Chapter Text
Tangibility proved to be not without its downsides.
With the ability to travel the world came the need to adjust between the places that overflowed with magic, and those where the concept simply didn’t exist. People who believed and the ones who didn’t. After spending weeks at a time being invisible to the world, it was easy to forget that home was ripe with believers and practitioners. People who could see him, touch him… oppose him.
At least, this was the excuse Jack had given himself as he sat, bound, inside a damp cave. A cell, really, with a barred gate as the only entrance and exit. It was hardly his fault, he wasn’t prepared for the possibility that people would go out of their way to capture him, shoot him right out of the sky. How exactly was that achievable anyway? He hadn’t much of a chance to examine the net that had wrapped around him, dragged him down into the ocean, beneath its crushing tides and delivered him right into the hands of the hunters.
By the initial looks on their faces, they hadn’t intended to net him specifically, but he must have been worth more than their desired target. A dark glee had spread amongst them all, and, with a body full of salty water and no power to aid him, Jack had barely a chance at attempting escape. His staff had been snatched before he could grip it in his hand. They’d bound him tight and chucked him below the deck of their ship.
The journey on board had passed in haze, all he could recall was the rocking as waves crashed into the sides and spilled through the windows, but he ended up tossed inside this dungeon in the end. Feet and hands concealed within metal cuffs unlike any he had seen before. Not that he could access his magic without his staff, but these people clearly hadn’t been wanting to take that chance.
That had been… Well, there was simply no way of telling exactly how much time had passed since, but it had been long enough that his own boredom had begun to drive him insane. Down here, Jack’s only friend appeared to be naught but the sound of hollow drips and one lonely torch picket on the wall outside his cell. Occasionally, a guard came down only to ensure that he was indeed still locked up, to whom he would attempt to indulge in small talk. Charm his way out of the situation, perhaps.
They never listened, every attempt falling flat when all the received was a gruff sigh before they trudged off through the cave. Leaving him to the rumble of the underground and his own countless thoughts.
Many attempts had been made to break the cuffs by swinging his hands as hard as he could against the stone floor. All it ever resulted in were a few sparks, and snickering from whatever guard had caught him in his feeble efforts. Jack’s response was always a glower, or a witty comment; he wasn’t about to give up.
Without the visibility of the sun, Jack couldn’t tell exactly how many days, or weeks, he’d spent banging his hands on the ground before his body couldn’t take it anymore, and he begun to resign himself to his fate. He considered waiting until the hunters tried to use him for whatever they had planned before making his escape. Without access to his powers, he wouldn’t make it very far. He would need his staff, and he couldn’t be more grateful that no human had the ability wield it, even if that meant he was being held so that they may force him to use it for them.
Well, so he suspected, anyway. The guards had remained tacit of their plans, even the man who came to ask questions about Jack’s abilities never revealed a sliver of his intentions. Without that knowledge, it proved difficult to construct a plan of escape.
Was he starting to lose hope? The fact he couldn’t even sit himself up anymore certainly implied as much. What could be done when even the wind couldn’t answer his calls?
Jack couldn’t die, at least he had no evidence to support that he could, so deep down it was all nothing more than humiliating. Frustrating, maybe. Bested by humans all because he forgot that in this region, people were more likely to believe in him. It’s a good job, he thought, that he was all alone. Nobody would ever let him live this down, if there was anyone at all. Jack didn’t really commune with the other spirits of the world.
In the middle of attempting to count as many drips as possible before losing it, a new sound reached out to his bored ears. A distant roar, followed by a series of clashing, banging and explosions. Curious, he quirked his head to look out between the bars of the cage door, as though he could see through the stone walls of the cave.
The sound of cries and varied amounts of yelling ensued, and something he thought was hope flared inside his chest. Hope was a sensation unfamiliar, but he knew it surged through his stagnant blood vessels. Somebody was out there, fighting his captors and could potentially rescue him from this cell.
The calamity eventually quietened down and Jack sat with desperation. Ears sharp and waiting on any sign of approaching footsteps.
One beat passed, then two. The echo of drips throughout the cavern was all that followed and a defeated sigh tore itself from his chest. Nobody was coming. He was probably buried too far deep underground for anyone to just stumble upon. The hope in his chest waned.
Approximately two seconds away from closing his eyes to attempt sleeping this whole ordeal away, having given up on a rescue, the crunch of stone against metal re-alerted Jack’s senses.
