Chapter Text

Prologue.

(...)–and on some random winter night, if there were anywhere Hiccup wished to be...

...Most people wouldn't think of their workplace.

You see.

To begin with, even he, on certain days, didn't like thinking about the forge. In fact, there were days when Hiccup could barely look at the place without feeling...conflicted emotions, to say the least. But the forge had become something of a second home to Hiccup, whether he liked it or not. It was kind of inevitable, after all these years of spending more time there than in his own room.

Working at the forge had entered his life as a sort of punishment when he was around nine or ten years old, only to soon become, rather depressingly, his self-imposed refuge from most of his problems and, eventually, the place where Hiccup would perhaps spend the rest of his days, as so many people in the village liked to point out.

Don't get him wrong, he doesn't think of it in a derogatory way –at least not entirely– Hiccup understood, perhaps more than the people of Berk themselves, where he stood in relation to the grand scheme of things. Or maybe just... within that large village filled with even larger people. And the point is that he doesn't. He wasn't on that particular map.

Not for as long as he could remember.

(And, as long as things remained that way, Hiccup's brightest future would be to stay behind that furnace—making swords and maces until his fingers fell off and his skin wrinkled. The first of his bloodline to be cast aside and become a blacksmith. Incredible.

It was an unfortunate thought, but undeniably a logical one. It made sense for the other Vikings to think that of Hiccup.

It made sense for Hiccup himself to understand the reasoning.

But that didn't mean Hiccup had accepted it.)

Maybe his place was in that troll cave he had dreamed of finding as a child. Getting kidnapped and mistaken for a tooth cleaner, just as his dear old father had so often implied about him. Drawing laughter from visitors whenever he thought his son wasn't home.

Or maybe his place was in the forest, on those occasions when he actually ran away from home after hearing things others would call him weak for caring too much about. When there was only him, the forest atop the mountains behind the Haddock house, and his strange stick – which could very well have been a hunter's sword. Chasing those stupid trolls and maybe bringing one or two of the monster's heads back home to prove that– no, no, Father. I'm not going to become a human mop when I grow up.

I can be a warrior, just like all of you.

Hiccup wished his place were beside everyone else.

There weren't any trolls by the end of the day. Obviously.

Hiccup's uncertain future is...complicated. On a good day, he tries not to think too much about it.

And on a bad day, he did. Relentlessly. Painfully. Too much, even. And, in a way, Hiccup hadn't changed much in that regard.

And then there was that moment, beneath the evening sky, so many years ago. When the sun had already put up with enough of Hiccup's nonsense and decided to disappear for the rest of the day, earlier than it did during the warmer seasons. Moments after little Hiccup decided the troll hunt was over, as he sprawled across the ground in some random clearing and stared at the thin clouds drifting across the sky.

He remembers thinking to himself how lucky those trolls were that he was tired. Tired of those stupid visitors. Tired of the things his father said to them. Tired of running away from home–

Tired of running around, knocking down fantastical walls and annoying dangerous monsters in the process. Viking things.

Those Viking things were making him tired. And can you imagine how absurd that thought is?

The Hiccup of that time was tired of himself. Not only because he'd had that thought, which went against practically everything he so desperately wanted for himself, but because of everything that had led him to that moment – lying there, defeated, while perhaps having his first existential crisis in his few years of life.

He was tired. And all that damn effort wasn't getting him anywhere. Nothing he did seemed right. Not the way everyone else made it seem.

And that only became obvious after running through the entire forest to escape. A future chief shouldn't run away. A Viking shouldn't run away.

But of course he ran. He ran from those stupid insects.

Because, at the end of that whole endeavor, the fantastical walls were just bushes.

Because, no matter how hard he tried, the dangerous, cruel monsters everyone claimed to have defeated at least once in their lives were nothing more than glorified insects to Hiccup. Of course. Of course they were. That's just how things were for him.

If Dad heard this…Hiccup caught himself thinking, with a certain dark humor that didn't suit him, just like everything else.

He would definitely laugh. At me.

Tiny yellow and black insects with a distinct sweet scent. With their stingers and everything else, chasing him through the entire forest because they were angry with him. And this time it was painfully true.

Angry with him. With Hiccup. Not with some Viking.

Because there weren't any in that forest.

Lying in the clearing, the flattened, cold grass beneath him, his body throbbed from all the running. With a thin branch – a real branch, not a sword – still between his even thinner fingers, the grip of his hand tightened.

And as he stared blankly at that beautiful sky– the child Hiccup, that skinny, stubborn fishbone, realized something that day.

Nowadays, he no longer remembers exactly what led him to that conclusion, nor does he remember the feelings that came before it. All he can remember is the vastness of the sky above his small body stretched across the ground. The dance of the thin clouds overhead, drifting as though there were no end. His breath left his lips in puffs of icy air. The sweep of the winter wind through the treetops. The rustling of the leaves.

Just him, the forest around him, and the blue sky.

The Hiccup of that time then realized, at the tender age of nine or ten, that he was tired of pretending.

(It was the first time Hiccup became aware of himself and of his place.)

Anger seemed to be the only universal truth in his entire life. His father was angry at him, the adults in the village were angry at him, the children his age were angry at him– for Thor's sake, even he himself sometimes felt awful about himself back then. And more than anything, he needed to be determined to change some of those things. Or, at the very least, become acceptable to everyone else.

He needed to change. But not magically, the way he'd wanted just half an hour earlier and throughout all the years before.

He needed to change something, and this time, there had to be an answer.

Little Hiccup didn't expect the shouting to stop, or the contempt in the adults' eyes to disappear. He didn't believe the beatings from the other children would vanish overnight.

But he wanted something to happen. And this time, something good.

And for that, there was no point in staying sprawled across that ground.

Maybe he needed to be more determined, but that didn't seem to be the problem – a destiny in a troll cave or serving as a mop in the Great Hall wasn't a very appealing future to his younger self.

No– the nine- or ten-year-old Hiccup actually had plenty of determination. It was determination that made him run through the entire forest that day, after all. Not the bees. Definitely not them.

Not once did he give up on becoming a Viking. A Viking like his father and the others. And he certainly wasn't going to do it then, especially after having that epiphany.

Determination and motivation weren't the problem.

