# The Only Way Out

By: TheDragonBoy

## Content

Hiccup huddled close to the fire, shivering lightly in his wet clothes against Toothless’s side. The Night Fury, seeing the flames beginning to die down, fired another small blast onto the pile of sticks, determined to keep his friend warm as he dried.

“Thanks, bud,” Hiccup said. The dragon rumbled supportively.

But in truth the fact that he was just narrowly avoiding hypothermia was the last thing on Hiccup’s mind. Not only was the cold a welcome change to the sweltering heat he had just endured, but as he sat there, drying off from his impromptu bath in the cove’s pond, he could still hear the roars of dragons and the cries of Vikings echoing from his village.

Staring into the crackling flames, all he could think about was coming up with a plan to save Berk. But after twenty minutes of racking his brain he still had nothing. Well, technically he did have one idea; one stupid, crazy, terrifying, suicidal idea. And the longer he sat there, the less he could deny that it was the only option he had.

Toothless gave a concerned croon and nudged the Viking’s side. Hiccup pulled his distant gaze from the fire and looked to the dragon with a troubled expression. He sighed.

“Toothless, I can’t just sit here while dragons destroy Berk.” The Night Fury looked Hiccup in the eyes, ready to hear him out, but the boy hesitated. He gave himself one last chance to think of a less insane plan, but nothing came.

“Look, there’s no way the village can fight off all those dragons, but maybe I can stop the attack. Toothless, I need you to take me back to that island. If I can just… reason with that dragon I might be able to save everyone.”

The Night Fury’s eyes widened a bit as he considered the Viking’s dangerous proposal.

“It’s the only thing I can do. But I can’t do it alone… What do you say, bud?” he asked with a bit of hopeful desperation.

Toothless glanced away and rumbled thoughtfully, but when he looked back, Hiccup could see the resolve in the dragon’s eyes. The Night Fury snorted and dipped his head. Hiccup smiled just a bit despite the circumstances, warmed by the dragon’s friendship.

“…Alright then, let’s do it.”

…

Hiccup rode low in Toothless’s saddle, clinging to his warmth as the dark, misty air rushed past him. They were deep into Helheim’s Gate now, fully enveloped by the night, and Hiccup could see nothing but blackness in all directions. The young Viking listened to the flapping of the Night Fury’s wings and felt the occasional push or pull when Toothless banked, avoiding invisible obstacles. All the while Hiccup kept his eyes peeled for any sign of their destination.

Suddenly the soundscape shifted a bit. Hiccup heard a few echoes and felt the air get a bit warmer. Were they in a cave? Then he saw it: a dim, red light, growing brighter and closer with every wingbeat, until finally they emerged into a vast cavern.

Rocky ledges and talon-scarred perches covered the jagged walls, and a thick, red mist obscured the ground, glowing with the light of unseen fires and bubbling magma. Toothless glided once around the area before picking a wide outcropping and touching down.

Hiccup considered dismounting and telling Toothless to hide, after all it wasn’t the dragon’s home they were trying to save, but without the ability to fly on his own, Hiccup decided they were better off sticking together. Besides, if he did manage to talk the behemoth out of attacking Berk, it would probably save scores of dragons’ lives that would otherwise be lost in the fight, so the Night Fury had a stake in this too.

“Alright, bud, let ‘em know we’re here.”

Hiccup felt Toothless take a deep breath beneath him, and then let out a firm, resounding roar. It echoed off the walls, ringing throughout the cavern until it eventually faded into silence. They waited, nerves on edge. Hiccup was just about to question why nothing had happened when he heard a deep, ominous rumble, strong enough to penetrate his body and rattle his bones. Toothless’s ears stood out stiffly; he lowered his head and peered over the edge.

Suddenly, a thunderous roar filled the cave, shaking the ground and knocking loose stalactites down into the misty depths. And from those very depths, rising through the fog, came the enormous head of the dragon they had come to see. It spotted them quickly and adjusted to their level, turning to face them. Hiccup picked one of its six eyes to look into and did his best to keep the knot out of his throat.