Footsteps. Odd, asymmetrical in weight. Step, scrape. Step scrape. Not a pattern he had come to familiarise with any of the guards. He sat back up, pressing himself against the damp cave wall.
“Do you think there’s anything down here?” spoke a voice that Jack hadn’t heard before, followed by a low grumble.
His throat locked itself, preventing any cry for help from escaping. Now in the face of a potential rescue, it would seem his mind has caught up to him. The ordeal of being captured and held prisoner is good enough cause for distrust. Would this person look at him and do the same? Release him from this cage only to trade it for another?
Or steal his staff and leave him here to wither for the rest of his days.
Maybe he already has been locked up for an eternity; it certainly felt that way.
Jack curled up against the wall as much as was possible, convinced it would swallow him whole. Shield him from any on-coming dangers.
When a long shadow cast over the cave wall, Jack held his breath. Not that he needed to breathe. Another shadow followed, decidedly not human or humanoid. A deep growl bounced off the walls, bringing the footsteps to a halt.
“What is it? Another hunter? Just be ready…”
The growl stirred Jack’s bubbling unease. All they had to do was round the corner and they’d find him. He bit his tongue, a weak attempt at calming the prickling of anxiety.
And then, when a flaming sword and a pair of friendly eyes appeared, Jack let go of the breath. Immediately, he made eye contact with the person, and any fight inside them dissipated at the sight of Jack chained and hunched in on himself. Another set of eyes appeared, much larger, much more green, and Jack wasn’t sure what to feel. Threatened? Hopeful?
The boy darted to the cage, wrapping his hands around the iron bars. “Hello?” he called to Jack, voice thick with compassion.
Still, Jack wouldn’t allow a word to leave him, as if his own silence would protect him from any lingering threat of being taken by someone else. What happened to the sass and verbal abuse he had been hurling at burly guards non-stop? Why now, when face to face with potential rescue, does fear feel the need to bury its claws deep into his being?
“It’s okay,” the boy spoke again. “We’re not going to hurt you.”
The ‘we’ being him and the dragon by the boy’s side. A Night Fury, a species Jack hadn’t seen in long enough he figured they’d all but disappeared. But here, one was stood, next to a viking no less, seemingly ready to attack or defend if given the word. Jack swallowed, unsure what to make of the image.
“How long have you been down here?” the boy asked, and despite the caution screaming loudly at him, Jack managed a shrug. “Don’t be afraid, we’ll get you out of there. Toothless, the door.”
Right away, the dragon fired a blast at the cage door, warping it right off its hinges. The boy took a tentative step inside, approaching Jack as though he were a wounded animal. Hands extended in a placating manner, light on his feet. His face seemed to crumple once his eyes landed on Jack’s shackles, the extremity of the measures taken to prevent his escape.
“I’ve never seen chains like this before. It’s a bit much for just one guy,” he mumbled, mostly to himself. With a deep breath and burst of confidence, the boy came to kneel in front of Jack, thoroughly examining the armour around his feet first.
With a pinched brow and pursed lips, the boy looked to be weighing his options. He sent Jack an apologetic glance, and only then did his voice find its way back to him.
“W-wait! Don’t leave me here,” he pleaded, sure that’s what the boy had been considering.
This made the boy’s defences melt. His shoulders relaxed, like a weight had just been lifted.
“Hello,” he offered again.
“Can you get me out of this?” Jack asked, hesitantly, lifting his hands to show off the metal encasing them.
“Here, without hurting you? I’m not sure. Toothless can break the chains, but as for the cuffs… there must be a key for that around here somewhere…” he trailed off, more sort of voicing his thoughts aloud than anything else.
Toothless. The name twirled around Jack’s head, and he studied the dragon. A pet? No, that didn’t seem right. A companion, then. Either way, not something Jack ever thought he would see, what with how humans have been content to wage war against dragons for as long as he’s been around. Possibly longer.
This could be a positive sign, meaning that these two could be trusted. In his current state of desperation, Jack was willing to take the gamble. Besides, the boy at least looked sympathetic and willing to help. Whether it was for nefarious reasons was irrelevant, it was a chance to get out of this cave Jack had called home for Norns knew how long.
“Okay,” Jack said, regaining the boy’s attention.
“Okay?” he repeated, more questioning.
“Do what you need to. Anything to get me out of here, I’m sick of these walls,” Jack managed a chuckle, not without humour.