It was his dream, after all. And back then, that thought alone was enough. As simple as any other.

The problem was how he would achieve it.

He needed an alternative route.

He wasn't the fastest, the tallest, or the most experienced. The most anything, really. Definitely not the strongest.

None of those paths would make him a Viking.

A real Viking.

So, that evening, when he finally gathered the strength to get up and returned home, the moon was already high in the sky. He didn't flinch when his father scolded him. He didn't go straight to his room the way he usually did after messing up – he stayed where he was, quietly, and that caught Stoick's attention. In a rather absurd way.

You see, the chief of Berk thought his son– skinny, small, scrawny, Hiccup, of all people– was challenging him, of all people! Only Thor knows what led his father to think whatever it was, as he looked at his son covered in dirt, scratched all over, and strangely quiet, staring at the chief with an expression that not even Hiccup himself could remember.

He didn't know what his father had thought, or how the rest of that night had unfolded after the confrontation. All Hiccup could remember was that, shortly after dawn the following day, he was standing in front of the village forge – a rustic structure built mostly of stone and dark oak wood, smelling of worn leather, old blood, and misery.

Back then, it looked like the gateway to Hel, ready to consume the younger version of himself and drag him into the purgatory of the unfortunate.

A punishment, as his father had put it.

It didn't take long for Hiccup to get the hang of that hole, claim part of it as his own, and then... turn it into something. He didn't like calling it home, much less a refuge. As true as both of those things were, on different levels. One thing, however, was certain: that something had become his true north star, guiding him whenever he felt lost.

Toward what direction? Well, he could only hope it was toward becoming a Viking.

Gods, how he hoped it was.

Odin had decided his place was beneath Gobber's good arm, and only Odin knows what it's like to be there in an enclosed space, just a few weeks away from Gobber's next bath.

Misery and regret hung in the air – figuratively, of course. But if Hiccup had to describe his situation and the smell that accompanied it with two words, those would be them.

Sometimes, he wished only Odin really knew.

Hiccup's job was to help with rusted swords, scorched catapults, and axes that really shouldn't bend as much as they did in good, civilized Berk.

Between Gobber's instructions, his self-proclaimed mentor, and all those Vikings who couldn't take care of their own weapons, Hiccup had become very good at fixing things.

But that wasn't his alternative route. Ah. Nope.

Hiccup discovered it during his first few months at the forge, while rummaging through leftovers from Gobber's rough work. Junk that collects dust, as the blond Viking would grumble about those odd pieces he didn't see much purpose in and that always ended up appearing around the workshop sooner or later.

Gobber was Berk's great blacksmith, and Hiccup had no doubt about his skills. But between making the same weapons, repairing the sameweapons, and dealing with every other – rather routine– consequence of surprise visits from fire-breathing creatures, the Viking had adopted a very simple approach. Don't make more stress for yourself. Dealing with the scaly beasts and the aftermath they left behind was already troublesome enough, if Gobber's missing hand and foot were any proof.

So Hiccup, being the weirdo that he was, collected all that junk. Pieces of metal from Gobber, and strange materials left behind by the merchants his father and mentor sometimes had to entertain. He spent sleepless nights burning his own hands while testing different ways to give those pieces – those useless parts of a whole – the slightest bit of hope. A way to turn them into something greater. Something better.

Months after that day in the clearing, when the glow of the furnace was the only source of light on the entire island of Berk, with aching hands and trembling legs from standing for so long, on that day, Hiccup finally discovered his route. He found the first step toward his dream. Toward his hope.

In front of him stood a single shield, strange and a little crooked. Unlike the usual kind, it wasn't made of wood. Not entirely.

It was small, a little ugly. Definitely heavier than normal. But it was his. It was the shield Hiccup had made.

A little later that day, he showed Gobber his creation.

The shield didn't survive the strength test.

But the fire–

"Ah, lad..." Gobber had grunted, watching the strange surface of the shield gleam beneath the flames, illuminating the faint trail of the other minerals embedded within its coating. Like a scattering of incandescent grains of sand. He watched how the fire had clung intrinsically to the material, and how Hiccup had turned that into his triumph.

He had discovered a mixture capable of absorbing heat more slowly than normal. It wasn't exactly iron or metal, and he didn't know what to call it. He didn't know if it was actually good as a shield, since it had broken so easily. Maybe it was the amount of ore, or maybe it needed more wooden parts to support the structure. And then there was the matter of the fire – how long until too much heat was absorbed by the metal? Would dragon fire have the same effect, or was it a hundred times more reactive? What was the ideal thickness so it wouldn't break, whether against dragons or under other circumstances? What–

He didn't know the answer to any of those questions and, oh, how he longed to find out.

He felt a pang of sadness afterward as he looked at his shield in pieces. But it was all worth it when Gobber grabbed the collar of his shirt with his hook and practically forced him to recreate the substance.

Hiccup's thing was creating.

He was an inventor, even if Hiccup was the only one who took that seriously, after all this time without anything nearly as significant as that first time.

He liked to tell people to ignore all his failures over the past few years and focus on how he'd achieved that result. How he'd managed to build an automatic catapult out of broken bows and axe handles that Gobber had so eloquently thrown at his face to keep him occupied. Ignore how the catapult had started spinning out of control and destroyed one or two posts. That's not the point. That's not relevant.

At least, not to his growth as an inventor. Failure is part of the process, after all.

His father and the rest of Berk certainly didn't think that way. But it didn't matter– it wasn't as though they'd ever thought the same way Hiccup did at any other point in his life. They certainly weren't going to start now, with his slightly faulty inventions, when Hiccup was destroying parts of the village the dragons hadn't yet bothered to.

Ah, the dragons.

Those creatures even stupider than trolls, the ones Hiccup was supposed to kill even though it was far more likely the opposite would happen. But it wasn't like anyone expected that from him anyway.

In fact, the other teenagers in the village used to shout jokes about how Hiccup and the dragons had some kind of strange rivalry – how the two of them were constantly competing to see who could destroy more of Berk.

When his father found out about that particular insult directed at his son, Hiccup – perhaps to lighten the mood; honestly, he'd rather not remember – made some stupid comment about how that was the only way the villagers would ever associate Hiccup with any kind of conflict against dragons. Or something like that.

