'This is Berk. It's twelve days North of hopeless, and a few degrees South of freezing to death. It's located solidly on the meridian of misery. My village, in a word, sturdy. And it's been here for seven generations, but every single building is new. We have fishing, hunting, and a charming view of the sunsets. The only problems are the pests. You see, most places have mice or mosquitos. We have-' The boy's thoughts are cut short as he opens the door to reveal a Monstrous Nightmare about to blast fire at him, he slams the door shut just narrowly avoiding the fire, "-dragons."
After a breath he reopens the now sizzling door, and leaps off of the front porch, weaving through the erupting mayhem as Vikings pour out of the buildings, ready for a fight against the dragons.
'Most people would leave. Not us. We're Vikings. We have stubbornness issues. My name's Hiccup. Great name, I know. But it's not the worst. Parents believe a hideous name will frighten off gnomes and trolls. Like our charming Viking demeanor wouldn't do that.'
Dragons and Vikings fight back and forth, a dragon sends a blast causing an explosion that knocks Hiccup on the ground. He gathers himself and continues to run through the village while Vikings yell out to the boy.
'Meet the neighbors. Hoark the Haggard...'
"What are you doing out?"
'... Burnthair the Broad...'
"Get inside!"
' ... Phlegma the Fierce...'
"Get back inside!"
Hiccup lets out a gasp as he is suddenly grabbed by his vest and yanked back, narrowly avoiding a Deadly Nadder.
"Hiccup! What is he doing out again!" A large Viking with a red beard questions the nearby crowd before addressing the boy again, "What are you doing out? Get inside!" He sets Hiccup down and looks towards the sky, searching.
'That's Stoick the Vast. Chief of the tribe. They say that when he was a baby he popped a dragon's head clean off of its shoulders. Do I believe it?' Stoick proceeds to lift and throw a cart at a dragon before wrestling it down.
'Yes I do.
Stoick turns and addresses another Viking, "What have we got?"
"Gronkles. Nadders. Zipplebacks. Oh, and Hoark saw a Monstrous Nightmare." the Viking responds.
"Any Night Furies or Demon?" Stoick questions.
"None so far."
"Good."
Hiccup continues to run while the vikings are firing the catapults. He crosses an open plaza and ducks into an open building where a peg-legged, one-armed blacksmith who has a hammer in place of his left arm, shapes a sword. The blacksmith stops hitting a sword when he spots Hiccup sneaking in.
"Ah! Nice of you to join the party. I thought you'd been carried off." The Viking jokes as Hiccup puts on a leather apron and starts to place tools back in their places.
"Who me? Nah, come on! I'm way too muscular for their taste." Hiccup responds while flexing his non-existent muscles. "They wouldn't know what to do with all this."
"They need toothpicks, don't they?" Gobber says smugly, deflating the young boy's confidence.
'The meathead with attitude and interchangeable hands is Gobber. I've been his apprentice ever since I was little. Well...littler.' Hiccup gets to work, transferring bent and chipped weapons to the forge as Vikings crowd the counter for replacements.
Stoick walks through the village shouting commands, "We move to the lower defenses. We'll counter-attack with the catapults." Armed men rush past, flanking others who carry sheep to safety. Stoick follows up the rear as, overhead, a monstrous nightmare sets a rooftops aflame. "And make sure that Demon doesn't get to the catapults again."
'See? Old village. Lots and lots of new houses.'
"FIRE!"
Four teens tug a large wooden cask on wheels. They fill buckets of water to douse the flames. While the teens fight the fires Hiccup leans out of the stall to watch them awestruck.
'Oh and that's Fishlegs, Snotlout. The twins Ruffnut and Tuffnut. And Astrid.'
An explosion erupts behind her, framing her in a ball of fire. The others join her, looking heroic.
'Their job is so much cooler.'
Hiccup leans further out the window as they pass, but he's hooked by Gobber and hoisted back inside.
"Ah, come on. Let me out, please. I need to make my mark." The boy pleads.
