Hiccup watched the suds roll and boil in the washing machine and rested his head against the stained wall of the basement laundromat. Today really couldn't get much worse: not only was he suspended and officially on his final final final warning but he no longer had a job to be suspended from...and he had the girl of his dreams and the people who got him suspended staying with him. He glanced back at the washing machine and noticed the suds were looking distinctly pink...
"Oh Thor...no..." he breathed, realising he had put his best red shirt in with Astrid's pale blue outfit... He slid down to sit on his heels, his back against the wall and head in his hands. He had ruined Astrid's only clothes and she was going to kill him. Maybe he could just run away now...
Wearily, he trudged up the stairs to his apartment, let himself in and took a sip of his tepid coffee. Astrid stared at him.
"Okay-why do you do that?" she asked him directly. He looked up with a sigh.
"Do what?" he asked.
"The whole pathetic defeated thing?" she asked him bluntly. "I mean-I was there in the cafeteria...and you were amazing! You looked around, planned an escape, executed it without hesitation and saved all our lives...then rescued the senior command staff...and you still walk around liked a kicked dog." Green eyes flicked up defensively.
"Prefer cats," he murmured. She stared sharply at him so he gestured at the picture of the little black cat and the collar. "Fury, my little cat. Had him since I was about four. He died two months ago...sarcoma...bone cancer." She inhaled.
"I'm sorry," she murmured. He shrugged, staring at his coffee.
"I may have turned your clothes red," he confessed. She stared at him and sighed.
"I needed to get some more clothes anyway," she sighed. "I'll head to the bank and see if they can issue me new cards." He nodded.
"You-you're still welcome here," he said awkwardly, toying with his mug. "I mean, you're practically my only friend in AI6...when we had an AI6." She smiled and bounced up and down on the couch. "Hmm...a bit soft...I'll have backpain by morning!" she complained. He looked up and sighed.
"You could have my bed," he said hesitantly. "Um...it's only a single but I can put the clean sheets on and...yeah..." She stared at him: he was blushing but it was a genuine offer. She shook her head and gently grasped his shoulders.
"That's really sweet, Hiccup-but I can't steal your bed," she told him. "Look-you've had a bad enough day. I'll be fine." He gave a small shrug.
"The offer's still there," he said, "though I have no idea where I'll put the twins." She grinned.
"I can offer a couple of suggestions," she murmured. "I..."
Both froze at a knock on the door and Hiccup reached under the table, drawing a service pistol from a holster taped there.
"Who's there?" he asked, cringing back out of direct firing line from the door. There was a pause.
"Me," came a nervous male voice. "Erm...kind of weighed down here, Hiccup..." The auburn-haired man flicked the safety on and unfastened the door, admitting a husky blonde man, wrapped in a bulky brown duffle coat and hanging onto a computer bag with another bag slung over his shoulder. Fishlegs scuttled in as Hiccup fastened the door again. He stared at the shape of Astrid perched on the couch and inspecting him carefully. "Who-who...?" he squeaked and then realised who he was looking at. "Oh my Thor...this is the girl from the Gym!" Hiccup face-palmed as the temperature in the room dropped by about fifty degrees.
"What?" Astrid said in a subzero voice. Hiccup paled.
"Astrid-this is my friend who I mentioned in passing while we were trapped, though possibly not my friend or even alive for much longer if you get your hands on him-and I may have mentioned that you work in the PT department, are really fantastic and are about the only person who treats me like a human being..." he said urgently. "I did NOT ever call you the girl from the Gym. EVER. At all. Oh Thor, protect me now..."
"Wow-I see what you mean," Fishlegs added without any sense of self-preservation. "She is gorgeous."
"And we're dead." Hiccup stood between the furious looking Astrid and the utterly oblivious husky boy. "Fishlegs...this is why you don't have a girlfriend. You have NO social skills at all! Astrid-this is Fishlegs Ingerman. He is-tragically-my only real friend outside AI6 while you are the closest to a friend I have-had-in the Service. When there still was one. So taking into account my patheticness and my utterly minimal number of friends, could you please not kill each other...and by that, I mean Astrid would you please NOT kill Fishlegs. Fish-apologise profusely to Astrid if you want to see another dawn. Honestly. NOW!"
"Eep!" Fishlegs squeaked, clutching his computer bag to his chest as Astrid rose and glared in his face.
"Don't. Ever. Call. Me. Gorgeous!" she snarled. The husky man backed away until his back was pressed against the door with Astrid's finger wagging in his face. "I am a SERIOUS agent, not a bimbo!" she added fiercely.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." Fishlegs whimpered. "I-I-I didn't realise..." Astrid spun and turned on Hiccup and he backed up in a panic.
"And YOU! What were you thinking discussing me with this...person?" she roared. "Is that what you think? Scoring me like some prize chicken? How dare you!" He waved his hands in panic as he backed away until he was pinned against the kitchen counter.
