If We Had Wings - A Tuffnut Love Story (HTTYD/RTTE)

6

Delta grinned in amusement as she followed the sand wraith back over to the shells. As she picked out some more, Chicken moved to nestle down right on top of Tuff's head. By the time they'd finished sorting through the seashells, the chicken was fast asleep.

"Alright, let me get something to help carry these," Tuffnut offered. But before rushing back into his den, he pointed his eyes up at Chicken. "Uh, do you mind removing Chicken from my head?" He asked Delta, "she gets cranky when I wake her."

"Oh, okay," Delta responded awkwardly, reaching up to carefully lift the bird from his head. Just as delicately, she placed her in the sand. Chicken cooed softly in her sleep, but was otherwise undisturbed.

When Tuffnut pounced back into his den, digging through his pile of trinkets again, Delta decided to follow. "What is all this stuff?" She wondered in fascination. Some of it was natural, but others were oddly shaped and didn't look like anything she'd ever seen before in the wild.

"You like it?" Tuff asked happily, then went on to explain, "most of it is stuff me and Ruff found on old shipwrecks. Those things are always full of cool stuff."

Delta frowned at this. "These are human things?" She hissed, backing away warily.

"What? Oh, no, don't worry," Tuffnut assured Delta. Then, as if to prove his point, he picked up the hilt a sword that'd lost it's blade with his teeth. "See?" He growled around the object in his mouth, "compwetewy hamwess."

Delta couldn't hold back her amused gurgle at his altered speech. Deciding to trust him on this, she walked up to him. Tuff froze, only able to focus on her ocean eyes, full of wonder, as she moved her face closer to his. For a moment he found himself in a daze, until he realized that this was not an act of affection. Delta was simply trying to observe and sniff the sword hilt.

"It smells like...smoke..?" Delta observed curiously.

The sand wraith dropped the object and answered casually, "probably 'cause the ship where I found it was on fire."

"There you two are," a groan came from the entrance to the cave. Both Tuff and Delta turned to Ruffnut standing outside peering in. "Come on, Tuff, Delta doesn't wanna see all your weird junk," she sighed.

"Hey, it may be junk, but it's cool junk," Tuff growled back, then turned to Delta with a hopeful look in his eyes, "don't ya think?"

"It's very interesting," Delta responded in a coo, causing Tuff's heart to flutter in a way it never had before.

Turning back to his sister, he stuck his tongue out and held his head up in triumph. Though he wasn't sure what made him happier: proving to Ruff that some dragons found his collection cool, or the fact that Delta seemed interested in him at all. He knew from the moment he saw her that this fury was going to claim his heart. He just hadn't expected it to happen so quickly. Tuff only hoped that these budding feelings would be mutual.

• • •

All of the dragons were settling down at the end of the day. Delta had finished setting up her den with the twins, and now she was lying down on the beach with the others. Everyone gathered their catches of the day into a pile, except for the tidal fury, who was still too injured to properly fish.

"It seems you're settling in nicely," Hiccup began to converse with Delta, "I heard you spent some time with Ruff and Tuff today."

"Yes, they've been a big help in learning about living on land," Delta agreed with a happy groan.

"And they didn't annoy you to death with their stupidity?" Snotlout wondered obnoxiously as he took a fish from the pile and ate it. "That's a first."

Delta gave him a glare, feeling the need to defend her new friends. "I'll take stupidity over arrogance any day," she growled at him.

"And I'll take that as a compliment," Ruffnut squawked to Delta.

"You said it, sister," Tuff agreed, just happy that Delta prefered him and Ruff to Snotlout.

Suddenly, Astrid let out a screech. All heads turned to find her batting an eel out of the fish pile. "Alright, who put an eel in here?" She demanded with a hiss.

"Woah, did Astrid just get scared?" Ruffnut observed in entertainment.

Tuffnut gurgled in laughter. He then got up and padded over to where the dead, blue eel had landed near the water. He nuzzled it up onto his snout and pranced back over to Delta. After dropping it in front of the tidal fury he turned back to Astrid. "I got it for Delta," he answered coolly, "she likes 'em."

The others all gave him looks of disbelief; Tuffnut wasn't exactly the type of dragon to go out of his own way to make another dragon happy, unless it was his sister. "You caught an eel for Delta?" Snotlout questioned a bit jealously, then added smoothly, "I mean, I would've done the same, but I was busy training. I could show you some moves tomorrow, if you want." He shot Delta a wink.

Delta rolled her eyes and groaned in annoyance, "no thanks; I don't mix well with fire."

"Wait a minute," Fishlegs called to Tuffnut, "weren't you the one who was all freaked out that she eats eels?"

The sand wraith shrugged and laid back down between Ruff and Delta. "Eh, I got over it."

Delta gave him a kind look when he turned toward her again. "That's very thoughtful of you," she purred, then proceeded to eat the eel.