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Hiccup couldn't believe he was about to willingly let a dragon eat him to save Snotlout.
Well, partially eat him, he supposed. Either way, if he survived this, Snotlout had better not complain about Hiccup ever again.
While investigating a mysterious "Curse of Tears" that had caused many merchants to disappear without a trace, with only tear-shaped beads of glass left behind, the dragon riders had split up. Hiccup, Snotlout, and their dragons had teamed up, but had gotten sidetracked when Hiccup's betrothal gift for Astrid was stolen by none other than the bounty hunter who had kidnapped Hiccup from Berk a few months ago.
And then it all went really bad.
Hiccup and Snotlout chased Amos onto a plateau of shifting sand just outside of the markets. And without warning, faster than a blink, Amos was gone — sucked into the sand like he'd fallen into open air. Toothless and Hookfang snarled, hackles raised, but there was nothing to attack. The thief was just… gone.
Snotlout disappeared next. One minute he was there, the next, with a rush of sand and a lot of screaming…. gone. Hookfang shrieked and dove for where his rider had disappeared, talons desperately digging through the sand, but Snotlout had vanished as completely as Amos.
Hiccup's stomach twisted with dread — he had a pretty good idea of what they were dealing with, thanks to a horrifying passage he'd discovered through the Dragon Eye. He'd thought it a myth, perhaps, created by the Hunters to scare people from their territory, because it was too strange to be true.
But everything lined up in his head. If he was right, if he wanted any chance to save Snotlout — and Amos, he supposed — he would have to be taken himself. But getting down there, below the sand, would be the simple part. The actual rescue and escape… well, short of training and befriending a massive dragon that had been subsisting on a steady diet of unsuspecting merchants (he didn't like his chances), Hiccup didn't have many options.
The sand swirled at his feet, and five great talons rose up, peeking from the ground. Literally peeking, as at the end of each talon was an evil, unblinking reptilian eye. Hiccup's stomach twisted with dread, mind racing, heart thudding a frantic rhythm inside his chest. Gods, sometimes he hated being right. And the idea slowly taking form in his mind was ridiculous. Utterly, completely insane.
Because he'd only have one chance at this, to save his cousin and his once-kidnapper. If he went with his standard "befriend the dragon" approach and it didn't work, all three of them would be devoured. But to pull off this new, highly dangerous idea, he'd have to commit from the start. No training the dragon, no trying to get on its good side.
But this plan also scared him so much that his hands trembled just thinking about it. His stomach churned and sweat beaded on his brow and his lungs tightened to the point of pain. Maybe the Dragon Eye is wrong, he thought desperately. Maybe it's not as ferocious as it says. Maybe I can train it.
Snotlout's face, eyes wide, jaw set stubbornly, terrified but brave in the face of death, flashed in his mind's eye; his screams as the earth swallowed him echoed in his ears. Hiccup couldn't take that chance, could he? He had to commit to the too-horrible-to-think-about plan.
Hiccup steeled himself, teeth gritted, eyes locked on the wicked-looking eyes protruding from the sand. He waited, each heartbeat simultaneously lasting a lifetime and a second. The eyes disappeared, and seconds later an enormous hand wrapped around his right ankle and pulled.
His abductor was fast, but Toothless was faster: In the split second between the grabbing and the dragging beneath the sand, Toothless lunged, his teeth closing around Hiccup's metal leg. The leg popped off, pain seared through Hiccup's stump — Toothless screamed — and Hiccup was dragged down, down, down, through sand and dirt, choking, suffocating —
He hit the ground hard, his teeth rattling and pain shooting down his spine. It took every shred of self-control for Hiccup to remain limp. He couldn't give in to the urge to cough or clear the sand from his eyes, nose, and mouth. For his plan to work, the Sandsnatcher dragon had to think he was dead.
To keep himself from panicking, Hiccup mentally reviewed everything he knew about this dragon (unfortunately, everything he knew about it was terrifying, so he was only partially successful):
The Sandsnatcher was a primordial monster — a remnant of a more brutal time. All primal instinct and burning hunger like the Red Death. It lurked beneath the sand and used its talons to stalk its prey, then pulled them below, never to be seen again. It swallowed its victims whole, like a snake.
It usually didn't devour its meals right away, though, which was why Hiccup was operating under the belief that Snotlout would still be alive. No, the Sandsnatcher, according to the Dragon Eye, preferred to eat its victims alive, and a single meal could keep its belly full for several days.
