in his ministrations, looking confused, "What?"

Astrid couldn't face looking at him, fearing the hurt in his eyes. There was no point faking honesty any longer, for the rationale was no longer staring her in the face, "To...stop thinking. I had to get free of all...this."

He began stroking her hair, still puzzled by her words, "What do you mean?"

Astrid choked out a laugh, and considered the corniness of what she was about to divulge, "Of my house. Of this new Berk. Of you."

Hiccup's breath hitched in his throat, carefully digesting what she had just spoken. Understanding dawned in his eyes as he continued to run his fingers against her blonde tresses, "You should have told me."

Astrid frowned, "Told you what?"

"If you really wanted to..." Hiccup paused, reeling on order to collect himself, "I could have left anytime. All you had to do was ask me."

"What?"

"I..." he slowly manoeuvred her off of his body and eased her around so that she was sitting facing him, "You've been avoiding me for months Astrid. I knew you hated me but...but for some reason I still...I still hoped you would..."

Hiccup trailed off, turning his face away from her. Shame began to creep onto his cheeks, flushing his face and shoulders. He shifted away from her slightly and Astrid suddenly felt the hurt that was projecting off of Hiccup like the heat of a flame.

She felt her heart break a little.

"You know I don't want to escape you," she whispered, staring at nothing, "But I just can't deal with all this...this change!" Anger began to flood her thoughts as she continued speaking, completing a knee-jerk reaction long engrained in her bones, "I can't do this! It happened too quickly! I had no time to adjust!"

Hiccup flinched at each of her words, and it killed her to watch him continue to suffer. And yet, she couldn't bring herself to comfort him either.

She took a deep breath and tried to distract herself by tracing the lines of his tunic with her eyes, wishing inadvertently that the garment was free of his body. She tried to calm herself by thinking of him, being concerned for him, caring for him, "I'm just frustrated. I shouldn't have taken it out on you. I'm sorry."

He remained silent for the longest time, and Astrid slowly began to realize the level of despondency she had dug herself into. Panic coursed through her veins as she realized that he would stop giving her longing looks from a distance, stop showing up exactly when she needed a friend. And that's exactly what he was, a best friend that she had been treating like dirt just because she simply couldn't get her own act together. Her face screwed up in anguish as the realisation of her actions dawned on her. All of this time, Hiccup had simply been waiting for Astrid to tell him to desert his island, his home. He had thought that she hated him – hated him – but she really couldn't blame him for believing it.

She swallowed back the feeling of nausea that threatened to take over her body as her epiphany took hold. All along she had thought that she was only hurting herself. But here she was, destroying the boy she loved more than she could rightfully handle without going off the deep end. And now look what she had done. The boy hated her. He couldn't even look at her.

"I'm...I'm so sorry," she croaked, weakly reaching out towards him, "Hiccup...I..."

For a long time they continued to sit in silence, with nothing but the crackle of the hearth to break through the din. Astrid continued to stare despondently, her heart beating feebly in her chest. Her head was swimming with a thousand and one possibilities of how Hiccup would respond to her, how he would act once he finally acknowledged her presence – if he acknowledged her presence.

Hours into the night, Astrid couldn't help the tug of sleep on her conscious any longer. Eyes still desperate for something, anything from the boy, Astrid crumpled herself into a ball and fell asleep in the mass of blankets piled on the floor. Some minutes after, Hiccup pulled the covers over her shoulders, and left.

When she awoke the next morning, coughing and wheezing within the cocoon of woollen blankets that encircled her, she was unsure of her surroundings. Only the sounds of the wind whistling vengefully from outside assured her that the winter storm was still raging on, carnivorously thriving on consuming the island.

The flash of an array of axes fixed to the walls suddenly reminded her of what she was doing in a strange house, wrapped in strange blankets in front of a strangely shaped fireplace. Dry retching, she scrabbled to her feet and tore through the lower levels of the home, trying desperately to find the kitchen bin. Once she had found it, she snatched at the rim and heaved forcefully, expulsing the contents of her stomach within. Her legs and arms quivered tremulously, and her muscles refused to carry her weight any longer as she collapsed into a heap onto the cold wooden floor.

Using all of the energy she could gather from her tired limbs, Astrid rolled herself onto her back and stared up at the ceiling, eyes wide. Again, the events of the night prior plunged her into a sea of ice as she remembered the expression on his face, the look of absolute absenteeism. She had finally pushed him away in the same moments she realised she had needed him more than ever.