“*ahem* Um, hello,” Hiccup started awkwardly, “I’m here from the island of Berk and we would really appreciate it if you would, um, stop telling all the other dragons to eat everyone in the village.”

The young Viking almost cringed as he heard himself. All that time flying and he couldn’t have thought through what he was actually going to say!?

The gargantuan head moved closer and eyed the Viking-dragon pair intently. Toothless stared back, still as a statue, every muscle on high alert. Hiccup did his best to interpret the creature’s expression, but failed to glean anything certain.

“Dragons and Vikings don’t have to fight,” Hiccup added, composing himself a bit more. “I mean just look at us,” he gestured to Toothless. “We can all work together to make the archipelago a better place for both of us… What do you say, big guy?”

The young Viking reached out his hand as far as he could. The massive dragon gave a low rumble, and he saw its massive eyes shift to look straight at him. Hiccup held his ground, his heart pounding under its gaze as he forced himself to continue to meet it.

Please say yes. Please say yes.

He saw something in the dragon’s eyes suddenly shift, and his blood immediately ran cold before he even had a chance to consciously interpret it. In the time it took to blink, he felt Toothless leap off the stone with all his strength, just as the other dragon’s massive jaws shot open and launched at them. Just barely clearing the creature’s cavernous maw, Hiccup looked back and saw the beast’s massive teeth come crashing together at the far back of the ledge, breaking off the entire shelf of rock. The air shook as the dragon swallowed.

“Toothless!! Go!!” Hiccup screamed. The Night Fury did not have to be told twice. Flapping hard, he banked in the direction of the exit and sped towards it, but a number of falling rocks from the massive dragon’s attack forced him into evasive maneuvers, slowing him down.

Hiccup watched the tunnel approach, staring down the opening, pressing himself flat against the Night Fury’s back as he silently willed the dragon onward. For a second it looked like they might actually get away, until a row of enormous, jagged teeth rose up to block their path.

Hiccup’s eyes went wide. He saw the shadow fall over them, saw the upper row of teeth careening downward to meet the lower ones, and realized in that split second exactly where that must put them. In their last seconds of light, Hiccup glanced to his left, and came face to face with the enormous, gaping gullet of the giant dragon.

Toothless let out a frightened shriek, the jaws snapped shut, and everything went black.

The dragon’s top jaw came down on top of them as the massive beast descended back into the depths of its lair, pressing Hiccup against Toothless’s back. Its colossal tongue rose up to greet them, squishing up against the Night Fury’s underbelly and pinning them in place between masses of wet flesh. The pair felt themselves begin to slide, pulled backwards by the unfightable force of the creature’s maw, slipping quickly down its slimy tongue, until they found themselves landing in a tangled heap at the entrance of the dragon’s throat.

Toothless had just enough time to grab Hiccup in his claws and curl protectively around him before they both heard the most chilling sound either of them had ever experienced.

*GULP*

Squishy flesh crashed into them from behind, propelling them forward into the massive esophagus beyond. There was so much room between the rolling waves of peristalsis that they actually fell a few feet before landing with a splat against the beast’s throat muscles, which firmly guided them down the length of its enormous neck.

Hiccup felt the walls press against them from beyond the Night Fury’s protective embrace. Globs of slimy goo splattered against his clothes. Pressed against Toothless’s chest, he heard the dragon’s heartbeat pounding inside, but it was soon drowned out by the deep, steady thumping of the enormous dragon’s much larger heart as they were carried toward it.

Oh gods! It ATE us! Hiccup thought in a panic. His head buzzed with frantic thoughts, but it didn’t take him long to realize that there was nothing else he could do at this point. Hopelessness began to sink in.

“Toothless… I’m so sorry, bud. I never should have asked you to take me here.”

The Night Fury crooned mournfully and squeezed him in closer, a little too close in all honesty, but Hiccup wasn’t about to ruin the moment. Instead he hugged the dragon back as tightly as he could.

“It’s been nice getting to know you- aaaahhhhh!!”

