The Outcast Lands EXTENDED EDITION

Chapter 9

“I’m totally freaking out now,” Fishlegs exclaimed, now more convinced than ever that Gobber’s stories about the island were true.



“How is this possible?” Stoick asked, baffled by this development. He could not imagine how it was possible that a dragon was capable ofspeaking their language. It was almost enough to shake his nerves and begin taking his friend’s warnings with a little more hedence.



“You saved me. Why?” Astrid asked.



“I was just roaming around when I saw you in danger,” Stormfly replied, but no longer were those words out of the dragon’s mouth when her skin and scales turned to violate.



Everyone gasped in awe when they saw the dragon change color. It was rare to see a dragon with the capability to change colors, especially one that can talk. As for Astrid, she found it odder that the dragon changed color right after that comment. What kind of emotion was behind those words? She already saw Stormfly turn dark blue when displaying anger or aggression, so she knew that the dragon was not angry. She acknowledged that she knew nothing about the dragon, but she began to wonder if the dragon’s negative feelings made the dragon change to a dark color. Was the dragon lying? Deception was the only emotion she could think of, which made sense after being given a response like that.



Stormfly noticed her look of disbelief and then looked down at the scales of her front right leg. When she saw that her color had changed, she shook her body and focused on changing back to her normal color.



“You were following us, weren’t you?” Astrid eyes her suspiciously.



“Me? No, I wasn’t,” She defended, but the dragon again turned purple.



“You’re lying!” Astrid said, not in an accusing manner, but more of a surprised, revelatory manner. “You turn violate every time you tell a lie.”



The golden dragon drooped her head, as her skin and scales slowly turned pink. “I was curious about you, Camicazi!”



“Wait… what?” Snotlout interrupted. “You’re that creepy voice that’s been hounding us?”

“Who’s Camicazi?” Hiccup asked.



Stormfly returned to her normal golden color as she looked in Astrid’s direction. “She’s Camicazi!”



“Me? I think you’ve got me mixed up with somebody else; my name’s not Camicazi.”



“I want to help you, Camicazi, and your friends. This island is full of danger.”



“Are there any humans on this island? We’re stranded here with no way to get back home.” Stoick asked. If this dragon was capable of speaking in Norse, then there had to be other humans on this island from whom she had learned from.



Stormfly hesitated for a second before answering the question. “I will bring you to someone who could possibly help.”



The Viking’s nerves were eased when the dragon kept her natural color; but that did not mean that they could trust the dragon. That was why all eyes went towards Hiccup for the final decision. “I guess it couldn’t hurt, since she does know the island better than we do.”

* * * *

As their journey continued deeper into the island, Stormfly seemed to tag behind Astrid intensely. For some reason, the Mood dragon was taking much more interest in her than anyone else. It appeared that she was completely sold on Astrid being this Camicazi person. Hiccup could not help but wonder if this dragon belonged to Camicazi, and if Astrid was a splitting image of her. It would explain the dragon’s infatuation with her.



The mood dragon was not the only curious dragon among them. Toothless took an interest into Stormfly. Frequently, he would take a look over at the other dragon. Hiccup could not help but notice how many times his dragon stole glances in her direction. He also noticed that the Night Fury was casually falling more and more behind. If he didn’t know better, he would have sworn that Toothless was slyly trying to wind up walking next to her.



He finally accomplished just that, and was now walking beside Stormfly. She looked curiously at him as he let out a series of moans and grunts. She smiled at the Night Fury and let out a flirtatious laugh. “You’re cute.”



Upon hearing those words, Toothless’ legs failed him and he began to wobble around. His tongue flapped outside of his mouth as he acted like a Viking who had indulged in too much ale. Hiccup could not help but smile at his love-struck dragon.



Stormfly laughed as she watched the Night Furies reaction. Their moment of light-hearted fun came to an end, though, when they both smelled danger approaching. “Stop!” She yelled as her skin and scales turned to dark blue.



Toothless attitude quickly changed, as he also sensed the danger that was coming. He was growling by the time Hiccup got to him. “What’s out there?”



Out of nowhere, a thin dart-like object flew past Hiccup’s face and impaled itself into the ground.



“Poison Darters!” Stormfly growled.



“Raise your shields!” Stoick ordered.