The boy gave an affirmative nod before instructing the (his?) dragon to blow the chains of Jack’s confines. In the smouldering remains and smoke, Jack managed to push himself to his feet, barely balancing on weary legs. It was awkward with the metal boots and his legs being weak from disuse, a horrifying tell of just how long he had been trapped in here. Chained to the floor, reduced to crawling or pushing himself along the ground, like he was unworthy of being treated like person and more like an animal. The boy seemed to think along the same lines as he saw Jack’s struggle, a sick realisation dawning on him and he rushed to Jack’s aid.
“You’re freezing,” he commented, settling one arm around Jack’s waist. “We need to get you out of here.”
Jack found he lacked the strength to disagree. He allowed himself to be guided over to the dragon’s side, where he then stood confused. The boy caught on quick, eyes going wide with realisation.
“Oh, right. Just take a seat on the saddle there, Toothless won’t hurt you. Here, I’ll help you swing your leg over.” It was an awkward fumble getting Jack onto the dragon’s back. In all his many years, dragon riding was a concept unseen. Wasn’t even something he thought possible, and yet there was this mystery boy. Clad in black leather and a dragon by his side, wielding a flaming sword and coming to Jack’s rescue, although unknowingly so.
“You ride dragons?” he couldn’t help but question. A wide, proud smile split across the boy’s face. It glowed, and he nodded, but a silent query sparkling in his eyes.
“You must come from far if you haven’t heard of the Dragon Riders. We’re sort of famous. Or infamous? Everybody seems to know about us, actively hunt us down… Anyway, I can tell you all about it later, if you like, let’s just focus on getting you out of here.”
Jack gave little thought to the words, other than the fact that the ‘we’ implied there was more than just this boy. His form slumped on the dragon’s back as the boy guided them out of the cavern. It felt winding, claustrophobic, almost like it went on forever. All the while, the boy asked Jack a handful of questions: what was his name, where was he from, how did he get captured and why. It occurred to Jack, then, that this boy must be clueless as to what exactly Jack was.
“My name is Jack,” was all the information he had the energy to volunteer.
“Jack,” the boy echoed, feeling it on his tongue. It was unusual to him, if the way he scrunched his eyes was any indication. Then, he smiled, and it was warm, free of the malice that Jack had become accustomed to. “I’m Hiccup.”
Now that was a strange name. Jack kept this thought to himself, however, lest he come across as rude. He didn’t particularly want to rub any more humans the wrong way and end up inside another prison just for being what he was.
After maybe two minutes of walked, the first rays of daylight bounced into the cave, glittering against the damp walls. Hope, raw and genuine, swirled through Jack’s chest, his lost energy coming back to him in a rush that would have snatched his breath if it were possible. Without a care in the world, he desperately scrambled off the dragon’s back, making a dart for the cave entrance. The boy, Hiccup, made an alarmed cry of protest which went ignored.
Still clad in metal confines and legs that felt like jelly, Jack struggled to the entrance, collapsing more than once, but he didn’t have it in him to care. Eventually Hiccup came and helped him walk, and he dropped to his knees the instant the outside world danced around him. The beam of the sun was a sweet caress against his skin, and the wind blissfully wisped his hair around his head.
Freedom. At last.
Except, there was one arm draped around his shoulders, and a hand clutching at his sleeve. Beside Jack, Hiccup was crouched, expression unreadable but he must understand that Jack hasn’t seen or felt the sun in a long time. A deep sympathy settled over him.
The scent of morning frost tickled Jack’s nose, the nip of winter air but gentle kisses on his cheeks. It filled him with vigour and a bright laugh burst forth from his chest. All he wanted now was to lie in the snow, gather it between his palms, feel it between his toes. But his iron prison had quickly put a damper on the newfound joy, dark clouds coming to settle back over him.
He remained caged. Had no access to his magic. What good was this freedom if he couldn’t even walk?
“Come on,” Hiccup was attempting to haul Jack to his feet, assisted by his dragon friend. Jack crashed back into reality, manoeuvred himself onto the dragon’s back though his body went limp with dejection. “You okay?”
Unable to find the words, Jack simply shook his head. How could he be okay? He could barely move, let alone be in touch with the elements that gave him life. His elements. The snow and the wind and the bitter winter air. Gray blocked out the sun, accompanied by a flurry of snowflakes.
