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A/N: (Isuzu): Hi guys. Long time no write. Sorry about the long delay, but things have been hell here. Plus, the bunnies were dying, and we were forced to adjust our breeding and feeding habits for them. But they are now healthy and starting to make a comeback. So, I would like to introduce you to the new secretary, Sephora. (Sephora): Hi.(Isuzu): We let her man the chapter to see what she can do. Feedback would be nice, so please do not hesitate to say what you think. However, please know that if you make her cry, that she has been taken under Gabrielle's wings, so beware and no flames please. Thank you all so much for your patience. Isuzu out.

For Space Between Seconds

Things Toothless is Not Allowed to Do

8. Toothless is not allowed to prepare food for Hiccup

Toothless really had to stop getting ideas from humans. In fact, if he would just stop thinking of completely innocent things to do, it might be for the better.

Why was this?

Because when he wanted to do something that was completely innocent and good in all ways of thinking, things always turned out bad.

Like now.

In all honesty, Hiccup should have come up with a way to fool Toothless into thinking that he ate his ever so generously offered fish, so that he would not have to eat it and then would not be on the receiving end of Toothless's pout when he saw that he didn't eat his gift. He'd been able to get out of it the last few times by saying he'd eaten already, but Hiccup knew that sooner or later he'd have to eat it again.

What he didn't know was that Toothless had decided that it was time to make it really special.

Apparently, he'd seen the way that some of the other Vikings did things to mark anniversaries, or special milestones for different people, like birthdays, and had decided to do something for their own upcoming anniversary. Which was really sweet of him to consider, but completely unnecessary since Hiccup wasn't even planning anything for their special day, besides more flying than usual and a good rub down of Toothless's scales with that special mixture that he was so fond of.

As it was, Toothless had wanted to do it, and what Toothless wanted, he usually got (provided that it wasn't on the list-stupid thing seemed to grow longer every day).

Apparently, he'd been planning for a while, but had been unsure how to go about doing it. Normally, he would have gone to the kitchens and seen what they did, but whenever he got anywhere near them, he'd find the door barred and shut, with a bunch of angry cooks wielding hard wooden spoons and spatulas ready to defend their domain. Needless to say, he wasn't a big fan of them. Especially when they would hit him over the nose repeatedly because of past events that were so totally not his fault. So that left personal dwellings, which meant that, he was limited to Hiccup's home. After all, he couldn't go to any of the other human dwellings without eliciting some kind of reception that translated to "go away, this is my home and my humans, go get your own" from the other dragons. In fact, the only way that he could have been allowed in was if he was a Terrible Terror, something that made him shudder. As it was, though, the household of Stoick the Vast did not tend to cook much in their own home.

So considering all the obstacles in his way, he really should have just taken it as a sign from the gods that he was not meant to cook.

At all.

Especially since he had no experience.

Yeah, that wasn't going to happen any time soon.

So he'd decided to just wing it.

In all honesty, it didn't turn out quite as bad as it should have. Toothless managed to not pick out any plants that would have killed him instantly and somehow avoided the ones that would have eventually destroyed his body inside out. Instead, he'd managed to get a hold of some unknown and foreign plant that wasn't native to Berk (which begged the question of how in Hel it was able to survive there) that seemed to be able to make Hiccup feel like absolute, complete and utter shit.

But let's go back to how this all happened.

It was, as stated earlier, because of their little anniversary, and Toothless was just trying to make a special meal for Hiccup. First, he went "fishing," aka stole some fish from the wharf early in the morning when he was still relatively unnoticeable and no one was awake enough to pay attention to him and returned home to drop off the fish.

Next, he got his human, which was a lot easier said than done, considering that Hiccup was able to sleep like the dead after a long night of idea making. So it took him three nose nudges, two licks to the face, two blanket tug-o-wars and five minutes of coos to finally get Hiccup to wake up. It then took another five minutes to convince him that even though the bed was nice and warm, he needed to get up and out of it so that he could start his day.

After about thirty minutes, Hiccup was finally coherent enough to stop trying to fall asleep where he stood/sat.

So after a small normal breakfast, they went flying, not really going anywhere in particular just content to be with each other on one of the only days that they would have together with no distractions.

After a few hours of flying, Toothless finally decided that it was time to get started on the special lunch. So he started to get them back home. On the way there, he dropped Hiccup off at the forge per his request (even without fighting dragons, the Vikings were still a fighting people and thus often bent/broke their swords), which allowed Toothless plenty of time to get cooking.

Dragging his various ingredients together to the back of the house, he stared at it all, trying to recall everything that he would need in order to do this.

Step one: make a fire. Easy enough, he just had to go and some wood; just gather, aim, fire.