Since merchants had been going missing for weeks now, Hiccup felt fairly certain that its hunger had been sated and it would want to keep its newest catches fresh until it had digested the last unfortunate supper. The only time a full Sandsnatcher ate its prey right away was if it had been killed during the capture — the dragon was loathe to lose a meal, so rather than wait and be forced to eat something tainted with rot, it would eat the newly dead catch while it was still as fresh as possible.
This dragon, the passage had revealed, only had one weakness: a small soft spot on the forehead, between its hollow eye sockets. The problem was, it was so massive that reaching it from the ground would be virtually impossible. Hiccup's plan was truly a new level of reckless, dangerous, and terrifying (even for him). He had to pretend to be dead, let the dragon begin to eat him (praying that it started with his foot, not his head) and let it swallow him just enough for Hiccup to get close enough to that soft spot to strike.
Hiccup recoiled at the prospect of hurting any dragon, but those eyes had been flat and cruel, just like the Red Death's, and he knew that if he did not attack, they would all be dead. He hoped hitting the soft spot with the butt of his sword would be enough to incapacitate and not kill it. When — if — they escaped, he and the other riders would have to figure out how to deal with the dragon, because while they didn't kill dragons, they couldn't just let it lurk beneath the sand and continue to feast on travelers and traders.
He forced his mind back to the task at hand. The monumental, disturbing, sickening task of allowing a dragon to eat him. He could figure out next steps if everything went to plan and they got out of here alive. Right now, he needed to calm down, breathe as shallowly as possible, and play dead. And pray the Dragon Eye was right about the Sandsnatcher swallowing its meals whole instead of chewing them. (Gods, he really didn't want to do this!)
Hiccup nearly jumped as a voice screamed from a few feet away, panic painting every word: "Hiccup? Oh my gods, Hiccup! Stay away from him!"
Okay, so Snotlout was still alive. Thank Thor.
And then another voice, harsh and grating, hissed, "Hush! If it's eatin' him, that means it's not eatin' us!"
Aaaand Amos was alive, too. Wonderful.
"If that thing eats anybody," Snotlout snapped back, "I'm gonna make sure it's you."
Despite the terror screaming through Hiccup's body, he couldn't help but marvel at how quickly Snotlout had come to his defense. If he had known that Hiccup was, in fact, not unconscious or dead, would he have so blatantly shown this side of him? Definitely not, Hiccup decided, but it was kind of nice all the same, the little confirmation that Snotlout did, in his own strange way, care.
But all thoughts of his cousin were driven violently from his mind as hot, moist breath washed over his face in a repulsive wave. Gods — the smell. Not death and rot like you'd expect from a man-eating dragon. Not even blood. But something else, something sharp and sour, a smell he could only place because of his close calls with Changewing attacks.
Acid. For a moment, panic threatened to overwhelm him (had the Dragon Eye left out that this thing spat acid?), but Hiccup had a lot of practice keeping his emotions, particularly his fear, on a short leash. He didn't dare breathe deeply — he didn't dare breath at all with the Sandsnatcher looming so close — but he steadied his nerves by focusing on the facts. This wasn't the explosive smell of an imminent acid attack. It was a deeper, more pungent smell, one that stewed and smoked and simmered but did not spew. This was the stench of the dragon's corrosive stomach acid, primed to break down its next meal.
Oh, this was a really bad idea.
Snotlout was still shouting, still hurling insults at the monster as it huffed around Hiccup's face, inspecting its prospective dinner. Hiccup's fingers twitched minutely, itching to lunge for his sheathed Dragon Blade. If the dragon was close enough, maybe he could do this without letting himself get even a little bit eaten. If he could just move quickly enough, grab his sword, ram the hilt into that soft spot, then maybe…
But no. The angle was all wrong, and with his eyes closed, he had no way of knowing if the soft spot would be within reach. And if the dragon was faster than him (it almost certainly was), then the only real chance he had was to attack when it was preoccupied with something else. Unfortunately, that something else was going to have to be swallowing Hiccup whole.
Okay, so we're doing this.
Hiccup's chest burned with the urge to breathe, but he didn't, he couldn't, until the dragon had moved away from his upper body. If it moved away from his upper body. Gods, please let it start at my foot.