Jack had to find his staff, that was priority number one now. Along with the ability to use his hands and feet. He turned to Hiccup, his rescuer, a plead on the tip of his tongue.
“Just find something to remove these.” He hadn’t meant for it to come out as bitter as it had, but alas, he was bitter to the core. Not that Hiccup appeared to take it personally, much to Jack’s relief.
“I think I know where we might find a key,” Hiccup said, before hopping onto the dragon, a neat slide just in front of Jack. Hiccup cast him a contemplative look, before grabbing Jack’s arms and pulled them tight around his waist. “I’d say ‘hold on’ but, well, just keep your arms wrapped around me.”
Before Jack could think, Hiccup kicked the dragon off the ground. Being used to the wind sweeping him up and away, Jack should have taken it with ease. But a surprised yelp broke free from him, the velocity almost whisking him off the dragon. Without the wind to catch him, Jack knew he had to do as Hiccup instructed, and he crossed his arms tight around the boy, pressing himself up against his back to erase any space between them. Keeping him safe from falling.
Now up in the sky, Jack had the first chance to examine the place in which he had been held captive for so long. A harbour of some description, hidden within a glacier. Ships of various size were dotted around the place but most notably all of them were on fire, and most were in the process of sinking. The stench of smoke hung heavy in the air and not a single person was to be seen below. There was one more ship, larger than the rest maybe, sailing off in the distance, and it didn’t take a genius to figure that the hunters had all made their grande escape.
“Was this all you?” Jack questioned as he observed the wreckage.
Hiccup gave a modest chuckle. “We managed to catch them by surprise. I wouldn’t normally be able to tackle a whole armada on my own.”
“Well, if that isn’t karma,” Jack muttered to himself, feeling a prickle of satisfaction at the knowledge they’d been unsuspecting just as he had when they nabbed him.
Hiccup made to land on the large ship that remained moored. It was clad in iron armour and numerous traps lining the rails, while the main mast had been splintered and caused the destruction of the deck where it had collapsed. Water was bubbling out the hole in the bow.
The dragon landed gracefully and Hiccup leapt off its back. The wood beneath them gave an angry groan. Mildly concerning, but Jack trusted that it wouldn’t cave in.
“All right, you stay here and I’ll have a look around,” Hiccup instructed, immediately drawing a protest from Jack.
“No, I need to come.”
“You can barely move,” Hiccup helpfully pointed out in return.
“I’m on the dragon. I-I need to find my- I mean, they took something from me. I won’t be able to live without it.” The simmering fear inside Jack prevented him from being specific, being honest. So far, it was clear that Hiccup was clueless about Jack being a spirit, despite the stark appearance, but would his good nature change if he were to learn the truth?
Better to keep the staff and the powers a secret, until he could escape properly.
Credit where it’s due, Hiccup did give this some thought, though only for a moment before shaking his head.
“It’ll be safer if I go alone. I don’t know how sturdy this boat is. I’ll be ten minutes,” he promised before turning on his heel to head up towards the cabin.
Jack let out a frustrated huff. The dragon - Toothless – gave him a curious grumble, to which Jack managed a light chuckle.
“You know what I am, don’t you? But without my staff, I’m not so sure I’m anything. I need to get it back. Will you help me?”
Jack then took the time to fully observe the dragon he sat upon, the saddle and what it was connected to. Some mechanism by the left footrest, linked all the way along to a tailfin. A bright red tailfin, a prosthetic. Jack gave a hum at the discovery.
“Come on, surely you understand what it’s like to be without your abilities? How you would be nothing without it?” he continued to try. This time, Toothless made a noise which could very well have been a resigned sigh. A sense of victory flickered within Jack. “Let’s go, quick.”
With a huff that contained too much attitude for a dragon, Toothless began a steady search with Jack. However, they didn’t make it very far along the deck before the wood began to cry in protest. It was blackened, dying embers glowing faintly which meant that beneath the surface it continued to burn.
“Uh-oh,” was all Jack could get out before it gave way under them. Jack and Toothless yelped in unison as they plummeted to the deck below, the crash causing an intense ringing that pierced Jack’s ears.
Coughing and blinking the smoke away, he’d fallen from the dragon’s back, now sprawled pathetically on the floor in a heap. A black blur filled his vision as he received a face full of tail.
“How was I supposed to know the floor would break? I hate being unable to fly.” Jack muttered that last part to himself, but the dragon made a noise which Jack took as it agreeing with him. They weren’t so different in the flight department.