Step two: cook the fish. But how? He stared intently at the fish, tail swishing back and forth as he contemplated, before he remembered how Hiccup would stick a stick into the fish and put it near the fire. After ten minutes of careful moves, failed attempts and stick finding, he was finally able to take the fish and stick it into the ground and get some herbs on it.

Step three: wait.

And wait.

And wait.

And…

What was that?

Something caught his eyes from across the way, something bright and flashy.

Shiny.

There was a shiny thing across the way.

Toothless turned toward the cooking fish, then back to the shiny thing. He weighed his options, thinking of what he should do: go after the shiny or stay and watch the food. The shiny thing suddenly moved, and in that moment, sealed its own fate. Toothless bounded toward it, eyes smiling, ears perked, and absolutely enthralled. The shiny kept moving, and swaying, and flying and the smell of burning was there.

Which meant that it was time to turn around and panic as he got the fire out. Honestly, couldn't he take five seconds for himself before everything started falling apart?

Still, the fish wasn't too badly burnt, and besides, Toothless was sure that Hiccup had eaten worse.

Step four: roll fish in special herbs he had found. That turned out to be the most fun part of the whole thing. He started just doing it all serious like, wanting to do a good job, but something just kind of tickled him funny about it. He was rolling a fish around. And once that thought struck, he couldn't keep himself from rolling it in different ways. First spinning it in a circle, the flopping it around, then going up and down, then side to side, and then figure eights. It was quite fun, even if it did make it so that the fish was no longer quite as pretty and whole as it had been before, but hey, at least it was all covered in herbs now.

Step five: give it to Hiccup. Who was currently coming up the hill that lead to his house. Instantly, Toothless perked up at the sight of his human, and, grabbing the now done fish on a stick, he trotted down, a little bounce in his steps. After the mandatory hello nuzzles (it was mandatory, after all, he had been forced from his human, and nuzzles and pets were a must to make up for that separation) he presented his human with the fish.

"Oh, gee, thanks buddy," Hiccup said, an awkward smile on his face. It seemed vaguely familiar to Toothless, although he could not place what. "You shouldn't have, really, I'm not that hungry."

That would not do at all. Toothless had worked hard for that fish! Nudging Hiccup, Toothless gurgled at him, eyes going between his human and the fish, until finally, Hiccup brought it up to his mouth and mumbled something that sounded like, "I'm going to regret this."

Turns out, Toothless regretted it more. Not five minutes after stomaching the fish, his human had gone green in the face. Then, he had clutched at his stomach, as though in pain. Then he had wobbled off rather rapidly to a nearby tree, hunched over, and puked. Which kind of ticked Toothless off because he could see some of the fish in that puke. He would have been a lot more angry if it weren't for the fact that his human was dying! Panicked, Toothless had jumped over to where Hiccup was hunched over, roaring in panic as he tried to get a response from the sick human. Toothless ran in circles for a bit, going up to his human and nudging him, then backing away to panic again before trying to comfort him by cooing and curling up to him. None of it worked. Then, Hiccup finally stopped puking, only to fall onto his side and give one pain filled groan before going silent.

Toothless felt rather justified in losing it then.

He couldn't really remember what happened next. Vaguely, he could recall grabbing the human with his mouth like a mother cat with a kitten and then racing into the village below. He remembered a Nadder that shrieked in pain when he trampled over its toes, a female Viking flying, her basket of eggs whirling from her hands, shouts of anger and surprise, and someone trying to grab his tail. There may or may not have been an incident involving a Gronkle licking at a rock, a Nightmare with her rider, a stray axe and a dress. He wasn't too sure about the incident with a Zippleback and some basket full of lettuce either.

The end result, however, was the same.

He made a mess of the village (again), but got to the person that he was looking for: the healer. It took an eternity (really just five seconds) of pawing at the door and whining with his poor human (now covered in bits of egg, feathers, and a forest green dress laying over his head) before the healer opened the door. She did not even get a moment to ask what he wanted, because Toothless just rushed in, knocking the poor woman down. After lying him down on the cleared table (there was something heating on the fireplace, but he paid it and the wooden dishes next to it no mind), he turned to the healer and bellowed at her. She stared for five seconds in shock, before her rage came back, and she somehow managed to kick him out. (No one was sure what happened in there, but rumor has it that she grabbed an eel and started to hit him with it.)

It took two hours before Toothless was allowed back in, and by then, most of the villagers and their dragons had stopped glaring at him, except for that Nadder and Gronkle. After the door opened (Toothless did not jump in this time, in fact he backed up and looked at the healer warily), she beckoned him in, just as Stoick came up the path.

She explained what happened. He had food poisoning. It was not fatal. He would be fine. Let him rest, make sure he drank lots of fluids and ate only bread for a few days. And never do it again.

Three weeks, two sessions of hurling and one feeling better human later, and Hiccup told Toothless the newest rule: no cooking, EVER.