The order came just in time, as ten more darts came flying at them from withint the forests. All the darts were reflected, successfully, by their shields as ten small dragons came flying towards them. They were dark green in color and were about the size of a Gronkle. They almost looked like miniature Monstrous Nightmares in body structure.



“Keep your backs to the trees!” Stormfly instructed the Vikings. That would protect the Vikings from behind, and give the small dragons less opportunity for accomplishing a sneak attack. “Whatever you do, do not let one of those darts hit you; their poisonous! They may be less harmful to you larger Vikings; but to you little ones, they can be deadly!”



That last warning was for Hiccup, and he knew it, but he was not about to sit out and stay on the defense this time. He was determined to do something to help out. He quickly climbed up onto the saddle on Toothless’ back.



“What are you doing?” Astrid asked in alarm. If those darts were as poison as the Mood dragon made it out, then Hiccup could easily be killed by one of them. He was the last one to be trying to take on these dragons.



“Toothless and I’ll keep them distracted. You guys get ready if any of them decides not to follow.”



“I’m going with you, little Viking,” Stormfly replied, and then looked over towards Astrid. The golden dragon bent forward until her long neck touched the ground. “Care to ride with me, Camicazi?”



“My name is Astrid, not Camicazi!” she replied, finding being called ‘Camicazi’ very annoying. She took the dragon up on her offer, not willing to let Hiccup risk his life alone. He and Toothless would have a better chance with their help.



As she climbed onto Stormfly’s back, Bitwolf ran out to join them. “I’m coming too. You’ll need as much help taking those beasts down as you can get.”

Stormfly did not object. While she had nothing against the other Vikings, she was more concerned for the female Viking’s safety. The only way she could assure her safety while fighting off the Poison Darters were to have her on her back. She was willing for the taller young Viking to also ride with her, mostly because it would protect Camicazi from the rear. The dragon had no doubt that the male Viking would not be as at-risk from a poison dart as the girl.



With his ax in hand, Bitwolf climbed onto Stormfly’s back, sitting right behind Astrid. “Are you sure about this?” He asked Astrid. “This dragon’s still wild, after all.”



“Of course I’m wild,” Stormfly said with a little annoyance behind her voice. “And don't you forget it!”



The two dragons took to the sky, with Toothless leading the way. They pushed through the thick forest towards the open sky above. Bitwolf looked behind them to see a couple of the small dragons in pursuit. As they continued to fly upwards, others came out of hiding to join them.



The lead Darter opened its mouth and fired a poisonous dart. Bitwolf was barely able to get the head of his ax in front of his face to reflect it away. “That was close!”



“Let’s see if we can get some of them to follow us,” Astrid said, leaning forward in anticipation of some slick flying.



“You read my mind,” Stormfly replied with a grin.



The dragon took a sharp right before reaching the open sky. Astrid looked back to see if they had succeeded in getting some of them to follow. From a quick look back, it looked like they had gotten the attention of three or four of them.



“Hold on tightly!” Stormfly warned.



Astrid leaned forward and held firmly to the dragon’s neck. Bitwolf had no choice but to hold on tightly onto her as the dragon began her speedily swerves around trees. The pursuing Poison Darters dodged all the trees as well, keeping up with the Mood dragon with incredible speed and swiftness.

The small dragons fired a series of poison darts at them, but Stormfly avoided them by dodging around a large tree. The Darters continued their chase, firing darts as they did.



The Mood dragon tried a new tactic to cause confusion among the small dragons. She retracted her wings as far as she could and spun rapidly in mid-air. She was able to narrowly avoid a few darts thanks to her spinning and twisting around.



“I think I’m gonna throw up!” Bitwolf complained. Astrid may be used to flying on the back of dragons, but he wasn’t. His eyes could not hold a single image in all the blur, and his body was starting to protest.



Stormfly ceased her spinning and spread out her wings before gravity was able to pull them back towards the ground. Gliding through the forest, it took a minute for the world to stop spinning for Bitwolf. Once his head did clear, he looked back to see the angry Darters still on their tail. He looked straight ahead, and an idea formed in his mind. “Fly as close as you can to that branch, up ahead.”



Stormfly grunted an affirmative response, and positioned herself to swoop right underneath the branch that the male Viking pointed out. Bitwolf raised his ax, hoping he could muster enough strength in his arms without having a steady foothold.



The dragon raced towards the branch, and flew dangerously close to it. She was almost scared that the girl would crash into it. Bitwolf threw his ax and bent forward, in anticipation of the branch break from the tree.



