It's an AU I posted just yesterday on Tumblr. Since my attention will be on my other fic 'Lost no More' (currently trying to work past a scene I am having trouble with), I can't say exactly how frequently I will be updating this one. But I am having fun so far, so please enjoy this short prologue! Constructive criticism is appreciated!

What Defines a Father And a Son: Prologue

Stoick the Vast knew his life and the lives of everyone on Berk was about to change for the better when the Dragon Master and his Night Fury fell out of the night sky during one raid with an anguished cry.

With him believed to have been the cause for all the attacks, for all the hardships they experienced and danger they have faced, the Chief thought this last battle might have been it. That they may have finally come a step closer to ending the Viking-Dragon war for good.

The dragons even started leaving soon after their leader had been downed, further proving that the Dragon Master, and those who must have come before him, were the cause of this endless three-hundred year old war. Though their motives were unknown, besides stealing food from hardworking Vikings, it seemed to make sense.

They had been bold tonight.

In order to save the dragons that had been caught, the dragon rider often needed to swoop in and remove the nets holding them down. It was how they even knew the Night Fury had a Rider in the first place as he was dressed in all black and almost completely blended in with the dark scales of his mount and the darkness of the night.

It was while dodging maces and axes thrown at them while saving three netted Nadders that they were ultimately defeated, after having the same man appear the last few raids to add to the carnage, when Stoick himself flung a bola at the two right before the Night Fury got too far away to be touched and managed to capture its two strong wings as they attempted to make a fast escape.

It brought him satisfaction to hear the mighty dragon roar an anguished cry as it fell towards the woods of Berk simply because of the speeds it had been flying at. Separating from its rider somewhere along the way, who seemed to have fallen in a different part of the forest.

Though the Night Fury survived his fall without a doubt as dragons were known to be tough creatures, Berk knew the Dragon Master's chances of surviving a fall that high were slim to none. That is, if he was human.

There were those occasional few who believed he wasn't, that he must have been some kind of demon send to take Viking lives with a dragon's fury. How else can one man control an entire legion of firebreathing monsters?

But Stoick knew the truth. Or rather, he wasn't afraid. He knew that men like a Master of Dragons and Drago Bludvist were just that. Mere mortal men and nothing more. They bled too and they could be killed just the same.

Sure that the rider must now be dead, Berk recovered from the raid with an eased heart. Damage was looked at, lost food was counted, the hiding elders, mothers and children were checked on to make sure no one had been taken while help wasn't looking, with a kind of swiftness did they get back up on their feet by the time late afternoon came rolling by. It helped to discover that there were no dead tonight. Though that meant, because of the mysterious rider, that there had been no dead dragons this time either.

As the Chief of Berk protected his people will all of his might, so too did the unknown man.

Once reassured that his people could go on without him for the next few hours, Stoick gathered his best and most able warriors still remaining. While the injured were cared for, they set out to hunt down the Night Fury.

They found it later by Ravenpoint, where they had seen it crash hours earlier. Still bound, still seemingly out cold. It was almost too easy, a gift of the Gods one of them even boldly stated. Prodding the downed dragon's ebony black head with his axe, Stoick found that it did not respond.

"Leave him alone!"

The Chief had expected a great many things to happen after that night. With the supposed death of the one commanding the raiding dragons, he had even believed life on Berk was about to turn for the better.

He had not expected to turn his head and find that the one turning his life upside down would be the sudden appearance of a young boy who had come, bruised, bloody and broken, to defend his dragon.