How To Train Your Dragon (OC Insert)

Chapter 9

Third POV

Hiccup was able to return Val to the Night Fury, and that night, he worked many hours on making a saddle. And for the first time, it came out pretty good.

Hiccup takes the saddle with him on his visit to the Night Fury and half-dragon the following day. As soon as he greets the two, he lifts the saddle in the air to show them what he created.

Toothless immediately gets to his feet and raises his tail into the air, like an excited dog ready to play chase. Without warning, he takes off running.

Hiccup laughs and chases Toothless with the saddle in his arms.

Watching from the sideline, Val gets a boost of energy and chases after Hiccup. She gets closer and closer to him until she is in arm's reach. That's when she grabs the saddle from him and runs in the other direction.

"Hey, Val!" Hiccup playfully shouts to her. He changes course and chases after her this time.

Toothless notices Val joining in on the fun and dashes to her side. As Val continues to run, the dragon moves his head underneath her torso and lifts her onto his back.

"What?! Not fair!" Hiccup shouts, his voice being heard from a distance behind them as they get further away.

Val laughs happily as she holds the saddle over her head.

The chasing eventually ceased, and Hiccup was finally able to put the saddle on Toothless. Along with that, he also ties a string to the fake tail wing. That way it can be easier for Hiccup to hold the tail wing open when he's up front on the saddle.

Toothless and Hiccup take a practice flight around the lake, and Val sits in the grass watching with amazement.

After about one loop around, Hiccup decides to change trajectory and pulls on the string in his hand. Unfortunately, he pulls a little too hard, messing up Toothless' balance. The Night Fury falls into the water, along with Hiccup.

Val claps her hands from the shoreline, thinking that was all on purpose. "So cool!" she exclaims to the two.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The following day Hiccup adds a few more improvements to his saddle. Learning from his mistakes the day before, he chooses to tie two strings onto his belt and connects them to the applied hooks on the saddle.

He flies with Toothless over the cove once again as Val watches from down below. And instead of holding the string that holds the tail wing open, he has it around his ankle.

He tries to adjust the tail wing's angle, but Toothless loses control of his flight pattern. The boy and the dragon fall into the tall grass just above the cove.

Hiccup is able to unhook himself from the saddle and steps out of the tall grass.

"Hiccup?" Val's voice echoes from inside the cove.

The boy stands at the edge of the cliff and waves down to her. "We're alright. Don't worry." Hiccup turns to look for Toothless, and he finds him happily rolling around in the tall grass. He found this behavior odd yet interesting at the same time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One would think that spending time with a dragon would help gain knowledge from how it acts. And that is correct. Everything Hiccup learned from the Night Fury, he used as tactics during his dragon training.

The other day, for instance, Hiccup was playfully scratching Toothless' back. And when he got under his chin, the dragon fell limply to the ground.

Another time Hiccup found out dragons like to play around with light. When visiting them once again, he uses his metal hammer to reflect the sun's light on the floor. And before he knew it, both Toothless and Val were chasing after the dotted light, like cats trying to catch a laser pointer.

Overall, Hiccup made progress with Toothless' flying. He made adjustments and added new gear to the saddle. Now there are two stirrups so that he can easily use his foot to maneuver with the tail wing.

They practice with each tail wing pattern just above the cove. And unlike before, a rope is tied from below the saddle to a nearby tree trunk, making it so that Toothless glides with the wind. Val wanted to experience some of the progress as well, so she is currently sitting behind HIccup on the saddle.

After another successful fly pattern, Toothless lands softly as Hiccup writes down a few notes on a small piece of paper.

"Again! Again!" Val exclaims with excitement while flapping her wings a bit.

"Alright, alright. Let's do one more test flight," Hiccup chuckles as he pats Toothless.

The Night Fury spreads his wings and they are lifted into the air again. Unfortunately, the wind decided to pick up, and the force of it pushed Toothless way much more than expected. The rope snaps and the three of them fly back into the forest.

Val is the first one to regain herself and slides off Toothless.

Toothless rolls onto his stomach and stands up. But as he does so, Hiccup is unexpectedly lifted off the ground by the string on his belt.

He yelped in surprise before reaching over to unhook himself, but the ground collision bent the hook inward. Now there's no way for him to remove the loop. "Oh, great," he mutters to himself.

Not given any other option, Hiccup has no choice but to take Toothless and Val with him to the village. And with the sun down, it makes things easier for them to sneak around.

They eventually arrive at Hiccup's small workshop. Val takes the chance to look around at the many tools. Toothless sticks his snout into a bucket out of curiosity, but he drops it pretty loudly.

Coincidently, Astrid was walking around the village when Toothless made that sound. She grows cautious as she approaches the workshop. "Hiccup? Are you in there?" she calls out.

Just as Hiccup was finishing up fixing the hook, he perked up when he heard her voice from the other side of the wooden doors. So he quickly bursts through the workshop and closes the doors behind him. "Astrid, hey. Hi, Astrid. Hi, Astrid," Hiccup says, trying not to seem suspicious.

From inside the shop, Val listens in on their conversation while sitting up on Toothless' back. She also down to notice the string still connected to the saddle.

"I normally don't care what people do, but you're acting weird," Astrid says suspiciously to him.

Toothless pulls away from the door, which also pulls on Hiccup. He attempts to act normal and laughs nervously.

"Well, weirder," Astrid adds, now crossing her arms.

Before Hiccup can say anything, he is pulled into the workshop.

Astrid approaches the doors and opens them, only to find it empty. As she looks around in confusion, Hiccup gets on Toothless with Val and they fly to the cove.

Luckily, no one spotted them on the way back.