"I Do.... NOT!!"

Chapter 24: Trader Trouble

"Y-you brought us this? You saved our lives... We never could have started growing things again without you." He said in awe. "Yeah. You can thank my other friends for that! Those are special seeds- they'll grow no matter what toxins are in the soil here." Ruff said, sounding pleased. "Dragon!! Kill it!!" Sounded to Windshear's right. She crouched and growled, sizing up the humans running towards her. "It's now or never!!!" Ruff yelled, holding out a hand to the boy. He looked back at the advancing Vikings and then grabbed Ruff's hand, making his decision. Windshear blasted into the sky, two humans screaming in her ears. Zev and Mya weren't as fast taking off... Of course they wouldn't be used to it.

One last sprinting flight took the three back to the boat. "Ahha! And who has been kidnapped for the rescue?!" Tuff said, eargerly awaiting the shaky little human that tumbled from my back. "Don't know his name. But he agreed to be a hero and take the other supplies back!" Ruff said. "Uh, I'm Zane. Yeah and she didn't kidnap me. I wanted to come," the small Berserker human said. "Aww that takes the fun out of it!" Tuff said. Zane looked at him in confusion. "How old are you?" Ruff asked. "I'm 15." Zane said, puffing out his skinny chest. "Oh. Thought you were like 12. You're short. You have a cute face though! I'm 16. My name is Ruff" she commented. Zane looked hurt at first but then smiled at the compliment. "Well aunt Borgia says I haven't had my growth spurt yet," he replied. "Alright you have a lovely sail back home. Tell your crazy villagers that they can stop killing dragons now. We have some buts to kick." Tuff said, climbing aboard Zev.

"Good luck! And thanks again, um really cool of you to help us!" Zane said, smiling widely. Ruff saluted him and hopped onto Mya, and we took off, heading for the nest. It was nearing evening, and we had the feeling the battle there had already commenced.

.... The dragon nest, Astrid's POV....

I was feeling less groggy and a little less sick as the hours stretched on in thick fog. We must have passed Helheim's gate awhile back. When Stoick saw we were both to groggy to give any directions, he had ordered viggo to stay on the other end of the ship and used an old deadly nadder to find the nest. The vikings around us muttered about how fast we had gotten here, and their fears of the dragons pulling us.

I looked up and forward... to see massive creatures pulling the ships at unearthly speed with chains. "Lovely isn't it. We've cut so much time from this journey by using these rumblehorns. You see dragons can be useful... When they are properly controlled," viggo said, seeing me looking around.

I ignored him and wrestled with my ropes, trying to get undone. Heather shifted and then woke, groaning in pain. "Geez I feel like I've been trampled by gronckles..." She muttered. "Me to. How do we get these off?" I whispered. Heather and I began wiggling and plotting escape... And then a blur of black scales and skin color filled my vision. I screamed in terror not processing what it was that had seized my waist and was dragging me up and off the ship. I realized our ropes were cut... It must have been a dragon! A familiar voice stopped my squirming, and I looked up along with Heather to see Hiccup's friendly face... Just a little more scaly, with sharper looking teeth than normal and black horns that looked nothing like his ear flaps as a dragon. I heard "jump", and then launched myself toward claws coming out of the mist. I swallowed back a scream as the claws caught Heather and I carefully around the waist and we began ascending through the mist. I looked down... But Hiccup was nowhere in sight. There was to much mist.

A bit later we broke through the mist and saw clearly our rescuer. It was Hookfang! She roared a greeting and then dropped us. I shrieked and then was cut off as the air was knocked from me and I landed on Stormfly's back. "Oh I'm glad to see you guys!" I gasped, hugging my friend. Stormfly warbled happily, and flew a little higher to talk with the other dragons. Our small group decided on splitting. Some of us would rescue the dragonets, while the others helped Hiccup. I went with the dragonets group and circled around the back side of the nest after we reached it.

