Chapter 2:

"Toothless!" Hiccup yells, jumping off Stormfly and onto the cove ground.

The stranger glances at him, but Hiccup only startled her. The red glow in her palm strikes Toothless, bouncing him 10 feet away, crashing into a boulder.

"No!" Hiccup screams in anguish. In a second, he has Inferno unsheathed in his hand, and runs for his fallen best friend.

But almost immediately, a white Nadder and mottled green Nightmare bar the way with their wings. They screech a warning, but right now, dragon or not, Hiccup didn't care. With a roar, he swings Inferno at the Nadder, who leaps back in surprise. With his way clear, he runs toward the stranger who was once more crouched over Toothless with that ominous crimson light in her hands.

Without hesitation, he swings the sword, ready to lop off a body part. The stranger rolls away, and produces a small dagger, shock evident on her face.

For second, it rattles even Hiccup. Why is he suddenly so violent? He's never made Inferno for actual maiming, just… intimidation and distracting rouge dragons.

Then he hears Toothless' moan, and remembers: this girl kidnapped his girlfriend, and his best friend. She also looked like she was torturing him for a good amount of time, and was about to kill him.

Anyone who does that in a square of one hour didn't deserve mercy.

He prepares to attack again, but in a flash, she suddenly throws her arm up, and is pulled into the sky by the enemy Nightmare.

Hiccup snarls in a very uncharacteristic way, and turns to his friends. "Snotlout and Eret go after the girl and her dragons. Fishlegs, Tuffnut, Ruffnut, go to the village, and get a cart and some rope. We're going to carry Toothless back with our dragons."

The gang shakes off their shock of seeing their chief in his violent frenzy, and shoots off to do their jobs.

Hiccup takes a deep breath to calm himself, and sheathes Inferno. Toothless was bleeding, but he seemed alive. Astrid seemed in better condition, thanks the gods, and was getting up slowly. He streaks over to his girlfriend, helping her up. "You okay?" he asks as they shuffle back to Toothless. "Is… Are you hurt anywhere?"

Astrid shakes her head gratefully. "No, I'm fine. I think Toothless is the one you should be worrying about though."

Hiccup nods grimly. "I guess… You sure you aren't hurt?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

Hiccup smiles a little, and tears off some fabric from the hem of his shirt. He quickly dips it in water, then sprints to Toothless and dabs at the wounds, cleaning off as much blood as possible.

The Nightfury hisses weakly in pain, and cooed his suffering.

"I'm sorry bud." Hiccup murmurs, hating every moment that he caused a hiss of pain from his friend. "But don't worry, we'll fix you up soon."

Toothless groans, his eyes cracked open just a tiny bit, staring at nothing.

"Soon…" Hiccup assures him. "I promise."

The now dully glowing, green eyes that Hiccup had admired for 5 years slides its view to his face, and for a split second, a shard of terror stabs his heart.

Toothless didn't seem to recognize him. In fact, he seemed to see Hiccup as an enemy, narrowing his pupils, and a soft growl rumbling in his throat as he feebly attempts to bat at Hiccup with his paw.

He's just got a headache, Hiccup told himself. That's all, his vision is cloudy and he can't see properly.

This of course, was also what he thought when the Bewilderbeast that attacked Berk had taken control of Toothless. He had managed to pull Toothless out of that one, but he wasn't sure he could do it again.

He had heard from stories that some best friends can just begin to distance over long periods of time. He had never believed it would happen with him and Toothless, but he knew that with him being so busy, and rarely seeing each other except at dawn and dusk… things, in the tiniest way perhaps, had changed between them.

A Nadder cry rings through the air. Stormfly, who Hiccup had assumed was flying around the cove to guard it, appears next to them.

She shuffles her wings and seems to glare at Toothless with slit eyes, which was ridiculous of course.

Hiccup puts it off, and turns to Astrid. "So, care to tell me what happened?"

Astrid shrugs. "There's not much to tell. We were just flying back home, then Toothless starts acting funny like his mind was under control again. I scream for help, then that… girl and her dragons knock me out and I don't know what happened after that."

Hiccup sighs. He had hoped for more info than that, but it was alright. They could figure this out when they caught that intruder.

And speak of the devil… The gang and their dragons appear out of the trees. Fishlegs and the twins with a large cart hanging from between the dragon's claws, and Eret and Snotlout with… nothing.

"Let me guess," Hiccup says, a hard edge unconsciously put in his voice, "you lost her?"

The two boys gulp.

Toothless moans, and Hiccup snaps out of his anger. "Never mind that, let's just get Toothless to Gothi. Fishlegs, get the wagon over here. Stormfly, I need you to move your wing under Toothless like this…"

#####

You guys think Toothless is going to be okay? Meatlug thought to her friends worriedly as they flew across the sky with their riders atop them.

