trans_9 | Sticks and Stones [closed]

He couldn't find her in the great hall, and that meant that she had likely heard, too, heard the truth. He wasn't sure if he should look for her, wasn't sure if she'd want him to find her. It wasn't that he expected her to run off and cry, but Astrid, by her nature, was the type to deal with things like grief alone.

In fact, he remembered when they were younger, when her father had died, she'd just... withdrawn; disappeared to practice like the crazy person she was. He wondered sometimes if the Astrid of the present, who made everything look so effortless, had been built on those quiet afternoons in the Berk woods, as she worked out her grief with relentless practice.

He still found her anyway, trying to find somewhere to be alone himself. It was a room that wasn't really a room. It led to an open sky, a meadow surrounded by trees, somehow still inside the ship. They weren't trees like back home, but they were trees. What he didn't know was this was Stacy showing off the Sensoriums to anyone nearby. All he did know was that he heard screaming. Over and over. And thunking noises. Scream. Thunk. Scream. Thunk. Scream. Thunk. Grief and anger with its own percussion. As if just screaming or just thunking alone weren't enough.

He watched her, and for once she didn't see him coming, she was so lost in it. For a moment, he wondered idly if he should leave, since she hadn't noticed him coming in, but found that he just...didn't quite want to. Right now, as far as he knew, she was the only Viking left, the only person from Berk left alive with him. After a while of standing there, watching, listening, he started to shake, and then closed his eyes, his mouth setting in a firm line.

Then he pulled his knife out of its sheathe, and his eyes opened again, and there was his own scream, his own thunk, as he threw it into the same tree Astrid was using as her unfortunate practice dummy. It actually hit the tree for once, next to her axe. And it even stuck. A testament to what he was feeling maybe.

(Everyone always told him he needed to focus more.)

Then he stood there, shaking with pent up...something waiting to see if she'd yell at him to get out or not.

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But just saying 'hi' wouldn't have let him let out his own rage and frustration.

For a moment, he stood there, gaze cast downward, hands balled into fists, arms swinging slightly at his sides from the tension.

"They said--someone I talked to said our loved ones might be in the pods. As if--as if that's enough."

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She nearly scoffed at that.

"I... I don't know if I can rely on that chance either. Not until we see them face to face. Alive."

She squeezed at her enclosed fist, feeling herself tense again. Shutting her eyes, she slowly brought braced hands to her mouth. Her faith shook and she began to question. Questions she didn't expect Hiccup to have the answers for.

"Why is this happening to us...? Are we being tested? Can the ancient ones not hear us? If so, why--why are they not listening? Allowing their children to suffer..."

How was Lord Odin, their father above, not stepping in for his mortal servants. It was just incomprehensible.

Hiccup just stood there for a moment, looking aimless.

The only thing he could think of, that he wouldn't dare say, was that maybe the gods couldn't do anything. Maybe--horrifying thought--these things killed the gods. Maybe the world hadn't been destined to end in flood and furor. Who's to say that isn't how it ended?

"I think the gods would expect us to be strong enough to fix this. We're Vikings, Astrid. Maybe Ragnarök is an occupational hazard--"

He stopped.

Oh gods.

OH GODS.

Their world had ended in a flood of death and--and maybe it was so horrible they didn't remember it, but what if the serpent had--what if the gods had...?

There were two of them left. Two left. Two were meant to survive after the heavens split apart and were supposed to--they were supposed to--

It was never said how they were meant to survive...

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A chill ran through her.

Ragnarök. Ragnarök. The greatest catastrophe of the Viking culture. They were not listening--the gods were not heading their prayers because, because...

Wait, whhhy did he stop? Hiccup, why did you--

....

Realization kicked in. Astrid stood upright, hand moving to her hip and closing her eyes with brows furrowed, pinching the area between her eyes on the bridge of her nose.

No.

No, no, no, no--nooo. No.

"Hiccup... you can't be serious..."

They were... the last? THE foretold last?

"No, let's--look, we're getting ahead of ourselves here."

Waaay ahead of themselves.

"Listen, whatever happened, whoever was saved, the person--the dragon-person, by the way, which was really--anyway, the person I talked to, he said they think there's a way to restore our worlds."

Hiccup took her by the hands.

"I don't know what I can do, at least not without..."

Toothless... where are you, bud?

