Crossing the Divide

Chapters

Chapter 1: Heads in the Clouds
Chapter 2: Fresh New Faces
Chapter 3: When Worlds Collide
Chapter 4: Shocking Experiences
Chapter 5: Moving On
Chapter 6: Dash Deals With A Dangerous Dump
Chapter 7: Ursine Umbrage
Chapter 8 The Big Apple: New Yoke
Chapter 9: Ponyville Panic!
Chapter 10: Nocturnal Encounters

Chapter 1: Heads in the Clouds

“This never gets old!” I yelled as the wind whipped past me, the helmet I was wearing protecting me from any serious harm, or at least that was the idea. My wingsuit as usual was flared open, allowing me to do what no other rider could even dream of accomplishing, which was flying with their dragon.

Speaking of dragons, out of the corner of my eye I could see the one being that had affected my life the most; my best friend, Toothless the Night Fury. A dragon so fierce it is said that the Night Fury dragons are the unholy offspring of lightning and death itself. As usual he was giving me that wide eyed grin which was almost trademark to him, showing nothing but pure unbridled happiness to just be flying about with me. If I could have seen my face, I would have seen an almost exact replica of that look. Even during the middle of the night we could see, the moon was bright enough to pierce the clouds.

“Woohoo!” I yelled again before performing a bank to my right, diving down under the clouds. Being above the clouds was nice but the view wasn’t anything special, all there was was white puffs, nothing interesting or notable. Sure, going as low as I was, was a little risky but as long as I had Toothless by my side, I had confidence that I would be safe.

As the cloud coverage lessened, the outline of the most beautiful sight filled my vision; Berk. A sight to behold to be sure. With animals, dragons, and of course people, all living in a beautiful harmony among the recently rebuilt town. The grass was various hues of green, as the blades not touched by the light of the moon appeared a darker green than the blades which did get the moon’s light. The sea was a nice tint of blue, with the familiar sound of waves washing and crashing against the shores of the island, crops were blooming, and the animals roamed around. I could never get enough of the sight, and in a way, it was all mine.

Being the chief of the village was hard work, harder than anything I ever had to do but as the challenges reared their ugly heads, I never backed down, taking them down one at a time. Of course that wasn’t to say I never got help along the way, and I would never be that prideful to not acknowledge all of those that helped me along the way. Whether it be my Mother and her words of wisdom, Astrid and her endless loving support, Gobber and his experience, or Toothless and his … well, honestly the only thing he had was his control of the dragons.

It was almost as if he knew that I was thinking mean thoughts about him, for without a single second of warning, I was tackled from behind by a massive ball of black scales. I hardly had any time to react before we were tumbling through the air, my entire body clutched closely to his, and I knew why a few seconds later.

The ground slammed into Toothless with no remorse, but he hardly cared, that dragon could take far worse than a simple attack by the ground. The initial impact was followed by many more, but decreasingly forceful ones, until eventually we came to a complete stop with him straddling my body as I lay on my back.

He had the typical smug grin on his face, the one that just screamed ‘I won.’ I simply rolled my eyes at him, like I could give any other response to his antics.

I swear that his smirk grew wider before his mouth opened and his massive, saliva coated tongue attacked me in a vicious assault of licks. no matter how I tried to defend, scramble away, or flail, his tongue kept on assaulting me, right in the middle of the village square.

“Gah! Stop that! You know that doesn’t wash off! How many times do I have to tell you!?” I shouted, trying to push him away from me, but failing horribly at it.

Eventually Toothless stopped his licking, instead opting to chuckle at my soaking wet body. That dragon would be the death of me, unless he kept saving me. I stood up slowly, using my hands to wipe off the most of the saliva but no doubt there was more hidden somewhere.

I was lucky that there was not a soul around to see the little event or else I would have never lived it down. How could the chief of Berk be defeated so easily and in such a sloppy way? I simply smiled at such a thought, I was pretty sure that everyone already had seen Toothless take me down with such easy force.

“Alright, Toothless, let’s go see Mom and Astrid before we head out,” I said, starting to walk back to my house, they should be there by now … in fact I was probably late. With a little bounce in my step, Toothless and I moved from the open square to our house.

It was the largest house in the village and conveniently placed right next to the Great Hall. Father never really told me much about the home, but I could assume that it had to have been built either by his father or his father’s father. I knew he didn’t build the magnificent thing but that didn’t mean he didn’t work on it.

The moment I reached the door, it swung inwards, revealing my Mother who was standing with her arms folded in front of her, foot tapping and a smug grin on her face. “You must stop being late, Hiccup.”

“Yeah I know, but can you can’t blame me this time, blame this big lug. He decided to assault my face again,” I told her, motioning to Toothless all the while. He on the other hand was currently following a butterfly intently, looking as if he was about to pounce on it and eat it.

“I’m glad to see you, even if you do nag my ear off.” I teased, while embracing my mother, as she hugged me back.

She simply smiled and shook her head before removing herself from the doorway, allowing me to walk inside. Toothless could never have fit through the door, so instead he had to come in through the door to his roost. The moment he noticed that I was no longer standing outside, he leaped onto the building before scrambling his way inside, dropping his head down from the roost, looking at us upside down, his tongue wagging out as per usual with him.

I pushed his head slightly to the side, making my way over to a seated Astrid who had a mug of something in her hands, and since there was no smell to it, it most likely wasn’t alcohol. Of course that didn’t mean that she didn’t partake every once and awhile. After all, us Vikings held far too many celebrations to actually stay away from it.

“Hiccup! Glad you could finally make it home, Odin knows when you ever make enough time to sleep,” she said before leaving her seat and mug to come up to me.

Slowly she wrapped her arms around me, pushing herself up to me before our lips met. It wasn’t anything long but it still felt amazing, almost incomparable. The reaction from Toothless just made it that much better, since he looked like he was trying to stick his tongue out in disgust but ended up having it flap over his face because he was upside down.

“I’m glad you're home though, things are rather … bland without a certain duo,” she said, giving me a little punch on the shoulder.

“Ruff and Tuff never leave the village though,” I said, a little smirk crossing my face, while Astrid just rolled her eyes at me.

“Yeah, yeah … so, where were you two? Goofing off as usual? Don’t you have a village to run, or whatever you call it,” she said, sticking her tongue at me. That of course was mimicked by Toothless who had since returned to ground level, and apparently taking Astrid’s side in the entire thing.

“Oh, you know … flying, gliding, working on the map … just the basic stuff,” I said, rubbing the back of my head as I glanced around the house. I noticed that despite her quietness, and the fact she was cooking, Mom was staying right up with the conversation.

“I thought you were done with that, Hiccup?” she spoke up, finally breaking her silence.

“Well we were, but a couple of days ago we came across something rather new, much farther east,” I said, starting to recant the little tale. Toothless, eager to get into the act, hoped deftly over to me and began to nod his head vigorously. “We were moving past a recently catalogued forest, you know, the one that you wanted to name, Astrid, and we came across something rather ... odd.”

“Odd, as in …” Astrid said, rotating her hand in a circular motion indicating for me to continue despite my pause.

“Odd as in a wall of, well … clouds,” I said sheepishly, lacking the ability to describe didn’t really help me in my retelling of what happened.

“A wall of clouds?” Astrid said, raising an eyebrow in disbelief.

Toothless murmured a few sounds, trying to fill in the gap of the story, gesturing with his front claws as to how wide it was. It was amusing to see him stretch out his legs to their full distance before he realised they weren’t long enough to describe it. His face fell into a slight frown before his eye lit up, and I knew what he was going to do. Without further pause, his wings snapped open to their full length, inside the house mind you, knocking down multiple decorations, and utensils in the process. He simply held a massive grin as he pointed from wing tip to wing tip, proud of his ‘accurate’ description.

“Oh, Toothless,” Mom simply said as she moved about to pick up some of the strewn about utensils. “You need to watch where you’re going, or maybe you will have to sleep outside.”

I glanced over to Toothless who looked at my mom in sheer terror before wilting and pulling his tail closer to him. I merely laughed before giving him a few pats on the back.

“Anyway, this wall of clouds was different. They stretched down all the way to the ground, and even past that when it came to cliffs. We tried to fly above it, tried being the key word here, and failed despite the big lug here … we had to bail after awhile,” I said, glancing over my shoulder at the ebony dragon whose ears just perked up at the slight mention of him.

“So, what do you think is in there?” Astrid said, extremely curious at the prospect of their being something else out there, despite us having not a single clue as to what was in or beyond the veil of clouds.

Toothless summed up the answer with a little grumble that sounded close to a ‘I don’t know’ before shrugging his shoulders. Of course, his moment of enlightenment was quickly passed by as he spotted mom placing a few fish down beside him. She nearly had to jump out of the way to avoid being tackled by him, while I had to duck to avoid his tail.

Returning to the topic at hand, I continued. “To be honest, I don’t know. I did see a fleet of what looked like Berserker ships go into the cloud. That’s why later tonight, Toothless and I will head back to that cloud and see what we can find, who knows, maybe there is another dragon nest there.”

Astrid protested, “What!? No! Hiccup, you’re the chief now. You have a family, even an entire island to take care of! You can’t just go doing things like you did before you were inducted as Berk’s chief!”

I knelt before her, taking her smaller, feminine hands in mine, looking into her eyes. “I have to do it, Astrid. I’d send you, but you’re nearing the time to give birth, and I’d never be able to forgive myself if something bad should happen to you, or our baby. I can’t trust the Snotlout or the Twins to get the job done, because they’d either get into a fight and forget what their mission was, or they’d take along some mead, or beer, and get drunk. I couldn’t let you go, not now, Astrid, you know that. You’re too close to giving birth. Plus, Mom needs to stay with you. She’s already experienced the whole pregnancy and birthing process and can help you, if I’m not here. If the Berserkers are up to something, then we need to know about it, especially if their activities involve Berk in some way. It’s the only way; please Astrid, I wouldn’t dare to suggest it if I thought that there was a better way.”

I looked over to Mom, who was still cooking over the fire, but still paying attention to the conversation, as I’d see her glance occasionally at me. “Plus, in the event that something should happen to me and I’m not able, to for whatever reason, return; then Mom will have to take up the role of being Berk’s chief. She’s the only one who has the experience to do it until our child is of age. I’m not planning on anything happening to me, but then again, neither was Dad.”

I came up behind my mother, hugging her from behind as I murmured into her ears, “If I don’t come back, please, take good care of Astrid and our child.” Mom simply nodded, as I began to gather items that I thought I might want for a trip into exploring what was beyond that massive wall of cloud. Basically my cartography kit, which I got from Trader Johan; as well as a wilderness survival kit, and a medical kit, in the event that he might need it.

I placed them into a satchel and proceeded to get into my gliding suit. Once that was done, I called Toothless over, who stood at attention as I placed the saddle on him and tightened the straps securely. I then proceeded to examine the belts, tugging and yanking, looking for weaknesses in the gear. Dragon riders always made sure to have spare gear, in the event that they do find a weakness in their gear, but don’t have the time to fix, or replace it due to circumstances. Usually requiring haste to respond to the many attempts against Berk and its citizenry.

Once I was satisfied that the the saddle and its belts were safe to use once again, I scritched Toothless’ chin, before lightly smacking him on the back, so that he could leap outside, and wait for me out there, while I bid my family farewell. I leaned over and hugged Astrid, since she was so heavy with child, and frequently found it painful to be on her feet for longer than half an hour. “I love you, and look forward to seeing you soon; the gods willing, Astrid my love.”

“Take care, and please don’t do anything reckless. … Just, come home again safely.”

I turned to Mom. “Take care of her. I love you, Mom. I thank the gods that you’re back in my life and I hold dear each and every day that I get to spend with you.”

“I will. Do what you must, my son, and come home to us safely.” She got up from her chair and hugged me tightly, before I turned to see a drawing of my father.

“I’m going now, Dad. Watch over and protect Astrid and Mom while I’m gone. I miss you, even though our relationship as father and son was often … more than a little awkward, you were still there for me when I needed you the most. You’ll always be with me.” I caressed the edge of the picture frame, before exiting the home.

Once my satchel was secured to the saddle, and I was satisfied that it wasn’t going to come loose after several test yanks and jerks. I climbed into the saddle. “Ready to go bud?” Toothless gave a happy sounding growl, before launching his powerful body into the air, beating his wings furiously as he tried to gain altitude. Using both stars and the familiar and not so familiar landmarks of the uniquely shaped islands, we retraced our way, returning back to the massive wall of cloud sitting on the ocean.

Even though this was a recon mission, I was hard pressed not to shout in joy, as Toothless and I soared the skies together. There’s just something about flying that is exhilarating, a sense of freedom that can’t be attained anywhere else. Up here, I can release the stress my responsibilities of being Berk’s chief. Up here, I can, if only for a time, lose myself in an illusion that I don’t have the responsibilities that I do. Up here, it can just be a young man and his dragon. Not Berk’s chief, not a son, husband or soon-to-be father.

Once we had arrived at the cloudbank, Toothless looked back at me, while hovering in place, waiting for me to give permission and reassure him about us going into the cloudbank. “It’ll probably be like flying blind, bud. Just fly like you would in a cave and hopefully we’ll see what those Berserkers are up to on the other side of this cloud. While in the cloud, do that thing you do in the caves towards the ground, in case the Berserkers have found land or are using the cloudbank for cover for whatever activities they might be up to.”

Toothless shook his head, not in a no gesture, but more like he was impatient to get on with it. I chuckled and rubbed his cheek. "Alright, let’s go bud, but let’s go slow. Don’t want to be having any rock pillar encounters like we did last time.”

I chuckled at the memory of the scolding I had gotten from both Mom and Astrid, once they had learned of my latest near death experience, as Toothless and I nearly killed ourselves as we were flying fast in a thick fog and nearly killed ourselves on a natural rock tower that is a rather common sight for the seas in which we Vikings call home. It wasn’t fun at the time, but I know they scolded because they cared, and were scared of losing me by getting myself killed, somehow.

We entered the cloud, flying forward slowly as we didn’t want to crash into any stone formations. Time ceased to exist in the cloud. We only knew that the moon was out, because the cloud wasn’t pitch black. I don’t know how long we were in the cloud, flying through it, when the cloud emitted a bright bluish-white flash. Thinking it was possibly lightning, and knowing that it would be really, really bad if Toothless and I were to get hit by it, I shouted, “Let’s get out of here bud!” Leaning close towards Toothless’ body, to make myself the most aerodynamic profile, to make it easier for Toothless to go faster. He closed his wings close to his body, diving to gain speed. It was a dangerous and risky move, but I trusted Toothless to fly through this cloud and get us out. He was able to fly in pitch black caves, after all, so clouds shouldn’t present any problem whatsoever.

I felt the inertia as Toothless snapped open his wings, and we went from a downward spiral to a horizontal one. It felt as though my heart went from my throat to the pit of my stomach. Toothless continued to make the sounds he had in the caves on a fairly frequent basis, as we made extreme haste to exit the cloud. Because I didn’t want us to get hit by any lightning, plus I had vowed to Mom and Astrid to make it back, if at all possible.

We finally shot out of the cloud, and Toothless and I both had to react quickly as we were fast approaching a forest bordering a coastline. A range of mountains rose up in the distance. Was it Norway? I had seen dragons unlike any which I had ever encountered. I patted Toothless on the side of his neck, pointing towards the mountain tops where the unfamiliar dragons were roosting. He nodded, roaring in acknowledgement and happiness, especially since we got out of that cloud and away from the lightning in the cloud. It might have been only that one brief flash, but for Toothless and I, one flash was one flash too many.

Many of the dragons which weren’t sleeping, turned their attention towards Toothless and I, as we approached these dragons which I had never before encountered, I gazed in amazement as I saw dragons eating gems and crystals! The younger ones even appeared to move like us humans do! The older and larger dragons, from what I could see, favored walking on all fours, when they weren’t relying on their wings to move about. The largest and oldest dragon came to the fore of all the dragons and gave a mighty roar. I prepared myself for whatever might happen, as I had no idea if they might do. “Be ready for anything bud.” I instructed Toothless

“What is this abomination that I see before me! A youngling of our proud and noble race stooping so low as to be some dirty beast of burden for some filthy—monkey!?”

I had to scrabble to grasp onto one of the handles on the saddle, due to my surprise that a dragon was actually speaking in my native tongue! In all my encounters with dragons, neither I, nor anybody else that I knew, had ever encountered a species which could talk! “By the lightning of Thor! You can talk!”

The dragon looked affronted at this. “Of course I can talk, We were among the first inhabitants of this world to gain the ability of communication! Honestly, I’m surprised that you can even speak our language. Howbeit, it still doesn’t answer my previous question regarding why that dragon is sullying the honor and dignity of dragons everywhere by allowing you to ride him.”

I scritched beneath Toothless’ chin, as he closed his eyes and growled happily, while the other dragons growled loudly, apparently angered by my display of affection to my buddy. I simply shot them a glare, before straightening up to show them that I wasn’t afraid of their scare tactics.

“Toothless, my dragon friend and I, have been through a lot. At first, we were enemies, because to each other we were unknown and dangerous. It required trust on both of our parts to conquer our fear of the unknown so that both of our species could forge a friendship Toothless is grounded as he can’t fly without me to perform the adjustment to his fake tailfin, so he needs me. Without him, to protect me from the dangers my home often faces, I might have never seen the sunrise this morning. Toothless is my friend, my partner, and my best bud. Through combining our strengths, to cover each others weaknesses, we become stronger and better than what we would alone. Besides, I fail to see how me riding Toothless sullies the honor and dignity of your species. Is dragonriding not done in these lands?”

The elder dragon let out a sooty puff of smoke, causing me to cough, and wave my hands, trying to clear the air. The rest of the dragons followed the example of the elder, so that it required several minutes for me to fan the smoke away. “I should think not! Besides, while I may have seen creatures similar to you, I’ve never seen a creature exactly like you. Nevertheless, it is still an affront to our draconic sensibilities to see you riding one of our brethren. Also, we would not have our younglings tainted, by seeing you riding one of our brethren.” The dragon elder focused upon the dragons that were watching us, as I waited to see how this encounter would turn out. Raising his voice to address the gathered dragons, he shouted; “My fellow dragons, we must destroy this filthy monkey and the sullied dragon which he rides upon. We must erase this example of heresy, these who dare to soil the honor and dignity of our race!” he roared, declaring this conversation over.

The dragons roared, a plume of flame coming out of their mouths as they did so. Then they turned their plumes of fire towards Toothless and I. While I wasn’t too concerned about Toothless being able to survive a brief firefight, neither I, nor our tack would fare too well in a firefight. Plus, the odds weren’t in our favor. I could only hope that Toothless was faster than these dragons.

I hastily scrambled back up into my saddle on my buddy Toothless’ back, and yelled, “Let’s go bud!” grasping upon the grips on the saddle to hoist myself into the saddle, and quickly fanned his fake tail piece out, as we hurried to leave those dragons territory. I could feel the heat as the dragons breathed their plumes of fire at us as we hurried to escape. “Don’t let them escape! Destroy them!” I could hear the elder dragon say in between the furious roars of the dragons attacking us.

One dragon managed to catch up, and his claw ripped the left shoulder piece of my flying suit. I cried out in pain, feeling the talon cut my shoulder. While it was deeper than a scratch, I could tell he’d not torn any major blood vessels. Fortunately for me, Toothless was able to outfly the other dragons. Not wanting to stop, in case those dragons were still flying after us, I strapped myself into the harness, and began hoisting the first aid satchel that I carried with me, ever since Father died. Old Gothi made sure my pack was freshly restocked prior to any excursions that I would make with Toothless. I selected a smaller bag with the Viking symbols for stopping blood flow, and rubbed it into the wound, crying out because of the pain. Once the herbal powder had been administered, I removed a roll of bandage wrap, and using my small dagger, cut the wrap and secured the loose end, once my wound had been wrapped tightly in a length of bandage strip.

“That was really something, huh bud? But wasn’t that amazing!? Those dragons could talk! How cool is that!? Let’s gain some altitude, so we can get a sense of the lay of the land. The guys back home are not going to believe this! Dragons talking!” Once we had attained a great enough height, I could see some scattering of islands in the distance, which led to a larger piece of land. I patted Toothless on the cheek and pointed towards the islands and the larger piece of land beyond. “Let’s go there, bud. But let’s keep an eye out, in case we encounter any more dragons that might attack us.”

Toothless looked back over his shoulder before nodding his head in agreement, yet I could see in his eyes that there was something bothering him. Something else aside from his usual look of self-determination and light-heartedness. For the first time since the incident involving Drago, I saw confusion in his eyes. What that talking dragon had said really hit him hard, not that it didn’t get to me as well but Toothless probably took it far more personal that I did.

“You alright, bud?” I asked, running a hand over the fins on his head. He didn’t look back at me instead opting to keep scanning the horizon. He did let out a series of grunts and grumbles though, which gave me more than I needed. Sure I couldn’t exactly tell what he was saying but we shared a close enough connection for me to guess.

“I’m interested by it too, bud. Those dragons were unlike anything that we have ever seen before. They kind of looked like giant Nightmares… we’ll find out what those dragon’s were protecting,” I said, to which Toothless just nodded in response again. “Alright, bud, let’s head back to Berk but let’s try and keep this quiet. Something this big could cause a lot of trouble among the village.”

Toothless grunted something that sounded like agreement as I clicked the wing paddle into place, and with a quick grin over his shoulder, Toothless shot forward at top speed. We would most likely make it to Berk by dusk, since this was the furthest east we had ever travelled … for now.

Chapter 2: Fresh New Faces

The wind whipped past my helmeted face, just like every other day since Toothless and I had become dragon and rider, respectively. This day was different though, for we had a set purpose. Our early morning flights never had a purpose other than to feel free of being stuck on the ground. The sun was hardly peeking over the horizon in the distant east which was odd considering that the cloud wall that we found had covered up most of the sky in the east. Maybe there was something more to it than a simple set of clouds.

“You ready to find out what is over those mountains, bud?” I asked Toothless. He simply replied with a cocky smile before a short grunt that undoubtedly meant yes. He had a hard time last night, trying to keep his little bit of anxiousness under wraps, even to the point of him having a hard time getting to sleep. Now, though he was more than energetic, for he knew where we were going.

We were making great time and it was hardly even past day break, we would be at the mountains before evening, especially since we were flying alone. Sure it was fun to fly with the others, but Toothless and I were the fastest when we flew alone.

As proven by the tree that was nearly ripped out of it’s roots because Toothless flew too close.

“Really now?”

Toothless just gave out a hearty chuckle in response, to which I just smiled. At least he was still acting like himself, I was worried that the contact with those weird dragons had left him a little jaded.

I gave him a firm pat on the side of his head, signalling for him to go as he pleased. That was the level of trust we had, far more than any other rider on Berk. It was easy to make the jump from trusting each other with our lives, to trusting each other with flying.

The majestic purple mountains slowly grew in size and detail, the closer we flew towards it. Though it grew slowly, looking down, the trees whipped past in green blurs. We were travelling far faster than a horse could gallop. It was awe inspiring and even a little bit scary, thinking on what a crash at these speeds could do to both Toothless and I. Sure he was a tough dragon, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t be hurt.

Wanting to try something that Toothless and I had been working on, I proceeded to hook myself to the saddle, so I wouldn’t fall off if Toothless moved in some way that I was not prepared for. “Let’s try this out.” I pressed down upon the petal, until I heard the distinct clink of the lock mechanism engaging, thereby enabling Toothless to fly somewhat, should my body not make the correct minute maneuvers while unconscious.

That’s right, I was going to try to ride Toothless and sleep in the saddle. Really, the only things that I could see Toothless really needing me awake; was if we either hit really wild air, or we were under attack by a dragon, or several of them. I patted Toothless cheek to get his attention. “I’m going to try and get some sleep bud, wake me up if you need me.”

He growled in acknowledgement, as I closed my eyes, my foot pressing or easing off the tailfin control pedal. I knew I needed to continue to practice and develop my body reacting to different airborne situations so that even if I was unconscious, my body would be conditioned to react to the airborne problem, even while I was unconscious.

{C T D * * * {Later} * * * C T D}

I awoke some time later, as Toothless jostled his back, as I aroused quickly from my sleep. He pointed to a riverbank, indicating that he wanted to land, and probably rest. The sun was getting lower, and the mountains towered over us, like a majestic giant earthen meat eater’s jawbone. I could see the prickly pine trees, as well as the maple, oak, and birch trees ascending up the mountain, before there came a point where nothing at all grew upon the rocky crags. Adjusting the tailfin, Toothless and I glided our descent, making a spiral downward as we did so.