It would be an understatement to say his father wasn't happy at all after hearing that.

And it didn't seem to be just another joke. The last time he hid among the clutter in the forge while a couple of bullies were chasing him, Hiccup overheard the two brutes talking about some sort of bet. Something about which part of Berk Hiccup would destroy during the next dragon raid, and who Hiccup would send straight to old Gothi, the village healer, by the end of the day.

They were betting on Gothi herself and, honestly, he tuned out of the conversation right then and there.

Hiccup didn't need that nonsense. He'd already learned to store it away in that insignificant little box at the back of his mind. It was almost automatic at that point.

It doesn't matter. Hiccup remembered thinking. The heavy footsteps of the two teenagers fading into the distance. None of this will matter afterward.

And that day, while he was hiding, he remembered that, even in the heat of the forge, that thought made him feel cold. Numb.

In that sense, the process is the least important element.

With his failed creations, Hiccup absorbs his mistakes and turns them into successes. He gets right what he got wrong, then gets it wrong ten more times afterward. It was part of it. For his creations, the process is the most important thing. He learns from it, no matter how much it hurts to fail over and over again. And maybe, just maybe, next time, it'll be ten times less. Ten times fewer mistakes than the previous attempt. He doesn't know. But Hiccup keeps trying. Until the number of mistakes gets smaller. Until he manages to build something perfect.

Something worthy of a Hooligan.

The perfect weapon.

A weapon capable of bringing down a dragon.

Not killing it – because that's something he'll do himself.

And then none of that nonsense will matter. No jokes about fishbones, no pointless beatings, no stupid bets. All that bullshit will disappear.

Nothing he's gone through – nothing he's lived through – over the past few years will matter. Everyone will forget. Even he wants that to happen.

The moment he kills a dragon, Hiccup will become someone else.

Someone better.

He'll become like them.

(Hiccup will no longer be alone in that clearing, with a strange ache in his chest, far greater than the scratches covering his body. The tips of his fingers tingling with pain. Longing. Wishing– )

His father will understand. They'll finally understand.

They'll see Hiccup.

He'll finally become what he's always wanted to be–

A Viking.

...So, you see. If someone asked him where he'd like to spend a lovely early-winter morning before dawn, he wouldn't answer anything, because it's not as though people asked Hiccup things. Of all people.

Usually, they were too busy yelling at him.

But if, of course, he considered that lovely question himself, his obvious answer would be his own room in the Chief's house. A simple answer. An answer that made sense. His father. The Chief. His room. Everything and a little more. Straightforward.

His mind, whether he liked it or not, would be in that forge.

So there he was. No one had asked him anything, obviously. He was going to the forge because he had to be there. Because making his own life more complicated and creating stress for himself was what he'd learned during his first few months as an apprentice – the complete opposite of what Gobber kept hammering into his thick skull.

His father was still fast asleep downstairs, snoring like a war drum and making the floorboards tremble, as though the house itself were preparing for battle. Unaware of his son sneaking about like an amateur raider in his own home, slipping out the front door and running toward what was supposed to have been a punishment – in the middle of the night, no less. Because perfect weapons don't make themselves.

On this particular morning before dawn. Which just so happened to be today – today, which was a strange day. And it hadn't even properly begun.

As he contemplated his own life and every decision that had led him to that moment, he wondered whether "today" was, in fact, yesterday's "tomorrow." The early morning darkness seemed endless as he unconsciously waited for a sun that always seemed late whenever things involved Hiccup.

He didn't know the answer. Time became confusing when you spent too much of it thinking about your own misery when you should've been doing something actually useful.

He needed this creation not to magically self-destruct this time. By the time winter began, it would have been more than three years since that day in the clearing. Since that morning when he'd become Gobber's apprentice. One success and three years of failure were hard to swallow, but that wasn't the real problem.

Winter was coming, as it did every year, and with it, the shortage of food.

The dragons attacked a few days before the height of the season to steal what little the village had left. And if there was ever a time of year to prove his worth, it would be then.

This time, he needed to do something to help the village. Something that worked.

Yet on that early winter morning – when time seemed to seep languidly into his tired bones, his hair sticking to his forehead with sweat – as the metal surfaces of the items scattered around the workshop reflected different shades of silver and copper, the heat of the furnace bathing the entrance to the forge in a twilight glow, Hiccup realized that today, oh, today he wasn't going to be productive.

Today, on this random winter morning before dawn, Hiccup felt his brain melt with an indescribable heat and his heart race like mad.

Today, as he stared at the forge's completely destroyed door, frozen by the incandescent glow of the most beautiful, surreal eyes he'd ever seen in his entire life...

Hiccup realized he wasn't going to get anything productive done today.

Not while reflecting on his own depressing situation, and definitely not while the most peculiar – and undeniably brilliant – boy Hiccup had ever seen burst through the forge door in the middle of the night and stared at him as though his life depended on it.

As though that glow depended on Hiccup.

Of all people.

Today is a day, a yesterday, a strange early morning. But that's alright.

Hiccup will get used to it if this is what he gets to see every time.

Chapter 1 — When the Sun is Made of Honey.

Bright white specks streaked across the sky, illuminating the blackened canvas above the clouds like a black sea turned upside down. Just as dark as the ocean itself, its waves crashed against the great boulders rising from the water, like the dying swords of fallen giants. The sea was its own vast expanse of darkness, with the only celestial body in the sky illuminating its most distant, shadowed reaches, where not even the restless waves along the shore dared to appear. In that narrow stretch along the horizon, where the black sky met the unfathomable ocean, moonlight reflecting across the water, only silence reigned.

It's ironic to think that most of the stories he'd ever heard spoke of different horrors lurking beneath that silence. When, in truth, the real terror of the people who lived on that island dwelled above the skies, illuminated by the vastness of the stars.

Hiccup walked calmly along the stone staircase leading into the village. His father hadn't even stirred when he'd accidentally shut the front door a little too hard, making the iron hinge groan in protest. In fact, Hiccup believed his father would be impressed by such a feat, considering how little Stoick expected from him.

There wasn't a single light burning in Berk's houses to suggest anyone was awake at that hour. Not that it made any difference. That's what Hiccup liked to think, though the thought didn't stop his shoulders from relaxing as a chilly mist escaped his mouth in the form of a sigh.