With closed eyes, Jack struggled through a wave of indignity. Letting himself get captured by dragon hunters and locked in a cage, it wasn’t as if he had much dignity left, anyway. Still, he had never called for help before. Not from anyone, not even the Moon, in his most desolate times of need. In this moment, in this state, he didn’t have much of a choice.
“Help!” he called out to the sliver of sky that poked through the hole in the upper deck. “Hiccup!? Hello?”
Beside him, the dragon made its own wail for help, much to Jack’s bemusement. It wasn’t as if the creature could just walk out of here. But it gestured with its head down behind them, where the water was beginning to rise at an alarming pace, and the dragon’s tail was trapped underneath a collapsed support beam.
Perfect.
“Hiccup, hurry!” Jack cried at the top of his lungs, followed by Toothless firing an emergency blast into the air. He cried some more before starting a shuffle up the deck, away from the rising water. For as long as Jack could remember, he had been averse to the element, although he could never figure out why. Perhaps it was the negative reaction to his presence, that it was freeze at his touch, whether that even made sense.
Through panicked breathing, Jack couldn’t distinguish the sounds of pounding footsteps above them and the creaking of angry wood. Too focused on trying to get away, to not let the water touch him.
“Toothless? Jack?” Hiccup’s face appeared in the hole they had created and Jack sagged with relief. “What happened?”
“The wood, i-it just broke,” Jack explained, opting to skip details which hadn’t gone unnoticed by Toothless. That dragon was proving to possess a fair level of intelligence and it had only been, what, half an hour?
Hiccup heaved a sigh and effortlessly swung himself down onto the lower deck. “Does trouble have a habit of following you?” he asked, a fond lilt in his tone. “Good job I found this.”
Pleased, Hiccup produced a key and Jack couldn’t be more relieved. First Hiccup helped his dragon before releasing Jack of the cuffs, for which he felt much lighter; he hadn’t realised exactly how much they weighed. He pushed himself to his feet, preparing to run off and find his staff now that he was unbound, but his legs seemed to have different plans.
“Can you walk?” Hiccup asked just as Jack took one step and his leg wobbled beneath him.
“Guess I’ll find out,” he said, although his heart was already filling with dread. He pushed off the beam he had been using to support himself, and he had to quickly shift his weight before his legs gave out again. His body didn’t like that, as he’d propelled forward in an awkward stumble in the attempt to remain on his feet, ending with him crashing to the ground once more.
Never before had he felt so humiliated. Quite literally brought to his knees by his own inability to manoeuvre himself. Never felt so weak. Frustrated, he sent a fist into the smoking wood below him.
“Hey,” Hiccup rushed to help, hauling Jack back to his useless feet. Jack kept his head ducked to hide the burning shame, not that he contained the ability to blush. “Don’t worry too much, you just need some time to heal. I’ll bring you back with me so you can recover, unless you’d rather go home?”
“Don’t have a home,” Jack replied absently, too focused on glaring at himself as if that would help him walk properly. There was absolutely no question; he needed his staff. “I just have to find my st- my stuff.”
“I didn’t see anything upstairs that didn’t belong to the hunters.”
“It has to be here,” Jack insisted, words coming out in a harsh bite as his frustration gradually warped into anger. But Hiccup, who had only been selfless thus far, didn’t deserve to be on the receiving end of that. Jack reigned it in as best he could.
“Okay, we can do one more sweep of the ship,” Hiccup agreed, which Jack was grateful for.
They began a slow trudge through the collapsing boat, Hiccup keeping one arm firmly wrapped around Jack to prevent him from crumbling to the floor. The embarrassment it made him feel was burning. Jack Frost, a winter spirit, unable to move unaided, suffering a human weakness no less. It shouldn’t matter how long he hadn’t used his legs; he should just heal, he was a spirit.
What, precisely, did the loss of his powers entail? The inability to recover from any injury on top of everything else?
Their examination of the decks that remained above water produced nothing. No staff, not even a clue as to where it could be hidden. Jack quickly concluded that it would likely be elsewhere, but when his legs gave out for the umpteenth time, Hiccup put an urgent end to the search.
“There are other boats,” Jack started, just to get shot down without missing a beat.
“No. You can barely stand, and these ships are sinking faster than we can search them. You need to rest,” Hiccup said, fixing Jack with a stare powerful enough to render an entire crowd speechless. He quickly swallowed his objection, sensing the futility.