It amazed me that Toothless has managed to navigate through that wall of clouds; amazed and annoyed me. Sometimes his pride was too much for anyone to handle, though in this situation we were lucky that it hadn’t been to a fault. Still, I had to give him credit for accomplishing that without even waking me at all. No matter how long we’ve been together, he still managed to amaze me.

The moment we landed, I proceeded to remove the hooks and straps securing me into the saddle, and proceeded to remove the saddle and our supplies from off of Toothless’ back. While Toothless went to the river to drink and catch fresh fish to sate his hunger, I went into the nearby wooded area, retrieving broken limbs and branches, in order to start a fire. I had some ingredients for a fine woodland stew, and even gathered fresh ingredients as I gathered wood. For there were wild onions, potatoes, broccoli.

After I had returned to the river, as I didn’t want to wander off too deeply into these woods, both so not to worry Toothless too much, but also because I had no idea what kind of critters I might encounter in these woods after dark, and I’d much rather have Toothless by my side, just in case we did happen upon the animals of these lands.

I smacked my hand upon my exposed neck, as I felt a mosquito bite me. They were just starting to become really active, even before the sun had fully set. I really wish Gothi had included something to keep these bloodsuckers at bay, even if it meant that I smelled like the insides of a yak’s mouth.

I grabbed a wooden bowl and spoon from my pack, seeing the soup was hot and ready, merrily bubbling in a little pot I brought along. It was good, but not as delicious as it might have been, as I didn’t bring a lot of spices in my gear, again, because I didn’t want to weigh Toothless down with too much unnecessary gear. So, I ate my dinner in contentment, laughing as one of Toothless’ swipes, managed to get a fish to land on and bite his nose. I wasn’t worried though, as dragon hides are really tough, so he wasn’t feeling the fish’s teeth. Though the look of annoyance that I was laughing at his rather funny situation, was amusing in itself. Giving a short growl, Toothless snapped his head up, flinging the fish up into the air, and he jumped up, catching it into his mouth, his teeth coming out, as he made short work of that fish.

With dusk truly settled in, I couldn’t see much color, as it became a matter of how black something was, or not, with the clouds glowing with silver haloes with the moon hidden behind them. I repacked my gear, once the utensils and the pot had been washed and cleaned. Toothless was lying on a large boulder, resting after a filling meal of fresh fish and a long flight. Feeling compassion towards my best friend, I checked the position of the moon, and decided to wait until it reached its position in the middle of the sky, before I awoke Toothless from his rest and continued our journey. My hands clutched my daggers, as I unsheathed them, resting them on my lap, my hands loosely gripping the hilts, as my eyes scanned the darkened forests surrounding us.

The night sounds of the nocturnal residents of the forest continued to keep me alert, as I watched over my buddy as he rested. I didn’t know what might lurk in those woods, and honestly, I really hoped that I wouldn’t encounter any of the forest’s nocturnal residents. I mean, if dragon could talk, then Odin only knows what could call the forest home. I was glad that had pretty much died since then, only the glowing embers evidence of a camp here. The glare of the fire’s illumination would have diminished my ability to see into the surrounding woods.

I heaved a sigh of relief, as nothing eventful happened, and now that the moon was at its zenith, it was time to awaken Toothless and get across the mountain to continue our exploration. I began to smack Toothless’ cheek. “Wake up, bud. Let’s get a move on.” After several minutes, Toothless yawned widely, and his mouth made smacking noises, rather like the sound some of us Vikings upon waking up in the morning. “Let’s stick to the valley and try not to attract any unwanted attention.”

Toothless gave me a groan, rolling his eyes at my cautious approach. “I know bud, but I promised Astrid and Mom not to do anything reckless, and we don’t have the firepower to take on a clan of dragons head on. I know it’s boring, but it’s best this way. Because I do not want to face Astrid coming after me, once I died. I’d rather face the worst Niflhel has to offer than face an angry Astrid. That woman is seriously scary when mad, and sometimes even when she wasn’t mad.”

I proceeded to stow my gear back in my rucksack, as I moved to return the saddle to its former position on Toothless’ back, and then hooking the rucksacks onto the saddle. Once that was done, I had gazed at the stars while waiting for Toothless to rest up, to gain a sense of where north, east, south and west might be, respectively. Pointing towards a particular star which had recently ascended into the celestial tapestry from behind the mountain range, I said to my buddy, “let’s go that way, bud.”

Despite having an extremely fast dragon to ride, there was a risk that the talking dragons we had encountered would still be circling around those mountain tops, so the only other option was to find a path through the mountains on foot, which would be a challenge in its own. If it ever got too much though, I knew I could count on Toothless to help me.

I wish that I could say that the journey through the mountains was a breeze, but let me tell you, as someone who lives in an island with mountainous terrain, it’s not. The sun had risen about a third into the sky since we had started our trek, and I was hot and sweaty, my muscles ached and I was breathing heavily, and had it not been for my gliding suit, I would likely be bearing many minor scratches and cuts, due to the terrain, and the prickly bushes, trees, and vines. Which, while common, weren’t the only plants I had to trek through.

Toothless wasn’t even tired, however, and the only difficulty that the mountains presented for him were the loose stones and pebbles littering the mountain range and making the journey treacherous. And if it weren’t for all the thorny plants that I had to encounter, I’d have probably appreciated the stunning vistas which I saw. The cold streams of water rushing down, in a series of small waterfalls, looking as though someone had draped the rock in burnished bands of silver. The trees which grew in the valleys of the mountain range, the shade making the trek a little more bearable. The morning sun, piercing through the foliage, as though Sól was throwing her lances of light to pierce the forest’s gloom. The sky painted in golden yellows and oranges, transitioning to lighter and lighter colors until it was white, before darkening to the blues of the daytime sky.

Fortunately, what dragons we did see, didn’t gaze into the valleys populating the base of their mountains. Though, whenever I did see a dragon, I would freeze, holding my hand up, signalling to Toothless that he should also remain still. Once their head was no longer visible, only then did I dare to move through what I supposed must surely be the dragon’s nesting grounds.

Near the shore lay a huge boulder, about the size of Berk’s Council Hall, where Toothless and I rested for about an hour from our trek through the mountain range. I retrieved a large waterskin and let Toothless drink, and then I drank from a much smaller water skin. Though, as long as we didn’t venture into any deserts, I didn’t see that obtaining fresh water would be a problem.

Back in the saddle, I pointed towards a gathering of islands. The closest one’s shore had pebbles and small rocks for its shore, more than sand, and farther away from the coastline I could see tall grasses and small bushes growing in the island’s soil. There were no trees, and I could only speculate as to why that was, without further observation. “Let’s follow those islands, bud.

While those islands were not likely to be able to sustain a long stay of weeks and months. They probably made for a great rest stop for those sailing these waters, as well as a nice landmark in their ocean maps to orient themselves in the vastness of the oceans.

The ocean air was always a common thing to smell and feel on Berk, but for the oddest of reason, this place was … different. The air felt crisper, but not in the way of it being colder, and I just couldn’t describe the feeling past that. I had spent all of my life near the ocean, or over the ocean but this place gave off an entirely new feeling, one that I just had to bask in.

I rose up from the saddle, removing myself from the hunched position that I normally took when riding Toothless. My hands first went to my hips, just resting there as I surveyed the churning ocean, the tides splashing against the rock that the islands were comprised of, and the few birds that hovered around the shores of said islands. Slowly, I removed my helmet, holding it in my right hand for a moment before hooking it onto a little latch in the saddle.

The feeling of the refreshing ocean air whipping through my hair and against my unprotected face was amazing, even though it was something I felt on a constant basis. Sometimes I forgot to just take a step back and enjoy the little things, and being in the new world gave me the opportunity to actually do that. To bask in the simple joy of feeling free and unburned, all the while riding on top of my best friend, was what it meant to be alive and I think Toothless was feeling the same thing.

His eyes were temporarily closed while a big toothless grin was plastered on his face, tongue nearly lolling out of his mouth. Luckily we weren’t going overly fast at this point, instead opting to take it slower and enjoy the scenery. Sometimes I forgot that even Toothless enjoys these simple moments where he can just relax and take it slow for moment.

After awhile, we passed the last island and reached a large island or continent. Pointing northward I shouted to Toothless, “let’s follow the coastline for awhile!” Toothless, with me helping make adjustment to his fake tailfin veered as we redirected our flight path to follow the coastal border of the island or continent.

If this land mass was an island, then this was one big island, far larger than anything I had ever seen before. Approaching from any direction, one could see nearly the entirety of the Isle of Berk, despite it’s size yet this land mass seemed to stretch on and on far beyond what I could see. Perhaps we had indeed found a continent, one that would have who knows what on it.

“Who knows what is over there, bud … imagine what we could find,” I said to Toothless, who gave a small growl of agreement back at me.

Shortly after we started flying along the coastline, I spotted a village with what I must guess was its inhabitants. I patted Toothless’ cheek and pointed to the village. He nodded and roared happily, as we started to fly in circles, as we gradually dropped closer to the ground. Some of the villagers must have spotted us, as their movement became erratic and their pace sped up. Once we drew closer, I could hear the panicked screams and shrieks of the villagers, while the warriors of the village scurried to grab their weapons, shields and armor. From what I could tell the inhabitant of the village was comprised of deer, elk, reindeer and moose. The elk were using some kind of magic to shoot rocks and stones towards Toothless and I.

I cried out, as one stone hit rather hard near my wrist. “Fire warning shots, bud!” I was having to make rapid adjustments to help Toothless as he dodged and weaved, trying to avoid getting hit as much as he could. While dragons had tougher and thicker hides, it would still be really bad if his wing were to be broken, torn, or even bruised. “Stop shooting! We come in peace!” I could only hope that they understood my native tongue, because otherwise, things could either end up really good, or really bad; depending upon the disposition of the villagers, and how benevolent they were feeling at the time. That is, if they weren’t the ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ type.

Our landing was much rougher than what I would have liked, as we dropped nearly two stories, before impacting the ground. “Stop! We mean you no harm!” I bellowed, peering from the other side of my personal shield, cautious, as I didn’t want to be hit in the head with a projectile weapon of any sort.

“Why should we believe you, strange creature? Especially when you’re riding on a fearsome dragon!”

I swear I saw Toothless gloat, and stood in a ‘noble’ poise, looking skyward, with one leg raised up, and his wings pointing skyward. “You shouldn’t really. But if Toothless and I had meant you any harm, we would have stayed out of your firing range, and attacked you with dragonfire, or used rocks and stones as projectile weapons. I’m not asking you to trust us right away, but I am asking for a chance for us to prove ourselves to you. Sometimes we all deserve a chance, and often enough that is the only way you can get a sense of someone’s character.”

There were murmurings amongst the crowd, as they discussed my proposal among themselves. An elderly reindeer mare stepped forward, and pointed an accusatory hoof in our direction. “We can’t let someone who befriends a dragon be among us! That would be like sticking our head in the mouth of a dragon, and asking that dragon to not bite down! You can spew all the pretty words that you like, so long as you’re with that dragon, or any dragon for that matter, then we shouldn’t let you continue amongst us!”

A young buck stepped forward as he addressed the village and the elderly reindeer mare. “Pah! Hold your tongue you ninny! The times are changing, and we must change with it, if we want our people to not fade into oblivion! Doesn’t everyone deserve a chance to prove themselves? Look at this dragon, he has not behaved like some feral carnivore, a mindless beast of murder, but instead he has been civil, and not one of us has been harmed, even though we attacked them. This dragon and his rider might be useful to our village and might even improve our way of life! I say we let the dragon and his rider stay!”

The crowd renewed its murmurings as Toothless and I waited for the village’s residents to arrive at an agreement, on whether or not Toothless and I will be permitted to stay with them, or not. I was in awe at encountering yet more non-human creatures which are capable of speech, not to mention speaking a language that I could understand. Unless there was some sort of passive magic in the land which enabled communication where otherwise there might have been communication barriers. I held my head in my hands, as I felt a mild headache beginning as I tried to make sense of my being able to communicate with two vastly different cultures, first the dragons and now these deer villagers.

The murmurings finally began to die down, as five of the elders of each of the deer, elks, reindeer and moose stepped forward. “We, the elders of this village of Wandering Hoof have decided that you alone may enter the village, but your dragon is to remain away from the outskirts of the village with a distance of 50 hoofs between the dragon, and our village.”

I shook my head, frowning at the elders before me, and the villagers arrayed behind them. “I’m not going to agree to that. Toothless is my buddy, and I’m not going to go somewhere where he can’t follow. I wouldn’t want him to go someplace that I couldn’t. So I guess Toothless and I will continue our travels.Thank you for your … hospitality.”

I walked over to Toothless, as I swung myself back into the saddle. “Let’s keep going, bud!” I pointed to the coastal shore once again, as I made adjustments to Toothless’ fake tailfin. The loud wooshing sound accompanied us, as dust and dead leaves blew away from our launching point, and I kept a wary eye behind me, just to make sure that they were truly letting us leave in peace. I suppose my encounters with Alvin the Treacherous jaded my attitude towards meeting new people, or in this case intelligent deer, elk, reindeer and moose. Just like I had told them earlier, I wasn’t just going to trust their word, as I had told them that they shouldn’t trust mine, but to let their actions prove their intent, and since they hadn’t launched an attack, I relaxed, grateful for at least one less thing to worry about.

Not wanting there to be bad blood between us and the villagers of Wandering Hoof, I waved my hand to the inhabitants below, as Toothless gave a mighty roar, and launched one of his fire blasts towards the horizon, in an impressive show of power and majesty. Below, I could hear the sound of trumpets and horns being blown, before Toothless and I were too far away to hear the sound.

After travelling along the shoreline for a little while more, I pointed towards a spot near the shore that looked like it had a river which flowed into the sea. “Let’s rest down there bud!” I hollered, patting his cheek to get his attention. He nodded to me, and together, we proceeded to make a spiraling descent towards the banks of the river. Once we were back on the ground, I removed our gear and the saddle.

Toothless sought to go looking for fish in the shallow waters nearby but I stayed back, instead deciding to sit myself down among a group of trees. As I leaned back against one of the trees, my eyes kind of glazed over as my mind went off searching for some explanation as to what I had just encountered.

There were so many questions that were left unanswered: how did deer, elk, moose, and so on, gain the ability to talk? Was this new land’s inhabitants just sentient versions of all the animals I knew from home? Were dragons as feared here as they used to be on Berk? How had I managed to keep a straight head when talking to species that I hunted down back home?

Despite all the questions, I truly had no answers, nor did I think I would ever find them in this odd land. For all I knew, this was how it had been for countless years, so how would they be able to answer a question regarding why they are sentient? The only thing I did find out, from this completely crazy encounter, was that if I had found sentient cervids within a few hours of flying in this land, I could only imagine what else there could be. I had to be ready for anything when Toothless and I started flying once more.

Toothless eventually made his way back from fishing, having a rather pleased grin on his face. “I take it you were successful, bud?”

He nodded his head enthusiastically before stopping suddenly. He tilted his head to the side for a second before what looked to be a spark of recognition formed in his eyes. Without any sort of warning, he back to choke some of the fish back up. I lept to my feet, reaching out with my hands to grab his mouth and close it before he could let loose with the half eaten fish.

“It’s alright, bud … I’m good. No need to share your meal,” I said, with a little waver to my voice. He looked at me quizzically for a moment before shrugging it off and moving to lie down on the grass next to me.

We had been resting for maybe ten minutes when I spotted several dark and light spots against the blue sky. Initially they were flying in an eastward direction. However, suddenly they shifted, and started to move in our direction. I continued to watch, as they drew closer towards Toothless and I. Soon I could make out some detail, as these dots grow closer and more distinct. They were some weird meshing of an eagle and a lion! What’s even more, is that they were wearing some kind of armor!

Getting ready for a possible confrontation, I unsheathed my flame sword, and I shook my buddy’s shoulder to get his attention, and pointed my sword towards the approaching group of lion-eagle creature. I watched the approaching group warily, especially since they were not only armed, but they also had claws on both forelegs and hindlegs, and had a beak which could rip and tear. They had more natural offensive ability than I as a human did. However, I wasn’t going to back down, and Toothless and I were only going to run away if things escalated beyond peaceful talks.

Once the eagle-lion creatures had landed my mind was abuzz with courses of action and plans, just incase the became hostile. There were ten of them and only two of us, but I think our skill even the numbers a bit. I continued to watch them as, what I assumed, was the leader of the eagle-lion creatures continued to look me and my buddy up and down.

“Do you speak, hairless monkey thing?” it spoke, the voice rough, closer to Snotlout’s voice.

“As well as any Viking can, though I’ve been told that I talk too much,” I replied, trying to ease the tension.

“Ah, good. Well then, ‘Viking,’ I need you to step aside so that we can ‘escort’ this dragon back to where it came from. Its kind is not welcome in this area,” he said, certain words coming across harder than others, but I didn’t need the emphasis to catch onto what they were saying.

“You’re not going to harm, Toothless!” I yelled at him, making it obvious that we would fight if they forced our hands. “How about we just talk peacefully about this? My name is Hiccup, may I get yours … ?”

“Gryphon, we are gryphons,” he said, waving his … talons towards the other next to him. “You won’t be getting any names though.”

After a brief moment of silence following the leader’s statement, another gryphon, one just off to the leader’s right, spoke up,“You tame that dragon, Hiccup?”

“What? No! Toothless is my friend! There was never any taming involved. We just had to overcome our fear of the unknown that the other represented, and trust each other despite our differences.”

“While it doesn’t sounds as impressive as taming, that’s a rather incredible feat. Though tell me why doesn’t your dragon speak up for himself?” The leader asked.

“Because where I come from, our dragons don’t talk,” I said simply.

“They don’t … talk? How can you work together if language is not used?” asked the same gryphon to the leader’s right.

“Through body language, and how they present themselves. It takes a little bit of time but once you know how to read what they are trying to say … well, then you are truly friends with a dragon,” I said as I patted Toothless, as well as going as far to give him a little scritch behind his ear. “We had a run in with one of your dragons per se, and we were surprised to find out that those dragons could talk.”

“Sounds like yours are easier to live with …” muttered a different gryphon, though I didn’t see which one.

I needed to head this conversation in a direction that could garner me some info, “I noticed that you diverted your flight path, to come to me. Where were you guys heading and what do you guys do?”

“It is sensitive information, and we are therefore not at liberty to discuss either our destination, or our occupation,” answered the leader.

“Okay, if it is so sensitive, then why would you jeopardize the security of that information by coming to me?”

“To assess if you presented a danger to our homeland, and respond as appropriately.”

“Well, I can assure you that my clans and I have no interest in invading your lands.”

“Uh-huh.” The gryphon leader replied, his simple response short, and his vocal tone indicated skepticism and disbelief. He turned to another gryphon creature with a necklace of red and black beads, with little pendants of onyx clouds and citrine lightning bolt interspaced between every six beads. “Return to base, and inform those in charge of the creatures that we’ve encountered and that all patrols near home are to keep an eye out and raise the alarm should they exhibit hostilities against the patrols.” The addressed gryphon saluted swiftly before changing his course to return to wherever they had come from.

“Fine, don’t believe me, not like I didn’t try to be peaceful,” I said in a sardonic tone.

“While I’d love to talk more, I’m afraid that we have wasted too much time as it is.” He turned to the remaining eight gryphons. “All right you pussies! We’re resuming the original mission. Hop to it. And if I see any of you hatchlings slacking off, it’s KP duties for a week! Move, out!”

I had to cover my face, as their takeoff kicked up a lot of dust and sand. Once I noticed that the gusts which had returned to the regular strength of the ocean breezes, I lowered my arms and watched as they became specks in the sky, which kept shrinking until I could no longer see them. That encountered had been something else, though it was extremely close to how those villagers reacted when I landed by them. Maybe this land had some sort of issue with things they never seen before … though I doubt they could match up to a Viking’s fear of the unknown. Though we showed fear in an entirely different way.

I looked to Toothless for the first time since my conversation with the gryphons, and it seemed to phase him little, which surprised me considering how easy it was to get a reaction out of him. I think he might have been more worried about me though, since my eyes met his and I could see that questioning look he always had when he wasn’t sure if I was okay.

“I’m alright, bud. This land is something else, but I think we can brave it together,” I said as I patted him on the head.

We silently decided that now was the best time to keep moving. So I filled up our waterskins, after Toothless and I had drank our fill from the river, before cinching his saddle back on him, and putting our gear back onto the saddle. I clambered back on top of him and leaned over his head. “Ready to keep going, bud?” Toothless gave an excited sounding roar, as his wings beat, and we returned to following the coastline once again.

After soaring along the coastline for a little longer, we had came around a little peninsula to find something astonishing, well at least it looked that way from a distance. Rather far away, there appeared to be a massive cloud system, much like the one we had flown through to get to the mountains but this was different. It wasn’t moving as it hovered right above what appeared to be a town along the coast.

As I ordered Toothless to hover, I gazed a little farther up at the clouds itself and noticed something even more odd, there seemed to be building shaped clouds on top of it, but I couldn’t get a clear line of sight. If there was somehow a city on those clouds, I needed to take a look from afar before diving head first in there. Who knows what their reaction could be.

Over the ocean to my right was surprisingly large group of clouds that were moving at a higher altitude than the city. I smirked before patting Toothless on the top of the head before pointing to the clouds system. He nodded in understanding, knowing my intentions completely. We would use that cloud system to gaze at the top of the ‘city’ before deciding to investigate it up close. So without a moment more of hesitation, Toothless and I bolted towards our new camouflage.

Chapter 3: When Worlds Collide

While nerve-wracking, the flight to the smaller group of clouds had been short and successful. They were perfect cover, being the large fluffy clouds that look like sheep’s wool. Being on the shaded side of the cloud, and with just our heads peering out from the cloud, we could quickly duck into the cloud, if we thought anyone might be looking at us, or in our direction.

It was chilly up here, and I was glad that I bundle up warmly whenever I go flying with Toothless. My hands were feeling achy in the wet chill and my face was feeling rather numb, and my nose was pretty ruddy due to the prolonged exposure to the cold air that was up here. I love looking at these large puffy clouds, floating high above the earth, removed from the troubles and cares of mortals. And the play of light upon these clouds is awe-inspiring and beautiful, and yet at times fearsome and terrible as well. How the tops glow in whites and cream colors, while it progressively gets darker, until it is like a charcoal, or sometimes even as black as midnight, depending upon the weather and the time of day. The sound of the ocean wind, the cries of seafaring birds such as seagulls greeted my ears, as well as the sound of Toothless’ wings flapping, a constant ‘fwoomf, fwoomf’ that I’ve learned to tune out, due to how familiar with I have become.

Toothless and I were hovering just on the inside edge of the cloud we had flown towards, though my head was barely poking out of the top so I could catch a glimpse of the city that we were nearing. For once, it was as if the gods were smiling on us, since the cloud group was not only higher than the suspected city, but it was also aiming to pass directly over the city.

Of course it would take a good while before we were actually above it, so for the meantime, I continued to look at the upcoming city from our current spot. Perhaps there was a chance that we could be accepted as normal beings instead of the previous two encounters. Being treated as a monster, a mistake of nature, each experience scarring my heart and soul. It robbed from the joy of exploration, of encountering new peoples and cultures.

From what I could see through my spyglass, there were massive building like structures made of clouds, along with what appeared to be roads, and smaller buildings. They looked like someone had taken a large amount of cream and using utensils, carved away the unwanted extra. They had the same appearance and light behavior as untouched clouds, which was why I thought they must be made from clouds, though I’d be very interested to know how they could get them to retain their structure and not become like a natural cloud form. Not only that but there were people walking amongst the clouds! Well … people was a loose term. I could see others that looked extremely similar to the gryphons from before, as well as another type that looked like gryphons but were different. Finally, there seemed to a third type of cloud walking animal, though this type looked closer to the deer that I had seen before except there were a few major distinctions.

These new ones, looked closer to miniature horses that had wings on their sides, and varied in many different colours. Of course, by many I meant a whole mess of different colours. The deer folk that I had met were mainly the same, hardly ranging in colours outside of browns, greys, and some blacks. These new winged horses were by far the most colourful thing I had ever seen … well outside of a few dragon species. Either these winged horses could easily escape from predator species, or their meat must be really poisonous or something. I could only shake my head at how contrary their coat colorations were from those of the horses and ponies of Norway, Sweden and Denmark. I bet if I looked long enough at the city, I would have seen one of each colour imaginable, but something else stole my focus away.