Hiccup suddenly felt them both begin to fall, feted air rushing past his face in the steamy blackness. He heard Toothless call out in alarm and unfurl his wings, but unable to see what lay below, the young Viking had no way of knowing whether he’d be able to save them in time. Fear getting the better of him, Hiccup braced himself for the fiery sting of stomach acids.

“Oof!!”

The pair came to a sudden, hard stop, something Hiccup definitely hadn’t been expecting. No splash, no squelch, it was almost like they had crashed onto solid ground. Hiccup stuck his hand out of Toothless’s embrace as the dragon rolled off him, and was astonished when he felt the unmistakable texture of stone beneath his fingers.

“What the?…”

He heard Toothless get back onto his feet and shake himself, and a moment later felt the dragon’s snout poke up against him worriedly.

“Yeah, bud, I’m okay.” He put an arm over the Night Fury’s neck and used it to help himself stand again. The ground was on a noticeable slant, but it was definitely solid. Still in total darkness, Hiccup felt his way along Toothless’s side until he came to the saddle. He felt around until he found the saddlebags and then reached inside.

“Do you think you can light this?” Hiccup asked, clambering back towards the dragon’s front and holding out the object in his hand just in front of where he assumed the dragon’s head should be. He heard Toothless sniff and a moment later the Night Fury let out a small, concentrated blast of fire. There was a brief flash of purple light, and then a little orange glow that quickly grew to illuminate their surroundings. Hiccup looked away from his torch and out into the receding darkness.

The boy’s mouth fell open, his eyes went wide. He wanted to swear but he couldn’t think of anything nearly appropriate. In front of him lay the vast, eerie cavern of the giant dragon’s stomach. Towering walls of folding, red flesh rose like sea stacks on all sides, cradling a large pool of steaming, greenish slop. All manner of things floated around on the liquid’s surface: dead fish, bits of wool and fur, stray dragon scales and bones of all shapes and sizes.

A deep, rumbling sound shook the air around them as a large portion of the far wall shifted inward, sending waves crashing throughout the already turbulent sea.

Still at a loss for words, Hiccup glanced down to see what they were standing on. It was a large hunk of rock, poking up from the churning depths below, the only island in a sea of digestion and death. The ledge, he realized. When it tried to catch us, it swallowed the entire ledge we were standing on. He looked around in shock, he couldn’t believe it was so intact. There were a few large cracks here and there, and a number of little holes and dents, but otherwise it had descended the massive throat relatively unscathed.

A sad, timid tone brought his attention back to Toothless. The dragon stood next to him, staring out into the nightmarish hellscape with hopeless eyes. Hiccup’s frown deepened and he placed his free hand onto the dragon’s side.

“It’s alright bud, I’m here,” he said. It wasn’t alright, they were both pretty much goners, but it was the only thing he could think of to say. After everything, the least he could try to do was comfort his poor friend before-

*splat*

“Ah!” Hiccup exclaimed, feeling a large glob of hot slime drip onto his hand from the looming ceiling above. The surprise made him lose grip of his torch and before he realized it he heard it clatter to the ground.

“Wait, no!” he reached out and tried to grab it, but it was already too far gone, careening haphazardly down the stony slope toward the caustic sea. But by some stroke of luck, it managed to find its way into a hole before reaching the shore, just a couple feet from the acid’s edge. Hiccup quickly shimmied down after it, careful not to move too fast and lose his balance.

He peered down into the hole and was met by a sudden burst of flames, spewing out just inches from his face. He recoiled in surprise and fell backwards, staring at the tower of fire until it went down a moment later. When it did, he cautiously peeked back into the crevasse. A couple feet down he could see the torch, still burning, surrounded by several tiny puddles of digestive soup, kept separate by jagged rocks.

All the churning must have splashed some of the stuff down there, Hiccup reasoned. But that still didn’t explain where all that fire had come from. Just then he noticed a disturbance in one of the green puddles, it was starting to bubble… quite a lot actually! He quickly pulled himself back from the opening just before it erupted with another burst of flame. When it subsided he looked back inside and found that the puddle had almost completely disappeared. He reached down and hastily withdrew his torch before any other puddles had a chance to erupt.

