National Novel Writing Month kind of snuck up on… but I couldn't shake this idea, so I guess it all worked out. But do you know long it took me to name this baby? RIDICULOUSLY long (two months), considering how simple the name is. But I figure, if it works for Marvel, why can't it work for me? (Don't answer that.)

Standard disclaimers apply: I don't ownHow To Train Your Dragon,Rise of the Guardians,Tangled,Brave, or any other intellectual property contained herein. They are all the property of their individual owners; I'm just playing around in their sandboxes.

Stormfly

Chapter 1: Start the Fall

In two years at Burgess University, Astrid had never been in the arts buildings. She was familiar with it, since it was right across a courtyard from the athletics building where she spent a majority of her time. There had just never been any reason for her to go in, since she wasn't taking any art classes, and she didn't have any friends who were.

As soon as she stepped inside she was hit by a vibe that was nothing like any other building on campus. While art students went to the other buildings for non-art classes, this was their territory. They radiated some kind of creative aura that made the place feel like another world entirely.

Astrid couldn't help but feel like an outsider as she looked around the entryway. That was not a feeling she was used to – and definitely not a feeling she liked.

But she squared her shoulders and refused to be intimidated as she walked down the hallway.

She was Astrid Hofferson, after all.

The place was decorated with student work. Mostly framed pictures, but show cases were set up for jewelry, sculptures, and the occasional clothing item.

As she walked down the checker board tiles of the hall, she inhaled, trying to get a grasp of her surroundings. But there were too many smells that she didn't recognize. (That was unnerving.) She did detect the smell of cold metal and car oil, though. Familiar, and reassuring.

Halfway down the main hallway she found the art lab, thanks to the sign sticking out above the open door. She could hear the buzz of conversation from inside as she approached, along with the ringing of metal, and a whirring she couldn't identify.

Just as Astrid reached it, a young woman came out, looking back over her shoulder and nearly walking right into Astrid in her hurry. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine," Astrid said. The girl had managed to stop just before they collided.

The girl smiled, pushing a lock of short brown hair behind her ear. She had large green eyes, and what looked like a smudge of blue paint on her right cheek. "Hi. Can I help you?"

Astrid was fairly sure she had seen the brunette around campus, but couldn't remember exactly where.

She looked down to check the piece of paper Gobber had given her the day before, wondering if this would finally be the time that the name on it changed.

Nope. Still the same.

"I'm looking for someone called Hiccup – I was told he might be here?"

The girl's smile grew for some reason. "You're in luck – he just got here. Over in the corner." She pointed to the back, left corner, and Astrid leaned around the door to look.

Over at a long table set in the corner, a young man stood with his back to them, unwrapping a heavy bolt of brown leather. Was that a school supply? If not, what could anyone possibly need that much leather for?

"Thanks," Astrid said.

"No problem," the girl said cheerfully, before she started off down the hall.

Since Hiccup was still faced away from her, she couldn't get much of an impression. Just that he was tall and gangly, with tousled auburn hair, a dark green tshirt over a pair of jeans. Nothing special, she decided. Definitely nothing to be nervous about.

Now that she was looking into the lab, she saw that the whirring sound was a pottery wheel, where a dark haired girl was bent over a glob of grey clay. (Astrid suspected the clay was the main smell she couldn't identify.)

Assured that she knew exactly what she was getting herself into, Astrid entered the lab and approached the table where Hiccup was working.

He had one hand braced on the table's edge, while the other traced over the pages of a leather bound journal that lay open in front of him. Just as she came up behind him, he started to reach for a pen with his left hand. He caught sight of her from the corner of his eye. His hand missed the pencil, and he stumbled before catching the edge of the table for balance.

"Stupid…" he muttered, scuffing his left foot over the concrete floor.

She was about to be unimpressed… but didn't get the chance.

Now that she saw his face, she decided she would have to rescind her "nothing special" judgment, since it had been very wrong. He had a lightly tanned, rectangular face, with deep set, forest green eyes. And he was not hard to look at.

"Uh, hi," he said, getting his balance back.

"Hi." Attractive, yes. But he was also awkward. She had never known it was possible for those two things to go together. "You're Hiccup?"

"The one and only," he said. "And you're Astrid."

That took her aback. "Have we met?"

He grinned sheepishly. "I follow local racing. And I used to work for Gobber."

Gobber had not mentioned that part. The old mechanic was notoriously difficult to work for, and most of his employees lasted only a couple months. She was sure she had forgotten plenty of those that hadn't been there long. But in that case, she was surprised Gobber would remember him. He frequently forgot employees who still worked for him, never mind ones who weren't there anymore.