The center of Berk was bathed in the light of the sky, casting silver beams across the stone pavement. Shafts of light stretched over patches of mud as though they wished to merge with the earth itself.

Hiccup didn't consider himself someone who disliked people. Not entirely. But there were moments like that, surrounded by the purest nothingness, that brought him a bittersweet sense of peace.

If he closed his eyes, he could hear the gentle hum of the wind weaving through the rooftops. The waves crashing against the hardened edge of the island. He could almost see, through his eyelids, the faint glow of the stars, like white dots trying to seep back into his vision. He might think they were Sol's rays rising over the horizon and realize just how infinitely comforting and lonely that silence felt.

Back when Stoick still carried him with one arm, when he still walked him to his room and helped him fall asleep, when the man still smiled at him– melancholic, wistful, as though he looked at his little son and saw someone else– his nights were filled with stories. Stories of fallen giants, of immortal gods who were undeniably human. With all the flaws and worldly desires that came with it.

His father had never been a religious man, but the way he recited every little detail of those stories to little Hiccup made him seem almost devout.

There had been one time when he told him the stars in the sky were living fire. That those distant, fleeting specks were blazing flames, waiting for Ragnarök so their fire could shine as brightly as possible for one final second before going out forever. Falling straight into the gaping jaws of the end of days.

A strange mixture of fascination and sadness had settled inside the heart of a little boy who shouldn't have been feeling such things at such a young age. Especially because of that old story. Told so Hiccup wouldn't get himself into trouble, so he'd stay away from fire and Berk's dark nights while he was still young enough – when expectations could still be kept at bay in favor of childish innocence.

After all, back then, Hiccup was nothing more than a premature motherless child.

And that same small, almost forgotten feeling of bittersweetness stirred in his chest as Hiccup looked over the silent village and an even quieter sky.

Hiccup sighed. He didn't know why he'd allowed himself to remember that. Maybe it was because there had been more visible stars in the sky over the past few days, as the archipelago prepared for winter. Maybe it was because dusk and nightfall were arriving far too quickly, the nights stretching on languidly, longer than the days.

Maybe it was because of that bittersweet sense of peace.

It didn't matter. He crossed the center of the village with long strides, his thick, soft leather boots making almost no sound as Hiccup carefully chose where to step. The last thing he wanted was for someone to see him wandering through the darkness and start spreading even more rumors about Hiccup, worse than the ones already going around.

He passed through narrow alleyways, staying out of sight of a few balconies and low windows. The houses in Berk were crooked and numerous, some of them standing only because they leaned against the ones beside them. A few lampposts – tall wooden trunks planted into the ground with fire braziers burning atop them throughout the night – cast light across the stone pavement while Hiccup slipped behind them.

And before he knew it, he was standing in front of both his existential nightmare and his greatest achievement.

The forge was one of the few structures in the village capable of surviving multiple dragon attacks without collapsing into rubble. It also stood out in Berk like a scorched sore thumb – built almost entirely of dark stone with a dark wooden frame. It was wider than it was tall, with half of the roof left open to the sky so the smoke from the furnace could escape. A large wooden window faced the center of Berk, beside a pair of double doors. It was Gobber's workspace, where the other Vikings would crowd around the window and shout demands at both the blacksmith and Hiccup.

On the opposite end of Gobber's work area, somewhat hidden from public view, stood a single back door – a door that led directly into Hiccup's self-proclaimed workspace.

Hiccup slipped a hand into the small pouch tied around his waist. He pulled something out and with practiced fingers quickly unlocked the door using a replica of the original key. He pushed it open. An ironic smile threatened to spread across his face as the door swung open without the slightest problem.

Gobber will have to try something else if he wants to stop me. Hiccup couldn't hold back the smile that finally appeared as he spun the key around one finger, stepped inside, and kicked the door shut behind him.

He looked around the empty, dark workshop, his workplace and unofficial purgatory, with a grin he most certainly shouldn't have been wearing.

Hiccup thought he could've been whistling right then.

Nothing can stop me from staying up all night. Not even keys hidden somewhere strategically too high for me to reach. Thank you very much.

Take that, Gobber.

"Alright." He gestured broadly with his arms, as though expecting the metal tools to applaud him for successfully breaking into his own workshop. Or maybe they owed him a hug. Whichever came first. He wasn't picky. "Now, where were we?"

The tools didn't answer, obviously.

"Tough crowd." Hiccup clapped his hands together before rubbing them. He shivered as the winter wind swept in through the door and hit him full-on, making his button-up shirt flutter in the breeze. He rubbed his hands more vigorously, feeling the calluses on his fingertips and the small burn marks.

Hiccup inhaled. "Right. Where to begin...?"

Hiccup hurried from one side of the workshop to the other, reorganizing the space in pursuit of his goal while mentally sorting through a list of priorities. He lit the furnace, and orange firelight rose majestically. The glow illuminated nearly the entire workshop, painting the stone walls with a muted golden hue and softening the long shadows stretching across the floor. Every time Hiccup walked in front of the furnace, the reflected light dancing across the axes mounted on the walls swayed with him, like waves of liquid light.

At his workbench – a worn wooden table cluttered with tools and torn scrolls, positioned beside a stone slab – he dragged out a crate hidden beneath it, covered by a weathered leather tarp. The furnace seemed to be doing its job well because, as soon as Hiccup let go of the crate and dropped onto the floor, he felt sweat bead across his forehead, his hair sticking to his skin uncomfortably. The heat slowly warmed the sauna they called a forge, and Hiccup wasn't the least bit excited about the temperature shock waiting for him once he stepped back outside.

Slowly, as though trying to postpone the inevitable, Hiccup climbed back to his feet. With trembling arms he refused to acknowledge, he grabbed the crate with both hands and lifted it.

"Huff– Ugh–" His hand slipped, and Hiccup quickly tried to regain his balance by bracing one knee against the bottom of the crate. He lurched dangerously to one side and, before he could think, one hand shot desperately toward the edge of the box. A sudden sting spread across his palm as something sharp jabbed into it, and Hiccup bit back a groan.

"Son of a Troll–" Hiccup exhaled sharply, a strained whine escaping the back of his throat as he finally dropped the crate onto the table. The table groaned in protest while he leaned against its wooden edge with both hands, one on either side of the crate.