For once, the gods actually seemed to be listening. Because after a handful of heart-stopping moments of terror, the breath retreated from his face with one last whuff of his hair.
Hiccup risked a shallow breath and peeked his eyes open the tiniest bit. He immediately wished he'd kept them shut. Because the illustrations and description of the Sandsnatcher from the Dragon Eye didn't hold a candle to the monstrous horror of the real thing. Hiccup would be the first to admit that sometimes he could be a bit biased when it came to dragons — even the Cavern Crashers and Catastrophic Quakens were cute in their own creepy ways. But this thing… if he hadn’t read about it on a device called the Dragon Eye, he might not have clocked it as a dragon at all.
It was the color of wet sand, scales so numerous and tiny it almost appeared smooth, like a giant undulating earthworm. Enormous and serpentine, it spilled out of the confines of Hiccup's limited vision, even from six feet away. He could see about half of its face from where it crouched at its feet, slitted, snake-like nostrils twitching at the end of its elongated snout. From what little Hiccup could see, it had at least six legs sprouting from that winding, writhing body, spindly, spiderish things that set off a primal fear instinct at the first glimpse of them. And though he couldn't see them at the moment, he knew that the talons of each foreleg were all tipped with wicked draconic eyes.
Perhaps worst of all were the hollow pits where the eyes would normally be, carved deep into its skull. Darkness and death swirled within the empty sockets, hypnotizing in its own way, enticing him to lie down, to surrender to the deep and the dark and the cold. To give himself up to death, an offering on the alter of this dragon's insatiable appetite.
Over the blood rushing in his ears, Hiccup could just hear the sounds of Snotlout shouting, but the words disintegrated into a hazy buzz before his mind could process their meaning. He could sense the panic, though, the desperation, the helplessness as Snotlout was forced to watch a dragon devour his own cousin, friend, and leader whole. Hiccup very much wanted to give Snotlout a sign, try to show him that he was still alive, that he had a plan, but Hiccup knew he couldn't risk the dragon spotting it too. Sorry, Snotlout, he thought, stomach swirling in a sick twist of guilt and terror.
But then everything fled from his mind — Snotlout, Amos, his friends somewhere above, Astrid's betrothal gift, everything — as, through shuttered eyelids, he watched the Sandsnatcher come to its decision (dinnertime it was). With a series of wet clicks, the dragon opened its massive maw and unhinged its jaw like a snake. And then, from the depths of the gaping darkness, something pink and glistening slithered. Comprehension struck Hiccup with the force of an iron battering ram, revulsion oozing through his body like slime, moments before the thing began to curl around his limp legs, up his hips, and around his waist.
The Sandsnatcher had a prehensile tongue, and it was going to drag Hiccup down its gullet and into the acidic abyss beyond, like a fish on a line.
Hiccup nearly lost it then, nearly ruined the whole plan by flinching and trying to scramble away from the violating tongue wrapping around his body. The muggy warmth of dragon saliva seeped even through his leather armor, and the stench of acid and burnt flesh seared the inside of his nostrils. Gods gods gods — Hiccup barely held it together, managed somehow to hang on to the unwinding thread of his "plan" and remained a boneless, dead weight even as the tongue began to pull him in.
Hiccup wanted to close his eyes. He didn't want to see his remaining foot descending down a dragon's throat. But he had to keep them squinted open, because he needed to know the right moment to strike. He'd only have the briefest of windows, and if he missed it…
Hiccup's leather boot entered the dragon's mouth. he just managed to suppress a shudder; somehow, he hadn't expected it to be so warm. Immediately, the saliva began the process of soaking into the thick leather of his boot, quickly permeating it and the thick stocking he wore beneath. Hiccup wanted to gag at the hot moisture clinging to his foot, drenching through his trouser leg, as the tongue drew him deeper, deeper.
Being swallowed whole by a dragon was a much slower process than he'd anticipated. How he was able to coerce his screaming muscles to play dead for so long, he'd never know. Inch by agonizing inch, Hiccup's leg disappeared, ushered by that sinuous tongue until he'd reached the throat. Only then did the tongue retract as the powerful throat muscles took over, working Hiccup's unresisting body along the narrow corridor.