The blade of the ax cut through the branch, just as Stormfly flew underneath it. The Poisonous Darters could not avoid flying into the branch. The branch, itself, was not enough to take out the dragons, but it disoriented the dragons enough to have one to crash into the tree trunks, and the others to crash into each other.



The dragons struggled to recollect themselves. Seeing the disarray among them, Stormfly decided to take advantage of it. She flew around the large tree and sped right towards the dragons. Unleashing a breath of flames, she scattered the treacherous little dragons.

* * * *

There were more Poisonous Darters than it first appeared. Stoick, Gobber, and the young Vikings were fending off three more dragons. Gobber used his shield to save himself from a dart, while using his hammer prosthesis to attack one of the dragons. Stoick was in the middle of a wrestling match with one of them. He used one of his giant hands to keep the dragon’s mouth shut while he used the other one to deliver some body blows. “Wretched little dragons!



“Just like the good ol’ days, ain’t it!” Gobber said after another swing of his hammer.



Stoick did not reply. It had been a long time since he had wrestled with a dragon, but it was not as enjoyable as it once was. He no longer saw these beasts as a menace than needed to be exterminated. He saw them as normal animals who share the world they lived in. They were not the blood-thirsty demons from Helheim as and his people once supposed, but creatures who could reason, for the most part.



He looked up through the tree tops to see shadows flying in the sky. Hiccup was taking on a group of those Poisonous Darters up there. He could not help and worry about his son. Yes, he’s taken on more ferocious beasts before, but that did not stop him being concerned.

* * * *

Once Toothless was above the trees, the advantage was solely theirs. Toothless was the master of blending into his environment and coming out of nowhere for a sneak attack. Hiccup did not even have to give any commands; the Night Fury was in his element, or so he thought.



The Poison Darters proved to be very stubborn animals. Even though Toothless was clearly faster than them, they were not going to give up their pursuit. “They’re not getting the hint. Let’s try to scare them off.”



Toothless grunted and nodded his head. With the press of the pedal, they made sharp turnaround, with the dragaon’s wing-tips slicing the air currents with swift precisian. Now gliding straight for the group of darters, Toothless coughed out blue flames, which took the shape of a shockwave. The point was not to kill the animals, just to scare them off.



The burning shockwave disrupted the darter’s flight pattern and caused disarray among them. Toothless flying though them made the dragons even more disoriented.



Up ahead, he could see Stormfly, with Astrid and Bitwolf, rising above the trees and on their way up to where the action was. Hiccup was glad to see that they were alright. He saw them fly off in a different direction, taking a few of the dragons with them. It was great to know that Stormfly was a great flyer; he had his reservation about Astrid riding on a strange and wild dragon, whom they had just met.



“Hiccup, behind you!” Astrid shouted, still from a long distance away.



Barley loud enough for him to hear, Hiccup did as warned, only to find a twig-like poisonous dart fly across his line of site. A couple darters had started to chase after him again. “Let’s see how fast they can go!”



Hiccup leaned forward, and pressed his prosthetic foot down on the pedal. Toothless put more strength into each flap of his wings, and pushed himself to go as fast as he could. Slowly, the Poisonous Darters were starting to fall behind. He was surprised that they had not left them in the dust. Those darters were proving to be very speedy dragons after all.

Stormfly flew upwards, heading straight for the darters that were chasing Hiccup and Toothless. As soon as they were in reach, she unleashed her fiery breath, and scattered the last remaining dragons away. The Poison Darters all retreated from the battle; two speedy dragons were more than a match for them.



“Well, that was close,” Hiccup said, relieved that this threat was now over. He rolled his right shoulder around to get the stiffness out, but the strange sensation that he was feeling was only increasing.



He reached across his own chest with his left arm, and used his hand to rub the back of his right shoulder. That was when he felt something out of the ordinary. Something was sticking out of his brown-fur vest. He used two fingers to grab hold of it and gave it a gentle yank. It was only after he pulled it out when he realized that it had punctured through his clothes and his skin. There was a quick flash of pain as if a large splinter was quickly pulled out of his skin. He looked at what he had pulled out, and was shocked to see one of the darts from the Poisonous Darters in his hand. “Oh, this is not g—“



Everything began to grow blurry and every part of his body began to go numb. It felt like millions of pins and needles pricking every spare inch of his body at the same time. His motor functions started to go as he became too weak to sit up. He fell forward, onto Toothless’ neck, which unintentionally caused his prosthesis to lighten up on the pedal.