"It's fine." He was breathing heavily. Why did that damned crate have to be so heavy? Or maybe the problem was him. Maybe. That was the more likely answer. Dangerous train of thought–

"Perfectly fine." His voice cracked slightly as he dragged out the last word, as though trying to prove a point to a nonexistent audience, but he ignored it. Hiccup tried to breathe in slowly and methodically. He closed his eyes.

The very picture of tranquility, if he had any say in the matter.

He reached out and slowly pulled away the tarp.

All sorts of…things filled Hiccup's vision.

Twisted, rusted, and unusual daggers gleamed just like the axes on the walls. Chunks of metal, oddly colored stones, and strangely shaped rocks nearly spilled out of the overflowing crate. Hiccup spotted the tip of a crude arrow sticking out from one side of the box, the culprit that had jabbed his hand. Fortunately, the thick leather tarp had been between his skin and the sharp object, so he hadn't cut himself or contracted whatever centuries-old disease all that junk most certainly carried.

Hiccup liked to affectionately refer to that beloved and suspicious crate as the Treasure Chest. Gobber, the comedian that he was, preferred calling it ‘Gothi's Impending Heart Attack.’

The last time they'd argued about the chest, it was safe to say Gobber had been a little...too enthusiastic about knocking some sense into Hiccup. The mead had done most of the work, leading to a few...impolite remarks, even by Hiccup's sarcastic standards. Gobber and Hiccup had been having dinner in the Great Hall and, even from the opposite side of the large, noisy room, the old woman had somehow found her way to them after hearing her own name alongside the phrase ’Sudden death by unknown illness caused by hoarding junk’ – like an eel smelling blood in the water.

The two of them ended up getting smacked on the head with her staff – and not even Gobber's Viking helmet saved him from waking up with a lump on his head the next morning.

Hiccup snorted.

He carefully removed the items from the crate. Hiccup organized the workbench, stacking together everything that would be useful and everything he'd need to continue where he'd left off the previous day. Slowly, as his hands worked, his mind drifted away from his body. Muscle memory took over while his thoughts wandered.

Vaguely, he registered a few thoughts about the changing season. It was getting colder every day, and the first snowfall would arrive in only a few more days. He couldn't afford these brief moments of detachment if he wanted to be as productive as possible. Winter was coming, and there were still countless tasks to finish– repairing the fire braziers atop several lampposts, helping Gobber rebuild the Thorstons' barn after lightning had struck it through sheer bad luck, checking and listing the reserve weapons before the next dragon raid, which would probably happen on the very same day the first snow fell from the sky…

The list of chores slowly dissolved into background noise inside his mind. A feeling of guilt settled in Hiccup's chest as a single memory selfishly demanded all of his attention.

It had snowed that day.

In the clearing.

It had been a winter evening(...)

CRASH!

A thunderous bang echoed throughout the room, the walls trembling from the intrusion. The shrill sound sliced through the silence of the workshop like an anvil smashing against the floor.

The deafening crash echoed throughout the room, the walls trembling from the intrusion. The shrill noise tore through the workshop's silence like an anvil smashing against the floor.

The sound pierced Hiccup's skull painfully. The shock made his entire body tense and lock up; not even his fight-or-flight instinct could force him to move.

Hiccup felt his breath catch in his throat, his fingers tightening around nothing. His ears rang with the lingering remnants of the noise, but once it finally faded, he couldn't hear anything at all– his heart seemed desperate to burst out of his chest, preferably through his eardrums, because all Hiccup could hear was the frantic pounding of his own heartbeat.

His mind had been so far removed from his body that the shock of a sudden, loud noise hit a thousand times harder than it should have. Fuck, he couldn't even remember what he'd been thinking about anymore, aside from that ghostly, bitter feeling that always settled on the roof of his mouth whenever Hiccup spent too long dwelling on his own misery.

He felt dizzy. So, so dizzy. He couldn't move. Hiccup couldn't move. He thought he wasn't breathing. He wasn't breathing! The bitter taste in his mouth felt like a splint wrapped around his throat, and panic made his ears ring even louder as his body tightened painfully and he wasn't breathing– the pain tore through his chest like a mockery of his own memories and—and he– he couldn't–

CRACK!

His thoughts stopped abruptly.

Air rushed violently back into his lungs, tearing at Hiccup's throat. He coughed so painfully that he doubled over, one hand slamming heavily against the table for support. His free hand flew to his chest, fingers twisting his shirt uncomfortably. He breathed through his mouth in deep, ragged gasps, sweat dripping from his forehead onto the tabletop.

Silence.

Hiccup didn't know how much time had passed.

But slowly, steadily, his hearing returned.

Only then did Hiccup have enough presence of mind to realize the sounds had come from behind him.

He didn't have the strength to turn around.

Even after his breathing slowed, he still felt as though he were gasping endlessly for air. Only later, once he managed to push himself upright with trembling arms and stand without the risk of collapsing, did Hiccup realize where that feeling was coming from.

He wasn't the one breathing so heavily.

There was someone panting behind him.

If Hiccup hadn't been freaking out before—he definitely was now.

That was it. It was over. Hiccup was going to die.

He would be burned, beaten, drowned, thrown off Berk's cliffs right then and there. Odin had handed out far too much contempt and far too little patience to everyone in Berk – sooner or later somebody would have to do the dirty work. His body would end up as yak feed and Hiccup felt the tension rush back into his body with the force of a collapsing cliff and– He would die. He would die, and it wouldn't even be a dignified death– of course not. Of course not! Hiccup would be murdered by some viking baker or janitor with a personal grudge against him. Or maybe one of the other teenagers had finally gotten tired of sharing the same oxygen as him. Hiccup was betting on Snotlout. Maybe Hiccup had accidentally knocked over that strategically misplaced lamppost once or twice and it'd fallen – one or more times…– into Snotlout's bedroom while he was asleep. But it was an accident! He swore! The third time had been pure coincidence! Still, he didn't doubt Snotlout would follow through on his death threats. By the gods– he would die. He would die in the damned forge, of all places. From there he'd go straight to Hel's purgatory, he was sure of it, and she'd look at Hiccup with so much disappointment in her eyes that he'd feel as though he'd returned to the world of the living only to find himself facing his own dad and– oh, Thor, he would die. Hiccup would die, and– and it'd be the most pathetic–

A voice interrupted Hiccup's thoughts.

