Omphalos (Hiccelsa)

Chapter 2

They didn't die, of course, because that would be quite the depressing way to end a story that had hardly begun. No, indeed they had quite the adventure or misadventures waiting for them, it only depends on which way one chooses to see it.

Hiccup would say it was a misadventure.

Early that same morning, time and space away but not as far as one would think, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III left his house before the break of dawn to avoid the same thing he'd flew from his whole life; parents.

Instead of his father, like he'd avoided for 20 some years, today and everyday since that break in the twenty years, it was his mother.

It had been hard to readjust as the chieftain after Stoick's death, and also the reintroduction of his mother back into his life. Occasionally, she would be the mother she never was and reach across to wipe some dirt with her finger from his face, or take his clothes that he had thrown across the floor for the next day and wash them before they were clean, or she would go through and find another bottle of ale and frown at it, forgetting that Hiccup was well past the age to enjoy such beverages. With only a father before, it was simple enough.

His father let him be dirty. His father was a worse slob than he was with his clothes. His father let him drink things that burned his throat, and he would pat his only son on the back and tell him it got better on the second sip. And his mother would never be any of those things, but hell she was alive.

In fact, Hiccup had only had both parents for a year and three days (and the whole year was before he could remember anything) before they were wretched apart again and he was once again the child of a single parent.

It was more than a little difficult and awkward to co-exist with a whole totally new parent again. And now Hiccup was twenty-three and very much past the age he was considered to be a man. His mother had him when she was only 21, and most say that was much later than most to be starting to have children. His father had been a little older, but supposedly there had been some trouble conceiving Hiccup, so his age wasn't exactly comparable to his.

Hiccup? He was currently a free man. Well, as free as any chief could be.

Today, he flew away from all his troubles and people that would all pester him with the same questions: When was he taking a bride?

If Astrid were still around, this all would have been so simple. But she wasn't. Was she dead? He wouldn't ever know. She had just…disappeared. Now, living in the time he did, that was hardly surprising of a feat, people vanished unexpectedly most times. But usually it was people he faintly knew- the five-year-old son of the bread maker, an old weapon designer, the plump woman that babysat the annoying brats next door to his house. Really, he knew it could happen to anyone but Astrid wasn't just anyone.

Everyone knew she was going to be the chief's wife, and she had a certain way with people that Hiccup never excelled at. For days, people searched. Hiccup even called on his old friend Camacazi, who he had sworn off talking to a couple years back because Astrid was a little jealous, and the two searched for a week longer.

But he was a chief now, and he couldn't search forever, and soon everyone accepted she had vanished into the wind.

It was a sort of betrayal to Hiccup from everyone. Not only did everyone stop looking for her and just exist on like she never had been (even though they didn't know how not to, just like they hardly talked about Stoick except in tales of old and bravery) but even more so only after five months of her absence, people began to ask about his next choice for a wife.

Now it was a year, and people were becoming more aggressive with their rules. The elders were on his tail everyday, and soon he'd be matched with a pretty and ruthless Viking daughter of someone and he'd be forced into a marriage with them. In one part of his mind, he understood their fear. If he were to die, who would take over? It was always the son of the leader, and anything could happen in such times of uncertainty, especially since he was so determined to connect and domesticate these once dangerous dragons.