“It’s flammable…” Hiccup realized. He looked out onto the green, churning lake. “This thing eats other dragons. All the stuff those dragons use to breathe fire must leak out when they digest.”

He turned and looked back at Toothless. Trying to ignore the mental image of his friend digesting in there along with everything else, Hiccup did his best to think back to a few days earlier; back when they were in slightly less danger, back when the two of them had taken their first real flight. Afterwards, Hiccup had given Toothless some fish to celebrate. A Terrible Terror had come up to them to try and grab one, and Toothless had…

“Not so fireproof on the inside…” Hiccup muttered, repeating his words from that day. He looked around the vast, gurgling cavern once again. There was a lot of green goop.

“That’s it!” He exclaimed. “Toothless! We might not be dead after all!” The dragon perked up hopefully. “One good fireball and you could probably blast us right out of here!” he shouted excitedly. Then Hiccup’s newly acquired smile disappeared. “Except, of course, that would blow us up too. We wouldn’t be digested but we would still burn to death,” he added dejectedly. “Well, I would burn to death,” he corrected. “Dragons are fireproof on the outside so I guess you would probably… be… fine…”

Toothless’s eyes widened a bit as he came to the same conclusion that Hiccup had just reached.

“Oh for the love of Thor you have got to be kidding me,” Hiccup lamented. He let his head fall into his free hand and shook it. He quickly thought through their situation one more time. “That’s really the only way out of here, isn’t it?” he asked aloud.

He looked up when he heard Toothless approach. The Night Fury had a captivating look in his eyes: frightened but hopeful, concerned but encouraging, gentle but firm. His gaze asked the boy a single question. Hiccup looked back at him for a moment, and then nodded slowly.

“Alright, bud, I trust you,” he said softly.

*grooaan*

The stomach walls shifted again, sending another wave of chyme crashing over the surface nearby. They both looked off worriedly in the direction of the sound and then quickly back at each other.

“Let’s just get this over with- just… try to go slow, okay?” Hiccup asked. He knew time wasn’t on their side and that it was a stupid thing to request, but fear overruled his better judgment. Toothless simply nodded understandingly.

Hiccup walked a short ways back up their little island and found a small crack in the stone. He shoved his torch into the opening, wedging it upright and freeing up his hands. He turned back to Toothless, following close behind, and did his best to steel himself. Even so, he couldn’t help from trembling just a bit as he remembered the terror he had experienced just an hour or so earlier. Toothless nudged his side reassuringly with his snout.

Taking a deep breath, Hiccup laid himself down on the stone floor with his feet pointing downhill. Toothless walked over and positioned himself by the Viking’s boots, knowing that the slope would give him a bit of help.

Hiccup watched the Night Fury slowly open his jaws until they were gaping wide. His sharp white teeth gleamed in the flickering firelight, until they suddenly darted out of sight, retreating back into his gums, like castle gates receding from view, leaving him to focus on the full, unobstructed entryway of Toothless’s gullet. He stared into it, unable to look away. The broad, glistening tongue was even redder than the walls that surrounded them, as red as the blood of everything the dragon had ever eaten. And its smooth, slick, surface paved a slimy road straight into the dragon’s tight, hungry throat, ready to swallow him down again just like the fish after which his family was named.

But Hiccup tried his best to force those thoughts out of his head. He had to remember that it was Toothless behind those looming jaws, and that the Night Fury only wanted to keep him safe. And right now the safest place the young Viking could be, was inside his friend’s belly.

But nearly all thoughts, good or bad, melted away the second he saw that tongue begin to move.

It slid out over the dragon’s gums and slowly stretched its way towards Hiccup’s boots. Tenderly, it squished underneath them, as slick as could be, and gently lifted his feet, pulling them back into the gap between the dragon’s jaws. It took a sizable amount of willpower on Hiccup’s part not to just yank them out as fast as he could, instead he took another breath and watched as the slimy muscle wrapped around one of his ankles, taking a firm hold while at the same time covering his lower extremities with a thick layer of lubricating saliva.