There truly was no going back now. Hiccup bit back a wince as the throat muscles constricted, pulling him down another inch. Hiccup had never been claustrophobic, but if he survived this absolutely insane encounter, he had a feeling that might change. The inability to so much as twitch his toes if he wanted to, the moist press of the muscles on all sides, the mere knowledge that he was moving ever closer to the frothing pit of acid in the beast's belly — Hiccup had never felt more trapped, more petrified, more alone.
But then—
Through the mind-numbing panic swarming his mind, Hiccup heard a voice. Obnoxious, screeching, ridiculously loud. And this time, he could make out the words.
"Get your freaky-ass tongue off of him, you disgusting freak of nature! You hear me?! Spit him out, right now! Look at him! A twig, that's what he is! Not even enough to be an appetizer! I guarantee you he tastes terrible! And do you have any idea where he's been?! You eat him, and you're gonna be sick for a week. A fucking week! Are you sure that's worth such a measly little snack?"
Hiccup smothered the burst of manic laughter threatening to erupt from his chest — apparently Snotlout had realized that insulting the dragon itself wasn't working, and he'd moved on to insulting Hiccup instead. Weird choice, but it was so very Snotlout that Hiccup nearly sobbed. Not alone, he reminded himself.
Eventually, the stump of Hiccup's left leg joined his right in the throat, then his thighs, his hips, his lower abdomen. Hiccup watched his body vanish into the dragon's mouth with a detached kind of horror, barely recognizing it as his own.
Until a new sensation licked like tongues of fire at the bottom of his right foot — a new kind of heat, vitriolic and hungry. Either the dragon's stomach was closer than he'd realized, or its biology dictated a preemptive wave of bile to begin the process of predigestion. That would make sense, given that the prey was swallowed in one big chunk. If Hiccup hadn't been scared out of his mind, he would have been fascinated. When — if — he got out of here, he'd have to remember to tell Fishlegs.
But regardless of where this acid was located, the fact remained that it had now met the sturdy leather tip of Hiccup's boot. It hadn't burned him yet, but he could feel the heat emanating, could almost hear the sizzle of the leather being slowly eaten away. Once the acid chewed through the meager protection, it would melt away his flesh like yak butter in a hot skillet.
Hiccup really didn't want to lose another foot.
But he was in too deep — literally — to stop this. And though the initial wave of helplessness made his bones buzz and his muscles quiver, the realization that there was nothing he could do until he was close enough to strike quickly settled over him in a turbulent kind of calm.
Whatever would happen, would happen. Even if Hiccup lost his foot before he could incapacitate the Sandsnatcher, if he saved Snotlout, then it would be worth it.
And Hiccup was so close. Just a few more inches, and he would be up to his chest in dragon gullet. Close enough to, if he moved quick as a Speed Stinger, hit that soft spot with the hilt of his sword and knock the dragon out, hopefully for a good, long while.
The heat against Hiccup's toes grew teeth, biting mercilessly into his flesh. The pain sizzled and seared and scorched, nibbling away at his toes, forcing an agonized gasp from his terror-tight lungs. The dragon froze in its swallowing, alerted that something was off. That its meal was not, in fact, quite as deceased as it once thought. But much like Hiccup, the Sandsnatcher had fully committed at this point. It resumed its meal, its throat muscles moving a bit more quickly, eager, perhaps, to get this deceptive little morsel on the road to proper digestion.
Hiccup couldn't be sure if his hearing had abandoned him in what could possibly be his last torturous moments or if Snotlout had fallen silent, but whatever the case, Hiccup was glad for the sudden hush as the moment for action arrived. Ignoring the burning in his toes, moving viper-fast, Hiccup's left hand shot up and back, grasping the hilt of the Dragon Blade and unsheathing it from beneath his back with a wet, metallic slurp.
The Sandsnatcher couldn't see him with its empty sockets, but it felt his movement. Hiccup saw it snap to attention, but the process of swallowing its prey and predigestion had slowed its other body functions considerably. With every bit of force in his panic-coiled muscles, he slammed the hilt of the sword into the soft spot in the center of the dragon's scaly forehead.
For one horrifying moment, Hiccup thought it hadn't worked. Thought that the Dragon Eye had lied to him, or that he hadn't hit the right spot, or that he hadn't hit hard enough. The dragon's head, lifted a couple of inches off the ground, merely swayed. It teetered. But then — then, it flopped to the ground with a bone-jarring thud.