Somewhere in the distance behind us, I heard an extremely loud bang. One that seemed to resonate across the entire ocean, or at least that was how it felt. A sudden shockwave almost pushed me off of Toothless, but my saddle luckily kept me on him. Whatever this bang was, it warranted a little investigation, aside from just spying from the clouds.

At first we turned to face the direction it came from, my eye still peering through the spyglass. I was about to tell Toothless to take us over to where it came from, but I caught something in the field of my vision, something that should have been completely impossible.

There was a blue winged horse flying directly at the cloud we were in, not to mention it had a massive rainbow trailing out from her. I couldn’t have dreamt this even if I had tried.

“Take us into the cloud!” I quickly shouted to Toothless, worried that we would get seen by the winged horse. He nodded immediately before swooping lower until we were completely hidden in the clouds. It became darker, as less light penetrated through where we were. It was eerily quiet, aside from Toothless’ wingbeats and thundering of my own heartbeat in my own ears. With the chilly water in the cloud, I began to regret not bringing anything to protect my hands and face. The cold pierced to the bones, as my hands ached and I gave a mighty sneeze from the chilly cloud tickling my nose. My body was tense, ready to respond to anything that might happen, at least until the blue winged horse passed by.

Why was I worried about a single winged horse? In reality I wasn’t worried about that single horse, I was more worried about that horse telling the entire city of our presence. The village was isolated enough to be of little risk, and I couldn’t control the encounter with the gryphons, but an entire city, who possibly feared dragons, hunting us down could become a major problem.

We continued to hover in the clouds, constantly looking in the direction of where that horse was coming from. Toothless was on guard, probably feeling my sense of urgency and worry. I on the other hand was praying that the horse would be smart enough to just fly around the clouds. Though I wasn’t sure exactly who to pray to in this situation, since there wasn’t exactly a god for being passed over by flying horses … maybe Thor and his lightning would work?

Time seemed to stand still for a brief second as my current worst fear materialised from out of the cloud cover. It was hardly enough time to move and unfortunately the blue horse was currently on a direct flight path with me, not Toothless but me.

“Toothl-” was all I managed to get off before the collision knocked me clear off the saddle, despite the belts holding me on. They had snapped completely with the force of the impact, while I was lucky that I couldn’t feel anything broken. Though I still had more important things to worry about, such as falling to my death from the middle of a cloud. The chill of the air whipped by me, as the wind of my plummet greeted my ears. I watched in horrified fascination, as the dark blue, choppy waters of the ocean below rapidly grew larger in my vision.

“Toothless!” I shouted out again, hopefully loud enough for him to pick up. Without a second thought, I reached down to place my hands into the wingsuit hooks before flinging my arms out. In theory that should have stabilized me long enough to let Toothless reach me; in theory. In reality, the left wing of the suit had been torn, from what I was not sure but I knew that I could only fix it if I didn’t die.

Despite the extreme wind whipping past my face, making it hard to concentrate, I forced myself to focus on flipping myself around so that I was looking back up at the cloud that was, without a doubt, slowly growing more and more distant. It was a little bit of a struggle to do so, but I eventually was able to position myself so that I was no longer looking at my impending doom.

I was about to shout out once more, but my cry would have been unnecessary for the moment I opened my mouth, I saw Toothless break from the clouds, aiming himself downward with wings tucked in to hopefully reach me in time.

A glimmer of hope in the form of the massive black dragon was all I needed to cease my worries. This had happened before, but as long as Toothless knew where I was, we would both make it out of the peril. Though the worries continued once more when I saw a second thing shoot out of the bottom of the cloud. I couldn’t see it right off the bat, but the more I focused, the better it came into view.

That blue winged horse was trying to catch Toothless and it was actually getting pretty close.

I reached up an arm to point behind Toothless, hoping to get his attention. While successful initially, the fact that the horse was no longer behind him but instead plummeting side by side with Toothless caused my gesture to be futile. Toothless’s eyes widened briefly before narrowing into a look of pure contempt.

I don’t know if the horse saw it coming and couldn’t react in time, or Toothless had caught it by surprise, but the moment it was even with Toothless’s wing, my friend shot one of his wings out, smacking the horse out of it’s dive. The horse went flying and I tracked it for all I could before I felt myself land on the solid back of Toothless, knocking the wind completely out of my lungs.

My eyes quickly glanced to his tail, noticing that it was locked in its open position, giving Toothless the ability to fly on his own. My mind blanked briefly before recalling that I had locked it there when we were hovering. I let out a deep breath, my eyes closing blissfully, before shooting open as I remembered that Toothless had hit that winged horse pretty hard.

My eyes searched the local area, the crashing waves among the cliffs nearby or the churning open sea proved to have no sign of the horse. Though, along near the edge of the cliffs were what must’ve been anchored rafts about every five vika. They looked like they’d make very useful rescuing platforms, for anyone unfortunate enough to fall into the waters near the steep cliff face. At first I was a little worried that we had killed it, but had to quickly put those thoughts to the back of my mind. If one of those gryphons had been from that city, and they found out that we had hurt a possible citizen … we had to get out of the local area and into a place to lay low for a bit.

“Let’s get above land level, Toothless, and find some place to set down, preferably some place that is concealed … .”

Toothless let out a little bit of a whine, most likely wondering if I was okay. I just patted him on the head, nodding at his worried eyes. He took my answer with a large smile before facing back forward to focus on flying. I was okay and it was all thanks to Toothless, but I still couldn’t help but wonder what happened to that blue horse.

Not to mention how that thing could even be close to as fast as Toothless … though it was during a dive so it was easier for a smaller object to cut through the wind at higher speeds. I bet those small wings couldn’t hold up against a Night Fury during an actual flying competition. I bet that horse found out the hard way that a Night Fury’s wings hold a lot more power than their size shows.

“Too bad we didn’t make better contact … gryphons, deer, and now horses. Who knows what else there is in this new world,” I said before focusing on finding a place to have Toothless set us down.

{C D T * * * {Rainbow Dash} * * * C D T}

I had been participating in the 73rd Global Endurance Race, and had been smoking the competition since no other flyers were capable of making Sonic Rainbooms. But when I have this much awesomeness, coolness, and radicalness contained in a single body, sometimes I just have to release it all, otherwise I might burst if I tried to contain this much awesomeness, coolness and radicalness.

Anyways, it was a lovely day for flying, as the winds were gently blowing in an easterly direction. The large cumulonimbus clouds slowly drifting across the sky, the tops glowing in brilliant whites and gentler cream colors, while the underbelly were darker greys and charcoal blacks. The sensitivity of my wings and feathers provided sensory feedback. I could tell how strong the wind was blowing, which direction it was blowing, barometric pressure, humidity, if there were any possible atmospheric ionic charge, and dew point. The oceanic wind could provide some resistance once a certain speed was reached, which meant that the flyer would have to fight the wind … well, more so than usual, since the race was a mostly westward flight path until some place that is east of 'cloud-land.' I was never that great with geography, I just followed the general instructions.

I never told anypony that I could easily calculate the multiple weather-centric measurements, I didn’t want to look like an egg-head after all. Twilight would have a field day if she knew that I could do all of that off the top of my head.

Anyways, I noticed a group of clouds ahead of my flight path, but because I was an ace at weather manipulation and cloudbusting, I knew that these clouds weren’t going to hinder my pure awesomeness. I pierced the first several clouds, my speed and the resulting sonic boom completely destroying the clouds that I was flying through.

What I wasn’t expecting though was that the next cloud I entered had somepony in it, because I flew head first into something really solid and not at all composed of cloud. I was grateful that the racing management and sponsors required that we wear special flight helmets, in the event that something like this happened. Because at the speeds that I was flying at, I could have knocked myself unconscious, or even died!

Needless to say, I was pissed that the security teams failed to get whoever that pony was in that cloud off the racing track, but that wasn’t the most pressing issue. The collision had stunned me enough that I found myself dropping like a rock. I started flapping my wings, as I took note of my present condition, and that I hadn’t broken any of my wings, or broken any of my primaries. Still, I knew that I was going to have to land and send up a flare, so I could get checked out by the medical teams that were positioned about every checkpoint or so.

As I plunged out of the bottom of the cloud, I spotted a strange creature falling towards the ocean. A black dragon was dive bombing towards the creature, and I just reacted, as I didn’t want the creature to end up that dragon’s meal! I gave up correcting my heading and instead sped up my flapping, as I continued to let gravity aid me in getting closer to the weird creature as it fell. My ears were folded back, but even so, I could hear the rushing of wind as I plummeted towards the dark blue, choppy ocean, as I used my wings to adjust my fall so that I could rescue the odd looking creature. The cool smell of salty ocean air, as well as the tell-tale smell of ozone was a familiar smell for me. The ozone smell, not so much that of the salty ocean air. I was just grateful that ponies couldn’t get drunk off the smell of salty ocean air. Ozone smells more like copper than it does iron, despite that ozone not bonding with any metals whatsoever.

The creature looked nothing like I had ever seen before, but just because it looked funny didn’t mean I was heartless enough to let that black dragon eat it for it’s snack! I gave a few more strong flaps to propel me forward even harder before I did what any smart flyer would do, tuck my wings and keep my body aerodynamic. The distance between me and that dragon was closing quickly, and soon enough I would rescue that strange creature because Rainbow ‘Danger’ Dash always wins.

The moment I had gotten near the dragons wings though, that stupid dragon used its wing to swat me away from it. I frantically flapped, as it had sent me spinning, to steady myself as I pulled out of my dive, gliding towards the large island to my south. I hate to admit it, but that dragon had knocked me silly, and I was going to have to land, so that I didn’t end up dying from pride or being a stupid foal that pushed herself harder than her body was able to handle.

Although I couldn’t breathe a sigh of relief too quickly, since I still needed to land on the big island, well continent really. But I had seen out of the corner of my eye, the strange creature land on the dragon’s back, which was really strange, since there was no dragon alive that would allow anything to ride on them. I noticed that they were also flying towards the land, but they were flying in a more west-southwest direction, while I was flying straight south. After that, I turned my attention in front of me, since I didn’t care to have any more aerial collisions than the one that I had just been in.

The landing had been a little rough as my head was still spinning a little from being knocked around by that dragon … that and landing was probably the weakest part of my flying. That was always a secret of mine and not a single pony would ever find out about that, not matter how close they were. Speaking of landings, the beach I aimed for was nice and soft so that when my hooves actually touched ground, I quickly fell forward, letting the rather soft sand embrace me quickly. If it weren’t for the last few moments, I would appreciate the dirty golden-brown color of the fine beach sand, the lighter blue of the ocean water once land was nearby, and the occasional warmth whenever the sun would shine upon the earth, in between the large cumulonimbus clouds. I could hear the ‘shh, shh’ sound of the ocean breaking upon the seashore, as well as the sound of the blowing ocean wind, and the raucous cries of seagulls. For a brief moment it was just nice to lay on that soft sand and let my body take a second to catch up with itself.

Once I finished laying on the beach, I got up and trotted up far enough so that unless there were some freak typhoon or something, I wouldn’t have to worry about the waves washing me away, should I fall asleep before the medical team arrived at my location. I reached into a small pouch that had been hanging from my neck, and assembled the flare. It was just a matter of placing the small supporting cylindrical hole on the flare canister onto the stick, and placing the stick firmly enough into the ground that it wouldn’t topple over from anything. I then pulled the string, as a magical flare shot forth from the canister. It was a really bright red flare, and while I waited for the medical crew to arrive, I proceeded to check my feathers for any cracks or breaks, and assessing the condition of my wings for anything other than the familiar burning sensation and aches of used flight muscles.

This kind of self-assessment was crucial for any flyer, and any flight school worth their salt made sure that their students had memorized the symptoms for each and every condition that a the wing structure might encounter, before they even began to teach the basics of flight. I don’t even remember how many hundreds of hours I spent memorizing all those conditions and symptoms. But at moments like these, being able to correctly self-assess one’s own body could mean the difference between soaring through the skies, and being as ground bound as the non-pegasi ponies.

I gave a short, involuntary shudder at the thought of me not being able to fly again. I’d rather give up my chance at being a Wonderbolt, than never being able to ever fly again. I honestly don’t know how the unicorns and earth ponies can live their whole life on the ground. I fervently hoped that I’d never have to find out.

Fortunately, aside from some bruising near my neck, due to my flight helmet getting pushed into my neck muscles from my little aerial accident, I didn’t have hardly any damage. I proceeded to preen my wings, removing loose or broken feathers, as I continued to wait for the medic team to arrive. If they took any longer, I’m going to take a nap. I chuckled to myself as a thought crossed my mind. So much for them being first responders! Sweet Celestia are they slow!

Was it too much to ask for them to have a little bit of hustle to help one of the top flyers in this race, or to help anypony for that matter? They were lucky that I was tougher than most others for if it had been someone weaker, they could have really been hurt and the slow response time could have hurt them greatly.

I paused for a second, realising that I couldn’t redirect my anger out on somepony else. No, I was mad that the dragon got the best of me and made off with that strange beast, and yet I was getting mad at the response teams instead of that dragon. I was also disappointed, because this was just like getting to live a page out of the Daring Do series. Getting to encounter strange cultures, and rescuing ancient treasures. It would be nice if it spoke common Equestrian. I took a few deep breaths to calm myself before laying down, resting my head on the soft grass that eventually gave way to sand.

After a few minutes of letting my eyelids drift lower and lower, I saw several spots in the sky, as I groaned impatiently. “Well, it’s about time.” Figuring that it would be maybe another half hour, I laid down, resting my head on my forehooves, and resting my eyes for awhile until the medical crew finally arrived.

Despite a few parts of me wanting to berate them for being so slow to respond, I knew that was not who I was. Everypony gets mad but they should never take out that anger on somepony that doesn’t deserve that anger. I think that had been the subject of one of Twilight’s letters to Princess Celestia, though that hardly mattered.

Once I had informed them regarding the results of my self-assessment, I permitted the field medics to look me over, the unicorn among the group performing an extremely complex scan. I don’t pretend to understand how unicorns do what they do. It would be akin to trying to use meteorological terminology in a conversation with a foal who has not been taught anything about barometric pressure, dew points, or ionic charges.

Anyways, after the medic’s assessment agreed with mine, they escorted me into the emergency wagon, and after making certain that I was properly secured, the flight crew lifted off, the unicorn belted in, reclining on a bench along the wagon’s side, as I slowly yielded to exhaustion, and slipped into the blessed relief of a restful sleep. I did wonder what that strange dragon riding creature was up to, however, before completely surrendering to the realm of sleep.

{C D T * * * {Hiccup} * * * C D T}

Toothless and I had retraced our flight path a little ways along the coastline of the landmass which we were flying over. I gingerly touched my forehead, feeling a swelling sensation. It was times like these that I wish I had worn the helmet that my father had made for me, from one of Mother’s breastplates. I … don’t remember Mother as an infant, but I have to say that she must’ve been on one hell of a diet to attain her … attributes. I’m still a little weirded out that the inside of my Viking helmet at one time cupped and protected her breasts during the dragon raids of Berk.

I spotted a nice place to land, shrouded slightly by trees as well as being right next to a small stream that fed into the ocean. I patted the top of Toothless’ head before pointing over to the small clearing. He simply nodded before banking to the right and angling downward. I trusted Toothless to fly solo as I recovered from the collision and near death experience.

Once Toothless and I had landed, I removed the saddle, and proceeded to check Toothless for any broken bones in his wing from when he hit that flying pony with his wing. Sure his wing was tough, it had to be in order to support his bodyweight in flight, but that didn’t mean he was invincible. I gave Toothless his much larger waterskin, as he used his wings to hold it up for him to drink. I drank from my skin, still seeing bursts of light and colors in my eyes, as well as feeling dizzy and a pressure in my head.

I’d seen Vikings with the same symptoms, coming home from a battle, and they were usually alright after taking it easy for several days afterwards. I’m just glad that that pony didn’t take my head clean off my shoulders, or even snap my neck from our little accident during our encounter earlier.

Without any warning, an extreme pressure made its way all across my head, forcing me to my knees. It was a quick but intense pain that had passed almost as quickly as it had arrived, that didn’t stop me from reaching up and clutching my head as I felt minor aftershocks run through me. Toothless instantly rose and moved over to me to see if I was alright.

I reassured Toothless when he saw me sink down, as though my head hurt. “I’ll be okay, bud. I just need to rest a little while, and not push myself too much.” He appeared to accept my reassurances with reluctance, and opted to curl up around me, as I reclined against his warm body.

I rummaged about in one of the rucksacks and extracted several new harness straps, to replace the ones that broke. I had encountered similar situations before, and so made sure to keep extras on me, whenever Toothless and I would go adventuring. Unfortunately, the torn gliding membrane on my suit was going to require a larger patch of leather. Considering the number of intelligent races that I’ve encountered, I wouldn’t be too surprised if the cows could talk too!

That left me with two options; one: I could return to Berk, procure the necessary materials to repair my gliding suit, or two: I could attempt to procure similar or new material with similar properties that my leather glide suit has.

As disappointing, returning back to Berk seemed the surest option. I had become quite fascinated with all the different talking species that I had encountered since our explorations of the lands beyond the wall of clouds. I decided to wait until the cover of night before flying back on the course that we had came from. It should still be in the early, early morning by the time that we traversed back through the dragons’ territories.

I ate some more of my food rations, before turning to Toothless. “I’m going to get some sleep. Feel free to catch some fish from the river. You should probably try and get some sleep too, if you feel like you need it. I’ll wake you when it’s time to go.” With that, I took a strip of soft doeskin leather that I had frequently used to cover my eyes whenever I felt like getting some sleep before the sun had gone down, and covered my eyes with it, smaller strips of leather securing the ribbon to my face by tying it behind my head. With that, and feeling secure with my buddy Toothless at my side, I gradually fell into a deep, restful sleep.

{C D T * * * {Later} * * * C D T}

I awoke, deep into the night, needing to relieve the pressure in my bladder. Going a little bit downstream along the banks of the river, I lowered my pants and undergarments, sighing in relief as I proceeded to empty my bladder. Washing my hands in the water near the riverbank, I shook my hands free of the excess of water, and went over to where Toothless had been sleeping. I’m guessing he must’ve fallen asleep sometimes towards evening, because his forefeet were cupped over his eyes. I should ask him if he wants an eye cover like what I use.

I paused a moment, glancing at the star spangled heavens and the many stars in it, and the glowing clouds and rivers in the sky. The full moon illuminated one of the large poofy clouds, casting a silvery halo about it. Its brothers and sisters were arrayed in a different splendor, the tops glowing in soft whites and silvers, while the underbellies were as dark as the inside of an unlit cave. The nearby river shimmered the reflections of what stars weren’t hidden, as a gentle spring breeze blew through the area, a soft rustling sound coming from the trees, while the river made splashing sounds, as the ocean made the familiar ‘shh, shh’ of the waters breaking upon the beach., the smell of moss, trees, and salty ocean air greeting my sense of smell.

“Come on buddy, time to wake up, time to go.” I murmured to Toothless, as I tried to rouse him out of his slumbers. He groaned sleepily, and one of his forelegs batted about the air, before it hooked behind me, and then he hugged me close to his warm underbelly, as his wings wrapped about me, in a warm cocoon. As nice and pleasant as being Toothless’ snuggle buddy was, we needed to get moving. I smiled, as I started to tickle his sensitive underbelly, causing him to squirm and laugh before launching me off of him, and then pouncing over me, licking the side of my face.

“Ugh! Toothless, you know that doesn’t wash out! This is for how I chose to awaken you, isn’t it?” Toothless just gave me a small smile, and I swear on Odin, that he was giving me a smug look.

After getting Toothless to get off of me, I rose to my feet and surveyed the surrounding area just to make sure nothing had happened during our little nap, and thankfully nothing did, That meant we could just pack up and leave for Berk. I picked up Toothless’ saddle and proceeded to walk over to him.

I got him saddled up, and our gear back on him, the familiar smells of leather and oil soothing me. Our gear was suspended from the saddle, before I mounted back on him. “Let’s go home.” I held onto the saddlehorn, as Toothless slowly ascended into the sky. I tugged on the straps securing me to the saddle, making sure they were snug and secure, as I gazed into the spangled night sky. The moon was just starting to peek over the horizon, like the head of a mischievous child looking to see if his prank was successful.

I inhaled to cool salty ocean breeze, feeling relaxed. Living on Berk, it was ever a part of our lives, and we Vikings just didn’t feel at peace unless we were near the ocean. We arrived at the mountains we had trekked through earlier, one side lit up in a silvery-grey color, while the shadows appeared as black as soot. The forest top lit up in similar silver colors, the undersides of branches and trunks also like the color of soot. The mountain streams also lit up by the light of the moon, the liquid silver dancing and shaking unceasingly. Even at night, the land was immensely beautiful. I wondered if Asgard was anything like this. I certainly couldn’t imagine how the Asgardian realm could possibly top the beauty of this place. I patted Toothless’ cheek to get his attention, and once I had, I pointed straight up, and then made a gliding motion with my hands. Toothless nodded, flapping furiously to gain altitude to sufficiently clear the mountain range. I clenched my hands around the saddlehorn, grateful that my flight suit protected me from the frigid air often encountered at high heights and lands to the far north, such as Berk is.

We made it across the mountain range, but noticed that the wall of cloud was not there anymore. I patted Toothless’ cheek again, making a spiraling motion which moved from a centered point outward. He nodded, and we slowly started to fly in an spiral, ever expanding our spiraling flight from where we had initially hovered in confusion, since we had fully expected that the massive cloud wall to be immobile. I shrugged my shoulders at first, thinking that I just was wrong in my assumption of the clouds.

I motioned to Toothless to carry on westward in order to clear the mountain range so that we could make decent time back to Berk. Toothless nodded in excitement before shooting off. The initial explosion of power from him sent me back in my seat before I lurched forward and grabbed the handles of the saddle. It was only a few seconds before we crossed the mountains, and I was smiling under my mask … until I noticed something unusual.

On our initial flight through the clouds had us almost right over top an ocean before a small section of land, followed by the mountains. When we had crossed over to this new land, there was a larger section of landmass that had included a few forests scattered among open plains. The moment Toothless and I cleared the mountain range, we were not met by the ocean but instead found that larger area of land.

I don’t understand how that happened, how we got turned around so easily but somehow we had been in fact going east again. Toothless was just as baffled as I, since he was the one to initially stop. “I don’t know, either buddy. Whatever happened, we probably just messed up a little is all. Let’s head back again.”

Again we headed westward, across the mountains. aiming to make it to Berk. Just as swiftly, and much to my surprise again, we found ourselves over top of that landmass on the new land’s side. I growled lightly in frustration before signalling Toothless to go back again.

And again.

Once we had flown in this pattern for several hours, I let out a scream in sheer frustration since no matter how many times we tried, we always found ourselves back over the new land. Toothless lowered his ears in a sign of submission or fear, I was too angry to read too far into it. I let out a massive sigh as I fell backwards onto his back. “I’m sorry, Toothless. It’s just … this is too frustrating!”

Toothless let out a few reassuring grunts, probably in an attempt to tell me it was alright. I patted Toothless’ cheek, and pointed upwards, in the hope that maybe gaining height in the air might provide a better vantage point, as greater heights meant that one could see greater distances. He nodded, flapping furiously as we gradually climbed in the air. We went until I could not tolerate it. Toothless, given his draconic build, didn’t have much of a problem even at these heights, but I was breathing as though I had ran all over Berk.

We spun around, looking for the wall of cloud, as the sun peered over the horizon. It was a breathtaking sight, as clouds transitioned from dark blues and blacks to purples, reds, pinks and oranges. I spotted the landmass we had journeyed from and pointed to it, while making the gliding motion. At the heights we were at, I fully believed that we could glide across the mountain range, without being spotted, or if we were, being mistaken for a high flying falcon or hawk.

We flew over the mountain range without mishap, to my mild disappointment. I was hoping that we might be spotted so that Toothless and I might pour on some speed and aerial maneuvers against the dragon clans. But as I’ve found out in adventuring, only a small part of it actually involves danger and action-packed situations. We retraced our flight path, until we spotted the city on the ground, which lay beneath the one in the clouds.

We had nearly flown the exact same path as last time, seeing the exact same small islands, sections of beach, splatterings of trees that eventually formed a forest. It was all the same, except this time we didn’t see the village that was made up of those deer people. We probably just passed it without looking. During the flight, my eyes started to glaze over at having to look at the same stuff, though this was mainly due to my frustration still boiling a little inside of me.

