Hiccup shoved a flask of yellow paint into his saddle bag and patted Toothless' back. Fishlegs had suggested to the group that they all mark dragons of neighboring islands with distinct colors that represented the island they lived on, and Hiccup had agreed to that idea. After all, it would be useful if there was a way to keep track of which dragons came from where.
"I call that I'm partners with you!" said Astrid, walking up to Hiccup and giving his arm a playful nudge.
"Wait, who said we were going in teams?" Hiccup asked, glancing around at the others.
"Well, the twins are going to their island together, so I just figured..." She trailed off and shied away from his gaze.
Hiccup thought for a moment. "I was going to have us all go to the different islands by ourselves, but I guess we could work in pairs." Shrugging, he looked in Fishlegs' direction. "Fishlegs, is it okay if you wait back on Berk with Snotlout?"
"Um..." began Fishlegs.
"We need a couple people to stay here in case there's a problem and somebody has to send for reinforcements," Hiccup explained.
"I uh..." Fishlegs bit his lip.
"Alright, that settles it." Tossing paint to Astrid, Hiccup climbed onto Toothless. "Okay, bud," he said to the Night Fury. "As soon as Astrid's ready, we'll go. Sound good?"
Toothless let out a purr.
"I'm all set!" she shouted.
"Great. Let's head out, then." With that, Hiccup ascended into the air, aware of Astrid trailing close behind.
The ride to the island that Hiccup had volunteered to take charge of was unusually silent. Normally, he and Astrid would chat whilst flying. This time, however, neither of them spoke a word.
"You're awfully quiet today," he observed as the they both landed - with their dragons, of course - in a small clearing. "I thought you'd be uh...more talkative, considering that you um...wanted to come with me so bad." After hopping off of Toothless, Hiccup walked to where Astrid was sitting atop Stormfly and reached an arm out towards her.
Astrid rolled her eyes. "Hiccup, I don't need help getting off my dragon," she scoffed. However, she still took his hand and allowed him to assist her onto the ground.
"You alright?"
"Fine." She nodded briefly.
"Um...okay, then. Well, let's uh...see what dragons we can find." He started to turn away, only to be stopped by her grabbing his arm.
"Wait! It's still pretty um...early in the morning, Hiccup," Astrid spoke.
He twisted back around to face her. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"What I'm getting at here is that I think we have time for a little procrastinating. And...and we haven't...you know...hung out for a while. Just the two of us, I mean." Her cheeks tinted pink.
Hiccup rubbed the back of his neck. This was a bit weird. Yes, they'd spent a good amount of time alone before doing both duties and things that weren't duty-related, but that didn't mean 'hanging out' - as she had put it - wasn't still an awkward thing to discuss.
She punched his arm lightly. "Hiccup?"
"Well, what did you uh...wanna do, Astrid?"
The blonde Viking shrugged. "We could take a walk."
Biting his lip, he slowly nodded. "Alright, then."
As they set out - Toothless and Stormfly following closely behind - Astrid abruptly took his hand and laced his fingers together with hers.