A moment later, Hiccup felt the throat muscles relax, loosening their death-grip on his lower body, and slicked with dragon saliva, acid chasing at his heel, Hiccup was expelled from the dragon's mouth. He lay there for a moment, a sodden, slimy mess in a puddle of dragon spit. Free. Undigested.
And then his pain receptors caught up with his shock and relief, and Hiccup scrambled to his hands and knees, slipping on saliva and nearly face-planting back in the sand. Almost undigested, the rational part of his brain corrected wryly before being promptly smothered by the animal side, the part that cared nothing for reason or logic but only for escape from pain and danger.
"Gods — gods — gods — godsdamnit!" Hiccup howled, barely even registering the grit of sand coating the inside of his mouth and his tongue. With trembling hands, he tossed the Dragon Blade aside and wrenched his right boot and stocking off, hurling them away from him like they were a poisonous snake about to strike. The acid had only just broken through the barrier of the leather, but even with the boot gone, it gnawed at his flesh, sending tidal waves of agony into his foot. With no other recourse, Hiccup ripped off a strip of his tunic, and, not bothering to dust the sand off, used it to swipe at the acid eating away at his foot.
The sand multiplied the pain, grinding into the burnt flesh like salt in an open wound, but it worked. The adrenaline shooting through Hiccup's veins was the only thing that kept him conscious through the ensuing agony; though his vision whited out and his ears rang and pain became the anthem of his existence, he clung stubbornly to awareness, knowing that he had to move now and he had to move fast.
When he returned to himself, Snotlout had started screaming again (or had he ever stopped?), but now with a dizzying mixture of fury and jubilation: "Oh my gods, Hiccup! You're alive? You're alive! I can't believe you did it, holy shit, you beat it! Oh Thor, wait — how much of that did you hear? You absolute fucking lunatic, when I get my hands on you I'm gonna finish what that overgrown glass blower started—"
Hiccup barked out a half-laugh, half-sob, not looking up from his blazing right foot. "Y-you're going to… to eat me?" he croaked.
Snotlout paused for the briefest of moments. "Oh my gods, no, that is not—"
But Hiccup didn't hear the rest of Snotlout's protest. His vision had cleared enough for him to get a good look at his right foot. Thank the gods, he still had a right foot.
Mostly.
"It's gone," Hiccup interrupted a furious Snotlout, only now glancing up and around for the first time. His eyes swept over the crumpled form of the Sandsnatcher, the strange, fractaled glass ceiling, the sandy walls, the oddly beautiful, gleaming glass pillars, wild and nonsensical in their construction, like fire captured in glass form. And there, trapped within a towering ring of glass spikes, was Snotlout. (And Amos, but Hiccup didn't spare him more than a cursory glance.)
Covered head to toe in sand, eyes wide, cheeks flushed, fists clenched at his sides, helmet nowhere to be seen. And, to Hiccup's immense surprise, with the tell-tale tracks of tears down his face. Hiccup wisely didn't comment on them, just filed that information away for later, when they were safe, far away from this hellish pit of glass and sand.
He and Snotlout stared at one another for a long moment, reveling in the fact that they were alive and (mostly) undigested. Finally, Snotlout spoke, an unusual fragility to his voice. "What's gone?"
Hiccup tried for a wry grin that was more of a grimace. "My little toe," he said, somewhat breathlessly. He chuckled without humor. "I'm down to four toes."
The sharpness in Snotlout's eyes could have cut right through the glass between them as his gaze shot to Hiccup's right leg. He opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it furiously once more. "Where the Hel did it go?" he demanded.
Hiccup lifted his bare foot, where the little toe had indeed been burned away, the flesh melted and twisted by the greedy fingers of the acid. "Dissolved," he said matter-of-factly. He snorted in not-quite-laughter, a sound like glass shards, dangerous and fragile. "Digested."
Snotlout blanched.
"But that does-doesn't matter, not right n-now," Hiccup pressed on, scrabbling for the Dragon Blade and using it to heave himself to his foot. The scrape of each grain of sand against his acid-cauterized skin felt like being flayed alive, but he ignored it, adrenaline doing the gods' work in keeping him mostly upright. He swayed more than usual when he tried to balance on his right foot, the pain and missing toe stealing his stability.
Regardless, he hopped unsteadily forward, all but lunging at the wall of glass as he neared it. He caught himself with his palms, struggled to regain his breath, then looked up, finding himself face-to-face with his cousin, the glossy sheen of glass the only thing separating them.