The village looked to be rather open in how it was set up. No walls to guard the city, but there were a few guard towers here and there. It seemed that the city must not have had many issues with hostiles. The buildings got a bit more sparse as the city expanded outwards but there was still a fair amount of density. It wasn’t as crazy as the center of town, and it made Berk look small in how it wa set up. The sheer amount of buildings squished together was outstanding.

I simply filed all this information away, instead focusing on finding a solid landing spot that would ensure we wouldn’t be surrounded immediately or land on someone. I eventually spotted a section beside a dirt road that looked perfect for us to land on before entering the city. I patted Toothless before pointing to the section, to which he nodded before swooping down. The landing was smooth as usual, and thankfully not filled with people surrounding me immediately. There were a few odd looks from some ponies and even a gryphon or two but aside from that we had not been given much attention.

Though that brought up a whole new topic; the sheer diversity of the city. The amount of of intelligent species within the city was amazing! Not only were there gryphons, but also flying ponies, dragons, deer folk, some strange half man-half bull creature, large ferocious looking cats, about the size of the ponies, large snakes, half goat-half man creatures, and fantastical creatures which looked like nature itself had come alive, trees that had taken a pony form, water that appeared like the snake clans, and I had even spotted a few pony shaped mix of rocks, gems and dirt walking casually within the city! This gave me greater hope of not only that Toothless would be allowed to enter the city, but that I might even procure the proper materials to fix my gliding suit.

It was tough to get over the fact that this new area of the world was so brimming with life that was so similar to our own. Vikings had thought for centuries that we were the only ones that were intelligent enough to do what we did; build houses, forge tools, and create a society. Our whole world was shattered when we found out that dragons were nearly on par with us, minus the creation of tools bit. I could only imagine what would happen if the rest back home could see what I was seeing.

I felt a minor pang of anger and fear when i thought of home. The incident above the mountains had worried me more than I had felt since dad’s passing. What if I was never able to get home, to see mom, or Astrid again. I know she wasn’t far along when I left but what if I missed the birth of our child? Could I even live with myself if that were to come to pass?

I shook my head at that line of thought, for despite my deep rooted fears, I knew that I couldn’t succumb to such ideas. There was always a chance to get home and even if it wasn’t for a while, I would get home. To give up at a mere suggestion was un-viking like and though I wasn’t like the other vikings, I was one none the less. The moment my mind was made, I took a deep breath, holding it in briefly before letting it out.

The first order of business would be to browse the shops and stalls of the city, especially ones focusing on flight-centric products. Of course finding some basic necessities was also something to look for. That brought up a single question though, how was I going to pay for the materials? There was no doubt that they had a regional currency that would be the main form of trade, or at the very least a bargin system. The latter wouldn’t be overly beneficial to me, unfortunately, for I was lacking any materials that would even be suitable for bargaining. That of course left me with only one option; I’d have to provide a service to exchange for this city’s currency or something of value in order to procure the materials necessary for me to repair my gliding suit.

With our direction set, Toothless and I ventured into the city, all the while garnering many curious looks from passersby and locals alike. Most of the dragons here, for the few there were, walked on two feet, while the ones at the mountain range mostly walked on four. I wasn’t certain if they were different from the other dragons, or if they walked on two feet until a certain age or stage of life was achieved. It would be a nice way to expand my knowledge on the dragons of this land but if they were anything like the ones that we had encountered before than there would be a problem trying to interact with one.

It seemed that the area we had found ourselves near was actually a place of trade, a commerce if you will. It was a little odd in my mind that it was placed more towards the outskirts of the city but I was hardly one to speak from experience considering there were only a very small handful of towns I had ever been too. This marketplace was by far more impressive than what Berk had to offer, with shop stalls and buildings being lined up down each street. It made for one impressive and a little bit overwhelming experience, but I was no newcomer to seeing fresh sights so I paid it no heed after the initial shock.

Despite us being in the less dense area of the city, we still found ourselves almost constantly surrounded by others that were going about their day. The crammed streets made it extremely tough for Toothless to even be able to walk without incident. Toothless ended up having to be extra cautious when turning and also mindful of his tail after one of the deer folk took a tumble because they hadn’t noticed his tail. This single accident had brought to my attention the possibilities of damages he could cause to the sales stalls and the products they were offering if he took a single misstep. Poor Toothless, he looked really embarrassed when I used a bit of rope on the end of his tail, where his tailfin begins to jut out and secure it to one of the saddle hooks.

I did sympathize with him, though. Dragon tails are often prominently displayed in courtship and mating. For us Vikings, it would be the equivalent of walking through our villages completely naked. I’ll make it up to him, though how I would do that, I didn’t rightly know. Maybe some exotic tropical fish? I looked about me as I took in the sights of the streets we had been wandering through as I pondered on how I would make this embarrassing moment up to my good buddy.

The marketplace was extremely large in diversity, but of course I hadn’t known of any other except for the very small one in Berk. Though that one had mainly included the smithing shop and a vendor or two. in fact, we hardly saw people selling wares aside from Trader Johan. So to see all of these different creatures, selling so many different wares was something to behold. Hopefully with such a diversity, we could find everything we needed to not only fix the gliding suit but to also something to take back to Berk.

Toothless wasn’t exactly liking the market, since all the creatures among him were making it tough for him to gain any sort of space. The problem with his tail wasn’t helping any either, and my makeshift solution was probably making it just that much worse. His eyes were cast down nearly the entire time, though not enough to stop him from watching his movements. I truly felt bad for him, and even though I had already made up my mind to make it up to him somehow, I felt that I should find a way sooner than later.

“I know Toothless, I know. It’s just until we get back out of the city. Just … bear with it for now.” As I went from prospective stall to prospective stall, I’d get Toothless to flap his wings once, since I needed to test the air resistance properties of the various fabrics, some feeling so strange and exotic I could only wonder at where it came from, or how it was produced. Each time Toothless shook his head, which was a little discouraging to be honest, but it didn’t change that I needed good airtight material to repair my gliding suit.

It was funny to see some of the shopkeepers reacting as they did when I would walk up to their stand and browse their fabrics. Some had been very receptive and not really caring what we looked like, while the others had … reacted a little poorly in comparison. When Toothless made his judgement, that always ended up in a negative decision, and I would put down the fabric and move on, they hardly seemed discouraged. We had been through nearly ten different fabric stalls when a little detour came up unexpectedly.

“Psst, strange creature!” I looked around, noticing a gryphon curling one of his foreclaws at me, beckoning for me to join him in the dark and dirty-looking alleyway he was in. Considering that such places were prime mugging spots, I was understandably hesitant to join him. Sliding my flame sword out of it’s sheath but not igniting it, I cautiously moved forward, ready to react to any quick movements, real or perceived.

“Put that away, if I had intended to hurt you or rob you, you’d be dead quick as you please.” The gryphon growled, sounding rather displeased.

I shook my head, “I’ll just keep them out, for you know .... a means of defense, what with those talons. I mean no offense, but I’m also not going to be foolhardy enough to put away any means of defense from a stranger that I know nothing about. No doubt you can tell we aren’t exactly of this area, so I’m not taking a chance here.”

The gryphon burst out laughing, “You’ve got spunk, fledgeling, I like that!” The gryphon uncovered the wares that he was offering, as he spoke, his back towards me, which was both foolish and touching, since it was a show of trust to a stranger. Because with the less than honorable, it would have been an opportunity to attack him and steal his wares.

When he turned around, I looked at him a little closer, as he had several jars of fireflies to illuminate his humble little shop. On the lion half, the coat was faded and patchy, scars occasionally crossing each other, while the eagle half looked much the same, except with feathers instead of fur. He had a lighter jagged scar arching over the top of his beak, and three scars forming a triangle shape around his right eye. The milky appearance of that eye made it rather clear that he was blind in that eye. His feathers and fur looked rough and unkempt, and a little dirty from the dust and debris scattered through the alleyway. His build also looked smaller than the gryphons I had encountered. I don’t mean that he was shorter than they were, but that his body looked like he had muscles, but not like he must have appeared in his prime.

“So … why me?”

“Because, unlike those other fletchlings, you’re an earth pounder, the wonders of the skies are new, refreshed for you, because you can’t fly unaided. These fletchlings take the sky for granted with all her breathtaking beauty and her shifting moods. They live in her, the sky. They live too close to her, and are therefore blinded by familiarity. For you, however, it will always be like going from the distance of a star to that of the distance of the sun, each time is new, refreshed because you don’t live in the sky, you’re dazzled temporarily, but not blinded.”

There was a certain truth to what he was saying, despite him not knowing a single thing about Toothless or I. Sure we had flown often and I had even been ‘flying’ next to Toothless for sometime now, it probably wasn’t the same as living with the ability to just take off whenever one wanted. This gryphon had never dealt with a twosome like us, yet he still was able to read us like a book.

I didn’t reply to his words, instead opting to peruse his selection of fabrics and other tools which was supposed to perform some function necessary for flying. I found a fabric that I particularly liked, especially for its ability to capture air. I turned to Toothless who did his little flap test, and I was amazed when he nodded his head in approval at the fabric. “What fabric is this?”

“Ah, ah, ah. Now if I told you that, it would hardly be unique now. The most you’re going to get out of me, fledgling is the name. Teflon.”

“Interesting, very interesting. How much?” I said as I held up the fabric, mainly to inspect it further.

“Six bits for 9 hoofs length of the fabric.”

“Okay … as you probably can see, I’m not from around here, and I’m not familiar with the measurements used in this land. How much fabric does one hoof have?”

The gryphon pulled on the bolt of fabric until it was about 1/4th of a foot. “There, that’s about a hoof in length.” he replied.

“I’d buy it, except for one problem. I have none of these ‘bits’ with which to buy them. I don’t suppose I could get you to set aside those six bits worth of fabric until I have earned the necessary bits, would you?”

The gryphon chuckled as he looked about him. “Sure, because I’m totally swamped right now.” He motioned a claw about him, his voice heavy with sarcasm.

I chuckled, feeling somewhat embarrassed, rubbing the back of my head. “Right, so once I find the bits, will I find you here?”

He scribbled something on some parchment, “I’m staying at the Glorious Plumage. You can leave a message for me, once you have the bits and a time and date wherewith to meet you at. ‘Cause I move all over town, so I won’t be back to this particular alley for awhile. Just ask for DuPont.”

“Got it.” I turned about, now pondering how I might acquire these ‘bits’ which were the natives currency. I’ve seen ponies and other various creatures patrolling the city in their armor, the back of it having a stylized image of a sun in bas-relief upon their armor. They were probably my best resource for the information on what I’d need to find some service or good for me to provide.

I wandered about, before I encountered one of the rock and dirt composed ponies. An earth nymph, if I remembered mythology of the ancient Greeks correctly. Having grown up around Vikings, I didn’t want to frighten the creature, as it could provoke it into attacking me, and considering my most un-Vikinglike build, it was probably safe to say that I wouldn’t win in a fight against any trained warrior.

I hurried to get in front of the armored earth nymph, making sure to give a wide berth at first, so as to give me enough reaction time if it, he, or she should decide to attack first and ask questions later. Given that he was part of some kind of peacekeeping force, I wasn’t too concerned about that, but I would rather be safe than sorry. After all, I had promised Astrid and Mom to come back safely, even though I had no idea where that wall of cloud had gone.

I saw the pony nymph freeze upon seeing me move into its line of sight. I gave a nervous grin, waving at the literal earth pony. “Hi, I’m new around here, and I was wondering where I might go to earn some bits.”

“How do I know you’re not dangerous?”

“You don’t, however, my actions will speak for themselves. Listen, I just want to earn some bits.”

“... You make a good argument. Fine, I’ll take you to a place you can go. Just see to it that you don’t cause me any trouble. I don’t trust you entirely, I will give you the benefit of the doubt, however.”

It was difficult to fully follow my guide, with Toothless in tow, as my eyes and body went from one exotic sight to another. It was overwhelming, really, the sheer diversity of species within this city, and the strange-looking wares and produce that stores and vendors were hawking to prospective buyers. Fabrics, exotically crafted earthenware and china. There were silver, gold, and other metallic goods with a craftsmanship that Vikings could only dream about. There were colorful flowers, and fruits and vegetables, some of which I could not hope to name, without gaining familiarity of the native plants. It was overwhelming, the sheer amount of colors and things. I actually did manage to lose sight of my guide several times, before with an impatient huff; he, it, or she took my hand in his, her, its mouth, guiding to me to a large building before me.

“This here is the Freelancer’s Guild. If there’s a particular job that requires any skill or service that you’re capable of providing, this guild can match you to a particular job … for a nominal fee of course.”

“My thanks, uh …”

“Granite Quartz.”

“Right, I’ve been wondering for a while now but are you male, female, or neither gender?”

“I’m actually capable of being in any of those appearances. I’m an earth nymph, so I can be male, female or neither.”

“So, what about right now?”

“I’ve said too much already. I wish you well, creature. Just don’t cause us any trouble. ‘Cause if you do, I’ll make it so that you wish you had never caused any trouble in the first place.”

With that Granite departed, as Toothless and I entered the building. The insides of the building didn’t appear like it did from the outside. Instead of high arched ceilings, they were about seven feet high. The floor was of marble, but the ceiling appeared to be made of oak, though they must do something to their wood, because it looked almost like it was wet and coated with something, which gave the wood a warm, golden color.

I went to the desk which sat in the center of the room. A pony that didn’t have either wings or a horn was behind the desk. She was a light purple for her coat, with a pastel yellow mane. On her rear thigh was an image of an open book with the word index at the top of both pages.

“Woah! I’ve never seen a creature like you before!”

I chuckled, rubbing the back of my head. “Yeah, I’ve been getting that a lot lately. Anyways, I was informed that this was the place to come to if I needed a job.”

“That’s right!” her voice sounding cheerful and energetic. She pulled out some forms with her mouth, and placed them on the desk facing towards me. “I’m going to need you to fill out these forms for me before we can get started. Also so you’re aware, we take one-third of your earnings for helping you find the first job, after that, it drops down to one-fifth for each job that we match you up with.”

And I thought Vikings were bad.

An hour and a half later, I turned in the filled out forms, which she then placed in a folder, marking my name on it, before trotting away to one of the rooms behind her with an open door. The mare returned back to her desk. “Please be patient while one of our senior members reviews your information and currently available jobs.”

So, I sat down, retrieving a block of wood from my rucksack, and began to whittle away at it. After a while, the carving started to look like Astrid if she were in the battle armor of the Valkyries. Of course, her figure was her slim, athletic one, before her body changed to accommodate and nurture our child forming within her.

“Mr. Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third?”

“Hiccup is fine, miss.”

“Right, if you will please follow me, I shall escort you to Master Portsmouth. She will then inform you of suitable jobs for you, as she has taken into consideration your data and what the job will require.”

“Right, come on bud, let’s get going.”

The mare looked frantically waving her hooves as though to keep us away. “No, no, no, no, no! I’m afraid that the room isn’t big enough for a dragon of his size. Plus, Master Portsmouth has had a terrible experience with dragons. No, the dragon must wait for you in the lobby.”

“Er … right. Wait here until I get back. Be safe.” I instructed my buddy. “No one is going to attack him if he’s all by himself, will they?” I inquired of the purple-coated mare, as I caressed Toothless’ scaly cheek.

“No, of course not. But just in case, we do have another option!” She took something in her mouth and began to do something on a large whitewashed plank. When she was finished, there was a crude drawing of a sword and Toothless, with a red circle with a diagonal line running through it. She took an awl and bore some holes on either side, and ran a loop of rope around the backside, knotting each end of the rope on the front side of the board, before hanging it around Toothless’ neck.

“Why use pictures?”

“Why, for those who can’t read, of course!”.

It was a strange thought, as all of my friends were literate to varying degrees. Some excelled at it, such as Astrid, Fishlegs and myself, while others would prefer to engage in more … Viking-esque activities. Well, when Ruffnut and Tuffnut weren’t trying to one up each other in who could endure the most painful things in the most visually appealing ways, or Snotlout wasn’t busy singing his own praises, that is.

Once the sign was suspended around Toothless’ neck, I followed the mare as she led me to an office, and sweeping her hoof in a gesture to enter the room. I was greeted by an elderly reindeer female. She had a dark pink wrap, wrapped around her neck, which had white flower petals pointing towards the center of each ‘flower’ interspaced evenly along the entire length of the wrap. Lower down, there was a blue wrap, like the color of the darker blue part of the sky during the day. Her coat was like a cinnamon brown, while her underbelly was a light cream color.

“Hiccup?” the doe inquired, her green calcite-colored eyes looking me all over, as I entered the room.

“Yes, Master Portmouth?”

“Yes, taking into consideration that you’re teamed with a fast and agile dragon, and that you appear to work well together, you have several options that I see. One is as a trader escort, where you will guard them from thieves, brigands and dangerous creatures; another is as a bodyguard for V.I.P. that can fly, or are using aerial means of conveyances: and another is as a guard for the Global Endurance Race that is currently taking place.”

“Well, I think that the one as a guard for the race would be an ideal beginning job for Toothless and I to cut our teeth on.”

“Doesn’t that hurt?”

“What? Oh no, we aren’t going to actually cut our teeth. It’s more of a saying where I come from. It means that it’s a good task for our level of experience to gain more experience, which can help us be better at our job and make more and different kinds of jobs available as we continue to gain experience.”

“Alright, I shall notify the appropriate authorities regarding your decision to take on the job as a racing guard. What’s the best way for us to get in contact with you?” she inquired.

“Well, having me come to this place would probably be the best, since I’m not all that familiar with the layout of the land, or its landmarks.”

“Right … Then please come back here tomorrow afternoon at around 14 hundred hours so that you can meet up with your employer and begin your duties.”

I looked at her in confusion, not understanding what she meant. “I don’t know what time you’re using.”

She sighed. “What increment is your day divided into?”

“We divide the day into eight segments.”

“So midday would be … ?”

“The fourth part of the day measurement.”

Master Portsmouth calculated and adjusted some things by drawing two representations. One of which was divided a circle into 24 segments, while eight of the lines were emboldened in a black charcoal. “Do you have a name for your fifth part of your day measurement?”

“It’s called Undorn.”

“Okay, so come here about halfway between midday and Undorn.”

“Yes Master Portsmouth.”

She held out her hoof, while I looked at it, before grabbing it in my hand and shaking it. This got me a strange look however, and instantly I knew that I had done something that was not a part of their customs.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“Oh! I was just expecting you to curl your paw up into a fist and bump it against the bottom of my hoof. That’s a pretty universal greeting wherever you go, except solely in the Gryphon Kingdoms.”

“Ah, well what I just did is how my people greet each other in my land. As you can probably tell, I’m not from around here.”

The doe snickered at this, “yes, I gathered that. Though I hope in the future you don’t run into others that are … less tolerant of foreigners.”

“I hope so too,” I said before I bumped her hoof in the ‘proper’ way, “until tomorrow, Master Portsmouth.”

“Take care, Hiccup.” She said as I exited the door. Now all there was, was to find a place to hunker down until tomorrow. After gathering Toothless of course; hopefully he wasn’t too displeased with me leaving him behind like that.

{C D T * * * {The Next Morning} * * * C D T}

I had a relatively restful night, though given that I had not yet been paid for taking on a guard job, Toothless and I ended camping some mil outside of town. It wasn’t much but we could easily make do and as long as we were not bothered, then who was I to complain. Besides, I’m a viking, we were made to withstand any cold and this place was hardly cold at all.

Awakening to the sound of birdsong, I got up, and washed my face in a small stream about 1/7th mil away from where I had pitched camp. I hastily washed in the frigid stream, shivering and uttering curses on Helheim, before donning fresh clothes. I soon had one of my makeshift nets stretched across the stream to catch some fish for Toothless and I to have breakfast. What I might have caught probably wouldn’t be enough for feeding a dragon of Toothless’ size of course.

The only solution would be to get on him and attach the net to a hook on my saddle, and have Toothless drag it through the ocean, to get enough fish for him to fill up on. But I could get started on making my own breakfast though, so as to reduce the time spent between feeding him and I. One bonus is that I wouldn’t have to gut or cook the fish for Toothless.

He took flight shortly after I finished attaching the net and just as quickly he made his way to the ocean. It was nice to have easy access to it, just like back home. I shook my head though, trying not to think about our predicament; I had more important things to worry about, namely breakfast. The fish in front of me was nearly done roasting, over the makeshift fireplace that Toothless lit, when he returned with his own breakfast. I just shook my head as he lazily dumped the fish pile on the ground before going to town on it.

After Toothless and I ate breakfast, the next order of business was to fashion a crude enough sundial so that I could keep track of the passage of time. It would be bad to be late to meet the ones hiring Toothless and I. A piece of rock that could easily be carved on a dragon’s claws was the easy part of the task … getting Toothless to carve the sundial accurately was a whole different story. It took about six tries before he finally got the idea and made one that was perfect. After adding a few etchings, the sundial was perfect enough to make sure we would never be late.

I then proceeded to pack up camp, and stowing most of it in a couple of large rucksacks which were designed to hang from the hooks of my saddle. Toothless and I amused ourselves for awhile, chasing each other, or playing our version of tag. It was exhausting having to chase him, and even though it might have looked silly to others, it was a great way to stay in shape. Eventually though, I relented and collapsed from the massive exertion.

After recovering somewhat from my exhaustion. I checked the sundial, and it was about 10 o’clock. Toothless and I had lunch, before we went airborne to fly back to the city, to return back to the guild so that we wouldn’t be late meeting the ones hiring our services.So Toothless and I flew over the city, until I recognized the familiar sight of the guild building, whereupon we landed about the distance of a steinkast away from the building so as to not startle anyone just by dropping out of the sky right near the entrance. This time a pony shaped tree nymph sat behind the receptionist’s desk today. I heard the town’s clock sound the 2 o’clock in the afternoon.

I leaned upon the receptionist’s desk. “Excuse me, I was told to meet someone here at two o’clock? My name is Hiccup, and I spoke with Master Portsmouth yesterday about guarding a global-spanning racing track?”

The receptionist pulled out a scroll of parchment, checking it over before nodding to me. “Follow me, and I’ll take you to meet the one they sent to fill you in on the finer points of the job.” The receptionist leading me to a different room than the one where I met Master Portsmouth.

“So, do you have a name?”

“Everything has a time and season. In time, even I shall wither and die, though you fleshy types will have come and gone long before I do. We do not give our names to anyone other than our family, and our closest circle of friends. Most nymphs are like that, given our longevity. If you must call me, or any other nymphs by a name, call us based by our appearance.”

I gave the nymph a flat stare, before replying, “I don’t even know what kind of tree you are.”

The nymph turned his/ her/ its head towards me as he/ she/ it raised an eyebrow. “I’m a cherry tree nymph.”

I paused, thinking of possible names. Fortunately, unlike my father, I didn’t believe the typical Viking notion regarding naming someone. Basically that giving a horrible and ferocious sounding name protected them from trolls and ogres. Personally, I think that came about so that parents wouldn’t have to think up imaginative or original names, and to embarrass the Helheim out of their kids. “So … Cherry?”

“Hmmm, well it’s summertime now, so Berry Cherry would be a more accurate description. Do you think so?”

“Helheim, I’m the stranger in a strange land. I don’t know anything about naming ponies, but if it works for you, then it works for me. At least you don’t try to give absolutely horrible names to your young.”

Berry Cherry rolled her/ his/ its eyes. “You might be surprised.”

I chuckled, feeling amused at her/ his/ its response. “Perhaps. This has been bugging me for awhile, but are you currently male, female or neither? Because I ran into an Earth pony nymph that was in a stallion form, but its harder for me to tell with you nymphs.”

“I’m currently in my female form. Had I been in my male, I would have told you to pick something like ‘Cherry Colt’ and for my non-gendered form I’d have suggested something like ‘Cherry Glee.’”

These ponies and their names, I swear. Before I could be distracted upon pondering the oddity of pony naming sense any further, we arrived at the room where I was to meet the one who was to inform me in greater depths regarding my duties as a guard for a racing track that circled the globe.

Berry Cherry opened the door ushering me into a room very similar to where I had met Master Portsmouth. Inside a female pegasus pony was adorned in a mixture of metal plate armor and some kind of wood. Her chest and belly was protected by metal plate armor, while her sides, back and legs had wooden armor strapped upon them. On the right part of the metal breastpiece was an icon of a cloud sporting wings, and I’m guessing that the lines behind it which ended in curlicues either represented speed, or wind, or perhaps even both.

The mare rose upon my entrance, her eyes looking me up and down. She looked to Berry Cherry, raising an eyebrow.

