The Hideous RuffleTuffleback Chapter 1

A/N
Ruffnut and Tuffnut try to find out in advance what awaits them in Dragon Training. Instead, their lives get turned around in the worst way imaginable. There's a very good chance they won't even survive the experience. Rated T to be safe; the language is all K.

Disclaimer: Although this fic is about the twins, both Hiccup and Toothless will play important roles in the middle of the story. I know a bunch of you are going to ask this, because I always get questions like that whenever I write a story that isn't Hiccup-and-Toothless-centric. Now, let me tell you a story.

o

"I can't sleep."

Ruffnut groaned and covered her head with her pillow. Her brother wouldn't give it a rest. "I said, I can't sleep."

"Thanks to you, neither can I," she grumbled. "What's your problem?"

"Are you kidding?" he exclaimed as he sat up in the lower bunk. "Dragon Training starts tomorrow! We're going to fight real dragons for the first time! Aren't you excited, or nervous, or scared?"

"No, I'm just tired," she sighed. "I'll deal with all that other stuff tomorrow. If you'll let me!"

"Why? You're already awake!" She heard him putting on his boots. "What do you say we sneak down to the training ring?"

"Give me one good reason why I ought to do that," she mumbled.

"I dare you!" he shot back. When she didn't reply, he added, "I double-dare you!" She still didn't answer. "What are you, some kind of wimpy wuss?"

That did it. She jumped out of the top bunk, aiming her feet at the spot where he'd be standing. He was so predictable! They went down in a heap, with him on the floor and her knees on his ribcage. "Now who's the wimpy wuss?" she smirked.

He took a careful breath to make sure none of his ribs were broken, then smiled that irritating smile of his. "Since you're up and out of bed, you might as well go to the training ring with me. We'll be the first ones there!"

"Will that make any difference?" she muttered as she slipped her feet into her boots.

"Hey, if I want to beat Astrid and Snotlout, I'll take any advantage I can get," Tuffnut answered. "Maybe Gobber did something tricky with the place, and we can check it out and get familiar with it before he turns the dragon loose."

"I guess I've got nothing better to do," she sighed. Brother and sister sneaked out of the house, through the dark, silent village to the even darker training ring. They looked down through the bars to the stone walls and floor. Five stout doors were set in the wall, concealing five stone chambers that held five sleeping dragons. In a few hours, they would be doing their best to kill one of those dragons, or at least beat it senseless. Three of their friends would be doing the same thing; it was Ruff and Tuff's job to do it better.

It wasn't just about prestige or fame. Their reputation in the village was, to put it mildly, dismal. If they didn't find something to be good at, and find it soon, their chances of finding a decent marriage partner would be lower than a Terrible Terror's belly. Their parents would marry them off to the first ignorant fools they could find, and that wouldn't end well for anyone. But if one of them could win in Dragon Training, that would change everything! Their parents could hold out for a decently wealthy girl for him, or a guy for her, and their lives would be so much better. It's not like they wanted to get married; they didn't. But in a small Viking village, everybody got married. The tribe needed all the babies it could get. Personal feelings didn't matter; it was all about duty and obligation. Ruff and Tuff hated concepts like those, but they knew there was no escape. The best they could do was win in Dragon Training to make themselves more marriageable.

Unfortunately, only one of them could win.

"What kinds of dragons do you think are in there?" Tuff asked.

Ruff thought for a moment. She was the more thoughtful of the pair, by a very small margin. "Well, we know they captured a Gronckle three weeks ago, and we know there's a Monstrous Nightmare for the winner to kill. That leaves…" She counted on her fingers. "…three that we don't know about yet."

"Three mystery dragons!" Tuff exclaimed. "I don't like surprises. I want to know what they are."

"Yeah, right," Ruff muttered. "How are you going to do that – open the doors and look at them?"

"Sure, why not?" he smiled.

"Why not? How about 'those are dragons down there'?" she snarled. "We didn't bring weapons, or shields, or anything! What if they wake up?"

"What are the chances of that happening?" he smiled confidently. "Come on! I double-dog-dare you!"

"You can't go to double-dog-dares when you haven't even single-dared me yet!" she sputtered. "Don't you know anything?"

"I know I want to see those dragons before I have to fight them," he retorted. "We'll be really, really quiet, okay? We'll open each door, take a quick look, and shut it again. Nobody will ever know we were here!" She hesitated; he saw her wavering. "It'll be fun, crazy, and... dangerous!" he enticed her. He always knew how to push her buttons.

"Sometimes I hate you," she growled as she helped him open the portcullis and creep into the darkened training ring.

"Which door should we open first?" she whispered. They all looked the same – dark and foreboding.

He pointed at each door as he counted,

"Eenie, meenie, meinie, moe,
"Catch a Viking by the toe!
"If he hollers with no class,
"I can kick him in the –"

"Just open the door, okay?" she interrupted. His finger had come to rest pointing at the leftmost door, which was the one she would have chosen anyway. He shrugged and slowly pulled the door's locking lever. He eased one of the doors open about three inches…

…and then the hinges creaked noisily. They froze, then threw themselves at the door to shut it again. But something was pushing the door from the inside now, and it was a lot stronger than they were. It gave a powerful shove and the doors flew wide open, sending both of them sailing halfway across the training ring. They scrambled to their feet and stared in horror at what they had unleashed.

It was big, angry, and terrifying. Two toothy heads, each bigger than Ruff's body, hissed and glanced all around from atop two weaving snake-like necks. The green-and-red body sported two broad wings and four short, stumpy legs. Two long tails lashed from side to side as the monster stalked out of its prison.

"I think it's a Hideous Zippleback," Tuff whispered.

