:: DRAGONS: TRIALS OF BERK :: Chapter 1

:: DRAGONS: TRIALS OF BERK ::
A fan fiction by Fragsey (Formerly Empethree)

Based on the How To Train Your Dragon Film Series & Dragons: Riders Of Berk
(c) Dreamworks Animation & Cressida Cowell

Also at: www.fanfiction.net/s/9006192/1…

*Note chapter 1, I want to rewrite at some point as i thing i have been a bit to repetitive ie he she it etc. So hopefully if you don't enjoy this chapter try chapter 2!

:: Introduction ::

“Here on Berk the weather is so “kind” to us that the only Fall we have is the fall in temperature, and the only spring is attached to the rest of my false leg. The rest of the time it is either winter and snowing or for a couple of months summer and raining. Stuck in the middle of nowhere

The only upside is that the people are friendly, mostly, and content, as content as can be when every morning your boots are frozen to the ground outside your door.

“It has got a little bit warmer in recent times, well it would when you have hundreds of fire breathing dragons around. Of all those dragons, one in particular stands out among the rest, for he is my best friend. He always looks out for me as I always do for him. I will always have Toothless by my side.”


:: Chapter 1 :: The Fury of The Night ::

It was all quiet, Hiccup lay fast asleep in bed, his chest slowly rising up and down,  his murmuring as he was dreaming woke up Toothless and he looked back at his sleeping friend. Usually Toothless would have been out of the window and up on the roof looking quietly out to sea, until the sun came up when without fail he would stamp about on the roof, dislodging a few tiles at the same time, much to Stoick's annoyment, waking up his best friend for their morning flight.

But in the last few weeks Toothless just did not have the enthusiasm for it, Hiccup had tried everything, he thought that Mildew may of planted some more of that cursed plant again and Toothless was sick, or that when the whispering death shot Toothless in the leg with a barb, he had poisoned him. Nothing he tried seemed to help and Toothless mainly kept out of Hiccups way, confusing Hiccup even more.

Toothless loved Hiccup more than ever, but the emotions running though his head scared him. He was ashamed of himself. How could he of done it to his best friend. He had shot a plasma bolt at him, and Toothless know that all he was trying to do was help him fight the Whispering Death. He had let his own selfishness endanger his most trusted friend. But he had to enact revenge on his adversary, and even though he had bested him this time, he had to let him go. He couldn't let him get away with what he had done, he had to keep his promise.

Toothless sighed, and turned away from Hiccup, no longer did he sleep on his nice heated rock next to Hiccups bed, he has moved into the rafters of the small wooden house. He then put his head back down on the rafter and stared out the window over the village out to sea. All the memories over the last few years came flooding back to him.  He did not know much about his parents, who had named him Cha'Zor in his native tongue. They were killed during raid on the humans when he was small. Thats when a group of dragons came to his aid and took him in.

He grew up quickly, He was expected to engage in the dragon raids on Berk with the rest of the dragons, even though he didn’t really want to, he was intelligent and he wished to do other things. He thought of peace with the humans. For he knew they only defended themselves. There had been far too much death. He never took part in stealing from them, that was wrong, but he owed it to the dragons who took him in, he would be the aerial dive bomber and he forfilled his duty to them well, his precision and intelligence sparing all unnecessary loss of life. When not raiding  he had kept to himself and disappeared in on his quest. The other dragons left him be.

His quest for that Whispering Death had come to an abrupt end when he was shot out of the sky by someone that fateful night. He thought he would die a lonely and painful death, all without keeping his promise.

Thats when a small human came, and even though he was frightened, he kind of wished that the human would kill him, living with not forfilling his promise would have been more of a torture than  a slow painful death. Then he saw the look in the humans eyes, he was also scared, but he was different to the other humans he had encountered. But he was still a human, one of his most feared enemies. He looked into the boy's eyes and their eyes met. Cha'Zor sensed intelligence in this one. If he was not about to kill him he sort of wished that he could of got to know more about him.

His impending death was near. Any second now the human would bring the knife down into his heart and the pain would be over. He laid back and closed his eyes, tears welling up for the chance lost. His mind wondered to his... but then then heard a gasp and then felt the ropes being cut. Anger welled up inside him. He was far too injured and Cha'Zor knew it, he would never fly again, he would probably die on this island, either killed when found by humans or of starvation. He felt the ropes round his legs and wings loosen, he pounced.