“We need fliers, not ground pounders.”

Berry Cherry simply chuckled. “Don’t you worry none, he’s very qualified for the job.”

The guard shot her an unamused look, her wings ruffling and twitching a little. “Fine, how is a wingless—whatever he is, going to get into the air to guard the flight path from any additional ponies flying into the flight path and causing any additional accidents?”

Berry Cherry looked around, as though she was ensuring that there weren’t any unwanted eavesdroppers. She proceeded to snicker, before waving the armored mare closer. “You’re gonna love this. Mister Hiccup here, is a Dragon Tamer. He has a dragon on which he flies on!”

“—Friend, actually.” I interjected, not liking the implications associated with being called a dragon tamer.

“What’s the difference?” Berry Cherry inquired.

“Tamer implies that dragons aren’t intelligent, and are mere beasts A friend doesn’t do that. A friend will communicate and show trust that a dragon will not hurt him or her. Toothless might not be able to communicate in my native language, but that doesn’t mean that he’s completely incapable of communicating, or that he isn’t intelligent. I won’t treat my buddy and partner like that, nor will I tolerate others treating him any less than how I would.”

I turned my attention towards the guard pegasus. “Before we continue our conversation, might I ask your name? My name is Hiccup.”

“You don’t sound very Hiccup-y.” the guard responded.

I barked a laugh, not only not expecting her to respond like that, but the irony of how closely pony names seem to match up to their special talents. “Of course not! Hiccup is how my culture identifies the runts of our society. Basically their very existence is a source of shame and mocking for the members of my society. Plus our people think that by giving their offspring terrible names scares off monsters back home. So they gave me the gloriously horrible name of Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third. So, I die a little inside each time my full name is used. At least I never had to hear my mother use it while I was growing up. I cringe just imagining her doing that in her voice, sounding upset and looking at me with disappointment.”

The two ponies giggled at that. I rubbed the back of my head, a gesture of my embarrassment. “Well, it seems that there are some things that are universal, regardless of culture.” The guard mare replied. I grinned sheepishly at her.

“—So, I still don’t know your name, Miss Guard.”

“Zephyr.”

I saw an opportunity to tease her a little and decided to go with it. “What about the fur?”

“No, Zephyr! Zephyr is my name!”

“The Fur? That’s a strange name for a pony.”

“No, Zephyr, as in the wind?”

“What does the fur have to do with wind?”

“My name doesn’t have anything to do with fur! It’s Zephyr, a word to describe a type of air movement.”

I chortled, giving a her a large amused grin. “I knew that. I was just teasing you.”

“You—” She then proceeded to voice her frustration in an animalistic growl, glaring at me out of the corner of her eye, as she trotted back and forth before me, with her nose pointed skyward.

Berry Cherry giggled, before pushing at me with one of her forehooves. “You’re incorrigible. I got to get back to the receptionist desk. You two behave yourselves now.”

I wasn’t sure if she was implying something, that she was imagining things which weren’t ever going to happen, or what, so I opted to give her a thumbs up, before realizing that to a pony, they might not understand what such a gesture meant. Instead as a parting shot, I replied with a, “yes Mom.”

Zephyr huffed once more, before ruffling her feathers, once more before doing a few breathing exercises to calm down from the agitated state that I had teased her into. While she was doing this, I took the additional time to observe her further. She had a dark crimson-purple coat, like the crimson-purple in the sky at sunset. Her mane was of a similar color, but a few tints lighter, moving more towards a pastel coloration. Her eyes were a brownish-gold, and made me think of a similar precious stone in my homeland. Tiger’s Eye, Trader Johann called it, I believe. He says that it shimmers like the eye of an enormous jungle cat that it’s named after. Though considering some of his tales, I’m not sure if I’ll believe him or not. I guess I’ll reserve judgement until I ever see the actual eye of a tiger. Though, given my responsibilities as chief of Berk, it’s highly unlikely that I ever will. Unless Trader Johann or another entrepreneuring soul decides to have one in a travelling zoo or something.

Anyways where was I? Oh right, observing Zephyr. Now I’m no horse whisperer, but she had a slightly more muscular build than Berry Cherry did. But she wasn’t overly muscled. She had the body that balanced speed with strength. She wouldn’t be matching speeds with the blue pegasus with the rainbow colored hair that I had ran into the other day, but she wouldn’t be a pushover for other pegasus ponies, or anything weaker than her earth pony counterparts. I had already taken notes regarding her armor, so I won’t repeat myself here. I don’t know if she was considered an attractive mare, since I lacked knowledge of the pony’s culture and didn’t know what these ponies considered feminine beauty. Not that it mattered, since I was happily married to Astrid. Talking to them was weird though, since if you ignored the bodies they were in, they could have easily passed for humans.

“So, regarding your duties—” Zephyr resumed, returning my attention back towards her, instead of the inner introspection and silent observations which I had been making mere moments ago. “Essentially, what you will be doing will be patrolling along a section of the racing track to ensure that no one enters the racing track, either through ignorance, daredevilry, or foolhardiness. We’ve already had one accident yesterday, according to one of our racers, and the one responsible for guarding that section of track has been punished appropriately for her failure to show up for her shift.”

“What if there is an accident? What should I do then?”

“If your dragon is capable of saving the both of them, then try to do so, or save whomever you can. If you need the nearest medic team, you will be provided with a small sack of non-magical flares. We tend to have a combination of aerial guards, and grounded guards, such as earth ponies and unicorns, just in case we need to be ready for whatever possibility. If, in the event that a racer or a flyer, or both become injured, fire off the flare first, and then do your best to protect and comfort them. The grounded team will likely see the flare as well as the medical team, and ought to make their way to the flare’s position. However, I must warn you that you might have to defend the injured, even if the grounded part of your team never shows up. We do try to ensure that such events are highly unlikely to happen, but … well there are bound to be slip-ups and oversights, with an organization as large as ours. I’m telling you this so you can that you won’t be blindsided in the eventuality that your grounded team doesn’t show up. You’ll probably get an unicorn, since you probably fulfill the earth pony qualifications, while your dragon fulfills the aerial support aspect.”

She paused, before continuing. “You’ll likely be outfitted with a wooden shepherd’s crook. Now I want it to be known that violence and force are only to be used as a last resort, when all other attempts fail. If the ones entering or on the racecourse aren’t willing to obey your attempts at persuasion or use of authority, fire a blue flare, and it will indicate that you need additional backup. Do that, if you have the time, otherwise, do what you must, to get them off the track, to prevent any additional accidents.”

“Sounds simple enough. How much of a stretch will we be patrolling?”

“It’ll be about 3600 hooves for distance.”

“Can I compare your hoof to my foot?”

Zephyr looked at me looking a little confused, and a bit uncomfortable. “Sure, but shouldn’t you already know our measuring system?”

“I come from far away lands, we use a different measuring system than you ponies do, it would seem.” I replied as I placed my heel to match with the rear of her hoof. Her hoof was out ⅓ the length of my foot, so dividing … It would calculate to about 42 mil. Not a bad stretch to patrol, for a flyer. “Right, I think I have an idea of how far you want me to patrol.”

“Or you could just fly until you met the next patrol before turning around before flying into the next patrol.”

“No, because if they were at the farthest point away from me in their patrols, then that would mean flying both mine and their parts of the track. It could be hazardous seeing as how there could be a significant enough gap in my patrol time for a civilian, or daredevil to get onto the track path. No, just give me some landmarks to go by and Toothless and I will be fine.”

“Right. Well, I think it would be best if I showed you the stretch that you’ll be patrolling, instead of just telling you. That said, why don’t we hit the armory and get you the gear that you’ll need.”

“What about that? I doubt that you have any armor in my size with your insignia.”

“Oh, heh, don’t worry about it, you’re not the first creature that wasn’t a pony, gryphon or dragon that was able to fly, but wouldn’t fit into any of our standard armor. What we do then is simply have the creature that is working for us to cinch some belts over their armor which has our insignia on it. Simple, and then it gives them the authority necessary to execute their jobs, excepting matters wherein the Royal Guard is required, or whatever that nation has as a policing force. Royal Guard acts as both policing force and military for the land of Equestria. I just used it as an example, because my native country is Equestria.”

Needless to say, I was immensely amused at the horse puns which she seemed to be oblivious to. I could feel myself grinning as we exited the room, I holding the door for the lady as my body shook in silent laughter.

“Alright, what is so funny?”

“The nation for ponies is named Equestria?”

“That’s right.” she replied, tilting her head to the side, obviously not understanding my mirth regarding their country’s name.

“The word exist in a modified form and does relate to our activities with horses.”

“Ponies.”

“Equines then. We have knowledge of both horses and ponies in the land from where I come from, though on my island, our major livestock tend to be sheep. At least we don’t have to worry about dragons coming back and carrying off our sheep—usually. So hearing that your nation is called after an activity that we humans do with our equines, I found to be very punny.”

Zephyr groaned, her ears folding back on her head. “Please don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Make pun related jokes. It’s both painful to hear, and thinking about them hurts my head.”

“—Well, you did ask.”

“Well, now I’m sorry for having done so.”

“Don’t be, finding these quirks of yours makes it easier to feel a sense of comradery with you. I mean, If I ignore the fact that you’re in a pony body, I could easily imagine talking with another human.”

“I suppose … . Anyways, if you and your dragon friend will follow me to our barracks, we can get you the gear that you’ll need and then get you to the stretch of the track that you’ll be patrolling, so that you can get started on your job.”

“Alright.” I replied, as I followed her out of the office, waving to Berry Cherry as I passed her. “See you later Berry Cherry.”

“Bye bye, Hiccup. Don’t be a stranger now.”

“Alright. Hey Zephyr! Do you mind waiting for a bit while I get Toothless outfitted again?”

“No, I’m just going to leave you behind, forcing you to choose to either follow me, or leave your things behind.” She leaned slightly against one of the walls, near the doors entrance, but far enough away from the doors that she wouldn’t be hit, should they fly open. She had a slight smile, watching me with obvious interest as my hands worked, as I placed Toothless’ saddle on, and securing the rucksacks that we had brought along with us. After a brief wait, Toothless and I were ready to follow Zephyr wherever she would take us.

“Lead the way.” I told her, as I pushed open one of the doors fully open for Zephyr and Toothless to pass through, before passing through the doorway myself. Once we were on the street, Toothless lowered his body, enabling me to swing myself up into the saddle. Soon we were soaring the brilliant azure skies, as we journeyed towards our next destination.

Chapter 4: Shocking Experiences

During our flight, I was looking all around beneath me, just absolutely amazed, not only at the massive numbers of intelligent species, but exotic sights I might never see on Berk. There were spice merchants, and a perfume merchant, an oil merchant. It was just overwhelming, the murmur of the marketplace, and seeing laundry lines criss-crossing over the streets and alleys.

Suddenly my vision darkened as a velvety and thin fabric obscured my vision, my head and body bending backwards until whatever had been holding onto the cloth gave way. I clawed at the fabric on my face, before gazing shocked at what I held in my hands. I didn’t know what kind of fabric it was, but it smooth like velvet, but had a sheen in the light. I’d never encountered this kind of fabric, even with the exotic wares Trader Johann brought to Berk to trade with the villagers.

For one thing, the fabric was entirely see-through! Why anyone would want clothing to be see-through was beyond me, but I held in my hands what looked like some weird see-through shirt, except it cut off about midway on my stomach, and there were no sleeves, but small ribbons to keep the fabric suspended on my shoulders. Not to mention that it was pink. It was like the pink inside a seashell, but faded. It had to be some female’s garment, but its purpose was beyond me. It wouldn’t protect from cold, weather or sun, three primary reasons why Vikings wore clothes. Well that, and no one wants to see a naked Viking. I’ve been to too many feasts and festivals where some warrior would get drunk and remove his clothes. By Thor’s hammer, I wish I could forget those memories!

I heard a shriek, and looked behind me, to find a white coated Pegasus mare with a light sky blue mane racing towards me in a panic … or anger. It’s still somewhat difficult for me to tell with these ponies. Despite their large expressive eyes, or how their faces are similar to humans. I patted Toothless and pointed behind me, which in hindsight, I probably should have waited until we were over the majority of the buildings. For the next thing I knew, I felt our speed slow, and looked to see a clothesline bending under the weight and speed of Toothless and I.

“Uh-oh!” I could only exclaim, before feeling Toothless and I being launched in the opposite direction we came. Toothless, however was ready for this and folded his wings as he nosed into a dive, the both of us feeling the rush of air, as the Pegasus mare just barely avoided us colliding with her. I knew what Toothless intended to do as he and I had attempted similar maneuvers back home. First the dive to gain speed and then when Toothless snapped open his wings, our movement would go from heading to the ground, to traveling swiftly over it. Then came obstacle evasion.

I laughed as the gryphons uttered a set of startled squawks, vibrant coats of tawny gold, or mahogany browns, to creams and white, their wings flaring open, and they reared back upon their hind legs for the majority of them and ponies screamed in fear, a great many different colors, as ponies reared back, or dashed to get out of the main part of the street. Pegasi flared their wings, but simply didn’t have enough time to fly in the air, before I sped past them. I should probably feel bad for startling the locals, but I was caught up in the exhilarating rush and excitement as Toothless dodged about street corners, fruit carts, and the occasional guards. Though, after we had dashed past about 10 city blocks or so, he started flapping his wings to regain the altitude we had lost in the dive to avoid the other pegasus.

Toothless and I looked about the sky as we tried to regain our bearings. Which way had the sun been in our initial flight path? Which way had the shadows been falling? While I had been wracking my brain to remember these important details, so that Toothless and I could resume our initial flight direction, I heard an unfamiliar female voice cry out angrily. “Hey, give me back my camisole you perverted thief!”

I saw the white mare from earlier quickly approaching Toothless’ and my position. “Firstly, I’m not a thief. I never intended to take any of your clothes. Is this flimsy see-through shirt yours?”

I raised an eyebrow as I watched in rapt fascination as her cheeks took on a flushed look.

“Y-yeah. Now give it back!” She yelled before I handed this ‘camisole’ of hers back to her, which she quickly placed it inside one of her saddlebags.

“Why would you want to wear such a flimsy garment as that anyways?” I asked her, genuinely curious. “What purpose does it serve?”

“S-some wear it because it feels nice and comfortable.” She replied, her blush fading only slightly.

“And others?” I asked, catching on that there was more that she had not yet told me.

“Others wear it for sex.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you. Others wear it for what now?”

“Sex.”

“Once more.”

"They wear it to have sex!"

Multiple ponies around us turned to look at us, hushed whispers from one to another, as the pegasus mare’s blush returned with a vengeance.

“Gotta go, see ya!” She yelled as she raced off, no doubt to escape the judgmental stares and whispers of the ponies who had just witnessed what had just happened.

I was pretty embarrassed too. Though I had to chuckle, as I imagined someone else going through what I had just gone through. That certainly was an awkward way to expand my knowledge of an entirely different culture.

I yelped, suddenly grateful for the saddle buckles, as Toothless performed several barrel rolls without warning. “Hey! What was that for!?” I cried, watching my buddy look back at me before issuing guttural laughter, and making kissy faces. I could feel my cheeks warm up at the accusation. “It’s not like that!” I watched as Toothless rolled his eyes, and jostled his back, making me grip onto the saddlehorn in a natural reflex, despite the belts that secured me to the saddle.

“Hey! Do you want this job or not? Because I’m sure the guild has others that wouldn’t mind taking this job, if you aren’t serious about it.” Zephyr groused, looking at me irritatedly, once she had flown back to me and was within shouting distance.

“Sorry. This big lug decided to fly me through some laundry, and then we had to avoid the pony who owned the laundry, and dodge and weave through the city’s street level, before getting temporarily lost, and reuniting the laundry with its owner.” I informed her.

Toothless gave me an annoyed sounding grunt, shaking his head in disagreement, before shrugging his shoulders, as though he didn’t understand why I was trying to pin the blame on him. I wasn’t really upset with him, but it did irk me that I nearly got clotheslined by a clothesline. And no, it wasn’t my first time seeing a clothesline clothesline someone. Why? Ruff and Tuff. If they can endure the most amount of pain while making it look epic and awesome, then they’ll definitely try it.

{C]{T}{D}***{15 minutes later}***{C}{T}{D}Location: Global Endurance Race Guard barracks

I dismounted Toothless and looked towards Zephyr. Toothless wouldn’t fit within the barracks and I noticed some of the other guards acting edgy with Toothless around. Spears lowered a little more, pointing towards Toothless as guards passed by him and swords removed from their scabbard as well.

“They aren’t going to attack Toothless, are they?” I asked Zephyr worriedly.

“He should be fine as long as he doesn’t make any rapid movement, but we can have a sign made up, to indicate that he isn’t to be attacked, except in defense.” Zephyr replied, sounding particularly unconcerned, and not even glancing in Toothless’ direction.

“Yeah. We should do that. What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t look after his wellbeing? I’ll be here with him until that sign is finished.” I started scritching beneath his chin, before getting licked by Toothless. I wiped my face, and flung my arms to fling off the dragon saliva. I gave him the stink-eye. “Ugh! You know that doesn’t wash out!”

He gave another guttural chortle, his mouth parted in a mirthful grin. I proceeded to remove the saddle and tack, and set them off to the side, before tackling Toothless, my arms wrapping around his chest, as I did my best to play-wrestle with my friend.

Zephyr went into the largest looking yurt, and it wasn’t all that long afterwards before I heard someone cry out, “Release that poor creature, foul dragon!” Toothless leaped back, just avoiding a spear, growling at a tannish-brown stallion with a cropped mane that was an orangeish-tan color. His cutie mark was a light brown twister with horns on either side of the twister image, and a thin narrow ribbon about halfway down, which had the shape of a spade. I leaped between the stallion and Toothless, holding up my hands in a placating manner.

“Whoa! Hey, don’t hurt Toothless. We’re just playing with each other!”

The stallion raised an eyebrow at me. “You’re friends with a—dragon?”

“Yeah, I know that you guys don’t have the best relationship with dragons, but surely not all dragons can be bad. Come on, that would be like saying all ponies jump to conclusions or all gryphons are impatient,” I said with a small snicker, to which he just looked at me blandly. “Sorry, but aside from that, we don’t exactly come from these parts so we aren’t the same you see.”

“Is that why he doesn’t speak for himself?”

“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean he’s not intelligent, or that he’s not capable of other forms of communication.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Fine, don’t believe me. By Thor’s hammer, do you look for the worst in anything that isn’t a pony?”

“You can never be too careful around dragons! No dragon can be trusted! I, Dusty shall vanquish this menace!” The stallion threw the spear at my buddy, and I was already withdrawing my sword Inferno from its scabbard. Swinging downward, The spear’s tip embedded into the ground, just at Toothless’ feet. I watched as Toothless bounded over, leaping towards the stallion, toppling him to the ground in a swift tackle before placing a clawed foot on the stallion’s neck. It looked for a brief moment that Toothless was going to do more to the stallion, but instead he just growled at him, all the while pinning him down.

“What in Tartarus is going on here!?” I watched as Zephyr stomped over to where Toothless and the stallion was. She glared at Toothless, pointing a hoof in my direction. “You, off.” I watched Toothless look at me, tilting his head in her direction.

“Yeah, you can get off of him, Toothless.” I grasped the spear, yanking it out from the ground, and turning it so the point pointed skyward once again.

“Alright, who’s the damn little shit that started this. Besides the stallion, dragon and his rider, who saw what happened?” About fifteen hooves went up. “Alright, line up outside of the Command tent, and come in one at a time.”

{C}{T}{D}***{Three hours later}***{C}{T}{D}

“Okay, I’ve heard all the eyewitnesses accounts.” Zephyr turned to the stallion called Dusty. “Dusty, why did you attack the dragon, even when his rider reassured you that the dragon wasn’t dangerous?”

“Because dragons can’t be trusted!” Dusty cried, glaring at Toothless, his eyes mere pinpricks, and his brows furrowed in anger, and with his ears laid back, as he ground his teeth together.

“Even when the dragon’s trainer gives his word that the dragon won’t hurt anybody?” Zephyr retorted, her eyes narrowing, and raising an eyebrow as she glared at the hobbled stallion.

“They killed my family! They killed my friends! We must destroy any dragon that would dare to live within our lands! They must die for the deaths they have caused!”

“You’re going to blame a dragon that wasn’t even there for the ones that did kill your family? Then where would the bloodshed end, huh? What if the dragons decided to attack because we killed one of them? It would only end with the complete annihilation of either us or them. And even if we did take that path, it wouldn’t bring back the slain. It won’t make the ache go away! You have served the G.E.R Guards well, but I’m afraid that I can’t overlook this attempted dragon-slaughter.”

Zephyr turned to a larger, beefier stallion whose coat was a light cerulean, while his mane was several shades darker. “Turbulence! Watch Dusty, while I send a runner to fetch a couple of guards to take Dusty to be processed, and await his trial.”

“Yes Ma’am!” The stallion called Turbulence replied, snapping off a quick salute, before going over to where Dusty was hobbled, and an attached chain was wrapped around what looked to be a pony version of stockades.

“Swift Wind!” Zephyr shouted.

“Here, Ma’am!” A light gold pegasus mare with a light sap green mane stepped forward. Her wings were slightly larger, but her build was leaner, yet slightly muscled. A runner’s build, built for endurance running and flying.

“Go into Portsville and inform the City Guard that we have a pony to be processed and that a trial needs to set up for him, and that they should send a couple of guards to escort the prisoner to his new home.”

“Yes, Ma’am!” Swift Wind also saluted, before rapidly flying in the direction of Portsville.

Zephyr then came over. “Your dragon wasn’t hurt was he? I’m very sorry about Dusty. I’ve never had any problems with him before today.”

“I don’t know. You mind if I look you over, Toothless?” I smiled, watching him roll his eyes, and open and close his mouth as though he was being mouthy with me. I wasn’t too afraid if he was in high enough spirits to give me lip, but he let me look him over nevertheless.

“I don’t see anything. So I must’ve hit the spear down early enough that the tip of the spear didn’t touch my good buddy.’ I grinned, throwing an arm around Toothless’ neck. Toothless suddenly ducked his head out of my embrace, and licked the side of my face. “Ugh! Toothless!” I exclaimed, my right side of my face covered in his smelly dragon drool. Though I couldn’t be too upset with the big lug, as the other guards laughed at Toothless’ antics with me. The terse atmosphere that had been there earlier dissipated like clouds before the mighty sun.

“Alright, alright. Everyone back to duty. Hiccup, follow me,” Zephyr said promptly once the group had finished chuckling.

“What about the sign? Doesn’t it still need to be made up?” I asked, not moving an inch from Toothless’ side. He was already attacked once and I would not be gone if it were to happen again.

“It already has and will be delivered shortly. I wouldn’t fret much though, Hiccup, your dragon friend will be looked after by the guards. And unless they want to end up on the wrong side of some rope, they will make sure he doesn’t get harmed,” Zephyr said.

I couldn’t tell if that was a death threat or an imprisonment threat but either way it made me gulp a little just because of how she said it. I smiled uneasily in response to what she said before following her into the building that she had put herself in front of. It didn’t look like anything that I had seen on berk or even in the city but instead it was more like a makeshift building in that it looked quickly put up and would hardly stand up to any harsh weather.

The structure looked a little flimsy in that the wood that made up the building was thinly cut and held together by some very small nails. This was hardly a safe structure to be in if there was a typhoon or even a large windstorm.

When I had finished scrutinizing the structure of the building, I focused back on Zephyr who was looking through a few sacks and chest that were lined up along the sides of the building. They were aligned in a way that left one major pathway down the middle of the building and a few side paths that branched out in order to access further back items. I looked past Zephyr to see a three more guards farther back doing the same as she was doing, with the only exception being one of the three holding what looked like a flat piece of wood and writing on it. They were all gryphons, which was probably the first time I had seem a non-mixed group.

“Right, Hiccup, there are a few things that you need in order to work as a race guard,” Zephyr said as she continued to dig through the bags and chests. She seemed to be after certain items, but as to what they were, I had no clue and so I had to wait for her to show them to me.

It felt a little awkward waiting on her to pull out the items needed, what with me just standing there, shifting my weight from side to side. Not to mention making brief eye contact with one of the workers at the end who would look away immediately the moment we made eye contact.

“Grab one of the empty packs beside you,” Zephyr said, not even shifting her attention from her previous task. “Once you have one, come over here and we are going to fill it up with the needed tools.”

