Chapter Text
I was making another spare tail in the forge for Toothless when all the villagers started screaming and started running towards the closest house. I tossed my hammer to the side and ran outside. Screams that I knew all too well reached my ears. They were coming from the coast. Screaming Deaths, fifteen meters long flying snakes with spikes all over their body. Their mouths were filled with multiple round layers of long teeth that would shatter any flesh in seconds. There were ten of them. What the hell were they doing here? My body entered survival mode. A strike of fear shot through my body, dilating my pupils and speeding up my heartbeat.
‘Toothless!’ I started running through the streets towards the forest. He should be somewhere there. He had probably already started running towards me.
Stormfly and Astrid appeared from the sky. ‘Jump on, we’ll bring you to Toothless! I saw him in the woods!’ I grabbed her hand and jumped on Stormfly. A roar sounded through the air. Toothless, he was close.
‘Where is mom?’’ I asked while nervously looking around.
‘I think she went exploring.’ She shook her head. ‘It doesn’t matter. We can handle this.’ The twins, Snotlout and Fishlegs headed our way. ‘We need dragon root, now!’ Astrid yelled. ‘Use weighted arrows!’ The scales of Screaming Deaths were impenetrable for normal arrows.
‘But I can’t shoot!’ Ruffnut yelled.
I clenched my fists. ‘Just try to distract them! Astrid, Snotlout, Fishlegs and I will shoot arrows.’
‘Hey, who said I can’t shoot?’ Tuffnut yelled while spreading his arms. We ignored him and flew towards Toothless. ‘I mean, I can’t, but.’ Ruffnut punched him so he would shut up. The others flew towards the great hall where we stored our dragon root and weapons.
I jumped on Toothless, clicked my prosthetic leg into the treadle and shot up in the sky. The Screaming Deaths would reach the village in a minute. The others had geared up in the meantime and threw us a bow and arrows. Astrid caught a pot of pure dragon root and ran mid air on Stormfly’s tail to cover her spikes in it.
‘We distract the dragons so Astrid can get clean shots at them! Meanwhile, try to fire arrows whenever you can!’ I yelled as we engaged the raging dragons.
We started firing at them to distract them from Astrid. Stormfly flew past our line of defense and hit two Screaming Deaths. It should take twenty seconds for its effects to fully work. One Screaming death was coming dangerously close to us. He opened his mouth and started to rotate its teeth, making a sawing sound. I shot an arrow while Toothless started a dive to create more distance. Screaming deaths were quick, but not agile because of their size.
‘Guys, why aren’t they dropping out of the sky! It has been thirty seconds!’ Astrid yelled from above. A chill went through my body. If dragon root didn’t work, this would get extremely dangerous.
‘If they don’t drop after a minute we change strategy! Keep your distance!’ I yelled while we dived through three boulders near the shore. The Screaming Death crashed right through them and created a rain of stones. We just managed to dodge them.
‘Guys! A little help here, please! Help!’ Fishlegs screamed. A Screaming Death had almost caught up with him. Toothless fired multiple plasma blasts at the monster to throw it off balance, which bought Fishlegs enough time to quickly retreat under the cover of Astrid.
None of the Screaming Deaths showed signs of muscle relaxation. This would get nasty.
‘We can penetrate their armor if Toothless plus one, Stormfly plus one or the other three dragons shoot at the same time at the same spot!’ Fishlegs yelled. Toothless his shots had the biggest impact and Stormfly’s magnesium fire was the hottest.
‘But it could kill them!’ I yelled.
‘It’s that or we all die! If we hit their wings or tail they just fall. They can still swim!’ Astrid yelled frustrated. She was right. We had no other option.
‘Astrid teams up with me! You guys team up as well! Don’t take risks and only shoot when you’re safe!’ I yelled. Astrid and I had incredible synergy, so I prioritized that over two teams that only needed two shots. We shot up into the sky so we flew next to Astrid. I set my eyes on our next target. ‘Below us, left wing, in five!’