Then, the thought snaked into his head. The people who held him captive wouldn’t just flee without taking their most powerful possession with them. When they left the destruction of their fleet, they must have taken the staff too. Instead of exploring doomed ships, they had to chase the one that got away.
Jack hobbled over to Toothless, weakly hauling himself onto the saddle.
“That was easier than I thought,” Hiccup remarked.
“Hurry, we need to catch up to them.” Jack patted the saddle, encouraging Hiccup to join him. The boy’s brow furrowed, posing a silent question. “The hunters – they’ve taken it with them.”
“Okay, now I’m going to ask: what exactly is ‘it’ and why is it so important that you risk your life?”
This gave Jack pause, wondering for a moment if he could and should be honest. Take a chance and tell Hiccup, ‘Hey I’m actually a winter spirit and they took my staff and I am powerless without it’, as he had been nothing but kind and selfless thus far. Or would he change? Become afraid, maybe, or want to keep Jack for himself? Snatch up the staff the first chance he got?
No, he didn’t have it in him to be so trusting so soon.
“It’s a- uh, a family heirloom? It’s all I have left of… home,” Jack lied, averting his gaze in hopes that Hiccup wouldn’t be able to see through him. He waited a beat, and then two, before the boy relented.
“I can understand that,” he said, although the unspoken query didn’t go unnoticed by Jack. What do dragon hunters want with a random boy and his family heirloom? False excuses didn’t matter, not when Jack intended to disappear the second he got his hands on his staff.
They took to the skies, following after the ship that had vanished into the horizon far too quick to be normal. The wind against Jack’s face felt different like this, unfamiliar, not the friend he was used to greeting him and carrying him around the world. Still, it felt good to have it whip his hair and nip his skin, flowing between his open fingers. He took a breath and closed his eyes, pretending just for a moment that it was his winds dancing around him.
Until a strong gust caused him to lose his balance, startling him back to reality. Hiccup had to reach behind him to grab tightly onto Jack’s tunic, preventing him from falling into the ocean below. Dejected, Jack buried his hands into Hiccup’s waist, hiding his face between the boy’s shoulder blades. To this, Hiccup made a startled, choking sound.
Despite the fact the ship had been quick to vanish, they caught up to in no time. Jack perked up once he spotted their sails coming into view, his spirit reignited.
“Okay, just be weary because these guys are going to have-”
Before Hiccup could complete the sentence, Toothless swerved to avoid the net that had been launched in their direction. The dragon fired at the ship in retaliation.
“Traps,” Hiccup finished lamely. “This won’t be easy, maybe even impossible, so I’ll ask again: is it really life or death important?”
“It’s all I have,” Jack repeated his earlier words, and it was true. Without his staff, he was no winter spirit. He was nothing, just a ghost, doomed to walk the plains of the world alone. That potential future was bleak and haunting and wouldn’t do at all.
Would he fade into nothing? Quietly disappear as though he had never been around at all? It didn’t bear thinking about.
The dragon made a dive towards the ship, firing another shot as it did so, taking out one of the several catapults decorating the rails. Maybe if they got close enough, Jack would be able to jump off and search the vessel all on his own.
A cloud of arrows flew their way, which Toothless only narrowly avoided, save for the one that managed to clip the tip of his tail. Another net came their way but with luck, Toothless was able to shatter it to pieces before it reached them.
They tried in vain to inch closer to the ship, with every one closer they got, they had to fall back another five due to the onslaught of weapons and traps. Amidst the chaos, a man came out onto the deck, peering up at them, an amused smirk plastered on his face. That man, Jack recognised him. The one who had come to question him about his powers on numerous occasions, never getting a single answer out of Jack. He had to be the mastermind.
“They have it,” he said, more to himself than present company, as if voicing this fact would solidify the reality inside his brain.
“We have to go,” was Hiccup’s response. “I caught them by surprise earlier, but now, they’re prepared. Jack, I’m sorry, but we’re going to need more manpower if we’re going to face them like this.”
Jack didn’t get a single word into what happened next. While still absorbing Hiccup’s statement, Toothless made a sharp turn and flew them off to safety. Jack was helpless but to watch the ship, and his staff, disappear into a tiny spec behind them, and then eventually altogether. His pleas to return fell on deaf ears; Hiccup was taking them home where Jack was going to recover before they even considered chasing down the hunters again.
Jack really had never felt so powerless before.