I looked around me a few times before my eyes finally caught sight of what looked like this ‘pack’ that Zephyr had spoken about. It seemed that this pack was designed for ponies or gryphons, since there was actually two large pouches connected by a thick strap that would most likely go over top of a four legged being. It would be impossible for me to utilize the pack without making some major modifications to the pack itself. Though perhaps I could strap it across Toothless … .

“Hey, human, pay attention!” Zephyr snapped causing me to whip my head back to where she was standing. Though instead of giving all of her attention to the sacks and chests, she was now sitting on her back legs while holding some items in her claws.

“Take these items and just put them in the sacks, what you do afterwards is none of my business. Though a bit of advice; get your head out of the clouds,” she said dryly.

“Hehe, yes, ma’am,” I replied, rubbing the back of my neck before quickly two hand catching a smaller pouch that she threw at me. I briefly peeked inside to find that there were roughly five red tubes and five blue tubes that had a section at the end that looked thicker than the rest of them. It made we wonder what the thicker section was for, so I pulled one out of the satchel, inspecting it carefully. It seemed that Zephyr took notice before I could test out the item.

“That’s a flare, used to signal others from far away. Blue is used to signal for help if something out of your league happens, while red is for medical purposes. All you have to do is twist the larger section before throwing it or holding it. Just don’t hold the other end or you’re going to get burnt rather badly and those claws of yours don’t look all too strong,” she said casually. Not a lot of instruction mind you, but I guess it would do for the time being. At least I had experience handling items that burned.

“Right, thin side up,” I said before putting the flares back into the pouch.

“Good, next item,” she said as she tossed the next thing, she was holding in her claws, towards me. This time I was ready for her to toss it and caught it easily enough before examining it with a small bit of amusement. I guess the brief bit of examination I did happened to catch Zephyr’s eye.

“It’s r-” she started before I chuckled.

“I know what a coil of rope is, Zephyr,” I said shortly after I finished my chuckling.

“Good! Then we can move on, though there isn’t much more,” she said as she moved towards me with another stick in claw. This one looked nothing like the flares that were given earlier, instead it was much longer, closer to the length of a blade but all it had, that was metal, was two little prongs at the end. It looked like a weapon at first, but how could it even hurt someone? Besides, I had my only blade.

“Umm, I won’t exactly need a blade, you see … .“ I said before this time she cut me off.

“It’s not a blade, human. Let me show you,” she said before turning around. “Hey, Blacky, get over here.”

A certain gryphon came over, one that was completely the opposite of the name she had just called. Yeah, she called for ‘Blacky’ and instead got a gryphon that appeared to be as white as snow. Whether this was some sort of ironic name, or a nickname, I couldn’t tell.

The gryphon didn’t say a word but the moment he got close, Zephyr whipped out the artificial stick and prodded him. now at first nothing happened, the gryphon just looking down at the point of contact. His eyes stayed down there for a good moment before they slowly looked upwards at Zephyr, pupils decreasing in size until they were little pinpricks, much like Toothless’s were when under control.

Before he could say a word, his body started convulsing as though he had gotten struck by lighting! I mean, I had seen a few people get light zaps before, but this was far beyond that! It took a few seconds before Zephyr pulled the stick from his body and the gryphon collapsed to the ground, much to the amusement of the other who were taking inventory in the back. At first I was a little concerned with what had happened, but then I noticed Zephyr looking unconcerned.

“Is he going to be alright?” I asked Zephyr, looking over my shoulder where the twitching gryphon lay.

“Oh, he’ll be alright after awhile. He just needs to recover from having so many volts delivered to his body. And what I just demonstrated is perhaps one of our most important tools to incapacitating any of the more belligerent of the fliers we may encounter. Though, it really isn’t suggested to be used against a group of fliers, unless you’re close to the ground. Others in the antagonistic group would take advantage of your momentary distraction to either hurt you, or maybe even kill you, if they’re angry enough,” Zephyr explained with a giant grin stretched across her beak. “Anyway, this is a stun stick. Powered by magic and able to absorb ambient magic from nearly anywhere, it produces a nice shock that can incapacitate even the hardiest of gryphons or pegasi, who, might I add, are pretty resistant to lighting.”

I merely gave a low whistle before she handed me the stick. I looked it over a little, noticing a small button on one side of the stick. I didn’t even need her to explain to me how to use it, my mind already figuring it out. The button caused some sort of mechanism to allow the magic to travel up the metal prongs and arch in between them, allowing for someone to stun nearly anything. Of course the only way I found out about the arching lighting was by pressing the button a few times in experimentation.

“Well that’s about it, Hiccup. All that’s left is to give you some rations and a few first aid supplies. I’ll have Blacky gather them while we discuss your coverage areas,” Zephyr said as she began walking out the door, Blacky already grumbling and moving about.

“Umm, the pack will be on Toothless outside,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck with one hand as I backed up to the door, almost expecting him to attack me out of spite for being shocked. Instead he just continued to mumble all the while scrounging for my other equipment.

As I exited, I noticed one thing that was surprisingly odd … scratch that, extremely odd. Toothless was rolling on his back, swatting up at a toy on the end of a string which was tied to a stick. There was a female pegasus hovering above Toothless, constantly moving the toy which looked much like a firefly. Toothless was constantly rolling this way and that, reaching up with his claws in an attempt to swat the firefly toy out of mid air. With the way his tongue was hanging out and the big goofy grin on his face, it seemed like he was having the time of his life.

My jaw hung open for a few moments before I forcibly clamped it shut and turned to find Zephyr who was entering another one of their makeshift buildings just to my left. I couldn’t help but grumble at the sheer ridiculousness that Toothless was creating. Well at least he was proving that he was obviously harmless.

Figuring that I might as well follow Zephyr in the meantime, I left Toothless to continue endearing himself to the female pegasus, as I entered the building that Zephyr had entered not long before. I saw scrolls of all kinds, some that looked to be even taller than I was!, while others went as short as the width of my body, well, underneath my arms anyways. I watched as Zephyr went to one of the scroll holdings and removed one that looked relatively less aged, as some of the scrolls were so yellowed and riddled with cracks and tears that it looked like they might crumble into dust if someone were to touch it.

Zephyr unrolled the scroll and pointed towards the mass of clouds that I had seen earlier, where the cloud city is. “This is where your patrol route begins, the race track runs directly below the Vaporia, which is what this huge cloud mass is called. It actually has several cities on it, but you shouldn’t need to worry about it, as the track runs beneath the cloud, and not over it. The race track runs through the middle of this straight here, pointing to a huge straight that was just several miles smaller than the cloud of Vaporia.and your route will end when you see this small island to the north.”

The straight looked similar to a clog, but with a strong upward curl of the ‘toe’ region. It was near the bottom of the indentation near where the ‘toe’ started to curl upwards that a small island was seen on the map.

“Sounds like a simple enough route. How long do I work and how do I get paid?” I inquired of Zephyr.

“You’ll work from about an hour just after sunup until just after sunset. We tend to like using Thestrals and Gryphons that have excellent night vision for the night patrols. But you won’t have to worry about that. Anyways, you go to the Freelancer Guild to pick up your pay. Do you have any other questions?” Zephyr asked.

“I can’t think of any at this time, so I’ll go get Toothless geared up and we’ll be off to start our section of the patrols,” I replied.

“Remember, be safe out there,” Zephyr called out, though she was gazing out of an open flap in the tent’s fabric. I smiled, both touched by her concern and because of who she was saying this to.

“I will,” I responded before closing the door behind me. I gathered both my personal gear and the gear Zephyr had given, which Blacky had apprently dropped off by the tent, as I strode over, slightly struggling with the weight of both packs, my torso bent slightly forward, as I compensated for the weight of the packs on my back.

The pegasus mare was still playing with Toothless, letting him bat at the firefly suspended on a small rope which was attached to a stick that was about the length of her own torso. “Excuse me, miss? I need to get Toothless saddled up so that we can start our work,” I explained to her.

“Aww,” the mare vocalized her disappointment. She flew off in the direction of one of the barrack houses, waving a foreleg at Toothless as she departed.

“Alright, Toothless. We have some work to do,” I declared, as I started placing the saddle blanket over his back, before placing his saddle over top of it. I checked the belts for wear and tear as I cinched each one tightly and securely. I’m going to have to talk to somebody about getting some oil, so that I can keep the leather in good condition. Then I hooked my rucksack behind my saddle and giving it an experimental tug to ensure that it was secure. I placed the saddlebags just behind my saddle, though I had to let the securing straps nearly all the way out, as Toothless had more girth than a pony. I also gave the saddlebags an experimental tug, and satisfied that they were secure, swung my leg over, as I mounted Toothless.

“Remember where the big cloud was, bud?” He just looked at me with an unamused stare. “Yeah, you’re right. Anyways, that’s where we’ll start our patrol, is underneath that huge cloud.”

With Toothless powerfully beating his wings, we began our flight towards Vaporia.

Chapter 5: Moving On

It was a rather uneventful journey to where Toothless and I would begin our patrol. I was kind of hoping that there will be something exciting to liven up our patrol, even if it’s just escorting an elderly flier around the racing track, rather than them trying to cross through the racing track because of bad eyesight or forgetfulness. Toothless performed a few barrel rolls, and if I hadn’t had been strapped to the saddle, I’d have fallen right off of him. Or at least flailing wildly and yelling. Even now I was still working on learning how Toothless moved, and despite years of experience he kept pulling new and surprising acts out of nowhere.

It was one of the most important points that Gobber and I drill into any Dragonrider at the Dragon Academy at Berk. Always be aware of your dragon’s movement and behavior. Though Ruffnut and Tuffnut like to ignore this piece of advice, but they’re Vikings. Fighting and pain are second only to the mead we drink at our festivals and at home.

Toothless and I had flown several patrols before we encountered our first spot of trouble. Underneath the massive cloud continent of Vaporia small clouds floated on the underside of the larger, much more massive cloud above it. Two dark ‘cloud’ rods perched at the edge of the cloud, opposite to each other, blueish-white lightning arcing between the two rods, illuminating the edges of the racecourse. The racecourse avoided the blackish looking holes which appeared every so often in the cloud’s underbelly. There were also smaller clouds scattered beneath the much larger cloud, except where the racetrack was concerned. Sewage poured out of the dark holes in the underbelly of the cloud, making me glad that the racecourse didn’t venture anywhere near the openings in the bottom of the dark bottom of the cloud country.

One of the troublemakers was a dragon that positioned its body in a bipedal position, unlike the much larger four-footed dragons. Its arms were similar to a human, with claws like a gryphon’s, but matching the color of his scales, and not showing much color variation from the color of his body. I couldn’t tell if it was a male or female, at least by the shape of his body. But his voice sounded male, so I’m going to say that he was male. His scales started at a bloody-red color at the edges and gradually changed the closer to the stomach area so that it was a vibrant yellowish-gold color. His eyes were golden, with his pupils slitted like a cats.

One was a male gryphon, though again, I was basing it off of his voice, since I didn’t know enough about gryphons to determine gender by body shape, fur or feather coloration, plus unlike mares and stallions, their sex wasn’t obvious. Then again, I wasn’t looking all that hard nor did I want to. I know I’d feel uncomfortable if someone was staring at my crotch for an extended length of time.

He had a pair of yellow goggles resting on his upper brow. His underbelly was a tawny-golden color, while his wings were brown on the smaller feathers, with the medium sized feathers were a light grey color, and his largest feathers were white.

The last was a female pegasus. I’d seen enough ponies to determine that as a general rule, stallions had more ‘square-ish’ and more angular features, while the mares were more curvaceous and lacking the angular features that often serve as visual sexual cues which enable me and anyone else familiar with these ponies in this strange land to determine if the pony was male or female. Her voice was also a determining factor, but it was far easier to tell that this pony was a mare and not a stallion.

“Excuse me? This is the racing track for the Global Endurance race and it’s not safe to be here. Would you mind and take yourselves elsewhere so that both you don’t interfere with the racers. We don’t mind if you watch from off the track though.”

“Huh? And who do you think you are to tell us what we can and can not do, ya bald baboon?” the dragon mocked.

Keeping an eye on the trio, I removed a wooden carved plaque that hung from a cord. On the plaque in bas-relief was the image of a globe, with a small pony and an arc that started from the nose of the pony and wrapped around the ‘back’ of the globe and ended near the tail trailing behind the pony like an unfurled banner. “I am a guard for the Global Endurance Race. All I’m asking is that you vacate the racing track at this point in time.”

“Make us you freak!” the gryphon challenged.

I pointed at the mare, and gave the thumbs down sign to Toothless, as I retrieved the shock stick from the pouch. Toothless snapped his wings, and whipped his tail, making a cracking sound, like a whip as he closed the distance between the mare and us. He and I maneuvered before any of them could get over the shock of how quickly Toothless went from hovering in the air to closing the gap between us. I made a dipping motion with my hand, as I adjusted his tailfin and he used his tail to fly beneath the pegasus mare as I had asked, I jammed the shock stick into her stomach and pressing the button to stun her.

I heard her cry out as she jerked and twitched, before starting to plummet towards the ocean below. I used three of my fingers to make a ‘claw’ hand form and clenched the ‘claw.’ Toothless nodded, closing his wings and snapping his tail again as he streaked towards the still twitching mare. I could hear angered cries behind me, but after briefly looking back, I could see they weren’t going to catch up to us, though once we were burdened by the weight and additional air resistance of the mare, that would change.

I didn’t know what to do, once we caught the mare. I might be more logically grounded, but I am still a Viking. Besides, once I’m in the air I tend to be more geared towards reaction and action. Flying by the seat of my pants, as it were.

Anyways, Toothless caught the mare, and I looked back to see the dragon and gryphon quickly closing the gap between us, now that we had to deal with the the mare. “Toothless!” I cried, pointing towards the dragon and gryphon. I got my stun stick ready to take the assailants on. I saw Toothless give me a tooth-less grin, and I had to scrabble to grip the saddle, as Toothless spun around one, before using his front legs to throw the pegasus mare in the direction of the two other fliers.

The gryphon squawked loudly in surprise and his talons grasped the mare to keep her from plummeting towards the sea. Toothless beat his wings, rising higher and higher, as the dragon roared in indignation at having missed Toothless and I. He had to bank wide and flap vigorously in order to try to attack us again.

I looked towards the gryphon to make sure that he wasn’t going to throw the mare at us, like Toothless had done. So far, he seemed to be watching Toothless, the other dragon, and I as we fought to determine which one would be victorious. The dragon dove towards us again, but breathing fire. Toothless shot off a high speed scorching hot fireball, causing the dragon to roar, and dodge, as his fire didn’t stop Toothless’ attack. Toothless had to lower our position in the sky, to dodge the other dragon’s fiery plume.

A weak fire like that wouldn’t hurt Toothless, and my gliding suit would protect me for a while, but the straps that secured me wouldn’t last long against a fire based attack. Not with how much oils had soaked into the leather to keep it flexible and retain its strength without becoming brittle. Leather gear did have to get replaced once enough wear and tear had accumulated, but that didn’t mean that we couldn’t extend the life of our gear by properly maintaining it. Proper gear maintenance had saved more than one Viking from plummeting out of the skies after falling off their dragon because some strap or belt snapped.

Toothless spun, as I narrowly avoided the dragon’s claws from cutting into my shoulder. I could feel the rush of wind, as the dragon swooped passed us. I heard a whooshing sound, but before Toothless and I could react, a sharp pain shot through my back. The mare had slumped onto Toothless’ back, still having the occasional muscle spasm, but she was showing that she was getting control of her body back through. I was pretty mad that that gryphon had thrown the mare at me like that. Still I did kind of admire that he would attack me like that, even if it put his pegasus friend in danger.

If I had been more like a traditional Viking, I’d have slit her throat and dump the body into the ocean, but that isn’t the kind of Viking that I was.

The dragon was diving towards Toothless and I from the front while the gryphon was diving at the same time from the back. I waited until the last moment, before rolling to the side, the belts keeping me secured to the saddle. Both cried out as sharp claws and talons scratched and tore at each other, their wings beating furiously to get each away from the other.

Not wanting the mare to continue burdening me, I chucked the mare over my head towards the dragon and was surprised when he batted her away from him. Fortunately she had stopped twitching enough to be able to fly under her own power. She, however, started to fly up towards the cloud country above us, leaving her two compatriots and making it easier for Toothless and I. Almost effortlessly, Toothless kept beating his wings furiously and climbing in the air, as the other two also beat their wings to close the gap between them and us. My lips pursed tightly, as I furrowed my brow. Dealing with the dragon and the gryphon would be difficult as it would require getting close.

Groaning, I unsheathed Inferno, waiting for the gryphon to get close enough to me for me to spring my trap attack on him. He closed the gap, as Toothless fired another blue fireball making the other dragon give a rather high-pitched squawk and was forced to dodge the attack. The gryphon’s talons were too close, but I quickly wreathed Inferno in the flames which danced upon its blade, swiping the blade at the gryphon’s wings, seeing the feather’s catching fire. The gryphon dived towards the ocean, taken out of the sky. At least until he could grow replacement feathers. That is, if they can. I’m just glad to have one less foe to deal with.

Toothless and the other dragon used legs and claws to bat at each other, sharp talons raking over their scaly armor. I made a retreating motion with my hand, indicating that Toothless should back up. I released the gas from the hilt of my sword, and when I heard the coughing in the putrid gas cloud, I used the igniting flint in my sword to ignite the explosive gas, I frowned in disappointment as I saw that the other dragon looked like he hadn’t taken any damage from what I thought was a good attack.

Toothless started to fly along the underbelly of the massive cloud, occasionally snapping his tail to gain a burst of speed, as we started to have a rather sizable gap between Toothless and the other dragon. Taking a brief reprieve from dealing with the dragon, I took a split second to shoot a red flare over where the gryphon had landed in the water. Hopefully the medic crews would get to him before he drowned. I could only wonder if I was going to get into trouble for how I handled this issue.

Toothless shot out from the cloud and started climbing. I looked over my shoulder to see the small form of the dragon in the distance. Soon the sun was to our back. Toothless closed his wings, using his tail to maneuver just above the dragon. The dragon didn’t see us, dazzled by the sun in his eyes. However, I heard the mighty roar as Toothless impacted him near the base of his wing joints. I don’t know if they broke or were just badly sprained, as I had wind rushing past my ears, but I didn’t hear any sound of breaking bones.

I hadn’t escaped unscathed either, as one of his claws on his foot went through the dragonscale legging, lacerating my leg in a rather gory triple gash, all parallel. As the dragon fell, I quickly took a belt, and cinched it tightly to keep me from bleeding out before I could get it looked at.

When I was done with my own wound I reached in and fired another medical flare over my current position. “Search, Toothless!” I cried, leaning over slightly to scan the waters for signs of either the dragon, gryphon or both. I didn’t like that they tried to attack me, but I’d feel bad if they died, and I hadn’t done whatever I could to keep them alive.

I spotted the dragon floundering in the water, I lowered a rope with a loop in it near the end towards the dragon. “Grab on! We’ll get you to land!” Toothless flew the dragon and I towards the shore of the largest piece of land nearby. I saw the gryphon already on the shore, shaking itself of any excess seawater. We got to shore. Toothless landing to rest his wings for awhile, as a couple medic team air balloons drifted our way, a couple of fliers harnessed to the basket, letting them go anywhere they needed to be, rather than drift at the whims of the air.

While the belt helped to slow my blood loss, I still couldn’t stop the bleeding completely, so I for one, was really glad to see a medic team show up. I wanted to keep my promise to Astrid to come back to her in the same condition as I left. She’ll probably tear into me for making her worry like I have, what with not being able to return home immediately after discovering these exotic lands. I truly felt bad for causing her worry, even though the circumstances are out of my control.

I reached into my bag, pulling out flexible metal belt and yelled out,

“Toothless, Dragon Cradle!”

As I pointed towards the dragon. Toothless bounded over, tackling the bipedal dragon to the ground, wriggling as the dragon under him struggled to get out from under Toothless’ full body tackle. I held the dragon’s wings down to his side, as I pulled the belt as tight as I could, using a cotter pin to secure the belt in place, in the back. Pulling another belt, also of metal, I leaped upon the back of the gryphon, using my arm to cut off his airway and wait until he was unconscious, before I proceeded to secure the belt around the gryphon’s body and wings, burned though they were.

I pointed towards the unconscious gryphon. “Toothless can you carry the gryphon? I’ll handle the dragon.”

I helped lift the gryphon onto Toothless’ back, while I gripped the belt behind the dragon and started walking with the troublemaker. Toothless walked by my side, eyeing my wounded leg worriedly making a whining sound, laying his ears back on his head.

“Don’t worry too much buddy. I just need to get patched up, but first we need to get these two handed over to the proper authorities,” I tried to reassure Toothless.

Other than the dragon wrenching his body as he fought me every step of the way, until I had enough and knocked him out with the pommel of my sword, before proceeding to carry him on my back, though with his head pointed away from my body, as I didn’t want for him to use his firebreath against me whenever he woke up. I buckled slightly under the weight of the dragon that I was carrying, but considering that I was me, that wasn’t all that surprising.

This was going to take a very long time if Toothless and I had to carry both of these goons back to the G. E. R. guard headquarters.

“Let’s take a break, Toothless,” I said as I unceremoniously dumped the dragon onto the ground, Toothless shaking his body, and letting the gryphon slide off of his own body, though he probably didn’t ache as much as I was. I reached into my small pouch and secured one of the blue flares into the ground before twisting the flare like I had been instructed, watching a brilliant blue orb shoot high into the sky, before hovering high over our current location.

I maneuvered behind the knocked out dragon, my sword unsheathed, ready to knock the dragon out if he woke up and tried to breathe fire at me or caused me any trouble. Toothless rested beside the gryphon, keeping his head turned, keeping an eye on the Gryphon should he wake from his unconsciousness. I placed a couple fingers over the dragon’s airway while I scanned the sky for the additional help that was supposed to be coming. I hated waiting and especially when I had two uncooperative captives that I personally had to deal with. Well, I only really had to deal with the one, but it didn’t change that he’d been a particularly uncooperative captive, and I’d be glad to be rid of this troublesome duo.

It was after about an hour when additional reinforcements arrived. A squad of five pegasi touched down.

“You fired your flare?” the leader of the squadron queried.

“Yeah, The gryphon next to my dragon friend and this here dragon-” I jostled the limp body of my charge. “-attempted to fight me when they refused to get off of the G. E. R.’s race track. But Toothless, as awesome as he is, can’t fly with three passengers, and walking will take a much longer time to escort these two to have done with them in accordance with the laws of your country. So, if you’d like to pick one or both of them to carry back to HQ then Toothless and I would greatly appreciate it,” I informed the newly arrived ponies.

“Right, Peachy Sweet, Luckette, you two get out the harnesses and start attaching them to the gryphon. I’ll be helping to fly the gryphon, so you’ll need three or four harnesses. Berry Shine and Wing Wishes, you’ll be airlifting the dragon, so you’ll need to get three harnesses out,” the leader, who was a light blue colored pegasus mare with a light green mane commanded.

“I know their names, but what about yours?” I asked the leader.

“My name is Wind Chill,” Wind Chill informed me.

“That’s cool, so you must be a pretty … chill pony to be friend with. I hope you won’t give me the … cold shoulder.” I joked teasingly.

Wind Chill rolled her eyes. “Ha ha,” she deadpanned.

“Wind Chill! Don’t be so cold!” I continued to rib her.

Wind Chill exhaled a loud sigh, “Mister Hiccup, are you done, yet? Your jokes aren’t as funny as you think, and actually kind of hurts my feelings, to be honest.”

“Oh … . Sorry,” I apologized to her.

“I forgive you. I don’t think you’re a bad pony, Hiccup,” she replied.

“I’m not a pony at all.” I replied

“Really? I hadn’t noticed,” Wind Chill snarked.

“See, there you go! Loosen up, don’t be so uptight. I’m sure you’re lots more fun when you don’t act like you have a stick up your butt,” I cheered.

Wind Chill’s cheeks flushed as she heard the other pegasi snickering at that, she proceeded over to where Peachy Sweet and Luckette were finishing up getting the Gryphon into a harness, and were attaching straps and spring loaded hooks to the gryphon’s harness.

Peachy Sweet was a light pistachio green colored pegasus mare with a vivid cherry red mane, but several shades lighter than a true cherry red. Luckette, also a pegasus mare, had a light purple-blue coat, but this was much lighter and her mane was a light golden color. Berry Shine was a pale mulberry colored coated pegasus mare with a purple-ish mane that was kind of in the middle on the lightness/darkness scale. Wing Wishes was a powder pink pegasus mare with a purple mane.

