Another Nightmare Book 3: Facing Nightmares

Chapter 11

New chapter here. Sorry for the delay. Seems an email with checked chapter sank in the Atlantic somewhere.

Also, I took some artistic fanfic liberties with the relationship between certain characters. It is not based on anything from the original material, but I thought would be interesting.

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Something poked Hiccup's face. It was soft, but not wet enough to be Toothless' tongue.

'Nice Viking awake yet?' The small snout poked Hiccup's cheek again. 'The Night Fury not let out if nice Viking sleep still.'

Still groggy, Hiccup raised his hand and found the little dragon's head without even opening his eyes. Sharpshot let out a happy chirp.

'I'm awake now,' Hiccup answered, 'barely.'

'No hurry,' Toothless said. An exhale of hot breath ruffled Hiccup's hair.

'But me hungry. Night Fury and nice Viking not hungry?'

Hiccup chuckled at his little brother's antics. The dragon wasn't wrong though. A breakfast was a nice idea. Then again, Hiccup also didn't want to get up from where he was laying separated from the world by bone, muscles and thick black scales. He petted Toothless' leg with his free hand. It really was thicker than it used to be, but he didn't mind. Toothless' hold of him was as overtly gentle as it had ever been, though strong enough that Hiccup wouldn't go anywhere until the dragon decided so.

'I saved one small fish from the dinner. Let Sharpshot have it,' Hiccup said. 'I can wait 'till we get some fresh ones.' The little dragon rubbed his face against Hiccup and gave him a lick on the cheek.

'Hey,' Toothless said with a playful growl.

'Nice Viking my family also. Night Fury share. Lot of Night Fury smell not much Sharpshot smell.'

Hiccup could only chuckle some more until Toothless retracted his wing and he had to move his arm to cover his still-closed eyes against the sun. Sharpshot flew away to search for the fish. Slowly Hiccup forced his eyes open and blinked until they got used to the light. The sun was already quite high and most of the Flock were up and about. Fishlegs worked on piling some sticks and tree branches for a cooking fire.

'Let me sleep late again I see,' Hiccup commented as Toothless let him get up.

'How could I not? Since we left Fjoll, you have slept better than ever since... since we met, I think.'

'So never,' Hiccup said, stretching his arms. 'At least we aren't in a hurry to go anywhere.'

'I almost wish we were. Could fly faster,' Toothless pouted.

'The others couldn't fly much faster if the whole Midgard depended on it. We can play more during the flight, but I can't attach all of Fishlegs' things on your saddle if we are going to do that.'

'But then Meatlug is going to be slower.' Toothless' face dropped. 'Maybe half a day.'

'Sure.'

Hiccup kneeled next to Toothless' flight gear that he had taken off for the night. Fishlegs came to them as Hiccup was putting it back on Toothless.

"You finally decided to wake up."

"Actually Sharpshot did." Hiccup smiled. "It's good to be back out in the wild. No work to wake up for. Nothing to worry about expect trying to get Toothless tired by the evening."