Ch. 1

Hiccup opened his eyes painfully. How long had he been asleep?

He sat up, cringing at the sudden pain that split through his skull. Placing his hand at the site of the pain he felt a large bump that protruded from the back of his head. He struggled to sit up straight. Hiccup looked around and seemed to be in the forest somewhere? He must have fallen asleep on his outdoor explorations of the island again.

Turning his head to look around- Hiccup gasped

A DRAGON!?

The beast, only inches away from him, nudged at Hiccups right arm. At this Hiccup quickly scrambled backwards, pinning his back against a large rock. The dragon crooned at this response.

"Hold on… Hold on!" Hiccup panted.

Taking in the sight of the majestic and terrifying creature before him Hiccup shivered in fear. He had never seen this type of dragon before….had he? The jet black scales made him instantly think 'Night Fury'.

For some reason it didn't attack. Instead the dragon tilted its head, lowering its body to the ground slightly, almost as if being passive? Hiccup had never seen this type of behavior in a dragon before. They were killing machines that never hesitated to attack at the sight of a Viking. Why wasn't he dead yet?

Then the monster slowly walked toward him, a slight cooing reverberating from its throat. Hiccup tried to push himself further away from the beast, but the boulder leaned against his back instead. Holding his left hand up in a useless, but natural, attempt to protect himself, Hiccup spotted the knife neatly strapped to his forearm. Without so much as wondering how it got there, he unsheathed the tiny blade, clumsily holding it out between him and the dragon.

This didn't seem to faze the black mass of muscle and scales. Instead the dragon paused momentarily to look confusedly at the weapon before continuing its slow worried advance towards the Viking. Hiccup lowered the knife. He then realized how useless such a blade was against an animal as large as the dragon that stood above him. Hiccup cringed away from the warm breath and smell of fish as the beasts face was mere inches from his.

'AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!' Hiccup wanted to scream as he suddenly found himself being licked on the cheek by a warm, wet tongue. Instead it came out as a small "hnnggh".

It licked him? Gently even… Maybe it was trying to decide if there was enough meat on his bones to even bother with such a skinny thing as Hiccup. The boy's body stiffened and his eyes remained clenched shut, waiting for the dragon to snap him in half with its jaws.

Toothless couldn't understand what Hiccup was doing.

Usually his friend would playfully scold him whenever he licked his face. Instead he was acting very strange. What was he trying to do with the sharp metal stick he usually used to sharpen his drawing thing? Why wasn't he moving? It was upsetting.

Hiccup seemed genuinely uncomfortable, maybe he wasn't feeling well? Noting the smell of fear emanating from his shivering friend, Toothless slowly backed away so he was no longer standing directly over the Viking.

He didn't take his eyes off of Hiccup, and Hiccup slowly let his scrunched up eyes open and land on the dragon that had just slobbered all over him.

The Night Fury cooed worryingly at his rider's weird behavior as Hiccup seemed confused and terrified.

Toothless looked around. There wasn't an animal in sight aside from a few birds sitting peacefully, high in a tree to the side and a dozen small fish swimming in circles in the pond directly behind the scared Viking's boulder. The sun was slowly setting behind the evergreen trees and all was silent but the wind and bugs. Nothing dangerous. There was no reason to be afraid. Yet Hiccup seemed absolutely petrified.

'What's wrong?' Toothless knew his friend could usually tell what his coos and other dragon sounds meant.

Hiccup didn't seem to understand and that made Toothless even more concerned. Didn't his human recognize him, his bud?

After a few more seconds of recovery from the dragon tasting his cheek, Hiccup found the feeling in his trembling hands again. He raised the knife up, pointing at the beast a second time, hoping he could make it seem more threating this time. Maybe he could scare the dragon away if he acted more like a brave and strong (and illogical) Viking…kind of like his dad.

But something distracted Hiccup this time as he glanced at his arms stretched out before him clutching his blade. What in Thor's name was he wearing?

It wasn't his usual long green garb with beaten up fur vest. Instead he had leather armor covering a large portion of his arms. Same thing with his chest… There was less leather on his legs but his pants had a lot more sewn up holes than he remembered…Then there were his fe-foot?

"AAAAAAH!"

Hiccup fumbled with the knife before it fell to the ground. Paying no attention to the fact he was now unarmed, he instead focused on how he was…unlegged?

A complicated looking piece of wood and metal clung to his leg in place of his left foot.

Hiccup gasped, forgetting to pay attention to the giant carnivorous beast standing only a few feet in front of him. His body overall seemed…off. He most definitely did not have a peg leg normally and these clothes were obviously someone else's. He looked around frantically. This was a cruel joke, or a weird dream? In the corner of his eye Hiccup spotted the edged of a lake behind him and scrambled towards it on all fours.

Reaching the water's edge he glanced into the calm reflective liquid. He looked like himself…almost. He had a wider jaw and stubble spotted his face where he used to have what could barely be considered peach fuzz. His hair was the same color but longer, among other small differences in his appearance. Hiccup watched his own eyes widen in fear and confusion. Was that him?

He couldn't take another second of looking at that face that was his, but also wasn't. The Viking reeled back from the water's edge but immediately fell down at the sudden remembrance of his missing foot.

Recalling the large, dangerous, deadly, terrifying, DRAGON standing directly behind him, Hiccup quickly wheeled around on the dirt, to face the beast.

It just stood there. Almost calm, however its eyes betrayed the calm stance of the creature. Instead they showed a largely confused and concerned thought process in the dragons mind.

Hiccup was caught off guard by his recognition of such empathetic emotion being displayed by the most feared beast in all of Berk.

"Ok...ok" Hiccup panted. "This is by far the weirdest dream I have EVER had."

Toothless crooned, unable to put together the words Hiccup said and what he possibly could have meant. 'Dreams' were for sleeping as far as the dragon understood from what he'd learned of human language.

Hiccup continued talking to himself. "A big scary dragon that apparently DOESN'T want to eat me… I've gone far beyond puberty, and my leg has decided to detach itself from my body. I would reaaaally like to wake up right about now." Hiccup looked at the dragon before him almost expectantly, but nothing happened.

Toothless just stared back, perking his ears at hearing the expectant tone in his rider's voice.

Hiccup glanced to the side as he pressed his lips together forming a thin frown and raised his eyebrows. Well this was a little awkward seeing as he was talking to a fire-breathing reptile. He sighed through his nose, letting his face relax.

The Viking had seemed to have calmed down a bit and Toothless felt some relief at his human friend acting more like his usual self, though his discomfort was still evident.

It was then that Toothless decided it would be a great time for them to go flying. That always made Hiccup feel better.