Everything in his body had screamed kill that boy now, he would probably tell the other humans he was here, and his fate would be a lot worse. As Cha'Zor bared down on him, again their eyes locked, again he saw that fierce intelligence, fear and what caught him off guard was wonderment in the boys eyes. He could not kill him, it was not his way. His anger waned, he let out a frustrated roar in the boys face and with tears starting to well up in his eyes he leapt of the boy and as best he could tried to get away from there. He had almost killed a human in sheer anger. What had he become. He settles down in a quiet cove and waited for the other humans to find him, he would be tortured and probably killed. He accepted his fate and was grateful that he had chosen this path and not just killed the boy.

Next afternoon, Cha'Zor tried to make himself more comfortable, his tail was in agony, he knew why he couldn't fly. His tail fin was gone. Painful wounds from the ropes criss-crossed his body. He settled on a rock. No other humans had come, Cha'Zor wondered, why didn't the boy tell his people straight away. He dozed off in the sun.

In his dreams thoughts of his quest came flooding back, he suddenly woke up.
He had to get out of here, he couldn't fly he knew, but there must be some other way. And besides he needed food, he had not eaten in a while. Desperately he tried again and again finally crash landing next to the pond he gave up. He notices there were fish in the pond, he lunged for one, but missed, the pain in his body was like fire. He couldn't even feed himself. He felt weak.

Then Cha'Zor knew it, his life was at an end. He quietly laid his head down on the grass intending to fall asleep and not wake up again. Suddenly a noise in front of him made him glance up, the boy was there. Fear welled up inside him, they had come for him. No hope of a peaceful death now. But the boy just looked frightened. If a group of humans were here with him surely he would nor be. He was alone. Why had he come back? Curiosity rose in Cha'Zor's mind. He could see the boy staring back at him in curiosity. Was he here in peace?

Cha'Zor couldn't sleep that night, his mind raced. He should be enemies with the boy, but yet he felt he had wanted to know more about him. His curiosity was stirred more when next day the boy had returned with a fish. Of course Cha'Zor was wary, but when the boy had discarded his weapon he knew that he had to know more about him, that and his stomach was rumbling like a dragon. He reached for the fish. The boy started to talk in his language, he wished he could fully understand his talk. The human word “toothless” clicked in his mind he guessed the boy was talking about his lack of teeth. It reminded him of a long ago memory with his parents. So the human thought he had no teeth. Boy would he show him, this would be funny!

Cha'Zor laughed to himself in his mind as he ate the fish, the look on that boy's face was priceless. It had been a long time since he had laughed. He had to thank the boy, a traditional way for the dragons was to share a good meal, and although he was very hungry, he needed to gain this boy's trust if he was going to learn more. He approached the boy and regurgitated half for the boy to eat.

It then hit him, maybe this would not be the way humans thanked each other, judging by what looked like to Cha'Zor as an uncomfortable look on the humans face. His sense of humour kicked in again. He would play this, for all it was worth, maybe humour was a concept Humans appreciated and not just dragons. This could be a gateway for finding a way to live in peace with the humans. He motioned for the boy to eat.

He had to laugh inside at the boys reactions, but he had to go though with it, he motioned to swallow. He could tell by the boys face that he really did not like what he was eating, so Cha'Zor mirrored his distaste in a joking way. Something weird was happening with the boys mouth. Cha'Zor sensed happiness and guessed unlike dragons who used various appendages on their body to show emotion, humans showed happiness with their mouths, weird. He was right, humans did appreciate humour after all. He was still wary of the human, and it seemed the human was of him as well. But Cha'Zor was tired and needed sleep, his lack of food and his injuries meant he was still tired. The boy came over to him and had tried to touch him just as he started to drift off, which annoyed him a bit, but he found a quiet spot to hang from and managed to fall asleep

If seemed like a few hours had passed, and Cha'Zor was content. For  some reason for the first time in a long time he felt happy. He could hear a rustling and opened his eyes. He was not expecting the boy to still be here, did the boy want to spend time with him? And what was he doing, he walked over to where the boy was sitting. He was using a stick to scrape the earth, as he watched his curiosity turned to amazement, staring back at him in the dirt was another night fury. It reminded him of his own father. How did humans do this? He had to give it a go so he had grabbed a stick from a nearby tree and started to scrape lines into the earth. He could see why humans did this, it was fun. The boy had started to step round and though the drawing, careful not to step on the lines as Cha'Zor had jokingly warned him when he stepped on the lines. He was too busy laughing to himself to notice the boy almost bump into him.

The boy reached out to touch him. For a brief moment fear crossed Cha'Zor's mind, he had not let anyone apart from a select few touch him since an incident in the past, but the boy persisted. Why did he do that, was it a human thing as well for touch to show friendship and even love? He reached with his snout back at the boy and they touched. A feeling of euphoria filled Cha'Zor. Wow.... had me made a human friend?