"Where… where d-did all this glass come from?" Hiccup asked, setting his sword alight and smirking as, in the corner of his vision, Amos jumped at the sudden burst of fire.
"That thing made it!" Snotlout answered irritably. "It stirs up the sand and blasts it with its white-hot flames, and poof!" He waved his arms around furiously. "Glass."
Despite the pain in his foot vying for his attention and the still-burning embers of fear deep within, Hiccup gave a low whistle of appreciation. "Kind of wish I could have seen that," he commented, pressing the Dragon Blade against the glass with his left hand while steadying himself with his right. Praying it was hot enough to melt the glass. "Stand back."
"You were right," Amos piped up hoarsely, for once no animosity in his voice. "He is crazy."
"Of course I was right," Snotlout preened smugly. "I'm always right. And Hiccup's the craziest godsdamned Viking I've ever met." He sounded strangely proud of this fact. Another thing for Hiccup to hide a smile about and tuck away to consider later.
It was slow and dangerous work, but the dragon stayed blessedly unconscious as Hiccup melted a hole just big enough for the other two to squeeze through. Amos came first, nearly barreling Snotlout and Hiccup over in his haste to retreat. His footsteps faded deeper into the cavern, and neither Hooligan tried to stop him.
When Snotlout stepped through, he looked Hiccup up and down critically, going so far as to kneel at his foot to inspect the damage. He examined the raw, twisted flesh with pursed lips. "There's sand all in this," he remarked.
Hiccup winced. "Trust me. I know."
"It's gonna be a bitch to clean out."
Hiccup groaned. "I'm aware."
"You're covered in dragon spit — disgusting."
"I noticed, thanks."
"And your toe really is just gone."
"Thanks for the reminder," Hiccup groused, shifting his foot away from Snotlout irritably.
"But you're alive. We all are."
Hiccup blinked. Regarded Snotlout warily as he stood up and gestured for Hiccup's arm. Hiccup sighed and allowed Snotlout to wrap his arm over his shoulders. One of his cousin's hands wrapped around his wrist, holding him steady, and the other circled his waist.
"Yeah," Hiccup agreed, casting a worried look at the still Sandsnatcher.
"I don't know how, though," Snotlout snapped. "Were you awake the whole time?"
Hiccup nodded, far too exhausted to explain. His adrenaline was flagging; they needed to think of a plan, a way to hold out until rescue arrived. To hide from or restrain the unconscious dragon so it couldn't trap them (or worse, eat them) again. "It's a l-long story," he stammered. "Tell you lat-later."
Snotlout scowled without any real heat. "Fine, whatever. Take your time. I love being in the dark about shit like this. I'm a man of mystery. Not like I'm dying to know or anything." (He very obviously was.) A beat. "Did you… did you kill it though?"
"I don't think so."
"You don't think so?" Snotlout echoed incredulously.
"Well, if you want to get close enough to check, be my guest."
Snotlout scoffed. "I totally would, but I'm stuck lugging around your dead weight." Hiccup wasn't offended; the remnants of tears on Snotlout's face told the truth of how his cousin felt. After a moment of companionable silence, Snotlout asked, "So what now?"
Hiccup shrugged, his body sagging even more in Snotlout's grip. The pain and exhaustion were eating away at his strength and consciousness faster than the acid had taken Hiccup's toe. His head lolled sideways onto Snotlout's shoulder. "Hiccup?" That edge of fear had returned to Snotlout's tone. "Hiccup, if you pass out on me, I swear to Odin—"
"'m okay," Hiccup murmured, pleasantly surprised to find that, missing toe and acid-burned foot aside, he mostly was. "Tired."
"Well, stay awake, damn it!" Snotlout hissed. "You're the idea guy!"
Hiccup blinked rapidly, trying to bring the world back into focus. It didn't work. "Find… a p-place to hi-hide," he muttered. "Wait for r-rescue."
"If that thing wakes up, it's gonna sniff us out and scarf us down, no matter how good we are at hide-and-seek!" Snotlout argued. "What if the others don't find us in time?" His voice rose in pitch and volume as he spluttered. "We've got to find a way out — what if they never find us? If—"
Snotlout's hypothetical shattered into fragments along with the glass ceiling overhead.