Toothless grunted in alarm, as his ability to stay in flight became seriously hampered. His artificial tail-fin was open just enough to soften their out-of-control descent; instead of taking a sharp nose dive, they were gliding down towards the treetop.



“Hiccup!” It took her almost a minute to realized what was happening. “They’re in trouble. We’ve got to go help them!” She said, patting Stormfly on the neck.



“Hold on, Toothless!” Stormfly shouted making a sudden stop in mid-air, and a quick spin-around. She raced as fast as she could to catch up to Toothless.



The Night Fury was crying in alarm, unable to do anything to save himself; Hiccup’s foot was positioned on the pedal making it near impossible for the dragon to safely land on his own. Stormfly glided beside Toothless. “Hiccup, wake up!” Astrid shouted.



“It’s no use, he’s been hit by a poisonous dart!” Stormfly replied. “Someone's gonna have to jump onto Toothless’ back and fly them down to safety.”

“I guess that’s gonna have to be me,” Astrid replied



“No, I’ll do it!” Bitwolf replied. “Hold my ax for me.”



“Someone do something quick! The little Viking is slipping off!”



Stormfly did her beast to steady herself as Bitwolf awkwardly positioned himself to leap off the back of the dragon. It proved to be a very difficult and daunting task; he never imagined himself ever doing anything this insane in his lfe.



Toothless tried his best to keep Hiccup from sliding off, but a sudden gust of wind caused him to lose his balance. Hiccup’s body slid off the saddle, with his artificial foot still locked into the pedal. The strain from gravity proved too much for the already weak wooden leg, and the wood snapped.



“Hiccup!” Astrid screamed, helpless only to watch him plummet towards the tree tops.



“You’ve got to jump now!” Stormfly told the tall young Viking preparing to jump off her back.



Finding the nerves to throw caution to the wind, he leaped off her back and landed onto the saddle on Toothless’ back. He quickly settled in, but found that a very big problem; the metal portion of Hiccup’s prosthesis was still stuck in the pedal. He had to find a way to get it out before they crashed into the ground.



With Bitwolf safely on the Night Fury’s back, Stormfly was free to go. “Hold on tightly, Camicazi!”



“My name is not Camicaaaa—” Before she could finish her protest, the dragon began a nose dive in an attempt to save the little Viking. She grunted as she pushed herself as hard as she could. Just before reaching the tree tops, she pulled her neck back and reached out with her right claw and narrowly and gently grasped the Viking boy. She glided skillfully through the trees, and until she could land on her three remaining claws.

Bitwolf tried to kick the prosthesis fragment out of the pedal latch. “Okay, I know you don’t like me any, but if you want to live, you’re gonna have to trust me!”



Toothless reluctantly agreed, seeing that he had no other choice. Giving him the nod of approval, Bitwolf pulled out a pocket knife from his belt and carefully studied the design. He looked for the leather strap that connected the pedal to the artificial tail-fin. Holding the strap with one hand, he cut the strap between his hand and the pedal.



The strap snapped free, and with a hard pull on it, the tail-fin opened completely, giving the Night Fury back full control of his flight ability. He flew down through the tree tops and flew through the woods until he found Astrid and Stormfly. He swooped in, and made a perfectly smooth landing.



“Whew, that was close,” Bitwolf said, breathing heavily.



He climbed off of the saddle and joined Astrid, who was trying everything in her power to get Hiccup to wake up. They were soon joined by Stoick and the rest of the gang.



“Hiccup!” Having seen what happened to his son up in the sky, he led Gobber and the rest of the young Vikings as fast as he could to where he saw the Mood dragon land. As soon as he got there, Astrid had to jump away to avoid Stoick, who swooped his son into arms. He placed an ear to his chest, hoping to still hear a heartbeat. “He’s still alive, but his breathing is erratic.”



“Is there something we can do for him?” Astrid turned to Stormfly.



“He’s a small Viking. I don’t know if he’ll survive this or not, but there is something that we can try.”



The crackle of thunder echoed all around them as a new wave of storm clouds started to make their way towards them. “Night is falling and a storm is approaching. There’s a cave up ahead where we can take shelter. Then, I’ll go find some berries that might help with the poison.”