"Oh, you've made plenty of marks. All in the wrong places." Gobber says, setting him down.
"Please, two minutes. I'll kill a dragon. My life will get infinitely better. I might even get a date." Hiccup tries to persuade.
"You can't lift a hammer. You can't swing an ax, you can't even throw one of these." He says while holding a bola.
A Viking runs by and grabs it out of Gobber's hand, hurling it at a Gronkle. The bola binds the dragon,causing it to crash outside.
"Okay fine, but," Hiccup continues while rushing to the back corner of the stall where he presents a bizarre, wheelbarrow-like contraption, "this will throw it for me."
He lightly taps the hinged lid of the device making an arm spring up, equipped with twin bows. They prematurely launch a bola, narrowly missing Gobber and instead taking out a Viking at the counter.
"See, now this right here is what I'm talking about." Gobber scolds.
"Mild calibration issue." Hiccup attempts to defend.
"Hiccup. If you ever want to get out there to fight dragons, you need
to stop all," Gobber guessers to the boy,"this."
"But, you just pointed to all of me." Hiccup says astonished.
"Yes! That's it! Stop being all of you." Gobbers says, as if it is so simple.
"Oh. You, sir, are playing a dangerous game. Keeping this much, raw, Vikingness contained." Hiccup responds, raising a finger to emphasize his point. "There will be consequences!"
"I'll take my chances." Gobber says, not caring while tossing him a sword. "Sword. Sharpen. Now."
Hiccup takes it begrudgingly and lobs it onto the grinding wheel. 'One day I'll get out there. Because killing a dragon is everything around here.' Hiccup thinks while continuing to sharpen the sword.
'A Nadder head is sure to get me at least noticed. Gronckles are tough. Taking down one of those would definitely get me a girlfriend. A Zippelback? Exotic, exciting. Two heads, twice the status. And then there's the Monstrous Nightmare. Only the best Vikings go after those. They have this nasty habit of setting themselves on fire.'
'But the ultimate prize is the dragon no one has ever seen. We call it the--' Hiccup's thoughts are cut short when a viking shouts.
"Night Fury! Get down!"
'This thing never steals food, never shows itself, and never misses. No one has ever killed a Night Fury.'
"The Demon's with it!"
'The only thing feared more is the Demon. Said to be an unholy beast neither man nor dragon, not much is known, some say it looks like a human with wings, others say it's covered in a gray mist. One thing's for sure though, it's smarter than any dragon we've seen before. No one's ever killed a Night Fury before or the Demon. That's why I'm going to be the first.'
Gobber trades his hammer hand for an ax, "Man the fort, Hiccup, they need me out there!" He pauses, turning with a threatening glare, "Stay. Put. There. You know what I mean."
Not a second after Gobber left Hiccup grabbed his contraption and began to wheel it through a wall of clustered Vikings and the ongoing mayhem, as fast as his legs can carry him. Vikings call out to him as he passes them.
Hiccup reaches a cliff, quickly drops the handles to the ground. He cranks several levers, unfolding the arms of the bow and placing a bola . He drops a bola onto a chamber and then pivots the weapon, aiming it towards the dark sky.
He listens, with his eye pressed to the scope, hand poised on the trigger. He looks out into the night sky, searching for the dark creatures.
"Come on. Give me something to shoot at, give me something to shoot at." He mutters to himself.
The Night Fury blasts a tower causing it to topple. The fire illuminates the dragon as well as a smaller figure beside it for a split second. Hiccup pulls the trigger.
The flexed arms snap forward, springing the weapon off the ground. The bola disappears into the sky, the dragon quickly wraps its wings around the smaller being as the bola wraps around it's body. The Night Fury's scream is heard as the dragon falls out of the sky.
"Oh I hit it! Yes, I hit it! Did anybody see that?" Hiccup's victory is short-lived, as a Monstrous Nightmare appears. He frowns upon spotting the Nightmare, "Except for you."