She laid there until the chill began to set into her bones, and she had no choice but to obey her body's desperate request. She pulled herself into a seating position and was just about to crawl back over to the blankets when the door burst open, sending a torrent of icy, bitter wind that threatened to penetrate her to the very core. She cried out and went to shelter her body with her limbs, only to realize that she was nearly bare.

The door was shoved closed quickly after, and she was all but helpless to watch as Hiccup shook the snow from his hair and body like a sodden dog. He leant heavily against the wall as he began removing layer after layer of fur from his body, favouring his good foot immensely, "I spoke with your parents. I told them what you had done with yourself, and that you were safe with me for the meantime."

Hiccup didn't wait for her reply as he stripped himself of his final outer fur and reached for a wooden crutch she hadn't noticed before, "They agreed when I said it would be too dangerous to take you back out into the cold until the storm let up. Which means that you'll be staying here until Berk stops freezing over."

Hiccup limped towards the hearth, never making eye contact as he spoke, and started to rekindle the fire, "Dad is still stranded in Freezing-To-Death because of the burial, and he won't be returning until this storm cell has finally passed. You can take his bed or continue to sleep on the blankets, it's up to you."

He stoked the fires one last time and then proceeded to walk past her, heading towards the small carven staircase that led to the upper levels of the home, "There's food in the pantry and some bread left from last night's dinner on the table," he started up the stairs, with each step painting anguish on his features, "Call if you need anything."

Astrid sat motionless for some time after, rooted to the floor.

She wasn't smiling anymore.

Never let it be said that Astrid ever did things in halves. When she did something, she did it with every ounce of willpower that flowed through her veins. And when she excelled, she did so with a remarkable tenacity that could shine through in the very toughest of challenges. But when Astrid failed at something, her actions could very well bring about the kind of suffering that could raze a village to the ground.

The irony of her situation, as she lay crumpled before the hearth, didn't seek to bring her comfort.

She shoved the last of the day old bread into her mouth and chewed it quietly, hating the way it scratched her throat as she swallowed. It had to be sometime in the evening now, and Hiccup still hadn't emerged from his room to join her.

She had gotten dressed not long after she had returned to her senses, and had wrapped another blanket around her body to keep her warm. She pulled herself to her feet and padded across the floor, scouring the shelves of the Haddock pantry for anything she could make herself for dinner. She reached for some pickled vegetables and brought them over to the table, feeling their contents sloshing around as she did so. She fished a wooden plate from another shelf and began spooning some of the cured provisions onto the varnished surface, plopping them haphazardly into a pile. She closed the jar and stared absently at the preserves, lolling in their brine like children in a pond.

She had to speak with him.

She pushed the plate away, rejecting it forcefully, and spun around with her gaze tentatively set. She made for the stairs as purposely as she was able, trying to subdue the trembling in her legs. She had to see him, just something to convince her that he hadn't forgotten her or rejected her entirely.

The ludicrousness of her thoughts struck her as she was forced to pause halfway up the stairs. She screwed her eyebrows together, face askew with the anguish that had been building up in her since she had first woken up this morning. She was being appallingly selfish. She was about to force him into tolerating her presence, by striding into his room no less. Shouldn't she have just waited for him to come to her?

But she was already halfway up the stairs, and smothering the desirous, narcissistic trait that had all but taken over her body was easier thought then done. She let out a heavy sigh and clenched her hands into a fist as she pulled herself together, and continued up the stairs.

She knocked faintly on his door, and without waiting for an answer, turned the doorknob quietly. She cracked it open slightly, unable to tear her gaze from the thin glimpse of his bedroom that she had enabled herself to see.

"Hiccup?"

She heard the rustle of papers somewhere behind the entrance, and she mustered the gall to push the door open a little farther. Had she known that opening the door a little farther in order to see where the noise was coming from would entail locking eyes with him from across the room, she would have willingly stayed downstairs with her picked cabbage.

They stared at each other for an innumerable amount of time. Neither one could remember what had been brought about to initiate such a stare, but the bare emotion laden in his eyes was enough to bring her to her knees. She could have understood if he had simply looked at her and seen something different, a fallacy of who she might have been. But to look at her and see nothing...

Did she even recognize herself?

In seeing his eyes – so green with a myriad of emotions – Astrid wanted desperately to tear herself away. She wanted to wilt down and hide, to run away from the very heart and soul of her problems but her nature, ever thriving, kept her stubbornly rooted to her spot. She longed for him to show a sign of forgiveness, anything at all; distantly, she felt herself start to tremble and hold her breath until her lungs screamed for air.

