Title: The Strongest Of Them All

Genre: Poetry/Tragedy

Summary: They'd always seen Hiccup as weak, a mere runt, as Hiccup the Useless, but on the day they fought the Red Death, the Vikings discovered that Hiccup Haddock was the strongest of them all. Too bad they realized it too late. AU, character death

Disclaimer: I do not own How To Train Your Dragon or the characters or anything that you recognize.

He was weak and useless and cast aside.

He was abandoned and bullied and very un-liked.

The boy had done nothing wrong.

It wasn't his fault he wasn't very strong.

Except he was. In a different way from his fellow Vikings, but he was still strong in his own way.

He asked questions no one else thought of, said things no one else would say.

He was nothing if not different, and maybe that was why he was shunned.

But during one frightening battle, he truly left everyone stunned.

He faced the Red Death, the Queen of dragons, without a hint of fear in his eyes.

Maybe the confidence was simply a way to disguise

The fear in his heart.

But he didn't let that fear tear him apart.

Instead, he steeled himself and flew high above the rest.

Shocking even the strongest and the best.

He battled the queen from atop a Night Fury, his best and only friend for so long.

And it wasn't long before he showed the Vikings a different kind of strong.

For strength was not only a word to describe those with muscles or those who could hold a sword

Strength may only be one word,

But it has many different meanings, and today, the smallest Viking, taught them a kind of strength they had never considered before.

They realized for the first time that for many years, Hiccup had been fighting his own war.

Stomped on and pushed to the ground,

Left alone and shoved around.

He was mistreated and abused by his tribe, especially his peers,

And he used that pain to make him stronger instead of simply giving into tears.

He could've left them all behind,

Grown bitter instead of remaining kind,

But he didn't let that pain harden him in any way.

Instead, he fought for the people that abused him for fifteen years, refusing to let his tribe die in this battle that day.

He faced a monster the Vikings weren't willing to face.

They watched as the boy and his Night Fury disappeared into the clouds and the Red Death gave chase.

For several terrifying moments, all is quiet, and the Vikings are afraid to wonder why,

But then lightening lights up the sky.

They watch as the boy and the Night Fury take down the queen,

And only flames can be seen.

The boy and the dragon collide with the queen's tail,

The boy's name, several people call.

As the boy and his dragon begin to fall.

The dragon flies faster than ever before,

Pushing himself even more.

But it is not enough, and the Night Fury is too late

To rescue the boy that saved the downed dragon from a tragic fate.

The funeral is sad, as most funerals are,

But for some reason, this funeral seems sadder than those of other Vikings that have fallen in battles both near and far.

Astrid sits in the back with Toothless and doesn't speak.

All she can wonder is how they ever could have thought of his brave, strong boy as weak.

Stoick cries

As he sobs to his son one last goodbye.

The tribe is shocked, although they shouldn't be.

They have never seen their chief shed a tear, but they can clearly see

That this time is different from the rest

Of the times when Stoick was hurt during a battle or on a quest.

Those injuries left scars, but the death of his son would leave a scar that would never heal.

That much is obvious as Stoick breaks down and beside the casket, he kneels.

Gobber is crying himself, more tears than they've ever seen from the blacksmith.

For when Hiccup left, he took a small piece of Gobber's heart with.

Gobber had seen the boy as a son for so many years,

And with the boy gone, all Gobber could do was break down into tears.

Everyone is shocked when water fills Snotlout's eyes

As he walks over to where Hiccup lies.

They're shocked when Ruffnut and Tuffnut don't have one fight for weeks to follow Hiccup's death,

And when Fishlegs begins to sob after only one shaky breath.

Not many things can bring Vikings to tears.

Not many 'runts' will have stories told about them for several years.

But Hiccup was not the hiccup they once thought he was; Hiccup the Useless was no more.

And from that day on, Hiccup's strength would never be something to ignore.

They always thought of Hiccup as weak,

Far from the burly Vikings most people seek.

But when Hiccup was brave enough to stand up to the queen of dragons and didn't show an ounce of fear, even when he approached the flames in a free fall,

The Vikings realized that Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third was the strongest of them all.