"Good to know you have so much faith in us," a wonderfully familiar voice drawled from the brand new skylight.
"Oh my gods — Astrid! Oh, thank Thor!"
Astrid's voice turned sharper than a Gronkle Iron blade faster than Stormfly on a steady diet of chicken. "Hiccup?" A frantic warble and the familiar flap of wings followed, and Hiccup forced his eyes open to see Astrid on Toothless, along with Hookfang, diving into the cavern. Even with his bleary, fading vision, Hiccup could see all too clearly the fear clinging to his dragon and his betrothed, gritty and painful like grains of sand. Toothless crooned and nudged Hiccup's stomach, snarling as the scent of the Sandsnatcher's saliva assaulted his nose.
A small, calloused hand cupped his face. A thumb, warm and comforting, brushed across his cheekbone. Astrid's face filled his vision, light dusting of freckles standing stark against a bone-white face, two bright spots of pink high on her cheeks, mouth set in a thin, grim line. "Hiccup? Can you hear me? What the Hel happened? Is he— is he okay?"
"Mmmm," Hiccup tried, blinking languidly at her and thinking somewhat giddily that she had never looked more beautiful. Because she was real and she was here and they were together. "'M fine."
Toothless snorted at that, his warm breath puffing against Hiccup's free hand. Feeling as if he was lifting Mjölnir instead of his own arm, Hiccup rested his palm on Toothless's sleek forehead, relishing the feel of his best friend once more at his side.
Snotlout readjusted his grip on Hiccup, and he let his eyes fall shut at the swell of nausea the movement elicited. "Oh yeah, he's totally fine." Sarcasm dripped from every syllable. "If by fine you mean he was halfway eaten by a dragon and is now missing six toes instead of five, then he's just dandy."
"What?!"
Hiccup made a valiant effort to roll his eyes, but had no idea if he succeeded. Actually, he wasn't even sure if his eyes were still open at this point; the world had devolved into a grey haze.
But he could still hear Snotlout, loud and clear, directly in his ear: "And speaking of dragons? Did you happen to notice that freaking enormous one lying in the middle of this godsforsaken hole? I'm like 85 percent sure it's still alive, by the way, and if it wakes up, it will eat us all or blast us with molten sand. Oh, and there's a thieving moron bounty hunter running around loose somewhere down here. And I don't have a problem leaving his ass behind, but I know we're 'the good guys'—" Hiccup didn't need to see Snotlout's hands to hear the air quotes, "—so you can come back for him after you get me and Hiccup the Hel out of here!"
He said all of this in one breath, so fast that Hiccup's fading brain could barely keep up.
It was a testament to just how crazy their lives had become that Astrid sounded more resigned than confused when she sighed, "Okay, help me get Hiccup onto Toothless — careful—"
He felt himself being lifted, jostled, but also… he didn't feel it. Not really. He was in a muggy dream state, the pain receding in the wake of unconsciousness or the onset of shock (hopefully the former). He did, however, feel the arms clutching him tightly as Toothless took off with the click of Astrid's heel in the pedal. He felt warm breath ghost across his neck and Astrid's face burrowing into the crook of his shoulder. He felt the rumble of Toothless's croon, then the intoxicating weightlessness that accompanied flight.
And for that moment, with himself and Snotlout safe, with his best friend solid and real beneath him, carrying him up and away and into the dazzling sunlight painting the backs of his eyelids red, with his girlfriend holding him steady, her front pressed against his back, strong and protective and immovable, with her breath on his neck and her lips grazing his shoulder, Hiccup allowed himself to forget everything else. Just for a moment.
He forgot the agony and fear of being swallowed alive by a hungry dragon, his newly missing toe, and the ugly, voracious burns in its stead. He forgot about Amos wandering around somewhere in caverns, still clutching Astrid's stolen betrothal gift. He even forgot about the Sandsnatcher and the weighty responsibility that still clung to his shoulders, of what to do with the dragon once they'd regrouped and healed. Because they couldn't just let it keep taking and eating people, but it wasn't doing so maliciously (no matter how evil those reptilian eyes seemed).
He forgot about everything but his dragon and his betrothed and how well they all fit together, and how the world had clicked back into place when they'd been reunited. He relaxed in Astrid's arms and let the darkness take him, knowing that when he awoke, he'd be safe and cared for and surrounded by those he loved.