The next day Cha'Zor woke up early. He hoped the boy would visit again, he found he actually really liked him. He was overjoyed when the boy showed up again, with a large basket of fish, and was understanding in his fear of eels.

The boy had used the word “toothless” to greet him, so the boy had given him a nickname, a concept not alien to dragons, and fitting as his mother had called him “Tael'kas” as a pet name as a child, one of his rare memories of them. Tael'kas in his native tongue meant “one with no teeth” For young night furies didn’t get their teeth until their 2nd year, and Cha'Zor was a late bloomer, not getting his until after his 3rd birthday, thus the name.

He liked this human's name for him, and did not mind it appealed to his wicked sense of humour. He was well known among dragons as the comedian of the group. He found he liked this new name more than his own and in tribute to his parents decided he would be called Toothless to his friends from now on.

Toothless was even more amazed with the boys intelligence, he had made him a new tail. This was humbling to Toothless. Rarely had he been given anything, they had taken a brief flight together, though amusingly the boy didn't actually know he was about to fly.

As the days went on Toothless found himself enjoying more and more the company of the young boy who he found to be called Hiccup in the human tongue. Even though he could not understand the tongue of the humans, he found he understood what Hiccup meant. He was amazed by Hiccup's understanding of him and his ability to help control his flight. A few shaky attempts had meant a few bumps along the way, but after a terrifying dive Hiccup had mastered it, and for the first time realization hit Toothless. This human who a few days ago was a sworn enemy by the dragons, had given him one of the greatest gifts in his life. He returned to him the gift of flight, and although he knew that it would mean he would have to rely on Hiccup, he would do anything for him to repay this gift.

Again toothless was truly happy, he knew that he could not longer raid the humans, and that was fine with him. But happiness again turned to fear when another human, this time a female discovered them. She threatened to expose his and Hiccups relationship and that would be the end for him, and probably Hiccup too. He could not let that happen. But again to his amazement, yet another human turned out to become a friend. Who would of thought Humans could be so caring and loving, not their reputation of violent and evil, especially as the female, who he learned was called Astrid kissed Hiccup. He knew from the looks on their faces, a look that he recognised for the past, humans were capable of love. Toothless wondered if all what dragons knew of humans was wrong.

It turned out that he was right, he had been captured by the humans when he went to return the favour to Hiccup when he was in danger of being killed by a Monstrous Nightmare. An though at first he was treated harshly by the other humans he found that humans could live with dragons, as when during the battle with the monstrous Red Death, he was amazed to see other dragons, even that Monstrous Nightmare being flown by Astrid, Hiccup and other young humans. And what he thought was the Human's leader, Stoick saved Hiccup and himself from drowning. Together they had killed the Red Death, a dragon who had enslaved the rest of the dragons and was universally hated by them.

Toothless had discovered dragons and humans were actually only fighting each other because of what the Red Death had done. It was a chance for peace, and in the process he had found that he couldn't live without Hiccup, he had become a central part of his life. He risked his life for Hiccup as he knew Hiccup had risked his too, they were now pretty much blood brothers. The humans found this new revelation amazing and a lot of dragons took up the humans offer to live among them, and Toothless has come to live with Hiccup,

Their relationship became so solid that he didn't see Hiccup as his master, but more of his equal, and he knew Hiccup thought the same. He would always be with Hiccup, even when Hiccup made him an automatic tail fin, even though it was a great gift, toothless  did not feel the same while flying with it. He missed the partnership he and Hiccup had while flying, when together they were as one. And he found it boring just flying on his own. His most exciting flights ever were with Hiccup, not just flying to wage war, to get from one place to another, but flying with hiccup was for the sheer enjoyment.

Toothless thoughts then came back to the present and he sighed again. What was he to do, he could not leave Hiccup and yet he could not break such a fundamental promise. Thoughts racked his brain and overwhelmed him. Toothless again looked once more into the village, his best dragon friends he had also just met over the final battle were also here in the village, they also looked up to him as a leader.  And he was close to them. Although it was not unknown for each species of dragon to be friends, it was unusual for them to be close friends. The other dragons, Stormfly the Deadly Nadder,  Meatlug the Gronkle, Hookfang the Monstrous Nightmare and Barf'Belch the Hideous Zippleback. He could not leave them either, they and their riders were a team, and a good one at that. It was all too much for Toothless, with thoughts racing in his head, Toothless closed his eyes and went back to sleep.

:: END OF CHAPTER ONE ::