This is where I belong ||httyd fanfic||

27. The Aftermath

It was deathly silent, the world had been muted in the aftermath of the great battle and all the color seemed to vanish from the island. Even the flows of lava seemed to have stopped. All that was left was a stony beach covered in smoke that blurred everything like the dense fog around the island. A disturbing rain of black ashes fell upon the land like a gloomy snow, dying everything pitch black, like the body of the Night Fury, who laid down in pain and exhaustion. His muscles were stained and sore, being pushed to the point of snapping apart, while his bones felt like brittle glass, he was sure, in his now-barely functioning consciousness, that some had broken from the fall. He turned around, aching felt in every part of his body, struggling to open his eyes.

He noticed also, his back felt surprisingly light, and it seemed wrong to him somehow, like there was something supposed to be there. Toothless pulled in his splayed out wings to his body and squinted near the end of his tail, struggling to regain clarity and focus in his vision. His senses were returning to him and he felt that he was right – his back was meant to be heavier, but not by much. There was a familiar weight there, but now it was gone, and they only weight he felt now was that in his legs and wings, which felt like heavy lead or they had boulders the size of Gronkles tied to them.

His sight finally came back to him and he saw the grievous state of the tail fin that had landed right near him, disconnected from his tail. The leather was gone completely, the belt was ruined, and the metal rods were burnt and bent sporadically. And it all hit him at once.

'Hiccup...'

Toothless pushed the tiredness away and lifted his head up, looking around for any sign of his Hiccup, fearing that Hiccup might not have survived or that he had not made it in time. His memory slowly came back while doing so: after the explosion had passed, they had crashed to the ground, smashing against rocks and rolling and skidding like a stone skipped across the water until they had finally stopped in the shore. Toothless was sure that he had had Hiccup in his protective embrace, wrapped up in his wings and pressed hard and close against his chest, determined not to let a single scratch on him. But he also remembered falling into the explosion, and it escaped him still just how he had managed to catch him. He shuffled and shifted his beaten body all around, wondering perhaps if it was just a trick and he had not caught Hiccup after all.

It was then that he spotted his boy, lying a few feet away unconscious, the ash gathering on his splayed out form. His skin was deathly pale and his riding harness and clothes were burned and tattered. Toothless picked himself up off the ground, or at least tried to before collapsing down again, no ounce of strength left within him. His muscles screamed in pain and agony with every movement, the torture enough to snap any man or dragon's mind, but Toothless pushed on, dragging his limp hind legs, wings, and tail and crawling with his claws grasping at the shifting pebbles. All he could think about was the little dragon rider before him, his fatigued thoughts echoing his name, his limitless drive to protect his rider powering his legs through sheer will alone.

'Hiccup... Hiccup.... Hiccup...'

He could have fallen apart at any time, every claw lift could have been his last before that leg shattered, but it mattered nothing to him. Too worn to even cry out, he had still managed to make it; all he could do was take his Hiccup into his claws and wrap his wings around him in the warmest embrace any living creature could give another. In that black cocoon that now formed around Hiccup's motionless body, he was safe, and to Toothless, that was all that was necessary. With a whimper and a small lick on his boy's cheek, Toothless had managed to stir Hiccup, who slowly opened his eyes to find the concerned, near tearful gaze of his dragon focused entirely on him.