Oh.

Hiccup, he–

He felt as though he'd stopped existing.

It was as if his body had lost all its weight. As though the air in his lungs had become nothing more than a fleeting memory.

Everything around him seemed to have been swallowed into an incomprehensible void.

The crushing weight of the atmosphere on his shoulders vanished as though it'd never been there.

The tension left his body so suddenly that Hiccup had to grip the edge of the table again– his fingers turning white from how hard he squeezed. It should have hurt.

It didn't.

Silence stretched on after the voice faded away, but Hiccup couldn't focus on that silence. He couldn't.And this time, the familiar morbid feeling those two words always carried was replaced by nothing but static.

Hiccup felt dizzy, sober, light, and heavy. Everything and nothing at once. The last notes of that voice clung to his mind like molasses. His brain replayed them in a dizzying loop, deaf to everything except that sound. The bitter, rancid taste in his mouth became what it truly was – nothing more than a distant, fleeting memory compared to the overwhelming wave of emotion surging through him. Because at that exact moment, all Hiccup could feel was electricity racing through his veins like liquid fire. His goosebump-covered skin trembled with every second that stretched into a tiny eternity. The molasses in his mind trickled downward, through his bones, his limbs, his body, down his throat and then–

Oh.

It was sweet.

Like honey.

Golden light shimmered across the walls as a breeze swept through the blazing furnace.

Thump. Thump.

His brain had melted completely. His hands trembled uncontrollably, and his heart pounded like mad–

The voice came again, and Hiccup felt like he was dying.

If Hiccup had possessed enough presence of mind, he would've been panicking over himself. His thoughts were completely out of control. But now–

Now he didn't care in the slightest.

The voice– oh– soft, low. A little husky. Hiccup wasn't a poet, but he could have spent hours upon hours, from dawn until dusk, describing in the most absurd ways imaginable just how unreal and magnetic that voice was. He wouldn't have been a very good poet, but he definitely would've tried. For that voice. It deserved the effort.

It was as though every sound carried by that captivating voice contained the same sweet, intoxicating molasses that made his brain stop working and sent his heart racing.

Every sound, every subtle drop in tone, every higher resonance had an utterly catastrophic and gratifying effect on him. It reminded him of the wind chimes hanging from Gothi's porch, swaying in the sea breeze that swept across the cliffs. The gentle tapping of those metal strips against wood, creating a melody so beautiful and indescribable, different with every passing breeze.

And only then did Hiccup realize.

The voice came again.

And this time– this time, Hiccup finally realized.

He hadn't understood a single word it was saying.

The realization hit Hiccup like a slap across the face.

The impact was so great that his brain snapped back into place and immediately bombarded him with replays of his earlier thoughts, as though determined to show him the last few seconds of his utterly delirious train of thought – as though those had been the final moments of his life, and instead of replaying his entire miserable existence, his traitorous perfectly sober brain had decided to highlight that spectacular lapse in judgment and—

Oh, gods, the embarrassment was so intense he could physically feel it in the pit of his stomach. Heat rushed into his face so violently that his eyes watered.

Almighty Thor– he desperately wanted to die.

He had been– He had been– M-melting over a voice he couldn't even understand. Hiccup didn't even know what the hell that person had been saying!

That person…

Person…

Ah.

Oh, gods.

There was a person behind him, panting, speaking in some strange language. Behind him.

He had his back turned to a complete stranger–

Inside a forge.

Filled with damned axes–

Hiccup spun around so quickly that he lost his balance. His gangly arms flailed helplessly through empty air like underfed eels, knocking everything over as he stumbled. The tools on the workbench flew across the room and clattered loudly against the floor, metal scraping painfully against stone in a profane cacophony. He slammed his hip into the edge of the stone slab and let out a grunt worthy of a yak with a sore throat as he desperately tried to steady himself, narrowly avoiding a concussion by ducking just before smashing his head against the stone surface.

The entire disaster lasted only a few seconds, but the soundtrack to his humiliation continued as more objects and assorted junk rolled off the slab and crashed onto the floor.

...

…When the last object finally landed, both he and the intruder stood perfectly still.

Hiccup realized the person was no longer panting. Probably frozen in shock just as dumbfounded as he was by the phenomenal bad luck that seemed determined to haunt him.

Silence returned.

The forge fire flickered and shimmered, dancing with the wind.

Slowly, Hiccup raised his eyes.

The sun.

Hiccup felt his lips form the words, the sweetness of the enormity before him still coating his tongue with the intoxicating taste of honey.

It was the first coherent thought he'd had. Hiccup thought he'd said it out loud. He wasn't sure.

He doesn't care.

A gust of wind swept through the wide-open doorway, crossed the workshop, and struck the furnace. The forge fire took shape as though it were alive, surging into something untamed, unimaginable– Its ghostly golden glow expanded and shimmered, consuming every inch it touched. It was as though the workshop's morbid colors had grown young again – without the dried blood embedded in the rough stone walls, without the cracks and worn depressions marking the floor. Every scar left by that place's history disappeared. Vanished. The supernatural golden light wrapped around everything and everyone like a blazing veil, swallowing all of Hiccup's senses beneath an overwhelming and infinitely gentle wave.

Gold exploded from every direction.

The world could have ended right then and there, and Hiccup wouldn't have cared in the slightest.

A pair of incandescent eyes stared back at him, radiant, oh, so radiant, that Hiccup had the childish and foolish thought of the light everyone claimed appeared in life's final moments. When the Valkyries, magnificent and awe-inspiring beings descending from the heavens, bathed in that glow to carry away warriors who had fallen with honor.

But Hiccup wasn't a warrior. He wasn't worthy. He never had been. And there was nothing honorable about Hiccup in that moment. Especially because–

As he stood beneath the gaze of those twin eyes that burned everything they touched, a hysterical, blasphemous thought flooded his body and soul with the weight of a sin–

That–

That wasn't a Valkyrie. It couldn't be.

A Valkyrie could never compare to that being.