I felt the queens influence before we even landed, and the battle became excruciating as we all shook our heads and fought to keep ourselves free of her whispering voice. She may not have known we were there yet, so she didn't take total control. The cute baby dragons helped us focus as we herded and carried them all to a broken Viking ship we had found on our way to the nest. We carried the creaking boat, the deck covered in little dragons, to the closest bit of land, furthest from the nest. We hauled it all the way to the outskirts of Helheim's gate, and then left Spiketail in charge. He grumbled about not being enough to watch so many babies and then nuzzled Stormfly goodbye.

We steeled ourselves for the fight ahead and then flew back into the mist, making a beeline for the nest. We got there to find a disaster. Vikings were running for their lives, the entire fleet was on fire, the massive queen was roaring in anger at Zev and Mya. I for once applauded the twins insanity as they made a second round and set off another explosion on the queen's head. But the problems were just starting. We were all getting wobbly and losing a grip on our minds. The queen was actively commanding us to come closer! Just then the sight of Hiccup chained on one of the flaming ships broke me free of the mind battle for a moment. Stormfly squawked in rage and dove to the rescue of our friend. We landed among the flames and I jerked frantically at the chains holding Hiccup. Stormfly shook her head and stumbled, roaring deleriously."Get out of here!" I yelled to her. Most dragons were fireproof, but only to a point. The heat wasn't bothering me, but I could tell it was getting to Stormfly.

She squawked and fled, leaving me to fight Hiccups chains. I growled in frustration and searched frantically for anything to melt the metal, but the queen was to fast. Before I could move she was sinking the entire fleet of ships! I gulped in air before hiccup and I were pushed under. The big ship snapped in two, the front half disappeared with Hiccup still chained to it. I dove down to unchain him, but it was no use. I looked into his terrified green eyes and then swam back up to the surface for air. After a few gasps I swam back down and jerked on my friend's chains again, hopelessness spreading through me. Now he was trying to tell me to leave him there, but I couldn't do it. I tried to free him until I ran out of air. To weak to swim back up, I passed out mid yank on Hiccup's chains.

Painful breaths woke me, and I realized they were my own. I coughed savagely, spitting water from my mouth and nose. After a moment of recovery, I saw the chief diving back down to rescue Hiccup. I watched the water closely, hoping to see Hiccup's head. A massive spray of water drenched my wet self, and the big black dragon form of Hiccup shot out of the water. Stoick emerged not long after, dragging himself onto the shore. I ran to Toothless and hugged him tightly. Tears sprang to my eyes uninvited as I felt his warm scales and heavy breathing. "I thought those fools had killed you!" I sobbed, then wiped my eyes and turned to Stoick.

"You have no right to be his father. You nearly let your own son die! We're going to save your pathetic lives, not that you'll care or see us as anything but monsters afterwards," I yelled, my patience run out with the stubborn viking. I leapt onto Toothless back and hung on tight as we exploded into the sky, gaining an arial view of the mayhem. After moment, Toothless rumbled in concern. I was struggling to stay up right on his back, wobbling and falling asleep. I knew the drugs hadn't totally worn off... It was quite dangerous for me to be flying in this state. I shook my head and gritted my teeth. "Let's finish this," I said. Hugging Toothless' neck. Only when you're safely on Stormfly He replied. Then he let out a roar of command, it seemed to shake the air and vibrated through our entire bodies. The few dragons trying to fight the queen immediately snapped out of their dazed struggles and flew for their lives away from the queen. I screamed as Toothless bucked me off in a sudden, violent motion. my free fall abruptly stopped as I smacked into Stormfly's back and hung on for dear life. Stormfly flew like the wind, quickly taking me away from Toothless and the queen. "Wha- Stormfly! You gotta get me back there!" I gasped. She rumbled a firm command at me to rest and kept flying away. I tried to protest but found myself battling a strong wave of nausea and weakness.

We had barely made it to the edge of the nest when I passed out, falling from Stormfly's back. Unaware of time or space, I moved from wakefulness to drowsy sleep. I only caught a few other things after I'd passed out- Ruffnut telling me to stay with her, the sky lighting up with plasma blasts as Toothless fought the queen in the cloud cover, and Vikings murmuring in shock and surprise at the turn of events.