"But you--you're brave, and fierce and--they must have saved you because you're a warrior. I'm probably here to help you be a warrior. I've been here a day, and I'm already learning things--do you know there's this thing called 'science'? Rules about how the world works and how things go together, like knowing metallurgy but for everything. Maybe I can make you even better weapons."

He was getting off topic. He needed to get back to it.

"Whatever we do, I just want you to know...that I'm gonna help you do whatever you have to. We can work together to fix this, to bring back our world--" His eyes finally raise to meet hers. "--to bring back Berk."

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Incredibly ahead of themselves, she agreed with a demure nod. And there was no fuss from the girl when he held her hands. She wasn't use to it, but the male's touch gave her comfort.

Brave and fierce, huh? He flattered her so. ...He really thought so much of her, didn't he.

To be honest, Astrid wasn't entirely feeling so self-assured she is up to the task. But... he was willing to give her his all. To take on "fate", or a foretold dark prophecy, and set things right. No matter how hopeless their predicament seemed; he was willing to fight in his own way and keep hope alive. He...

Those blue orbs softened on him, countenance wavering as she met his emerald gaze. And there she saw it, at this proximity she saw it. His eyes were strong with a flicker of resolve behind them, his pale freckled cheekbones glistened from what might have been dried tears. She'd been so wrapped up in her own feelings and submerged in her despair, she hadn't thought of his own turmoil.

Snotlout, Ruffnut, Tuffnut, Fishlegs--the rest of the dragon training teen crew; old enemies turned pals, were nowhere to be found, probably never to be seen again. His father, Stoick the Vast, powerful and a vastly formidable Viking chief as he is, possibly just another body count to this tragedy-- just when the boy finally gotten the father's approval he so longed for.

Gobber and The Hooligans. An entire village of closely-knit Viking folk, who once looked down upon their awkward heir for his differences, though soon he taught them all to look past their prejudice towards the dragons and they regarded him a hero-- now perhaps completely lost in destruction. What good was an heir when he no longer had the very people he would have some day stepped up to carry on a legacy? The people who his blood ancestors--the preceding Haddock chiefs--cared for and protected with their lives.

And Toothless. She did not want to think about what happened to the dragon; the boy's first true friend. Ever. The friend that Astrid, as a child growing up, should have been more of.

Hiccup's damages were far greater. Could she even fathom how he must feel? And he tried to pent it up, barely hanging on; his profuse shaking made it apparent.

What she would do next would break boundaries and everything she upholds.

What followed were no words. Astrid slipped her hands out of his grasp, slowly extending them, and when it looks like she might grab his face, her reaching detours, and arms carefully slid around the frame of his shoulders. A gentle tug with enough force to have him tilt into her until he was solely against her, and digits clutched at his fabric, her headband clad forehead finding a place to rest against his shoulder, burying her face in the fur of his vest.

Nothing needs to be spoken. The female's firm embrace will speak everything for her:

"I need this. You need this. Don't say a word."

And something, somewhere, inside told her he wouldn't think less of her.

If he knew what she was thinking, he'd tell her that his loss wasn't any greater than hers. It was a home to the both of them, they both belonged to its people. Her mother might not have been among the saved, the same friends might not have...

But he was the overly sensitive one, wasn't he. Of course she'd be able to shrug it off a little easier, of course she'd see his pain as worse, because she was so used to just gritting her teeth through her own.

That was Astrid all over.

And it did hurt. It hurt because he's finally gotten the approval of his peers, finally fit in with the rest of his people. He'd finally gotten the love and approval of his father.

And maybe most importantly of all, he'd made a friend that had become a lifelong friend, the first to ever accept him as he was--a friend he wasn't sure was here. His best friend.

Finally, finally after a life of being Hiccup the Useless, he'd gotten everything he wanted. And then, in some universal display of irony, as if a world where he got his heart's desire couldn't exist without imploding under the sheer pressure of unlikelihood, Everything He Had Ever Wanted was suddenly gone.

Both the unselfish part of him that was mourning that loss for the loss it was, and the selfish part that was mourning it for the loss it was to him were working on overdrive.

So when she embraced him, there was a choked noise in his throat, and then a sniff he couldn't hold in, and he, in turn, buried his face in her hair.

His arms tightened around her--around the very last precious thing from home that, as far as he knew, he had in all the universe.

Also unspoken was:

"I won't tell if you won't tell."

Vikings didn't cry. Ever. Not even silently.

But he'd always been a pretty crappy Viking.

Sticks and Stones [closed]

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