“Will you and your dragon be able to get back alright?” Wind Chill asked from over where she was climbing into her harness. There were two harnesses in the front, and one in the rear, and it looked like they were evenly spaced from each other.

“I don’t know. Toothless? Do you feel ready to go back to HQ?”

Toothless roared, flaring his wings and rising slightly off the ground in a brief frontal jump as he shot a blast of plasma into the sky. It was like watching a blueish-white star moving in reverse, instead of impacting the earth like one of the mighty beasts of Ragnarok.

“And that’s why you’re best dragon,” I replied as I eased into my saddle, watching as the pegasi flapped their wings hard and fast, as they gradually became airborne.

Toothless gave a mighty leap, also flapping his wings, as sand was blown in every direction, as Toothless joined the ponies in the sky, his larger wingspan making it immensely easier to get airborne.

Near the base, as the pegasi were escorting the dragon and gryphon troublemakers to the guard’s jail, a flash of cyan caught the corner of my eye.

“Woah!” I exclaimed, as I waved my hands frantically in front of my face, as the cyan pony with the rainbow mane and tail dashed up in front of my face, looking over me, all of me.

“Hey! You’re the punk that was in that cloud on the racing track weren’t you! Now I’m not going to have as awesome a record as I would have,” she complained bitterly, her brow furrowing and her lips pulled tight in a frown, giving me a glare.

“Hey, it’s not my fault! The race track wasn’t marked, or surrounded by a bunch of winged fliers cheering along the track’s edges. It looked like the rest of the sky,” I retorted, feeling upset at her accusation that our collision had been intentional.

She hummed as if in thought. “So, what weird kind of being are you anyways? I’ve never seen anything like you before.”

Toothless turned around, tackling her onto the ground and licking her face. Rainbow started squirming and headbutted Toothless, who wasn’t phased at all.

“I’m not going to let you eat me, dragon!” she yelled at Toothless.

I chuckled, and scritched Toothless under his chin, and he promptly got off of her and jumped onto me, tackling me to the ground, and slobbering all over my face.

“Augh! Toothless! How many times do I have to tell you, that doesn’t wash out! Now I’m going to smell like you, you big lug!” I cried before engaging him in a little playful wrestling, laughing as I did so. After I ended up ‘losing’ and getting pinned, with Toothless bringing enough of his weight down onto me that I couldn’t wriggle out from underneath him, much to his smug satisfaction, I redirected my attention to the pegasus.

“I’m a Viking, and for your information, Toothless was greeting you, not trying to eat you,” I informed her.

“Weird. Is everyone where you come from as weird looking as you?”

“We come in all shapes and sizes, honestly. I’m hardly the typical example of a human, back where I come from,” I explained.

“Still, how awesome that you managed to tame a dragon!” she exclaimed with her wings unfurled and pointed skyward as she trotted around Toothless, looking him over. “I gotta say, I’ve never seen a dragon like him before.”

“Yeah, he’s pretty rare, even in my own homeland. I hold onto hope that one day we’ll find other dragons like him, so he won’t be alone. That he’ll have friends and maybe a lover of his own. But until then, we have each other, our friends, and my family,” I replied.

“Why are you working for the G. E. R. guards anyways?” the cyan, rainbow maned pegasus inquired.

“My gliding suit got damaged enough to not make it airworthy, so my buddy Toothless and I needed some of the local money in order to buy the things that we need to fix my suit. I’m Hiccup, and this big lug is Toothless.” I pointed towards Toothless, who looked towards the sky, while tilting his head to the right. “Hah, innocent my foot!” I barked a laugh at his charade of him being more angelic than he really was.

“Huh. Name’s Rainbow Dash. How fast can he fly?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I dunno. He’s faster than any dragon I’ve encountered back home, and so far, even faster than the great dragons we’ve encountered. We’ve never really tried to find out how fast he goes, I just know that he’s faster than any dragon that I’ve encountered so far.”

“Really now? I mean, he does look fast … but obviously he couldn’t beat me,” Rainbow bragged while polishing her hoof.

“Is that a challenge?” I asked before looking to Toothless who also seemed to pick up on Rainbow’s arrogance. “You hear that, Toothless? I think she doesn’t believe how fast we are.”

“Well how about a race then? First one to that cloud? Oh, and I’m not going easy on you,” Rainbow offered, extending her hoof to point to a certain cloud a good ways up there. After a few seconds of pointing she then moved her extended hoof towards me as if asking for me to shake it.

I grabbed her extended hoof and gave it a shake. “You’re on. Let me hop on Toothless then we’ll count down from three and go on one.”

She simply nodded, still wearing that smug grin of hers as I hopped onto Toothless’ back and began to strap myself in. I double checked the straps before looking over to the rainbow coloured pony.

“Alright. 3 … 2 … 1!” we said in near unison before taking off.

Without a moment’s hesitation Toothless and I took off, with him pumping his wings as fast as he could while I just held on for the ride. I didn’t bother to look and find Rainbow Dash, instead focusing intently on the cloud that was growing and growing closer by the second.

“Almost there!” I yelled to Toothless who just seemed to beat his wings harder, and in a blink of an eye we burst through the right side of the cloud, which was surprisingly bigger than what it originally looked like.

I didn’t say anything at first, but instead instructed Toothless to do a loop and come back around on the cloud. He simply nodded and pulled a nice loop while I awaited the sight of what I assumed a beaten pegasus just making it to the cloud. Instead what I found was her sitting on the cloud clapping her hooves together while still wearing that smug grin.

I groaned in annoyance at this while dragging my hand across my face. “How long have you been there?”

“Not as long as you think, monkey boy. In fact I’m pretty sure we were close to tying … I still won though.” Of course she did, either way if she did win that meant she was damn fast.

“So what now?” I asked as Toothless hovered, though I heard a faint rumble coming from under him. “Aside from breakfast, Toothless.”

“While I am the fastest pegasus in all of Equestria, I have to admit that you two are good runners up. Possibly even faster than the Wonderbolts … which gives me an idea. Tell you what, I’ll buy what you need, if you and Toothless help train me, and keep me in top form. I’ll even throw in some bits every time you need them and pay for expenses. What do you say?”

“Train you?” I asked, eyebrow raised in question. How did she expect us to train her when I knew next to nothing about her race let alone her.

“Oh you know, racing me, making sure I don’t do anything stupid, and all that jazz,” Rainbow said casually at first before she flapped her wings a few times to position herself right in front of Toothless. “Besides, how cool would it be to have a dragon and a … whatever you are again as my trainers! Surely that would get the attention of ponies everywhere, maybe even the Wonderbolts!”

“No doubt! You know what, I think that is probably a better idea than anything else but on one condition.”

“Name it!”

“You need to help me find my way home afterwards,” I offered hopefully.

“Ha, that’s it? I could do that with my eyes close!” she exclaimed proudly at first, “and if by some crazy twist, I can’t, then I know a mare who could definitely help!

“Then you have a deal. I’ll get what Toothless and I have earned at the Freelance Guild. Do you want to come with, or should I meet you somewhere?” I asked her at first before realizing something. “Wait, don’t you need to stay on the course for the race?”

“Ha! The race hasn’t even started for today. This next portion is a night flight so we’re scheduled to leave later, I was just out flying to stretch wings and keep up my awesomeness. I still have to make sure that my saddlebags have everything that I need, so … . Do you see that building off in the distance?”

“Yeah,” I replied, not knowing why she wanted me to observe the tallest building in town which probably could be seen from much farther away than we were.

“That’s City Hall. I’ll fly over there and meet you there once I’m done with what I need to do. Oh! And just a word of advice, you might want to purchase yourself some flight goggles.”

“Alright. I’ll see you later then, Rainbow Dash.” I watched as Rainbow Dash vanished inside one of the barrack buildings, before turning to my buddy.

“Alrighty, Toothless, I want to let Zephyr know what’s going on. I hope she won’t be too upset.” I removed the plaque with the silhouette of Toothless and the circle and a diagonal slash and underneath the circle was a simple image of a sword. I hung the plaque around Toothless’ neck as a precautionary measure, even though most of the ponies within the guard were fairly relaxed as Toothless really had yet to attack anyone.

So with that in place as a precaution, Toothless and I took off back to the cloud city which luckily wasn’t that long of a flight. In fact it was extremely quick because Toothless was probably eager to get some food. No doubt we could bargain a meal from Zephyr before we left her hire.

I arrived at the barracks where Zephyr had her office in and knocked on the door.

“Come in,” I heard Zephyr’s voice respond from the other side of the door.

I entered her office, noticing the pile of paperwork and several scrolls on her desk. Zephyr looked up to me from the cluttered desk.

“Hi, Hiccup. What brings you around?” Zephyr inquired. “I mean I heard about the little fiasco that already happened but it sounded like you guys were still up for patrol.”

“I just wanted to let you know that you’ll want to renew your job posting at the Freelancer guild, if it isn’t still active.”

“What? Why? Has your experience working for us somehow been unsatisfactory? Is it because of the attack on Toothless by one of our own guards?”

I waved my arms frantically in an attempt to dismiss such a notion. “No! No! One of the racers we had run into before we started working here was impressed by Toothless’ speed and wants him and I to go with her as a trainer. I accepted, but I wanted to let you know, so you aren’t unpleasantly surprised when I leave. I wanted to do right by you, since you’ve been so kind to give someone like me a job, when back home you would have been treated with suspicion and fear. Thank you, for letting me work here. Though my time with you has been short, I’ve enjoyed the time we did have together.”

“I see. I can’t say that I’m not disappointed that your tenure with us was so short. Hopefully the Freelancer Guild will have a replacement for me soon. I’ll have to check in with them tomorrow.” She furrowed her brows, and the right side of her swelled as she gave me a sad, crooked smile. “I enjoyed our time together as well, short as it was. Be safe in your journeys. I’m going to miss not having you around, just a little … and only because of your dragon.”

“You take care of yourself as well, Zephyr,” I said as I kneeled down and hugged her goodbye, to which she gave an appreciative hum. “Also, can Toothless have one last meal? Big sap likes the fish here.

“Sure,” she chuckled as we released each other, and I walked to the door, casting one more glance back at Zephyr, seeing her still watching me, her brows still furrowed in a sorrowful look. I waved goodbye to her, and she waved back, before the wooden partition of the door closed behind me and blocking my view of Zephyr.

I went outside and winced as a lance of pain lanced through my leg. Reminding me that I still needed to get my leg properly bandaged. I’m not looking forward to putting whatever they use for alcohol into the wound, but it’s something I’ve seen Old Gotti do, when treating wounded Vikings and while there have been those she couldn’t save, I know that we’d have a lot more graves if it wasn’t for her, well that and my fellow Berkians would see a lot more injured and handicapped Vikings.

I spotted a female pegasus with a pastel sap green coat and a moderate cyan colored mane and she had a tourniquet wrapped around a silhouette of a pony leg, so it was probably safe to say that she was on one of the medical squads. “Excuse me, miss?”

The mare turned to face me before I continued, “Yeah, I was in a tussle earlier and one of the fighters clawed my leg, so I was hoping you’d know where I could go to get it treated.”

“Are you sure you should even be walking?” She inquired, raising an inquisitive eyebrow at me, before tilting her head downward to look at my leg.

“It’s just a bit of a gash. As long as I don’t lose too much blood, I should be fine. Maybe a little weakened, but nothing I couldn’t recover from.”

“That’s not just some wound! Good Celestia above, that must hurt! Don’t move it too much, at least until we get it treated and even then you shouldn’t move that until you’re healed! I’ll go get a wheelchair and take you to Medical so we can have you up and going in no time. Be right back!”

I watched as she flew off. I didn’t even get her name, though to be fair, I hadn’t introduced myself yet. I looked around the grounds until I spotted some mare fawning over Toothless and giving him a belly rub. I couldn’t help but laugh at his expression, as his eyes rolled up and his tongue lolled out and I could even hear happy sounding groans and moans from him. Though I think the nearly empty bucket of fish next to him was more than one reason as to how she got his affection.

I did see a stallion tilting his head, looking at Toothless. I think he was looking at Toothless’ wings as I’d catch the stallion occasionally spreading and moving his own wing in various positions before looking back at Toothless. I just hoped he wouldn’t get wing envy or wing jealousy or whatever it’s called here, and decide to hurt Toothless. I was being a little more cautious, given how one of the guards just attacked Toothless, just because he was a dragon.

As soon as the mare returned with the wheelchair, which looked exactly like the name implied, the whole thing went by in a blur. A blur and a flurry of feathers, fur, and asking questions. Whoever this mare was, she was extremely passionate about her job, almost to the point of it being ridiculous. I remember her wheeling me over to a building that had a large red cross on it before rushing me inside and into a stall of sorts that was only separated by cloth.

From there she had somehow gotten my pants off, much to my embarrassment, and proceeded to dab something on the wound before bringing a tray had some tools on it. Did I mention that whatever she dabbed ended up feeling as though I was lit on fire by a Monstrous Nightmare? Well it did … luckily I had experienced it before so I didn’t scream too badly.

Though apparently through the pain, that was my leg being nearly lit on fire, the mare used some sort of thread to shut each slash of the three claw gash shut. I only noticed it once the fire on my leg died down, and was a little bit speechless at how well the mare did her job.

She tried to keep me from not walking on it, offering the wheelchair to me, but I told her that ‘I might not be a normal Viking but I’m still a Viking,’ and then proceeded to limp my way out of the hospital. It wasn’t too bad, even though it was painful and it still felt sore with each step as I made my way back to where I had last seen Toothless. We needed to get going if we were to get everything down that needed to get done.

That was maybe a quarter of an hour ago, and instead of instantly leaving to do what we needed to do, I have been standing around and watching Toothless roll around in a tussle with a big stallion who apparently needed a wrestling partner. The pony just marched up to Toothless and said he needed to face something that was bigger and tougher than the rest before outright challenging Toothless. So far the pony was able to keep up with him, though I can tell that my good buddy is going easy on him.

If Toothless really wanted to defeat the stallion in quick work, he would simply -whumpff - lay on him. I merely chuckled as the stallion was laid flat against the ground, on his right side as Toothless’ heavy upper body pinned him. No matter what he tried to do, Toothless just held him there with a small smirk plastered on his face. It seems Toothless finally got bored.

“Let him go, bud. We need to get going ourselves,” I said as I limped over to my Nightfury who promptly lifted himself up and moved to close the gap. At first I was expecting a tackle but Toothless instead moved to my left side and began to gently poke me, with as claw, near my gash. I forgot for a few moments that the gash had torn right through my suit thus allowing the patched up gash to be put on display.

Dad would be proud.

“Don’t worry, boy, it’s just a flesh wound,” I said wrapping an arm around Toothless. “Besides, you’ve done worse to me in the past.”

That earned a loud exhale as he bumped me a little. Even to this day, I continue to bug him about that one incident. Only with mild jokes, though. The big lug is tough but he does have a soft spot for me and I wouldn’t want to take advantage of that.

With Toothless finally gathered up, we saddled up for the small flight to and through the town. I didn’t bother hooking in since it would only take us a few moments to actually fly our way to a relatively clear away. Said area was a small park that was rather empty for mid day so it was an obvious choice to touch down in. I expected a small commotion over a dragon and a viking landing in the middle of a park but instead we received silence as it was empty.

In fact there wasn’t a soul in sight aside from the mere glimpses I saw of ponies walking past the streets leading to the park. So devoid was the park that it didn’t even feel like apart of the city. Honestly, the silence was a little unnerving so without any hesitation I bound Toothless’ tail again, much to his annoyance, and proceeded to lead him into the city.

I have to say, I didn’t really enjoy the crowded streets that I encountered when we first arrived, and after returning to them I could say that I didn’t miss them at all. Luckily though I spotted a few stalls that seemed oddly familiar, mainly a flower stall that had the same yellow furred and red maned mare working it. How did I remember her? I couldn’t honestly say for myself but when I spotted the mare I felt a feeling as though I had seen them before. Hmm, we don’t have a name for a such a feeling on Berk, perhaps I could name it Hiccup Sense or something like that.

Either way, it helped invaluably since just a few buildings away from the mare was the Freelancer’s Guild, the sign made it obvious this time. I patted Toothless on the back before hanging that sign on him once more. It was probably going to be a normal part of our carried gear. The usefulness was endless in my eyes, despite the small amount of humiliation that it brought to Toothless. Either way, I had him sit patiently out front while I moved to the front door of the guild.

A small feeling of guilt welled up inside of me, and I couldn’t help but feel a bit bad for taking the job only to leave it within the first day. What could I do though? Rainbow’s offer was much more worthwhile since she would not only pay me but pay for expenses. That just made me question how wealthy this multi-colored pegasus was, but that was a question for when she was around. The here and now was all about dealing with the Guild contract.

I pushed the door open slightly, before hearing a light jingle of a bell. It surprised me a little because I don’t remember there being one before. Perhaps it was there before but for whatever reason I couldn’t remember hearing it. Either way, the bell alerted the front desk mare to my attention and lo and behold it was the same mare as last time. Even better was she recognised me … great, this was going to be awkward.

“Oh, Hiccup! It’s good to see you!” The purple mare called out.

“Heh, yeah … good to see you too,” I replied to which she smiled. I never got her name! This was just getting worse and worse.

“I didn’t expect you to be back so soon, and I don’t think your contracted job is up if I remember correctly. I’m pretty sure you still have a few more days worth of work under the contract … “ she said as she tapped a hoof against her chin.

“Yeah about that,” I said as I rubbed the back of my neck, “I’m actually here to cancel my job.”

“Cancel!?” She gasped, “What happened? Was there and issue? Perhaps abuse and mistreatment of your dragon friend?”

“No, no, no, nothing like that,” I said frantically while waving my hands hoping to stop her from writing something down that could hurt Zephyr. “It’s just, I’ve been offered to help train a racer. They offered something that the contract couldn’t …”

“Is that so?” she asked with a perked brow. “I might not be Master Portsmouth but I bet I could tell you if the guild can counter the offer. So what did this racer offer?”

“Help getting home.”

“Oh ... “ she said, not even showing a sign of contemplating countering the offer. Instead she was a little confused, but that was expected. “Wait, you don’t know how to get home?”

“No,” I said before sighing, “you see I came from across this mountain range to the west but I couldn’t find a way to traverse it and return home.”

“You came from The Echo?!” She nearly yelled, eyes wide. “That’s incredible! No one has ever crossed those mountains before!”

“Great …” I replied. I felt like I had just gotten kicked in the stomach by a dragon nonetheless.

“Oh I … I didn’t …” she proceeded to stumble on her words before getting up from her desk. “Stay right here, Hiccup.”

With that she proceeded to leave the lobby and walk towards the back of the hall, leaving me standing in front of the desk. Standing in front of the desk, hung up on a single thing the mare said. Not a single person had ever crossed the mountains … what have I gotten myself into? The fact that this mare knew about the mountains meant that most likely many attempts were made. Would I even be able to get back to Berk or would I be forced to live my life out in a world that was not my own?

I loosely walked over to a chair and flopped down on it. My energy was sapped as the gravity of what she had told me weighed on my mind. The only time I’ve ever felt worse was when Dad died. What was I going to do? Would Rainbow be able to hold up her end of the employment? I wouldn’t get mad at her if she wasn’t able to, for it was probably something less than futile.

No! That wasn’t how a Haddock thinks, let alone a Viking! I stomped my foot in frustration for letting myself even think those things. I will get home; I will see Astrid and Mom again. I swear on my honour as a Viking that as long as I breath I will try to find my way home.

“Hiccup?” a voice called out, causing me to nearly jump out of my seat. I was so busy thinking that I didn’t recognise the reindeer and pony enter the room.

“Master Portsmouth? I didn’t realise … ”

“Berry Cherry!”

“Yeah, I didn’t realise Berry Cherry had went to get you,” I said, shuffling a little bit nervously.

“Indeed, and she informed me of what happened and as to your present situation,” She spoke with a small frown splaying across her face. “While I am displeased to learn that you opting out of your contract, I can see as to why. Normally we don’t bend the rules except in special cases so I need you to do something for me.”

“And that is?” I asked.

“Hold this,” she said before using her hoof to hand me a small, nearly see through, crystal. I picked it out of her hoof before examining it. I was about to ask her what it does but she cut me off.

“I would like you to tell me where you are from and how you got here. You don’t need to tell me every detail,” she said, while eyeing the crystal.

“Okay …” I said slowly while looking at her. She probably just wanted to hear the story for herself. “Well my home is Berk, a beautiful place where Vikings and dragons live in perfect harmony. At least as harmonious as living with dragons get. From what I can tell is that Berk is across these mountains that Berry Cherry called The Echo, and as to how we got here, well we flew over the mountains. Toothless and I found something odd and decided to check it out, next thing you know we are over here having this conversation.”

“Thank you, Hiccup,” Master Portsmouth said. “Can I have the crystal back?”

“Oh, sure,” I replied, handing the crystal over. “By the way, what was that for?”

“Don’t worry about it, Hiccup,” she said while smiling serenely. “Now, I have work to do with regards to your contract and filling the spot. I’m sorry to see you leave but it is probably for the best. I wish you luck on finding your way home. Berry Cherry will give you your payment and a little bonus on behalf of the guild; think of it as a gift. Goodbye, and good luck Hiccup.”

She turned and left before I could even reply to what she had said. I was a little shocked at what had just happened, as it defied most social convention that I had been taught … let alone any sensible reason. To just leave like that?

“Don’t be sorry, Hiccup,” Berry Cherry said, “Master Portsmouth doesn’t like to take too long chatting.”

“I can see that,” I replied before chuckling a little bit.

“Come, let’s get you some bits,” she said before heading back to her desk.

For the next few minutes I waited patiently while Berry Cherry sorted through some papers while writing down stuff at times. I didn’t say a word during that time for fear that I would mess her up in some way. In the end it proved to be fortuitous as the moment she was done with the paperwork, she plopped a small sack on the top of the desk.

“Here is you payment and a little extra, Hiccup,” she said with a large smile.

“Thank you very much, Berry Cherry” I said while picking up the pouch. “I take it these are ‘bits’?”

“Indeed! Your payment for the single day was one hundred bits since the grand total that you would make was four hundred over a four day period. Now the bonus that Master Portsmouth allowed was another hundred on top of that, as well as a small ticket that you can turn over to any Freelance Guild to ensure you get the veteran bonus,” she explained.

“Really? All of that?”

“Mhm! Master Portsmouth might act rather stiff but she doesn’t like seeing others in trouble, now shoo! Go find your way home!” she said as she mocked shooing me out.

I simply chuckled as I moved to the door, holding it slightly open as I looked back. “Thanks Berry Cherry and give my thanks to Master Portsmouth for me.”

“I will,” she called back while waving her hoof.

The door softly closed behind me, as I re-entered the bustling city. I looked over to Toothless who immediately perked up at my exit. Somehow he had gotten a hold of a fish which was still partially sticking out of his mouth. After seeing those two mares back at the camp grounds, I figured I shouldn’t ask. Apparently ponies either found dragons fearsome … or in Toothless’ case, adorable.

I moved over to the big lug and removed the sign from around his neck, which he was more than happy to have happen. Though I think he also thought I was going to unbound his tail but I just shook my head. Of course he pouted at that response but he should know by know that it hardly works on me anymore. Years of having to suffer from such a thing had built up a fortitude at his attempts to sway me from my decision.

“Well, bud, it seems all we have to do is meet that Rainbow pegasus,” I said as I stowed the bag of bits inside one of the satchels on Toothless’ right side. For a moment I realised something before I proceeded to pack it down at the bottom and in an nearly immovable position. She had promised to pay for the material I needed, so it wouldn’t hurt to just store the bits. Besides, they probably wouldn’t be enough to pay for the materials.

“Alright, let’s get moving. It might be midday but who knows what could happen next.”

Chapter 6: Dash Deals With A Dangerous Dump

He was running late, that slowpoke. It was kind of expected. Well, I mean, I did fly off pretty quickly. It sure didn’t take me long to grab up my bit bag from my room, so it only made sense that I would beat him to City Hall. So while I was waiting for the ‘human’ - as he called his own kind - a few ponies, as well as a gryphon, asked why I was waiting out front of the building. Some ventured to ask as to why I was on a cloud so close the ground. I simply told them I was waiting on a slowpoke who couldn’t keep up with me. Besides, I needed to keep up the image which I had made.

Twilight had asked me, maybe a week ago, why I kept boasting even after everything that had happened to me over the past two years. I lied at first about keeping up appearances for others and I didn’t want them to see me being soft. Now, that wasn’t a total lie, but she still stared at me with that disappointed frown she usually had when anypony was just being stupid. Eventually, I just told her the truth.