Toothless inched forward, pressing the tips of Hiccup’s toes against the entrance of the Night Fury’s throat. Hiccup felt it and took a sharp breath. Toothless did his best to make eye contact, flashing his firm, loyal, gaze.

*gulp*

It was a tiny sound compared to the overwhelming squelch from when he had been swallowed the first time. And it was practically nothing compared to the thunderous boom that had sent them both down into that cavern of a belly. Just a simple twitch of the throat, and Hiccup’s feet disappeared over the back of the Night Fury’s tongue. It seemed so innocuous.

Toothless took another look at his Viking friend. The boy wasn’t freaking out, so he took that as a positive sign. He felt the human wiggle his foot slightly just past the entrance to his gullet, as if he were making sure it was still there.

The Night Fury inched forward again, swallowing a bit more, and then took another pause. Hiccup was thankful beyond words that Toothless was being so gradual. He took the opportunity to re-steady his breathing and re-focus on the dragon’s caring eyes.

*gulp*

Toothless took another swallow of Hiccup, sending the boy in past his knees. Hiccup felt the instinct to pull back, his body warning him frantically that if he let himself get sucked in any further he would likely have no chance of being able to drag himself back out. But he kept his gaze locked with Toothless’s and kept himself still.

*gulp*

…

*gulp*

…

*gulp*

Hiccup felt his fingers brush against the Night Fury’s chin as Toothless swallowed him up to his waist. He rested his hand against the dragon’s jaw as a continued show of faith. He felt the muscles nearby twitch again as another tiny, wet gulp sounded from inside the throat. He felt himself sink in deeper.

As Toothless’s maw eclipsed the rest of his face, Hiccup stared down his own chest and watched himself slowly disappear with every swallow: his waist, his lower belly, then the rest of his midriff. He had kept his hand firmly on the Night Fury’s chin, but he was getting so close now that his arm was starting to bend at an awkward angle. He extended it slowly, following along the black, scaly hide until he felt a strange lump that somehow seemed out of place. In a surreal moment, he realized that he was feeling his own body, packed inside a bulge on Toothless’s neck, his hand on one side of the dragon’s skin, and his hip on the other.

Toothless swallowed again, and Hiccup felt the dragon’s gums brush against the crook of his elbow. It finally crossed his mind that if he let things continue the way they were going, he would be forced to hold his arms up over his head once his shoulders started their way inside. Realizing that would be a pretty uncomfortable position- well, even more uncomfortable- he forced himself to confront the alternative.

Hiccup withdrew his hand from Toothless’s neck. The dragon immediately paused, waiting for some sign that his friend was okay. The young Viking held his digits in front of his face for a moment, then looked back at the glistening entrance to the dragon’s throat. He took another deep breath.

Slowly, Hiccup placed his hand down on his chest, and then slowly slid it forward. He felt the slime of the Night Fury’s maw coat his skin as the throat easily stretched to accommodate it. He kept pushing until his arm was completely straight, and his fingers were buried deep inside the dragon’s neck along with the rest of him.

He took another breath and glanced at his other hand, his last free limb. Another wave of primal fear ran through him as he thought of pushing it inside too. His instincts screamed that he’d have nothing left to fight with, no possible way of prying himself out. But he ignored the cry. He thought of Toothless’s face once again, now obscured by his gaping jaws, and plunged his other arm between them.

Toothless felt the two limbs squeeze into his throat, and felt the Viking’s chest pumping in and out as Hiccup’s breathing grew more frantic. The Night Fury wanted to give some sign of reassurance, but he could make no sounds with the human lodged in his gullet, and any move he made with his mouth would probably just scare his friend even more. So instead he just took another pause, waiting for Hiccup to catch his breath.

*GROOOAAN* *SPLASH*!