"Can I help you with something?" he asked, after a moment of awkward silence.

Astrid searched her brain quickly to remember why she had come looking for him in the first place. This whole encounter had not gone anything how she expected.

"I'm looking to custom order a leather jacket," she said. "Gobber said you could do it for a reasonable price."

Hiccup had leaned back against the table, and when he heard that he rubbed his face. "You gotta be kidding."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Astrid demanded.

"No, sorry," he said, holding up a hand in apology. "Gobber just… never mind. Are you looking for something to wear when you race, or for every day?" He eyed the jacket she was wearing, which was worn at all the hems.

"The season ends next week," she reminded, crossing her arms over her chest.

Technically the racing season was over. The local circuit was closed, and the school competitions were over as well. But the school still had its annual charity event before the summer sports officially moved over for the winter ones.

Hiccup held up his hands in defense. "Hey, they're two different things – I just want to make sure we're on the same page. If you wanted something for next week's race I'd have to say no, since I don't have time."

Okay, he had a good point. Astrid decided to ease up a little. "How long would it take you to make an everyday jacket?"

"Depends," he shrugged. "Two or three weeks, if things go smoothly."

How likely was that? Astrid wondered. But she decided not to ask out loud.

"If you're looking for something custom, you're probably not looking for something normal," he added after a moment. "Especially if Gobber sent you to me. Hopefully." The last word was muttered, and his eyes slid to the side, so she got the impression it wasn't directed at her.

She did not like feeling as though she were missing something important.

Exhaling, she tried to find the best way to phrase what she wanted. It was one thing to tell Gobber what she wanted, since she had known the mechanic as long as she could remember. Telling someone else was strange, since she knew it might sound weird. She settled on plain and simple.

"I want something that would look kind of like armor," she said. "Gobber seemed to think that was right up your alley."

Hiccup grinned, as though it were some kind of inside joke.

"Like what Night Fury wears?" he asked. He seemed to be amused by the idea, though she wasn't sure why that would be funny.

She scowled slightly. At the reference, and at her own confusion.

Night Fury was a member for the Big 4 – Burgess' local team of superhero wannabes. General consensus was that they were a public nuisance who caused more problems than they actually solved (if they solved any at all) – which Astrid was inclined to agree with. Her brother, Anders, seemed to think they were heroes, though she had never been able to understand that view. Astrid might have been impartial towards the whole thing, if she hadn't been forced to listen to her father complain about them so many times. And if Anders hadn't fought with their father over it.

All four members had distinct personalities and appearances. But Night Fury stood out because he rode on a black dragon with a forty-five foot wingspan. That kind of thing left an impression.

"Not that bulky, but kinda, yeah," she admitted, thinking about the layers of black and brown leather armor that Night Fury wore.

Hiccup had already picked up his journal and started sketching. His brow furrowed as he worked his concentration intense.

"How much will this cost?" Astrid asked, realizing she should have asked that soon. Gobber had said "reasonable price", but who knew what that meant. After a summer of racing, money wasn't really a problem. But she had no intention of paying more than she would for a regular jacket.

He didn't look up from his notebook. "Depends on how much times and material it takes. Do you have a budget?"

"Can we keep it in the two fifty range?" That was reasonable, she thought. It was about what she had paid for the jacket she wore now.

"Easy," he said," before turning the journal around for her to see the rough sketch he had drawn up.

Astrid frowned again. "I don't want it to look like Night Fury."

Bad enough someone on campus had started selling tshirts with the Big 4's symbols – and people were wearing them. The last thing she needed was for someone to think she was some kind of groupie.

"Hey, I had two minutes," he said, shrugging. The motion wasn't confined to just his shoulders – his arms, hands and fingers all got involved. "It's a starting point."

She considered the sketch again. As a starting point… Okay, she couldn't deny that was the look she was going for. "Yeah. But the buckle over the shoulder is ridiculous."

"It's not—" He stopped himself and shook his head. He started to say something else, but didn't get a chance before his phone went off. Sighing in exasperation a he pulled the device from his back pocket. Astrid saw his mouth tighten as he read whatever was on the screen.

"Sorry," he said, returning the device to his jeans. "I've gotta run. If you come back tomorrow I should have some sketches done, and we can work out details."

He was moving even as he talked, throwing his journal into his messenger bag and hastily rolling up the bolt of leather before he threw it over his shoulder.