We created a bit more distance before we both turned around and shot the screaming dragon out of the sky. Meanwhile three Screaming Deaths that were chasing Astrid were coming close.
‘Dive!’ Astrid yelled. A Screaming Death had anticipated our dive and was waiting below us just above the sea with his mouth wide open. I held my breath and clenched my fists. We had no time to turn.
‘Tail, now!’ Astrid yelled.
A second later half of the dragon’s tail swirled through the air. He lost his balance and his mouth shifted to the left. Before he dropped to the ground he made a deafening scream, which disoriented Toothless. He scraped along the Screaming Death, which made him lose his balance. He spread his wings to break the fall before we smashed into the sea. I held on tight while Toothless swam back to the surface. An enormous force almost ripped my fists off Toothless. Stormfly and Astrid had dived into the sea and thrown us back into the air.
‘Fly left, now!’ Astrid screamed. A fountain of rain fell down on us. It was the Screaming Death that would have eaten us if Astrid hadn’t pulled us out. It shot out of the sea with its beak wide open. Because of our turn he just missed us. The wind of the bite blew up my hair.
‘Shoot him on his tail in three!’ I shouted while Toothless turned around.
Just as quick as the dragon had passed us it crashed down into the sea.
A scream split the air. The others were separated and Snotlout was being chased by three Screaming Deaths. Toothless started firing on the closest one while Stormfly sped up since her fire had a smaller range.
‘Fly towards me!’ Astrid yelled. Hookfang turned right toward Astrid. One Screaming Death was at maximum speed. Astrid made use of it by flying past it with a few meters between them and melted the dragon’s eyes.
‘Tail now!’ Astrid yelled. Another plasmablast shot through the air. Astrid delayed Stormfly her fire by a second because we were farther away. Blinding the dragon wouldn’t be enough. It could easily rely on its hearing.
‘Regroup you three!’ I yelled. They had taken down one Whispering Death by relying on Barf and Belch’s smoke screen.
Six more to go. Speaking of them, two were a few meters behind us, because we had to lower our speed for the plasma blasts. ‘Astrid a little help here!’
‘On my way!’ Astrid made a loop in the air bringing her to top speed.
‘Left wing in three seconds!’ I yelled. We turned around when Astrid almost reached me and shot down another one.
‘Fly up!’ Snotlout yelled from afar. A Screaming Death was waiting for us to dive. Me and Astrid changed our direction. In the distance an explosion sounded while another Screaming Death dropped swirling into the sea. The last five looked around and started screaming. They turned around and flew towards the sea.
‘Let’s escort them out shall we?’ Snoutlout yelled while we cheered. An enormous weight got lifted off my shoulders. I made sure to remember the path they took so we could come back for them. They were moving in a straight line so only me and Toothless would be able to keep up with them and I wasn’t planning on becoming their consolation snack.
wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
We landed next to the great hall. It was built in a rock so the only thing you could see from the outside was the enormous wooden door. Astrid jumped off Stormfly. ‘Something is going on here. Screaming Deaths are incredibly rare.’
‘And they live solitary, they never work together, they don’t live close to Berk and dragon root should work on them. Even if they were scared away from their home, they wouldn’t attack us.’ Fishlegs summed up, counting with his fingers.
I couldn’t concentrate. My thoughts kept dwindling off to the Screaming Deaths. They attacked us, but I didn’t want to kill them. We did not have another option, but still. I knew we technically didn’t kill them but they had no chance of surviving in the ocean. Something told me that they were forced to attack us. But how? They were untrainable.
Astrid walked towards me and put her hand on my shoulder. ‘You ok?’ she whispered.
I shook my head while looking down. ‘I should be.’ I hated myself in these moments. I did nothing wrong, but I still felt guilty.
‘But you are not... Wanna go home?’ Astrid exactly knew what was going on in my head.
I shook my head and made eye contact again. ‘That won’t help. Let’s finish this first.’ The others had noticed us and waited with their discussion.