Another contraction of the gigantic stomach sent more waves of deadly acids crashing around them. Hiccup wasn’t in a position to see them, but it all sounded far too close, and the fact that he couldn’t see it only made things more terrifying. Using all his willpower he did his best to take hold of himself.

“I’m alright Toothless, you can keep going,” he managed.

The dragon’s mouth tensed in reply, and a moment later he felt another swallow bring him in up to his chest. He could feel a pressure against the bottoms of his boots now as they pressed up against the far wall of Toothless’s stomach, somewhere buried inside his belly.

*gulp*

Toothless swallowed again and Hiccup let his knees begin to bend.

*gulp*

Hiccup felt his shoulder blades press against the dragon’s bottom jaw.

*gulp*

His neck rested on the edge of the Night Fury’s gums.

*gulp*

The red, slimy ridges of the dragon’s maw began to cut off his view.

*gulp*

His head slipped fully onto the dragon’s tongue, his shoulders already packed inside the slick throat and his neck walking the fine line between. He couldn’t even look down to see what was coming anymore. He couldn’t move at all. Toothless paused; they both knew it would only take one more swallow and then the Viking would be sent down to the Night Fury’s belly once again. Hiccup closed his eyes and breathed. He couldn’t bring himself to speak, but Toothless heard him nonetheless. He felt the dragon’s tongue rise behind his head.

*gulp*

Slimy warmth washed over Hiccup’s face and a wet squelch filled his ears. He felt the Night Fury’s throat slide up over his head, slicking back his hair until it finally closed up behind him, sealing him away completely inside.

A familiar series of firm, steady contractions pressed against his body, squeezing him down deeper. His knees curled up and reached his chest, his hands slipped through the sphincter and dipped into the steaming chyme beyond. Within a few short moments he felt his head pass through, and he was packed into the churning crucible that was the Night Fury’s stomach.

Toothless felt his little Viking friend slip quietly into his belly, tracking the human’s progress intently until he came to rest safely within the fleshy walls. Toothless couldn’t help but ponder for a moment over how strange it was, how out of place it seemed, for Hiccup to be in there. And only then did he realize how much the boy had changed him, because only a few days ago the thought of any Viking stewing inside him probably wouldn’t have even caused him a second thought.

But the Night Fury pulled himself out of his thoughts. He didn’t have time to ponder, they were in mortal danger and he had a job to do.

Hiccup felt the dragon begin to walk, his bloated belly jiggling gently with every step, gurgling and sloshing as it adjusted to its new occupant. He thought he could faintly hear a separate sloshing sound from outside as Toothless approached the acidic sea, but honestly it was hard to tell the sounds of the two stomachs apart. The dragon stopped walking. There was a moment of tense silence. And then Hiccup heard a sound.

*hhhssSSSS* *BOOM*!!

It was louder than anything either of them had ever heard before. Hiccup felt the blast fling them into the air, the force pressing him firmly into the Night Fury’s squishy guts. Disoriented and in the dark, he felt them enter a freefall. He could hear Toothless’s heart racing, but he didn’t hear the dragon’s wing’s flapping.

“Toothless!!” he screamed, but there was no response. He yelled again, and again, desperately wishing he had some idea of what was happening outside, or any indication that his friend was okay. He could hear the wind whistling past them beyond the dragon’s scaly hide.

Then suddenly Hiccup felt them slam into the ground, and both dragon and rider blacked out.

…

*gluch* *gluch* *gluch* *GLUCH*

Hiccup opened his eyes slowly as a beam of light reached his face. He felt things pushing and kneading at his body, but the sensation felt vague and distant and he was unable to feel much of anything else. He sputtered and took a deep, gasping breath as fresh, cool air touched his lips.

*BLUCH*

The semiconscious Viking felt himself slip and slide and tumble out onto the ground. The intense northern cold practically burned as it reached his hot skin- or perhaps that was something else. He breathed and blinked, but beyond that he didn’t move a muscle. He could hear the gentle lapping of water against the shore, and somewhere above him echoed the cries of hundreds of dragons.