If I ever wanted to be the best of the best, I needed to have an air of arrogance and awesomeness around me at all times. Athletes of the highest calibre tend to hold this same mindset and that’s what helps them push themselves to be better than the rest. My dad had taught me when I was younger that if I was going to succeed in being a Wonderbolt, I needed to think like a winner. That wasn’t to say that he didn’t teach me not to be a flankhole, but with him being a trainer for Cloudsdale’s hoofball team, he knew the mindset of athletes.

I felt a little bit of relief to finally tell Twilight why I was always so boastful and filled with pride … and she accepted me for it, though that was not to say she didn’t give me a quick scolding for going over the top and not being open enough with my friends. I guess I let the athlete mindset consume me long ago, and only after some choice incidents, which I still try to forget, I had learned to stop acting out that same mentality when I wasn’t participating in some sort of sport.

Yet here I was, being boastful and being prideful towards anypony that asked me a simple question. Dear Celestia, I need help.

I buried my head under a fluff of cloud that I pulled out with my hooves. Argh, too much thinking makes my head hurt. I can’t get cold hooves, especially not here. I’m too far into this race to start questioning myself. Though I guess I could possibly act less like a jerk to Hiccup, not that I had!

Yeah; I definitely hadn’t acted like a jerk. Besides, how could he pass up the chance to work for the fastest pony in Equestria!

At the thought of that, a large grin spread across my face before my hoof instantly slapped the side of my muzzle. Yeah, I definitely needed to work on this boastful thing.

Dong … Dong … Dong

Three already? Wait … did they even use clocks to signal time here? I mean I tried to listen to the innkeeper at my inn talk about how they measured time but it was far too weird. It was so much simpler to just count it like any sane pony in Equestria did. Whatever.

Either way, from where the sun was I guess it was near three or four in the afternoon. Geez was this human slow … I swear, if his dragon could talk I would have just taken him instead. I just hope he can actually help me out, even a pro flyer like me needs some tips here and then.

“You know, I’ve seen this a few times now, and it still boggles me how someone can just stand on a cloud without falling through,” a voice behind me said, startling me from my thoughts.

Well, startling wasn’t the right word. Actually, it was more like me falling through the cloud on my face, rather than getting startled.

“Ow,” I mumbled to the dirt that was currently in my face. No matter how much one got used to crashing into things, face-planting always hurt.

“Woah, are you okay? Boy, I know how you feel. Toothless here has thrown me into the ground more times than I can count,” Hiccup said from above me.

“I’m fine, just a scratch,” I simply groaned as I picked myself up from the dirt beneath me. Honestly it didn’t hurt, but it had caught me completely off guard. I mean, after waiting nearly an hour for him to be finished, I had pretty low hopes of him actually coming out to meet up with me. As I began dusting myself off, Hiccup spoke up again.

“Hope we didn’t make you wait long, I had to take care of a few things that lasted longer than we wanted …” he said while eyeing his dragon. “Anyway … how long have we kept you waiting?”

“Oh, not too long. I decided to keep it slow so you two could keep up,” I said while shooting them both a cocky a grin. Hiccup just chuckled while it seemed that his dragon was … staring at a butterfly that flew by? Weird.

“Right,” Hiccup said while looking around. I followed his gaze and it seemed we were drawing a crowd. Not that I didn’t mind, but it wasn’t really the best place to talk about business.

“It seems my awesomeness is drawing a crowd,” I said coolly but I could tell that more ponies were looking at Hiccup’s dragon than me. “How about we fly around a little? I’ve had enough down time and need to stretch my wings out.”

“I think Toothless would enjoy that but I still need that material to fix my gliding suit and we’re a little too big to fly through the streets,” Hiccup replied while gesturing at Toothless. Right… new plan!

“Geez, it’s like you've never seen a dragon before!” I yelled out to the crowd, getting their attention. “I mean look! There’s one over there, go bug them!”

Luckily for me, the crowd seemed to get the point I was making. Seriously, it’s cool that they’re interested in Hiccup’s dragon and all, but treating him like some circus sideshow freak is just stupid. “So, do you know where to go to get what you need? I could take you to some of the G. E. R. suppliers. They might have what you’re looking for.”

I watched as Hiccup shook his head. “You see, I met up with this strange gryphon merchant who agreed to sell me some fabric once I had earned enough money. He told me to go to the Glorious Plumage. If he’s not there, then I’m supposed to leave a message of a date and time that I’d want to meet up with him.”

“Well, do you have a map, or do you know the way?” I asked him, hoping that he would in fact know, since I’d never been here before and didn’t know where a lot of places within the city were located.

I watched with irritation as he rubbed the back of his head in a gesture of embarrassment. I hung my head and groaned, my flared wings twitching slightly. “Ugh! Do you know how long it’s gonna take us to locate someone that can take us to this place where this gryphon is located?”

“Only as long as it takes to find a city guard.”

I sighed, prepared to be extremely bored especially since Toothless was effectively grounded within the city limits. If I didn’t have the pressure of performing well in this race, I’d have probably enjoyed the city’s different population and cultures a lot more. It’d be just like Daring Do and the Serpentine Sceptre, where she enters a city with all kinds of ponies and all kinds of cultures! From the thin tall ponies with their aromatic gums and resins from Saddle Arabia, to the slender delicate does with kimonos and hair picks while bucks dressed in business suits and drove nice carriages of Neighpon, to the spiritual zebras of Zebrica, with the mares wearing those huge hoop earrings and all those neck rings, while the male zebras would sit out in the countryside and speak in reverent tones of their lores and legends.

One day, I will travel the world, maybe even as a Wonderbolt! How cool would that be! To perform death defying dives and acrobatic acts of awesomeness for creatures of all kinds all over the world! For Buffalo, Zebra, Gryphon and more! Old, young, the single and the couples and for families also!

Yep; any day now, I’ll be getting that letter of acceptance into the Wonderbolts. Meanwhile I get to waste my valuable nap time to look for some gryphon whose name I don’t even know, and whom I probably never would have even met if it weren’t for Hiccup and Toothless.

I wish I could say that our journey began as any epic journey, with intrepid heroes setting out to battle against a great evil, or that a band of unlikely friends had set out on a quest to do what needed to be done for the sake of one of their friends. Or even that it would begin like a Daring Do novel with Daring finding some important or powerful lost artefact and then having to perform amazing fight scenes and acts of acrobatic awesomeness in order to retrieve the artefact from the bad guys.

But no, we wandered through the streets, bumping into those who lived in the city and those who were just passing through, or even just visiting, either as tourists, or visiting someone they knew that lived within this city. I don’t know how long it must have been, but it was probably about an hour before we encountered one of the city guards. But what really set him apart was that he was an Ibex!

I had heard of Ibexes from Zecora mentioning them on occasion, whenever she would talk about her home in Zebrica, but it was one thing to hear about them and a whole different matter entirely to see them!

I took notice of all this, since in Daring Do and the Mask of Terror, Daring encounters an Ibex during her totally awesome adventure. I heard Hiccup clear his throat, not that he needed to, because the Guard was already looking warily at Hiccup and Toothless.

“May I help you?” the Ibex, who was decked out in the armor of the city guard armor.

“My companions and I need to make our way to the Glorious Plumage. But as you probably can tell, Toothless and I aren’t exactly from around here, and my friend Rainbow Dash here isn’t familiar with the town either. Can you help us out?” Hiccup inquired.

“Sure! Follow me. I’ve gotta admit, I’ve never seen a dragon like yours before. I’ve also never seen anything like you before either. Are you a new species of minotaur?” the guard asked, looking Hiccup up and down.

“We might be, are they the headstrong type and would rather bash through a problem than actually think of a solution that doesn’t involve breaking things?” I heard Hiccup chuckle after he responded.

“Eh, they’re a mixed lot. I’ve actually run into some really intelligent minotaurs, but I have run across some like you’ve described,” the guard responded.

Not wanting to be left out of the conversation, I butted in: “Name’s Rainbow Dash, the fastest flier in Equestria, maybe even the world, since I could fly circles around these slowpokes in the G. E. R. all day. Perhaps you’ve heard of me?”

“Head Bang. I’ve heard about the Young Flyers competition and how you performed a Sonic Rainboom. I really wish I’d have been there. That must have been quite a sight to see,” Head Bang gushed, while I puffed my chest out a little more and ruffled my awesomely cool wings. I definitely wouldn’t be the pony I am today without these sweet babies.

“Hiccup, and the big lug next to me is Toothless. And to answer your question, I’m not a minotaur of any kind. I’m a Viking.”

“Huh. Never met a Viking before. Never met a dragon like Toothless either,” Head Bang mused, peering at Toothless.

“Yeah, you might say that we’re out of this world,” Hiccup responded with a brief chuckle afterwards.

I groaned, facehoofing at what Hiccup had said. He’s just lucky that there’s enough different species that he probably wouldn’t end up being used for alien experiments. It might be entertaining to watch him should he end up getting probed, though.

Fortunately all this small talk had a beneficial side to it, as it seemed like it took very little time at all to arrive at The Glorious Plumage.

“Well, here you folks are. It’s been nice chatting with you, Hiccup. You folks take care and be safe, wherever you may go,” Head Bang said, before departing down the street, going along the same street we had traveled, likely to return to his patrol route.

Looking at the building before us, it may have lived up to its name when it was brand new, but now? I saw cracked marble, with vines of ivy climbing up walls and pillars, the unkempt looking lawn with various garbage and debris, and the pool filled with a dirty looking liquid. A shame really, this place must’ve really looked glorious in its heyday.

Hiccup led the way, his arms and weird-looking claws curling around the handles of the large wooden doors of the so called ‘Glorious Plumage.’ The door grated and creaked horribly over the marble flooring. Any conversation died as Toothless sauntered into the lobby as well. I could almost feel the stares that seemed to follow our strange group of Viking, his dragon friend, and a pegasus heading towards the reception desk.

Well, the stares were really more focused on Hiccup and Toothless, since they had probably not seen anything like them ever. I mean, there could be more of them, especially if he wants me to help him get home. Still, I was skeptical; I mean I had been all over the world and seen practically everything, so I would know if there was a dragon like Toothless. He couldn’t even talk, like what type of dragon was he even if he couldn’t talk, sheesh. Maybe he’s some new dragon! Heh, I can just imagine Twilight’s face when I walk into the Tree Fortress of Friendship with them in tow!

I kept my imagination at bay as we proceeded to the front desk. An Earth dryad, with the body of an elk stallion, manned the reception desk.

“‘Elcome, strangers, ta th’ Glorious Plumage. ‘ow might I be o’ service?” the receptionist asked us.

“Yes, Is a gryphon named DuPont here? I was told he would be staying here, and I need to speak with him.” I looked about the room as Hiccup asked the receptionist. Don’t tell anypony, but I was uneasy, looking at the rough looking customers that lounged about the lobby. Maybe it was just my imagination, but I couldn’t help but think that some of them had been giving us strange looks. They certainly looked like they’d seen fights, many of them sporting scars on their faces and bodies, not to mention they looked like the rough type that would find creative ways to torture their victims. Plus, I could smell their stench from way over where I was. Eugh. I’m glad pony eyes have a fairly large range of vision.

Toothless, however, didn’t look too concerned, but I imagine that there’d be very few creatures with either the bravery, or desperation to attempt to harm a dragon, especially since many of them tended to have tough armor-like scales and could breathe fire. Still, I could see Toothless scanning the room as well.

“And does ‘e know yer comin’?” the receptionist inquired.

“Not exactly, but he did say to come here and either meet up with him here, or leave a message for him of when and where we’d like to meet him. If he is here, just tell him that ‘a strange creature and his dragon friend has returned to buy some of his wares.’” Hiccup responded.

I watched as the receptionist left the lobby, hopefully to inform this gryphon merchant that Hiccup had agreed to purchase from. Hiccup leaned against the receptionist desk, while Toothless’ ear fins, I’m guessing, swivelled and raised or lowered as he peered about the lobby, and gave an impressively massive yawn. I didn’t see any teeth, which honestly surprised me, since I had yet to meet a dragon without teeth. It certainly made him appear less menacing.

“I wonder what he eats,” I mused softly to myself.

We all turned and watched as the receptionist returned to the front desk. “Mister DuPont ‘as agreed ta see ye.”

I watched as the Earth dryad motioned for Hiccup to draw closer, rotating his hoof in a vertical circular motion. Hiccup bent over and then the receptionist must have said something, as I could see his muzzle moving, but it wasn’t loud enough for any of us to hear. I watched as Hiccup nodded in understanding.

I followed Hiccup, since he seemed to know where we needed to go. Toothless followed behind me, as I gave the occasional backward glance to ensure that we weren’t being followed.

I watched as Hiccup knocked on the door.

“Who is it?” a voice called from the other side.

“It’s the strange creature and his strange dragon with a very strange pony.” I heard Hiccup say.

“Hey!” I cried in indignation, glaring at the rude Viking.

I could hear the raucous laughter from the other side of the door, before the sound of a metallic bolt being slid back was heard as the door opened to reveal a scruffy looking gryphon. His fur and feathers looked slightly dirty and unkempt, but it was the scars that framed his eye in a triangle that was the most visually outstanding thing about him, that and the milky appearance of that eye, which likely meant that he was blind in that eye.

“Ho, fletchling! Returned so soon are you?” I heard the gryphon say.

“Yes. Toothless and I got some luck, enough so that I have the bits I need to purchase that Teflon fabric you showed me last time,” Hiccup replied.

“How much are you looking to buy? The six bits worth, or are you be buying more than that?” I heard DuPont inquire as I watched as he rummaged in a sizable travel chest, before extracting a bolt of fabric, turning about as he laid it upon the floor and letting the bolt of fabric roll away a short distance.

“I’d like to buy 24 bits worth, please.” I heard Hiccup say.

I couldn’t help but laugh at the astonished look on the gryphon’s face. Though I watched with interest as the gryphon measured out the amount of fabric that Hiccup wanted to purchase. I watched as he used his index talon to score a cut along the width of the fabric, before folding the fabric up and handing it over to Hiccup.

“24 bits it is then,” Dupont informed, as he watched Hiccup fish out 24 bits, dropping them into the gryphon’s outstretched talon. Dupont counted the bits, before using a piece of parchment and an inkwell at the desk in his room and drew up a bill of sale.

“Here you go, Fletchling! A pleasure doing business with you. May the skies protect you wherever you go, so long as you show her the proper respect, eh?” DuPont grinned, lightly nudging Hiccup’s shoulder.

“Of course, Mister DuPont. May fortune and protection be upon you. Take care of yourself.” I heard Hiccup respond.

“You as well, fletchling. You as well.” I heard DuPont respond, before closing the door behind us and engaging the bolt to the door once more.

I watched as Hiccup took the fabric and began to pack it into his rucksack.

“Why did you by so much of that fabric?” I asked him.

“Because I want to be ready in case I have to repair my gliding suit, again. When we collided, one of the gliding parts of my suit was damaged, otherwise I could have glided down from the accident, instead of falling,” Hiccup replied.

“Oh. Sorry.” I scuffed my hoof in embarrassment.

“It wasn’t anybody’s fault. Well, maybe the G. E. R.’s for not being properly staffed for the entire race. That and maybe for not having the track marked properly, but I probably wouldn’t have known what purpose they served even if they had, because you know … not from around here,” Hiccup mused aloud.

“I’m just glad you came out of it alive,” I grinned sheepishly at him. “And I’m glad that Toothless managed to save you and not eat you, like I thought he’d do at first.”

“So yeah, it was just a series of unfortunate events. But, we might have never met, if it hadn’t happened,” Hiccup responded.

I laughed as Toothless turned his head and made kissy faces at Hiccup. It was even more amusing as I watched Hiccup’s face flush, before turning his attention to his dragon buddy.

“It’s not like that!” Hiccup protested.

I watched in amazement as I saw Toothless give Hiccup a toothy grin. Seriously, where’d he get those?

“Ugh! You’re full of it,” I heard Hiccup say in exasperation as he proceeded to mount Toothless, turning his attention forward as we flew back to the barracks for the racers participating in the G. E. R.

{C T D} * * * {C T D}

I watched in fascination as Hiccup cut the ruined part of his gliding suit out and cut a new one, his nimble stubby claws nimbly sewing the new fabric in. I continued to watch as his strange appendages pressed against the fabric, I guess to make sure that the fabric would remain secure and that it wouldn’t give under pressure.

He needed a place to do his work so it only made sense to return to the G.E.R designated area, well the one we fliers get. He said he wanted to stay away from the barracks because Toothless was too dangerous, or something like that. Honestly? It made no sense to me but that wasn’t what was important. What was, was napping … I mean there was only like four hours till the race and I hadn’t even had my mid-afternoon nap!

Well, I could start napping while he was doing his thing, but I’m actually a little interested in this ‘gliding suit’ of his. I’ll nap once he’s finished.

“Right, I need some heat, Toothless,” Hiccup said before opening his arm to reveal the gliding suit once more. Toothless nodded before taking in a breath.

Quicker than anypony could see, ‘cause my eyes were obviously top notch, a burst of weird purple stuff shot out from the dragon’s mouth and hit the wing suit. I don’t know what he did, but whatever it was, the spot where the purple stuff had hit looked slightly darker but also melded with the rest of the suit. I couldn’t even see the stitches!

“What was that? That was awesome!” I said as I zipped over to Hiccup, who still had his arm up. I carefully prodded the wing a few times, only to feel that weird fabric he bought.

“You know … come to think of it, we never named that did we, Toothless?” Hiccup asked, to which Toothless gave a small roar in reply.

“Wait, you can talk to him?”

“It’s really one sided,” Hiccup said. “He can understand me, but I need to watch his actions more … anyway! Let’s take this for a test.”

Before I could get out a response, Hiccup quickly hopped on Toothless’ back, causing me to notice that his legs didn’t end the same, with one having this weird contraption at the end; huh. In the brief moment that it took for me to wonder about Hiccup’s leg, Toothless was already launching himself in the air. The force blew my mane a little bit, but mainly it snapped me out of my thoughts.

“Hey! Wait for me!” I yelled, probably for the first time ever and flew to catch up.

We slowly climbed, making use of the up-drafts to climb higher and higher until Hiccup began to unhook the straps securing him to the saddle. I watched as he did something to some pedal before rolling off of Toothless and opening his arms wide.

I watched as he didn’t fall like he did when we first met, but instead glided. He wasn’t going anywhere like my top speed, but he was a ground-pounder, so it only made sense that he couldn’t fly as fast as me. Still, I have to admit, that it is pretty awesome that an earth-bound creature like Hiccup could even come up with something that would allow him to soar the skies, even if it wasn’t truly flying.

I watched as Toothless’ mouth glowed. Yikes! Was he going to breathe fire at his friend!?

“Hiccup-!” I began to panic, but it was already too late, and I watched as a blue fireball shot beneath Hiccup. To my relief, I watched as Hiccup climbed back to the height he had started at. It was pretty awesome, as Hiccup and Toothless could fly the skies together as long as Toothless could shoot those fireballs.

“Sorry if we scared you. We usually don’t do that around others, so we didn’t think that you might have seen that as an attack,” I heard him yell at me over the rushing sounds of the wind.

“What? I- I wasn’t scared.” I denied.

“Suuuuure,” he drawled out sounding entirely like he didn’t believe me.

“I wasn’t scared!” I hotly defended, feeling my cheeks warm up in embarrassment.

“Hiccup-!” he mocked, changing his voice to sound more mare-like, grinning at me as he teased me.

“Ugh!” I huffed, flapping my wings faster and leaving the two a little ways behind me as the duo shared a short laugh. I couldn’t hear them, even though I could see Hiccup and Toothless flying behind me.

If anything I felt embarrassed for even worrying in the first place. Why’d I think that Toothless might hurt Hiccup? I mean, they were pretty much best friends. It really reminded me of my bond with Tank. Though Toothless wasn’t a pet, but more like a friend and partner, with Hiccup helping or just paling around with him.

I fell back, flying near Hiccup.

“Sorry if I took it too far,” I heard him apologize.

“Agh! I don’t know why I even worried. Now you’ll probably keep teasing me about it,” I huffed, looking away from him, still feeling embarrassed.

“Not if it really bothers you. Hey, I need you as my friend... Plus, I don’t know who I could turn to who might help me find my way home,” he said.

“Gah! It’s more embarrassing than anything else really. I mean, I have this image I built up of being a cool, awesome, and radical pony, and now you’ve seen through it. It’s fine. But don’t think that I won’t get you back, though!” I grinned at the prospect of getting even, and as long as he was with me, I would have more than one chance for that to happen.

“Heh. Where I live, we’re cool for about a quarter of the year. The rest, we’re absolutely freezing. I do think you’re pretty awesome, especially with how fast I saw you flying when we first met. Though I think we have some different … word there. Would you mind explaining?” I heard him ask.

“You should probably ask Twilight when we see her. I don’t think I could really explain it really well, but an egghead like her should have no problem talking your ear off about what actually is radical. On the other hoof, her long-windedness is anything but radical,” I joked, thinking of just how crazy it would be to just sic Twilight on Hiccup … maybe that’s how I can get him back!

“I take it that’s a friend of yours?” I heard him ask.

“Yeah, me and Sparkle are tight. She’s the one who got me started on the Daring Do books. They’re seriously awesome, you should read them sometime,” I said, grinning at him.

“Maybe I’ll take a copy back to Berk. It sounds like an interesting series,” Hiccup pondered before deciding that he was done flying. Together we slowly made our way back to the ground, almost exactly to where we had taken off. On the way down I peered at the sun which was slowly making its way behind the horizon, which meant I would need to be ready to go.

The beginning of this stretch of the race was a short sprint up to the city of Cumulus which sat on the edge of Vaporia, where the racers would follow a rather quick route through the city before heading off Ursland. Yeah I remembered that country name rather well, only because I wanted to meet an Ursa, well aside from that feral star one from the Everfree. These guys were supposedly different, and I couldn’t wait to see them.

When we touched down, Hiccup proceeded to look over the suit once more before deciding to stuff the rest of the material and tools into one of the bags that was attached to Toothless. I just remembered that I had to make sure he knew exactly what to do for this next part or this was going to end horribly, and I was lucky enough to be carrying everything that had been given to me at the beginning of the race. Especially the trainer’s identification flag even though I didn’t need it earlier.

“Oh, by the way. As my trainer now, you need to know a few rules that G.E.R has in place. First, attach this to some part of you,” I said as I dug out the flag that he needed. Coincidently, the race officials thought it was funny to give me a rainbow coloured flag … I let them chuckle it up while I slowly died inside.

He nodded before taking the surprisingly large flag and tying it to Toothless’s tail. Said dragon then began to swish it back and forth, apparently not used to having something flapping like that. Meh, I dunno since he can’t talk. “Next thing is you can’t interfere with the race outside of helping me with basic stuff, like giving me water, or a snack, or first aid. Though I think that’s all common sense.”

“Kind of makes me wish I had packed more things … “ he said, implying something I quickly picked up on.

“Don’t worry about it too much, I’ve gotten myself this far I don’t think you’ll have to do much. Oh and lastly, though it isn’t a rule as much as something I need you to do for me,” I said before hopping into a hover in front of him. “I need you to challenge me! Push me to go faster and finish quicker! I don’t care how, but I need you to motivate me… without cheating.”

He simply chuckled at that before giving a quick ‘okay’ at my set guideline. Well, that was really all I had left for him though I gue-

“All racers report to the starting area!” A voice called out from somewhere, causing me to snap my head around quickly. Geeze, even after five days of having to hear that, I still wasn’t ready for the call out. Though it couldn’t match Princess Luna’s Royal Canterlot voice … nothing could match Princess Luna.

“Alright, that’s my cue. We’re going up to Cumulus that is on the edge of Vaporia up there,” I said while pointing to the massive cloud. “Meet me kind of … well kind of straight up from here. You’ll see me, kind of tough not to miss my awesomeness.”

“Will do,” he chuckled before slowly mounting Toothless. “Hope you know what you’re doing, ‘cause me and Toothless here don’t want to be saving you too often.”

I merely laughed as I flew off to the starting area. This was going to be a piece of cake, I mean, I have a dragon and a Viking to help me, who else could top that awesomeness. Oh, and since I was among one of the first to start tonight, this next stretch was definitely in the bag!

Chapter 7: Ursine Umbrage

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Chapter 8 The Big Apple: New Yoke

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Chapter 9: Ponyville Panic!

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Chapter 10: Nocturnal Encounters

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