While Stoick is holding down the netted Nadders, he hears a familiar yell in the distance. He looks up to see Hiccup running through the plaza, a Monstrous Nightmare fast on his heels. Alarmed, Stoick abandons the Nadders he was helping to tie down and runs off.
"Do not let them escape!" He calls while chasing after Hiccup and the dragon. Vikings scatter as Hiccup dodges a near fatal blast. The Nightmare's sticky-like fire splashes up onto buildings, setting them aflame. Hiccup ducks behind the last standing brazier just in time to block the Nightmare's blasts from spraying fire all around him. Hiccup peers around the smoldering post seeing no sign of the dragon.
He turns back to find it peering down at him, blocking his escape. It takes a deep breath preparing to blast the young viking, Hiccup braces himself for the blast. Suddenly, Stoick leaps between them, tackling the Monstrous Nightmare to the ground. They tumble and wrestle, resuming their earlier fight. The Nightmare tries to toast him, but only coughs up smoke.
"You're all out." Stoick smashes the Nightmare repeatedly in the face, driving it away. It takes to the air, fleeing. Winded, Stoick turns to Hiccup, glaring.
'Oh, and there's one more thing you need to know,' the burnt brazier pole collapses, sending the massive iron basket crashing down, "Sorry, dad."
As the sun begins to rise the remaining dragons fly off, holding whatever livestock they managed to get. The murmuring crowd eyes Stoick, awaiting his response.
"Okay, but I hit a Night Fury." Hiccup sheepishly responds, attempting to break the awkward silence, "And, and the Demon." Stoick grabs Hiccup by the back scruff of his collar and hauls him away, fuming. "It's not like the last few times, Dad. I mean I really actually hit them. You guys were busy and I had a very clear shot. They went down, just off Raven Point. Let's get a search party out there, before they--"
"--STOP! Just....stop." Stoick releases Hiccup. Everyone goes silent, staring expectantly. "Every time you step outside, disaster follows. Can you not see that I have bigger problems? Winter's almost here and I have an entire village to feed!"
Hiccup looks around. All eyes are upon him, "Between you and me, the village could do with a little less feeding, don't ya think?"
"This isn't a joke, Hiccup! Why can't you follow the simplest orders?"
"I can't stop myself. I see a dragon and I have to just... kill it, you know? It's who I am, Dad."
"You are many things, Hiccup. But a dragon killer is not one of them." Hiccup looks around to see many nods of agreement from the other vikings, "Get back to the house." Stoick continues, now focusing on Gobber, who hit Hiccup in the back of the head, "Make sure he gets there. I have his mess to clean up."
Stoick lumbers off in the opposite direction. Gobber leads Hiccup through the crowd, passing the group of teens as they snicker.
"Quite the performance." Tuffnut calls before being nudged by his twin, who was also snickering.
"I've never seen anyone mess up that badly. That helped!" Snotlout mocks as Hiccup passes, Gobber grabs the teen by his helmet and shoves him to the ground.
"Thank you, thank you. I was trying, so..." Hiccup trails off, quickening his pace, he up toward a large house, standing prominently on the hill above the others.
"I really did hit them." Hiccup tells Gobber solemnly.
"Sure, Hiccup."
"He never listens."
"Well, it runs in the family."
Hiccup cuts him off, "And when he does, it's always with this... disappointed scowl. Like someone skimped on the meat in his sandwich." Hiccup continues, this time impersonating Stoick," Excuse me, barmaid. I'm afraid you brought me the wrong offspring. I ordered an extra large boy with beefy arms. Extra guts and glory on the side. This here. This is a talking fishbone."
"You're thinking about this all wrong. It's not so much what you look like. It's what's inside that he can't stand." Gobber says in his attempt to comfort the boy.
"Thank you, for summing that up." Hiccup says sarcastically.
"Look, the point is, stop trying so hard to be something you're not."
Hiccup sighs, opening the door to his house, "I just want to be one of you guys."
Gobber eyes him sympathetically, as Hiccup turns and goes through the front door. Unbeknownst to Gobber he ran straight out the back door, and hurried off into the woods, determined.