She cursed herself at her selfishness, and tore her eyes away.

"Please," Hiccup's voice was gravely with disuse, "Go back downstairs. I...there's nothing to say."

Astrid stiffened at the dismissal, and her heart pounded painfully in her chest.

"Please Hiccup..." she pleaded, "Just let me explain."

"What's there to explain?" Finally, a flash of emotion surged behind his eyes, "For so long you treated me like I didn't exist, just like before all of this nonsense. And then you tell me...and then you tell me it's because you just couldn't adjust?" Astrid couldn't help but shrink back at his words, "I thought you were my friend Astrid. Maybe more. And now..."

He strode over towards his desk and stood near the candle, where the flickering flame only served to throw his features into sharp relief, "At first I didn't blame you for avoiding me. I may be a hero now, but I'm still the same old Hiccup. So I let myself pretend that you were just too embarrassed to be around me, and that you'd come back to me, and we'd talk it out. But...you never came."

He slumped over slightly and ran his fingers though his tussled hair, dropping his gaze towards a knot of wood in the floorboards, "And it kills me to talk about this, because I did love you. I was so ready to embrace my new life, and you, and...and I got burned for it. I can't make that mistake again."

"But Hiccup, I—"

"There's nothing else to say Astrid. It was over before it even began," he sighed again, grabbing his hair roughly this time, "I just wish you would have told me why, so I didn't have to waste the past five months of my life living in some fantasy world that still involved you."

"Please, just—"

"Just go Astrid. Go downstairs, get better, and when the storm is over you can leave. You're free to go torture somebody else's mind."

Hiccup's every word tore into her like a knife. The way he spoke them, so tainted with a vehemence she had never thought possible from the boy. It scared her to think that she had been the reason he had become this way.

"I'll leave," she whispered finally, raising her palms in defeat, "Just...just let me say one thing. I...do you really think that I hate you?"

It was the stupidest question she had ever asked, and she realized this only after the words had poured out of her mouth.

"You haven't given me reason to think otherwise," he replied somewhat incredulously, "But what I think doesn't matter. The whole point is that I've done nothing but care for you and all you've done is avoid me and glare at me. Unless you have a different definition of hate then I do..."

"I don't hate you," she said, almost a little too forcefully, "I was just scared. Suddenly you were different. I was different. The whole village was different and I...I just couldn't adjust to it," she crumpled slightly, leaning against his bedroom wall, "You're not the only person I mistreated. And now that I realized how badly I've acted...I...I just want to apologize and try to be forgiven."

She was surprised she had even managed to finish her sentence, with the uncomfortable lump that had grown in her throat impeding her ability to speak. She suddenly felt more exhausted than she had ever felt in her lifetime and all she wanted to do was wrap her arms around him and hope that he would forgive her.

But she didn't. Hiccup was distinct, separated in his ability to think or function. The only way she would gain his forgiveness would be through her own self growth, and through finally learning to be selfless and understanding. She certainly had lost the insight of the humanity around her; she'd been avoiding everyone in her inability to cope.

It was going to be a long journey. But she would follow the road less travelled, for Hiccup.

He wanted to believe Astrid, he really did. He wanted to believe that Astrid would come back to them, be the light that she once was before everything went straight to Hel in a hand basket. He wanted the old Astrid back, badly.

But he was still angry. Five months in turmoil simply didn't end with pardon. Hiccup was forgiving, but that didn't mean that Astrid wouldn't have to earn it. He deserved that much, at least.

He pushed himself off of the wall, closing the gap between them with a few hobbling strides, and said the only thing that he could.

"Prove it."

Now, I have a proposal. After I sent this to my beta, he replied back with, and I quote, "I will personally send one of my armored dragons to gnaw on your bones if you don't consider writing a second...lemony... chapter."

Now I want to ask you: would you like to see an m-rated scene between these two as a sequel to this story? According to my poll, 84% of you would be interested to see one from me, so I'm totally willing to write one as long as you guys are into it.

Please review, and let me know if you're interested. If I receive enough reviews/messages/any sort of sign, I will post an author's note next Tuesday with this fic (Horizons one-shot style) telling you guys that I will write it, along with the title you can keep an eye out for. If not, you won't hear a thing and this will remain a one-shot.

Feel free to just let me know if you liked this story as well too! I'm really worried about how you guys will take this dark take on the characters.

Brontë