"No. NO! I never did, Astrid. Thor, I value my life far too much! But Fish is my only friend and you're the only person who treats me like a human being so of course I mention every time I see you because it totally makes my day...often, my week, how sad is that? And I never dared score you because you'd be about a twenty-seven out of ten but I value my life. And I did describe you as beautiful because you are but I know now not to call you beautiful because you hate it even though you are and are you going to kill me now?"
She drew back her arm and punched him hard in the shoulder. He winced and clutched at the point of impact...as she punched him in the middle. This time his breath caught and he folded, grimacing in pain. Astrid frowned because she knew she hadn't hit him that hard. He remained on his knees for a long moment until a gentle hand rested against his cheek and Astrid crouched by him, peering carefully into his battered face.
"Hiccup?" she asked. He swallowed and gave a pained smile.
"I'm okay," he managed hoarsely and she winced.
"Sorry," she sighed. "I didn't realise that you were that hurt..." He sighed.
"Why would you?" he asked her. "No one bothers what happens to me." He tried to shrug but she wrapped her arms around him.
"I care," she assured him and he closed his confused eyes for a long moment. Had he died and gone to Valhalla? Quietly, he rested his head against hers and savoured the hug-he presumed he'd never get another one-and then slowly, reluctantly, he pulled away.
"Thanks," he whispered as she rocked back up onto her feet and stuck out her hand. He grasped it and allowed her to haul him to his feet.
"You should have said," she scolded him and he shrugged.
"Like I said, no one really cared...and you were mad about being turned down for the interviews...and then the cafeteria blew up so...yah, not much time to talk," he muttered. Astrid swiped the bangs off her face, then lunged forward and pressed a swift kiss on his cheek.
"Mutton-head," she told him as he stared at her, slack-jawed in shock. "I always care." Her gaze swivelled to Fishlegs. "And you-don't call me pretty or beautiful or gorgeous or anything like that! And take a seat! You're making the place look untidy, standing stupidly there by the door!" Fishlegs scuttled to take one of the seats by the table, gulping.
"Is-is she always like this?" he whispered loudly to Hiccup as Astrid rolled her eyes and folded her arms. Hiccup gave a small, apologetic smile.
"Um...yeah," he admitted. "She's very...forceful."
"Organised," Astrid corrected him.
"Got it," Hiccup agreed and slumped onto the couch. Astrid deliberately sat at his side, her eyes inspecting the husky man calculatingly.
"So why are you here?" she demanded. Fishlegs gulped and stared at her.
"I asked him to come," Hiccup said wearily. "Fish is a florist...but he's also a hacker par excellence and in the absence of anyone caring what happened to AI6, I asked him to look into it for me." She stared at him.
"He's not in the Service!" she protested.
"Neither are we," he argued. "Do you want the Berk PD looking into this? Clumping all over the evidence and scaring off whoever killed all our colleagues?" The intensity in her words had her thinking.
"I...we...no," she admitted, then sighed. "But at least we oughtta wait for the twins..."
There was a furious hammering on the door and a pair of voices shouting "LET US IN!" Hiccup groaned and levered himself up, admitting the twins who erupted in, still amazingly grimy and carrying three huge pizza boxes. Tuff instantly stole Hiccup's place but was just as instantly pitched onto the floor by Astrid, who glared at the twin until he found another chair. Swiftly the twins opened the pizzas and grabbed huge dripping slices. The waft of spicy cooked meat filled the room.
"Um, what sort is it?" Fishlegs asked.
"Ultra-meaty-pepperoni-double-yak-jerky-with-extra-extra-extra-chillies!" Tuff mumbled through a mouthful of extra extra extra chillies. He went bright red and gasped 'water'. Ruff fell off the kitchen counter with laughter and rolled around the floor, kicking her legs-and accidentally hitting Fishlegs by accident. The husky man huffed.
"Anything vegetarian?" he asked. Everyone stared at him in shock.
"Doubt it," Astrid admitted, taking a bite and flapping her mouth. "Gods, Tuff-this is almost all chillies and not so much ultra meaty!"
"Hey-who's the fat dude anyway?" Tuff asked tactlessly, picking some melted cheese off the box.
"My mother says I'm husky!" Fishlegs said in an annoyed voice.
"Okay, for the last time-everyone, this is Fishlegs, my friend the florist and super-hacker," Hiccup said tiredly. "Fishlegs, these ate various work colleagues-Astrid you've met and annoyed-don't call her beautiful!-and these mutton-heads are Ruffnut the girl and Tuffnut the boy. They blow things up and generally cause mayhem and destruction. Guys, how much were the pizzas?"
"Um...we never pay for pizzas," Tuff told him after they had stared at him in shock.