Dragons. Too lazy to make a common language, so they settle for telepathic signals that aren't exactly words, but emotions that sort of piece together the idea of what they want to convey.

Sure. The guy's tougher than me, and that's saying something. Hookfang shrugs, careful not to shake the cart hanging from his clawed feet that was also carrying his good friend, the Nightfury.

Ugh, you're worse than your human rider. Barf thought with disgust.

Tell me about it. Belch grumbles.

Guys seriously! Meatlug scolds. Toothless is really hurt! I've never seen him beat up so badly!

Yeah… Stormfly mutters. Seems kind of weird, doesn't it?

What? Her fellow dragons question. What's weird?

The Nightmare that attacked him barely looked much bigger than you, Hookfang. Stormfly says slowly, as though still trying to decide whether or not to continue. And no offence, but Toothless has taken you down plenty of times without getting a scratch.

Has not! Hookfang argues.

Yeah he has. Everyone else states.

Hookfang shuffles uncomfortably. Fine, maybe he's won a few scuffles. He was probably just off his game today.

There's a bruise on his head. Meatlug notes. So maybe the human attacker hit him in just the right spot to rattle him.

Or maybe magic? Belchoffers.

That girl did look pretty magical. Barf adds.

Hookfang rolls his eyes. Magic isn't real, idiots.

Stormfly however, seemed to consider it and gave the dragon version of a scowl. Maybe…

If you don't' mind us asking though, Barf says,

Why does it matter how he got hurt? Belch asks. He got hurt, so we fix him.

That's the important thing, right? Barf says.

Stormfly growls. It's just… I'm worried about what that girl really did to him. When I flew down to Toothless after that girl ran off, he didn't really… well…

Didn't what? Meatlug asks.

He just didn't feel like Toothless. Stormfly mutters.

What do you mean?

Honestly, I don't really know. Stormfly admits. When I saw him, I just got this…ringing in my head that this wasn't Toothless.

Well, what about now? Meatlug gestures to the cart.

Stormfly shrugs. Fine now. I guess.

Then let's just focus on getting him to the human healer and see if she can do anything for him. Meatlug says.

The others nod their agreement. But Stormfly didn't think Gothi could do anything for him.

Why?

She thinks back to the few lines of conversation that they had Toothless was first being lifted into the cart, and then into the sky.

Home… Going… Home… Toothless muttered.

Yes, we're going to take you back to Berk. To home. Stormfly coos.

Toothless seems to grimace, and at first Stormfly thought it was because of the wounds. Toothless? Toothless? Ga-a-ah… Just… try to endure it for a bit more, we'll get you fixed up as soon as possible.

For a moment, the Nightfury doesn't answer, and Stormfly assumes he has gone unconscious. But then, she faintly hears the river of questions he repeats over and over.

What… is… Berk…? Who… are you…? Who… is… Toothless?

#####

The girl searched the cove, eyes keen. One scale, that's all she needed. Was that too much to ask?

Her Nightmare caws from behind a boulder. He gestures with his clawed foot, pointing at something.

"Found something, Coal?" the girl questions, running over. Coal shuffles to the side with a proud grin on her face.

The girl's eyes catch something small and black, and for a second her heart races. Yes! She found one! She crouches down on the ground to retrieve it…

"It's a pebble." She states bluntly. She drops it with a sigh, and rubs Coal's nose, who was looking very ashamed of himself. "It's alright, man. Easy mistake to make from your angle."

The Nightmare still coos his apologies, and continues his search. A second later, Luna, her snow-colored Nadder bounds over to her, and begins nudging her to the pond edge.

"Something's in the water?" she guesses. Luna nods.

The girl quickly sheds her wool cloak and leather boots, revealing a lean, agile 19 year old girl wearing a simple, white cotton shirt and pants. She dips into the water, vision slightly warbled. She feels something shoots past her head, and stick into the squishy mud ground a few feet in front of her.

A Nadder spike. She darts towards it, and searches the wet sand around it with her fingers. Finally, her palm brushes something flat, thin, and impossibly black. Her fingers close into a fist around it, and she springs to the surface, taking a gulp of precious air.

She paddles to her loyal companions, and after shaking off as much water off as she could, finally opens her hand.

Luna and Coal peer over her shoulder to look at it, and the girl's face break into a wild grin.

Splattered with a few wet grains of sand and tiny pieces of algae, was a single, Nightfury scale.

One scale. 17 minutes.

It would be enough.

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A/N Second chapter! Hope you liked it! Please review if you have time!

PS: I know there weren't any break lines on the first chapter, sorry about that. If there aren't any breaklines on this one either, then… um… I don't' know. How do you write the breaklines and make sure they stay there when you upload? Plez help? *puppy eyes*