(No god or deity could ever shine as brightly as he did. Incandescent. Ethereal. Untouchable. He was the greatest of all stars—as though his light alone could sustain an eternal dawn. As though night itself could never again touch the sky the moment his gaze—golden, radiant, brilliant—fell upon the earth. The sea would stretch into golden flames across its entire surface, its depths twisting, yearning, longing. Monsters would emerge from the unbearable heat of the fire that scorched their eyes blind, for they were unworthy of such a sight. Such splendor. And then the golden light would consume everything that had ever existed. Greater than life itself. Devouring everything in its path. That would be the end of all things—Ragnarök bathed in fire.)

It was as though the sun itself had descended from the heavens, abandoned its immortal existence, and crossed the unimaginable breadth of the earth. Run tirelessly to that island at the far northern edge of the Barbaric Archipelago. To that forge. To Hiccup.

They were the most beautiful eyes Hiccup had ever seen in his entire life.

Amber eyes fixed themselves on Hiccup, glowing with something almost supernatural. A god in human skin stared at him– looking at him, seeing him, truly seeing Hiccup– And that gaze seemed so, so desperate.

A sound pierced through the haze of Hiccup's stupor.

A mouth was speaking those unfamiliar words.

Only then did Hiccup tear his gaze away from those liquid-gold eyes, and his own finally focused on the face of that being.

The explosion had happened long ago.

Thump. Thump.

The crackling of the flames faded with one last pop. The hum of the winter wind was nothing more than a phantom ache upon his skin—there was no longer any cold where golden light met dark stone.

All that remained of the explosion was an endless void. Silent. Faint. Where the only constant was the beating of his own heart...

…and the boy standing before him.

Thump. Thump.

Suddenly, Hiccup no longer knew if he was looking at something divine.

The moment he looked away from those eyes, it was as though that magnificent, extraordinary being had softened. Shrunk. Settled into the shape of something human, as though a single stolen second had pushed divinity into the background.

(And suddenly, the nature of that being changed.)

Because there was no other explanation.

The boy looked at Hiccup with such raw intensity that divinity spilled away from the edges of his face, giving way to something that was still beautiful, still radiant, but so, so painfully–

There was no god here. No Valkyrie. No untouchable magnetic celestial body–

There was only a boy.

and Hiccup knew– he felt it in the echo of his heartbeat and in the deepest part of his soul–that there was nothing and no one more beautiful than him.

and he was only human.

His skin was as white as freshly fallen snow, drinking in the light around him and tinting his naturally pale complexion with a silvery, starlit glow that clung to the boy's face and body as though the flames of the forge wished to forge a star of their own.

His eyes – oh, those beautiful, cursed suns – were round and expressive. They tapered sharply at the corners, giving them an almost feline appearance, though their naturally rounded shape softened those features. Like the eyes of a wild, untamable doe. Or a deceptively gentle fox. The lines of his face were slender and sharp, with high cheekbones and a jawline standing out beneath his silvery skin. Yet there was still enough youthful softness in his cheeks that it was easy to guess he was around Hiccup's age.

If Hiccup hadn't spent such an embarrassingly long time utterly captivated by that boy's unusually beautiful eyes, his hair would have been next on the list.

A soft, messy nest of brown hair, the color of fresh wood from the first trees to bloom in spring. The light from the forge struck the side of his head, illuminating his light brown hair until it looked almost blond. It shimmered alongside the boy's ivory skin.

In fact, now that Hiccup was thinking about it, he realized the boy's appearance was undeniably androgynous– the only reason Hiccup had unconsciously assumed the person was a boy was because of the short, messy hair, since Hiccup himself had short, messy hair. But most Vikings let their hair grow long along with their beards. Realizing that only left him feeling even more unsettled.

The wind blows again, and this time, instead of feeding the fire, the winter cold finally overcomes the heat of the forge – the flames die out abruptly.

As though they had never existed. As though they had never illuminated every corner of that room with their glow, surrounding the only two people on the island who had decided (by coincidence? Maybe fate? Hiccup hadn't the faintest idea) to stay awake until dawn on a dark winter night. As though that light hadn't irreparably altered the chemistry of his brain.

The next second, the last ember of the twilight fire goes out, plunging the workshop into complete darkness.

The only sound left is the wind sweeping across the rooftops of Berk.

Slowly, Hiccup's vision adjusts to the darkness.

The first thing he notices is that he never once looked away from that person.

And when he finally does, it's only because that person looked away first.

The boy's intense, visceral gaze slips away from Hiccup and falls directly onto the forge, now extinguished.

It's as if gravity, the atmosphere, and everything else have returned to existence.

Hiccup's head drops like a marionette whose strings have been cut. His chin thumps painfully against his sternum as he inhales and exhales deeply.

The second thing Hiccup notices is the unmistakable shape of a door lying on the floor. The same door he had unlocked with a copied key only moments before the most utterly insane sensations had taken hold of him. It feels like an eternity ago now, back when he still considered himself relatively sane.

He's not so sure anymore.

The door handle is beyond repair– twisted, hanging by a single strip of metal from the frame, the solid iron crushed inward, never to see the light of day again. Hiccup is almost certain that on the side wall (Stone. The forge walls are stone!!–) where the door had slammed with the force of ten Stoicks stacked on top of each other, there was now a deep crack in the exact shape of it.

He also has little doubt there's a matching mark on the floor beneath the door, where it landed so dramatically after being ripped completely off its hinges.

He can't blame it.

He'd like to dramatically collapse onto the floor and never get back up, too.

Just not now. At least not yet.

The divine voice speaks again.

–and if Ragnarök happens today, right now, this very second, then so be it.

Forget becoming a Viking and earning a place in the halls of Valhalla– Hiccup is perfectly ready to end his day, his night, his life, whatever this is, right here. He'll look Hel straight in the eyes, and instead of seeing his father, he'll see the long-awaited, well-deserved rest Hiccup so desperately needs.

"Gods," is the first thing Hiccup says in what might genuinely have been an eternity. "I'm going insane. I'm going insane and– ha, haha, Gods!–" He grabs his hair with both hands, threading his fingers through it like the madman he now realizes he is. "Gobber was right. I need more sleep. I'm going insane, and– and– all because of– " Hiccup chokes on the words.

"...a pretty guy–"

A loud, indignant huff cuts off Hiccup's stream of words.