"We usually use one of the Service accounts," Ruff admitted.
"The ones meant for emergency field expenses only?" Astrid asked.
"Yup. That's the one," Ruff grinned.
"Except all accounts are automatically frozen when the HQ is attacked," Hiccup pointed out. Tuff nodded.
"Um-that was why we were keen to be let in...as we grabbed the pizzas and ran when the card was declined," he admitted. Hiccup face-palmed.
"So you're on the run for stealing pizzas?" he asked. The twins grinned.
"Yup!" Ruff confirmed. For a moment, Hiccup massaged his forehead with his fingertips.
"Fine," he said in an exasperated voice. "Fish-before we get raided by the cops for pizza theft, could you please fill us in on what you found. Please?" The big man gave a sulky shrug but reluctantly flipped his computer open in response to the plaintive word and blue-toothed to Hiccup's very modest flatscreen TV which was unobtrusively fixed to the wall above the table, acting as computer screen as well as TV. Pudgy fingers flew across the ergonomic keyboard and the big man sighed.
"It was no accident," he began.
"No shit, Sherlock," Astrid muttered in his hearing. He turned round with a hurt expression to see Hiccup desperately shushing her and brusquely turned back to the screen, looking superior.
"I first accessed the geophysics department at Archipelago University and checked the seismic data," he announced. "The signal was indicative of a single detonation, since multiple detonations-even indistinguishable by visual means-will be detected by seismograph." Hiccup nodded.
"Zippleback," Tuff murmured.
"Then I checked the visual data from multiple sources..." He demonstrated the cameras he had accessed and Astrid's eyebrows shot up: he had literally grabbed data from every camera in a ten block radius. She leaned forward and paid closer attention to the hacker, reassessing his skills thoughtfully. "There was a single blast and then the building almost immediately collapsed. It was a precision attack designed to wipe out the maximum personnel."
"Holy Loki," Ruff murmured. "Zippleback."
"I therefore hacked the AI6 central mainframe to access the detailed schematics of the building and used detailed architectural and structural algorithms to locate the single pressure point where a detonation would cause the catastrophic implosion and collapse that was witnessed," Fishlegs continued.
"Why is this guy not working for us?" Astrid asked Hiccup. He sighed.
"Two reasons. The first is that he doesn't like restrictions being placed on his online activities. And secondly, no one knows how good he is. And anyway, could you see him working with Heather? He'd be a gibbering mess and utterly incoherent!"
"But...he's brilliant...and far better than Heather!" she hissed. He nodded.
"I know," he said. "I caught him hacking my computer when I was doing the online cryptography course and turned up at his apartment. I meant to bring him in as proof I was good for something but he was just so..." He shrugged. "He didn't deserve to spend the rest of his life in prison. And he has a really sweet-though very slobbery-dog. And a room full of carnivorous plants. He became my friend."
"'Little Shop of Horrors' sort of carnivorous?" Ruff asked hopefully.
"Venus Flytrap and Pitcher Plants. Only deadly to small insects," Hiccup replied. Ruff rapidly lost interest and stared back at the screen. Astrid swatted his shoulder.
"You see? This is why you're not an agent!" she told him.
"And why I'm still alive," he added bleakly. "Otherwise, I would have been at my desk when the building fell." Astrid stared and then nodded.
"You and me both," she sighed.
"The point is...here..." Fishlegs indicated, highlighting a point on the schematic. "Third Floor..."
"MILDEW'S OFFICE?" Hiccup gaped, staring. "How in Thor's name...?" He blinked. "I mean why would you put Mildew in such a crucial point. Why not security?"
"I mean, an explosive powerful enough to destroy the entire building would have to be..." Fish continued superiorly.
"A ZIPPLEBACK!" the twins said together, their voices exasperated. Fishlegs rotated to face them.
"We can't be sure of that," he told them. Tuff rolled his eyes.
"Yes we can!" he insisted. "You may know computers but we really know demolitions! A building of that construction would take seven explosive charges here, here, here, here, here, here and there to bring it down by a conventional implosive demolition drop...or one Zippleback at the stress point. Nothing else would leave no other sign...everything else would leave a distinctive rupture through sheer explosive force or a nuclear signature."
"What?" Fishlegs was staring.
"The Zippleback is based on the draconic gas Dracene that is ludicrously explosive and is able to be compressed extremely small in a container with an ignition source, mirroring the modus operandi of the Hideous Zippleback dragon that was last reported some eight centuries ago," Ruff added.
"They are solely manufactured by the Defender Syndicate on Eruption Isle, right at the southern limit of the Archipelago," Tuff explained.
"Arms manufacturers, playing all sides off and charging extortionate prices for their wares," Hiccup murmured. Astrid stared at him: he shrugged.
"No social life and I read a lot," he said defensively. She gave him a small smile.