"No kidding, Sherlock!" Ruff burst out. "Now that it's loose, how are we supposed to put it back?"

"I say we run for it, and let Gobber deal with it in the morning," Tuff quavered.

"That sounds like a plan," she nodded. They both turned for the exit, but they never made it. They were suddenly surrounded by a sickly-green gas cloud, they heard a sparking sound, and then a massive explosion hurled them into the air. The dual impact – first with the roof bars, then with the stone floor – knocked them both senseless.

When they woke up, they were alone in the ring. The creature had obviously escaped through the entryway, which they'd left wide open. Ruff saw her brother stirring and groaned, "That might have been a lot more fun if I'd known I was going to be alive at the end." She sat up, tried to stand, and winced in pain. "Ow! I think that thing bit me!" She clutched her left leg, and sure enough, there was a curved row of tooth marks on her boot.

"Did it bite anything off?" he asked. "We're lucky we – OW!" He grabbed his left shoulder. "Ohh, I am hurt! I am very much hurt!" They checked each other out. Both of them had definitely been bitten by something with sharp, pointy teeth. But the tooth marks were pinpricks, mere flesh wounds.

"I don't get it," Ruff said as she pulled her boot back on. "That thing could have bitten my head off! Why did it give me such a wimpy little wound? No mauling, no serious burns… I probably won't even get a scar out of it! What good is that?"

"Maybe it's just as well," Tuff said slowly. "When I get my scar, I want to get it while I'm fighting, not while I'm out cold! That dragon cheated." He glanced at the dragon holding-cell doors. "Maybe we should try another one."

Ruff slapped her hand on his shoulder, which made him wince – she'd inadvertently slapped the shoulder he'd been bitten on. "Tuffnut, don't even think it! I have had enough of dragons for one night. I'm going home. If you want to open another door, you can do it by yourself."

"Hey! I can't do this without you," he protested.

"Exactly! So what does that tell you?" she challenged him.

"Uhhh… you're going to be a typical girl and change your mind, so we can open another – OW!" She'd removed her helmet and whacked him on the head with it.

"Tuff, there's 'crazy' and then there's just plain 'stupid.' I'd fight a dragon with you if we had our spears and our shields, but all we've got is our empty hands and our empty heads! I don't want to die tonight, and I don't want to see you die, either. Let's go home and try to get some sleep, okay?"

"Fine," he grumped after a second. They closed the open dragon-cell door, pulled the portcullis down as they left, and made their way home in the darkness. Back in their room, they kicked off their boots, took turns rubbing ointment on each other's bite wounds, and tried to sleep. They failed. Their minuscule wounds were quite sore, and they were too wound up from their brush with a dragon tonight.

They should have been exhausted the next morning, but they were running on pure adrenaline now. Today was the first day of Dragon Training! They'd been chosen to take their place in the village as Viking warriors, learning to fight their most implacable enemies. They arrived at the training ring early, but Astrid, Snotlout, and Fishlegs were already there. All they needed now was a training master, and Gobber arrived on schedule. "Welcome to Dragon Training!" he announced formally as he raised the portcullis. Their great adventure was beginning! Hiccup, the chief's scrawny son, joined them unannounced as they were entering, but even his ill-starred presence couldn't dampen the twins' enthusiasm.

As they strode into the ring, boasting about the injuries they hoped to receive, Ruff tried to hide the fact that she was limping. Tuff had no difficulty waving his spear around with his right arm, but when it came time to wear a shield on his left arm, that would be a different story. He never got the chance to hide his own injury, though. He and Ruff got into a fight over who would use the best shield, and before they could settle it, the Gronckle that was their first adversary had fireballed the shield and put both of them out of the "game." They slunk out of the ring and watched the fat dragon take out Fishlegs and Snotlout, then almost kill Hiccup. It looked like Astrid might be the one to beat. She was the only one who never got shot at.

Once the old smith had wrangled the Gronckle back into its cell and slammed the door, he turned to his class of shaken students. "By the bye, would any of ye know anythin' about how my Hideous Zippleback got away?" They all shook their heads "no."

"That's strange," he said, scratching his chin. "The door and th' gates were closed, so it dinna break out. Somebody let it go." He whirled and pointed at Tuffnut with his hook-hand. "Are ye sure ye know nothin' about this?"

Tuff almost panicked. How did Gobber know? "I didn't see any dragon getting out of here," he blurted out. Ironically, that statement was the truth.

"Huh. How am I supposed to teach ye how to fight Zipplebacks if we haven't got one? I guess we'll have to catch another one when the lizards raid us again. Fine, ye're dismissed until tomorrow." The teens scattered to their homes. They all had chores to do except Hiccup, who was serving an apprenticeship to the smith and had a whole day's worth of work ahead of him. Ruff and Tuff were kept busy hauling water, cutting and stacking firewood, helping their mother in the kitchen, and doing all the other things young Vikings do. It was quite painful because of their injuries, but they couldn't say anything about them because it would be obvious that the wounds came from a dragon, and that would raise a host of questions that they didn't want to answer.

After everyone else had gone to sleep, the twins examined each other's wounds by lantern light. "It doesn't look infected," Ruff commented. "I thought Zipplebacks had venom or something."

"That's what Fishlegs said," Tuff noted. "But then, he said a lot of stuff that didn't make any sense."

"All those numbers sure didn't help him in the ring," his sister nodded. "I think we got lucky with these bites. They'll be all better in two days, and no one will ever know what we did."

"I hope not," Tuff agreed. They kicked off their boots, blew out the lantern, and went to bed. Both of them slept very restlessly that night. They repeatedly dreamed that their sibling was glued to them permanently, and they couldn't do anything without the other. It was awful! They were thankful to wake up and get their day started the next morning; it meant no more dreams.