‘So what do you guys think? Could it be dragon hunters?’ Astrid asked.
‘I don’t understand any of this.’ Tuffnut said.
‘Yeah this makes no sense.’ Ruffnut said while she swung with her arms.
‘I guess I agree with you two for once.’ Snotlout said.
I took a deep breath. ‘We should have a look at Tunnel Island. It’s the closest place they live. Me and Astrid will go. You should stay here in case the Screaming Deaths come back.’ Everyone nodded except Astrid.
‘I think it’s better we go tomorrow. Let’s get cleaned up. If anyone comes up with an idea, please tell us.’ Astrid looked me in the eyes. The ‘don’t argue with me’ eyes.
Astrid and I headed towards my house. I kicked a stone to the side. ‘I told you I’m fine.’ I started.
Astrid sighed. ‘No you’re not. You’re constantly thinking about it. It distracts you.’ She messed up my wet hair. ‘Tomorrow is better.’ She always saw right through me. Most people did.
‘Fine… You were amazing by the way.’ I gave her a kiss on the cheek. She smiled.
‘You too.’
wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
Astrid and I were flying above Tunnel Island. It was a flat island covered with sand. Some parts had gray rocks sticking out of it. That’s where most of the tunnels could be found. Nothing had changed, no signs of dragon hunters. If they had captured a Screaming Death you would at least have expected some remains of the battle. Splinters, arrows, weapons or blood. Toothless checked the caves with his echolocation and found some Screaming Deaths. If they came from here there shouldn’t be any Screaming Death left, they were already extremely rare.
‘Maybe they’re the same Screaming Deaths.’ Astrid said. ‘Let’s use the dragon root on them to check.’
‘I guess we could do that, but I want to guard him until the dragon root has worked out.’ I said reluctantly while I rubbed my boots into the sand.
‘It keeps surprising me that you even wanna protect the dragons that are trying to kill you, but I get it.’
Astrid drew her bow while Toothless shot a plasma blast at the tunnel to awake the Screaming Death. He shot out the tunnel, but before he fully left it Astrid had already hit the arrow. We easily avoided him for twenty seconds until he dropped out of the sky. We made sure not to fly too high so he wouldn’t get hurt.
‘So they don’t come from here.’ Astrid said while thinking of what it could mean.
‘If the dragon hunters created the attack, it probably means they had a base which was closer to another Island with Screaming Deaths. Maybe that strain is immune to dragon root.’
‘That makes sense, but… how do they train these dragons and capture so many? They’re even immune to dragon root. Are they enslaved like Krogan’s dragons were?’
I scratched my neck. ‘They’re impossible to train so I don’t see another option. So that would mean they can train the most powerful dragons and they’re not limited by the amount of riders they have. They can form an entire army. It’s just a matter of time. They don’t even listen to Toothless, their alpha.’ I dug my hand into my hair. ‘I hope it costs them a lot of time to gain control of them.’
‘Calm down. Screaming Deaths have never obeyed Toothless. We have no reason to believe they can create an entire army of dragons that won’t listen.’
‘Yeah, you’re right, but they can train them without a rider! We must find out how they do it and put a stop to it. It probably means they can train other dragons as well.’ I jumped off Toothless and started walking in circles.
‘So we won’t let them.’ Astrid jumped to the ground. ‘We know where the Screaming Deaths fled towards. We could investigate it tomorrow.’
I looked up and sighed. ‘There is only one problem. Berk is getting attacked and when we aren’t there, our defenses are weak. We don’t know when the next attack will be, it could be tomorrow when we’re gone.’
‘Gobber, Valka and Eret can defend us and the other dragons will defend our home. It’s risky, but we have to take risks. Meanwhile we should build more artillery.’ The other dragons didn’t help fighting the Screaming Deaths because Toothless ordered them not to. If we were losing, we would have asked for their help. but if I could prevent it, I would not put them in danger.