"Glad you do," she admitted. "Anything else."
"Fish-have you got video of Mildew's office today? How big is a Zippleback?" Hiccup asked. The twins stared at him.
"What, us?" Ruff asked.
"No one else here knows what a Zippleback would look like," Astrid said tartly. Tuff shared a look with his sister.
"Not exactly seen one ourselves," he confessed.
"Yeah, rumour has it a single one of those babies costs about three million!" Ruff added.
"And who would give us that money?" Tuff asked. "I mean we'd just blow it..."
"How many pizzas would that buy exactly, dear brother? Must be at least..."
"But what would it sort of look like?" Hiccup asked them with forced patience. "A credit card size? Shoe box? Supergiant ultra-meaty whatever pizza box size?"
"Double shoe box," Ruff decided and Tuff nodded.
"On it," Fish said, the screens speeding forwards to show the outer office of HR...from Fungus arriving, then Mildew...through Hiccup's anxious arrival, entrance and subsequent dismissal...coinciding with the arrival of a box bearing the label 'Fromage de France'...
"There!" Hiccup snapped. "Trace it back!"
The lobby and security checkpoint was displayed and the parcel was seen to be brought in by a man that had Hiccup frowning. The fragmented moments of the previous evening in the alley returned to him and he pointed.
"He was one of the men...at the Outcast warehouse last night," he said suddenly. Fishlegs used face recognition software while they watched the parcel presented to the front desk...and then the security man boredly phoned Mildew. Absently, Fishlegs retrieved the recording.
"VA200, Mildew speakin'!"
"Front desk, sir. I have a delivery here-some French cheeses. They need to be screened..."
"Are yer insane? I ain't having yer X-raying me cheeses. Yer'll ruin the taste!"
"I am certain that isn't the case, sir."
"I ain't eating irradiated food. I ain't getting' cancer fer no one!"
"But sir...protocol states..."
"NO! Now pass them round and have them brought straight up ter me. I got me eleven o'clock and he ain't taking long!"
Hiccup's fists tightened.
"So that ass and his paranoia that X-rays will irradiate his food has destroyed HQ!" he growled. "Someone has done their homework-and used Mildew's stupidity and arrogance to get a Trojan explosive in." He glared at Fishlegs. "Follow that man back!" he commanded. There was a beep and the face of the delivery man flashed up on the other half of the screen.
"Magnus 'Madguts' Jonsson," Astrid read. "Wanted for assault, extortion, torture, murder, theft, treason...Known associates: Alvin 'the Treacherous' Forraeder, Outcasts. Extremely dangerous, arrest on sight..." She stared at Hiccup. "This guy beat you up...and you're alive?"
"Yeah, lucky me," he grumbled then flinched. "Which meant they didn't want to kill someone who may be missed and draw attention to themselves..."
"The car he got into is also registered to Outcast Holdings..." Fishlegs added. Hiccup covered his face for a long moment.
"So Alvin destroyed AI6 after capturing Eret and Snotlout," he murmured. "They may still be in the warehouse. But for Alvin to kill all those agents...he's declaring war on the security services...and he doesn't believe anyone will do anything..."
"He must need us out of their way for whatever his plan is..." Astrid mused. She frowned and gestured to the auburn-haired man. He started. "Phone, doofus!" He stared at her. "The message!" The familiar words flashed up.
ALVIN PLANNING MAJOR EVENT ON 17TH. PRESIDENT LARSON, MILITARY AND BANKS ALL INVOLVED. PRIORITY BLACK-VA1.
"Okay, I believe you now," Astrid said firmly. "What are we doing?" Hiccup stared at her, turn between a small surge of pride that she was actually giving him credence and a greater surge of panic that he would mess it up and get everyone killed.
"You looking at me?" he asked warily.
"Yup," she said.
"But I'm the most useless agent in AI6!" he protested. "VA1019!"
"Well, you're in charge here," Astrid said firmly. "So what next?" Hiccup paused.
"Okay...Fish-could you scan the feeds and social websites and see what's planned for the seventeenth? There must be some big event that Al wants to make his move on. Ruff, Tuff-you need to get us some munitions and ordnance. And then we'll get into that warehouse...because much as it pains me, we need Eret." Astrid glared at him.
"That ass?" she snapped.
"Yes, he is a total ass," Hiccup agreed. "But he's got a lot of field experience and Heather won't listen."
"And why would he listen?" Astrid growled.
"Because he sent the warning, remember?" Hiccup pointed out.
"He makes a good point," Tuff conceded. "Okay...so what guns do you want?"
"Standard service issue pistols," Hiccup said firmly. "No rifles, no submachine guns and of course, no sniper rifles..."
And at this point, the window shattered...followed by the flatscreen. Three more high powered rifle shots hit the wall above their heads and everyone hit the floor...