Astrid had to blink, trying to keep up with how fast the situation had changed. One second he had been still, the next he had shut down everything with an efficiency that both surprised and impressed her.

And he was already headed for the door.

"Yeah, sure," she said, trying to keep up. Not something she enjoyed. "What time?"

"Any time after one," he said, turning to speak, but not coming to a full stop.

Astrid was half following, since she had no purpose in the art lab. Just as she reached the door she looked to her right, in the direction he had gone.

He went to set his left foot down on the laminated four but stumbled, as though the foot were giving him trouble with the added weight of the leather. But he took it in stride, shifting his feet and his center of balance to avoid falling. Judging by the precise movements, they were well practiced.

That surprised her, since he didn't seem like someone with a lot of physical training. He looked more like the kind who hung in the back during gym class, praying no one noticed him.

What little she knew of Hiccup was leaving her without a way to form a solid opinion of him.

Then he was gone around the corner, and she was still trying to process what had just happened.

Back outside, she took a deep breath of fresh air as she walked towards her motorcycle, expelling the art building from her lungs.

On the way back to her apartment, she stopped at the nearest Starbucks – a favorite hangout for students from the college.

Just as she pulled off her helmet, something over her head caused a rush of wind that blew her hair around her face with a force she felt all over.

Astrid looked up. Breath catching as she saw the long body of a dragon gliding twenty feet or so above her head, towards downtown. They moved too fast for her to register details about the dragon, or to catch a glimpse of its leather clad rider. Save for the flash of red that was the creature's left tail fin.

A black and blue clad figure tumbled through the air towards the dragon, accompanied by a rush of cold that elicited a shiver when it reached her. Jack Frost.

On the sidewalks, nearly everyone had pulled out their phones to snap pictures. A few had started running towards downtown. Something was obviously going on for them to be flying out in the open in broad daylight – and flying so low.

But wherever the Big 4 went, there was usually property damage, to say the least. So why people wanted to be there was beyond Astrid. It seemed a lot safer to just watch it on the news – if you insisted on watching it at all. She didn't understand why people seemed to enjoy watching the fights so much. What was the point?

Of course, she had never been big on spectator sports of any kind.

Still... she watched until they were out of sight. She wondered what was happening, only in as far as it might affect her. If anything was going to stop her from getting her coffee (if something was about to crush Starbucks, for example), or prevent her from getting home, she kind of wanted some kind of warning. Though they were flying in the opposite direction.

Until now, she had only seen the Big 4 in person once or twice. And this was the closest she had ever been.

Shaking it off, she headed into Starbucks for her latte. If anything did crush the place, hopefully she could be in and out before it did.

Inside, the smell of coffee mingled with the buzz of agitated conversation.

"Who's downtown?" one of the baristas asked. "Have they said?" She leaned over the counter, towards the kid who sat at the nearest table, with his laptop and several books that had apparently been abandoned as soon as the "news" broke.

"Gothel," he said, adjusting his glasses, and not looking away from the screen. "She's got a bunch of thugs, but I don't see the Stabbington Brothers."

"I think they're still in jail," the barista said.

Astrid lost interest at that point. If it was Gothel, it probably wasn't going to affect her. The woman and her thugs weren't after destruction, or control of the city, or whatever the others wanted. They were just in it for the money. Usually they went for one of the banks. None of which were between here and Astrid's apartment. The worst she had ever done was attack City Hall in an attempt to hold some officials hostage for a ransom. "Attempt" being the operative word, since she hadn't gotten very far.

Thankfully, the second barista, who didn't seem at all interested in the fight, since she was wiping down the counters.

"Don't they have anything better to do?" the barista asked, in a thick southern drawl, as she put the rag down and came up to the other side of the register. Tiana, according to her name tag.

"Who?" Astrid asked. "People? Or the Big 4?"

Tiana snickered. "What can I get for you?"

"A grande caramel latte," she said, pulling her wallet from the pocket of her worn leather jack. Hopefully Hiccup could get her new one down quickly, before this one fell to pieces.

Once Tiana handed back the gift card Astrid used to pay, she went to the espresso machine. Not bothering to try and tear her coworker away from the conversation with Laptop Boy. Astrid didn't pay attention to them, not giving another thought to the ongoing fight.

Not until Tablet Boy jolted half out of his chair with a wordless exclamation.

"What?" the barista asked. "What?" She leaned so far over the counter she seemed just about ready to jump over the counter to see what was happening on the screen. Astrid actually felt sorry for her.

A moment later, all that was forgotten.

"Night Fury fell of the dragon!"