This week I went to see HTTYD for the second time, this time in 3D, and it was a thousand times better than I remembered. Plus, I got a drabbley-fanfic idea out of it. :) I'm hoping this is the first of many chapters; I guess we'll see how it goes. This is my first shot at a multi-chapter thing that I didn't write all at once, so constructive criticism would be great!

Disclaimer: All I own of How to Train Your Dragon is a poster/ Walmart ad, which has found a home up on my bedroom wall. And the coloring books. But that's it, sadly.

Enjoy!

Many Things

Chapter 1. Artist

Hiccup did not like art. He hated techniques of every shape and order. There was nothing he would rather do than chuck his sketchbook into the ocean.

But he never did. He carried it around with him just about everywhere, tucked tight under his arm and with a pencil clenched in his hand. He was always reluctant to actually start drawing something; it usually took a long time, and he would die of embarrassment if someone showed up looking for Gobber and found him at it ("Sheez, Hiccup, that is one macho flower you're drawing there. What are you doing next? A princess?"). Besides, he hated drawing, right?

But when he went out into the woods, or holed up in his bedroom, and put his pencil to the paper, he had the time of his life. He loved watching the lines coming from his pencil tip and scratching, running, shading, filling up the blank whiteness. He loved the end results: Cool, I did that? He sort of liked when a drawing got messed up, which was rare, and he got to tear it to shreds. It was as though he had a tiny bit of power over whether the picture lived or died (which was decent when your own village didn't much care whether you lived or died).

But then, when he was finished with whatever he had done, he went right back to despising drawing altogether.

Hiccup was unconsciously thrilled to become Gobber's apprentice. Okay, so it sounds a bit weird to say he liked working with sharp objects, but that's exactly how he felt, even if he didn't quite know it. There was just…something…about pounding metal into instruments (or weapons, but "instruments" sounds nicer). He lived for the day when he completed a sword, and he would grip the hilt, swinging it from side to side, envisioning dragons beneath the blade. Usually, then, just as his dragon was nearly slain, Gobber would trundle through the door, and Hiccup would almost accidentally lop off his head.

"Oy!" Gobber would say. "Put that sword away, lad, before you damage something."

Hiccup would frown, watching his imaginary dragon slink off with a smirk on its detestable face.

Swords weren't the only things Hiccup worked on in the shop. He liked building stuff just as much, fitting different pieces together like a magnificent puzzle, tongue between his lips, until it turned into something functioning and useful. He stuck with every project like this he was assigned, no matter how many burns or splinters he got, no matter how difficult it turned out to be. Eventually, seeing the final product was worth it all.

In spare moments he put together little inventions, like a collapsible (but highly erratic) dagger, and a lock for his bedroom door. The biggest and best thing he ever made on his own was his Mangler, intended to bring down an entire dragon. He supposed it could be some kind of art if he wanted it to be, but he didn't at all. He didn't like art, remember?

Yet he kept on drawing, kept on pounding, kept on building. It was his world, and in a way, it was wonderful.

One day, while Hiccup was doing some random picture of a tree in his sketchbook (far more things had been catching his attention lately, since his whole life had changed, and he wanted to capture them on paper), Astrid bounced over and flopped down on the ground beside him. She studied the tree in from of them, then squinted at his drawing over his shoulder. Her eyebrows went up. "Wow, Hiccup! Look at you. You're an artist!"

His head shot up. "What? Really?"

"Yep."

He wasn't quite sure what to think of that; but Hiccup Haddock the Artist didn't really sound too bad.

So. What did you think? If you liked it, of course I would love if you reviewed, but what I would really like to know is if you didn't like it and why; because I want the next chapters to be better.
Thanks everyone! God bless!

Kay...if you read it before, I edited it a tiny bit...thanks, Ari-Griffin. :)