He felt something nudge against his back, but he had neither the strength nor will to respond. He heard a few heavy footsteps nearby against the gravelly ground and something black passed across his vision. A moment later, two large, worried eyes appeared in front of his own, along with a twitching, inquisitive snout.

“Toothless?…” Hiccup moaned weakly. The dragon nudged his face gently. His head rolled limply. Now looking a bit higher, he could see the many dozens of dragons flying overhead, gliding and circling around the misty skies, descending towards them one by one.

“The dragons are coming back to the island…” Hiccup muttered. “You did it, bud, you saved Berk.” The Viking smiled and took a deeper breath. Carefully, he tried to shift various parts of his body. Nothing seemed to cause him any horrible pain, but most of him felt strangely numb, and the parts that didn’t, burned like he had just stepped out of boiling water.

He tried to lift his head up, but only found the strength to raise it a couple of inches. Luckily Toothless was there watching. He stuck his snout behind the Viking’s head and helped support him as he tried to rise.

“Thanks, bud. Just take it slow,” he acknowledged.

He blinked and tried to focus his vision as he sat up. He noticed his vest and shirt were dripping and worn, having taken on a slightly green color and a number of holes. His pants were much the same and especially tattered toward the ends. One of his boots was missing and the other one was hardly there at all, in fact-

Hiccup went still. He stared for a long, long moment, his battered mind trying to process what he was seeing. His boot wasn’t the only thing that wasn’t there. Using what little energy he had, he tried to move his left foot… but there was nothing there to move. Stunned, he continued to stare in disbelief at the torn end of his pants, draped over the end of his leg where his ankle was supposed to be.

Toothless walked around so he could see his friend’s face again, and let out a soft, somber tone as he saw the boy notice his missing piece. Hiccup looked to the dragon, speechless, and his eye was caught by something a few feet behind him.

There was a large, solid rock protruding from the shore, seven or eight feet tall and standing almost vertically. It had dents and cracks in it, forming the definite outline of a Night Fury’s torso. The gravel below it had noticeable gouges that vaguely matched the shape of Toothless’s tail and one of his legs. Slowly, Hiccup began to piece things together.

The explosion must have shot us out of the mountain… we hit over there… Toothless must have spent some time slumped against that rock before he woke up. Hiccup imagined the position the dragon must have been in: his neck and probably a foreleg dangling over the top, keeping him mostly upright. Meanwhile, his unconscious belly had still been doing its job, trying to get him the energy he needed to repair his body. And all the stomach acid would have pooled up at the bottom… right around Hiccup’s foot.

Toothless gave a sharp, pitiful whine. Hiccup glanced at the dragon, who for the moment refused to meet his gaze. He seemed upset, almost angry with himself. Hiccup couldn’t read the Night Fury’s mind, but he could imagine what he might be thinking.

“It’s okay, bud… I… I know you didn’t mean for this to happen.” Hiccup said wearily.

Toothless glanced back at him from the corner of his eye.

“It’s not your fault, we were both knocked out. To be honest I’m glad you woke up when you did, otherwise I might not have gotten out at all.” That had been his attempt at a bright side, but the thought that Toothless could have completely digested him without even realizing it didn’t actually do much to lift either of their spirits.

“No, wait,” Hiccup scolded himself. “What I mean is: I’m still here, and I wouldn’t be if it wasn’t for you. You saved me, and Berk, and all of these dragons too. You’re a hero, bud.” Toothless snorted, a slight, prideful smirk sneaking onto his scaly face.

“You’re the best, Toothless.”

The Night Fury turned toward him again and gave his already slime-covered face an appreciative lick.

“Thanks. But we’re gonna have to set some boundaries for that tongue of yours now that I’ve seen what’s on the other side,” he joked.

Toothless’s smirk grew, and he gave the young Viking another slimy little lap.

“Very funny,” Hiccup replied with a sarcastic chuckle.

“Hey, now that the big guy isn’t around to control them anymore, do you think a couple of these dragons would mind giving us a ride home?”

Originally Published: 30-Jan-2020