His head snaps up, locking eyes once more with the ivory star that had fallen from the sky straight through his doorway.

The boy's raw, desperate expression returns in full force as he looks at Hiccup, his expressive eyes carrying all the pain his face had been hinting at. But now, as he stares back at Hiccup, those golden eyes widen even more. A new, unfamiliar emotion shines in those incandescent eyes and beautiful features, tinting his skin— his skin with—

Oh.

…Ah.

The boy is blushing.

His mouth moves soundlessly. No words come out. Hiccup finds himself in exactly the same situation.

His finally speaks, but Hiccup still cannot understand him.

"...W-what?" Hiccup hears himself ask.

The boy snaps his mouth shut so hard his teeth click together loudly enough for Hiccup to hear it from where he stands. The boy narrows his eyes. He stares at Hiccup with such sudden determination in those amber eyes that a shiver runs through Hiccup's entire body.

The boy parts his lips.

A whispered sound slips from between them.

"Nordic?"

The word stretches over every syllable, as though he were savoring the sound, feeling it in his own mouth, as though he lacked the confidence and certainty that came with speaking a language from birth.

"Y-yes?" Hiccup finds himself answering a beat too late, still trapped beneath that amber gaze.

A second passes.

Then the boy takes a deep breath–

And storms into Hiccup's workshop.

Hiccup barely has time to throw himself aside as the stranger invades his personal space and starts frantically rummaging through everything his pale hands can reach.

The tools that had survived Hiccup's spectacular fall don't have long to celebrate– the boy noisily shoves them aside. The pieces crash to the floor with a clamor loud enough to wake all of Berk. The painful racket makes Hiccup flinch and clamp his hands over his ears.

"Hey. Hey! What the hell are you—"

THUMP!

The crate tips onto its side as the boy throws his own weight against it.

The noise that follows could have put the worst thunderstorm to shame.

Dozens upon dozens of daggers spill across the stone slab before sliding onto the floor like pins the length of Hiccup's forearm. They ricochet wildly across the uneven stone. Metal plates, warped and battered swords, flammable stones, and heavy chunks of armor slam against the slab as though possessed. The sound tears through Hiccup's ears with a mastery even a Monstrous Nightmare would envy and Hiccup decides he's going to have nightmares about that noise for the rest of his tragically short life.

By the time Hiccup's soul returns to his body, the source of all his mental torment is already on the other side of the room, rummaging through Gobber's things like a boar gone completely berserk.

"Okay. Okay. That's enough."

Hiccup marches toward the boy, his shoulders tense and his entire body stretched taut like a rope on the verge of snapping and handing in its resignation.

He can't let this boy– or girl– h-he doesn't know! Oh Gods, what kind of situation has he gotten himself into? – break down his door, tear apart his workspace, and turn his life upside down like a cursed tornado without so much as an explanation. Even if Hiccup ends up getting punched in the face – the boy was half a head taller than him and he had somehow crushed a solid iron door handle. Hiccup is trying very, very hard not to think about that – he refuses to let himself be intimidated. He has every right to understand what's going on.

So, when Hiccup finally catches up to the frantic boy who seems determined to destroy his forge, he grabs him by the shoulder and turns him sharply toward himself.

Beautiful amber eyes stare back at him, brimming with tears.

The words die in Hiccup's throat immediately.

In Hiccup's defense, the boy interrupts him before he can recover.

"Rope!"

Hiccup is completely lost. "Uh...huh? What?"

"I-I need a rope!" The boy gestures frantically, pointing in every direction as though the item might magically appear. His hands nearly smack into Hiccup, and Hiccup realizes the boy either isn't used to gesturing like that or simply doesn't know how but he's far too desperate to care. Hiccup can sympathize with that feeling.

He swallows hard.

"Uh... a– a rope?"

"Yes!" The boy grows even more frantic, both palms landing against Hiccup's sides, though neither of them seems to notice.

The tears in the boy's eyes look closer and closer to falling. That finally gets Hiccup moving.

Before he can think better of it, he instinctively places both hands on the boy's shoulders, pressing them in what he desperately hopes is a reassuring way. A violent shiver runs beneath his palms, shaking the boy's shoulders. Gods. He's cold. The boy is completely soaked and Hiccup is only realizing it now.

Now isn't the time.

He'll think about it later, when the boy doesn't look like he's on the verge of falling apart.

"Alright. Breathe." Hiccup looks the other boy firmly in the eye, trying desperately not to get swept up in his own growing panic. He tries to keep his voice steady.

"I need you to tell me what kind of rope."

The sudden movement makes the boy stiffen. But, to his credit, it only takes him a few seconds to process Hiccup's words. He takes a shaky breath and lets his hands fall to his sides, clenching them into fists.

"...A rope strong enough to hold a boat."

He says it with such profound desperation that the words come out almost flat.

Hiccup suppresses another shiver. The weight of the situation slowly floods through him like an unforgiving tide.

"My father! H-he– he won't leave! I-I tried. I begged him– " A sob tears through the boy's throat and Hiccup feels the pain as though it were his own. The boy quickly hides his face, his messy bangs shadowing his features as he presses both hands over his mouth, muffling another horrible sound.

Hiccup feels his own hands begin to shake. He has no idea what expression he's making, but he's grateful the boy can't see it. The comforting thought doesn't last long shattered the moment another sob cuts through the air.

Pull yourself together, Hiccup hears himself think. I need to help them. The questions can come later.

With all the gentleness and care his awkward hands can manage, Hiccup slowly rubs his palms over the boy's shoulders, as though soothing an injured animal.

"I know where I can find one. It won't be here. But I know where the fishermen keep that kind of rope." Hiccup speaks softly. "I can take you there. You'll have to trust me."

The sobs gradually stop.

Star-filled eyes become visible again behind strands of brown hair. When the boy lifts his head and looks back at Hiccup, trails of stardust adorn his cheeks in the form of tears.

As heartbreaking as the sight undoubtedly was...Hiccup feels his lips lift into a small, gentle smile. He tells himself it's to comfort the boy, but he knows that isn't the only reason.

Even crying...He's still so beautiful.

"What's your name?" Hiccup whispers.

The boy opens his mouth and–

"Jack..."

The boy– Jack– whispers back.

"Jackson Overland.”