Chapter Text
Jack was back in the village. After a week on the road with the Hoffersons, he couldn’t help but feel different. His short time in the wilderness reminded the brunet of his time as a spirit. Out there, it was open and welcoming. The air was full of fragrance and earthly tones while the village smelled stale at the best of times and repugnant at the worst. The winds weren’t as playful or responsive due to the buildings stifling their movements. Something which the Druid knew a lot about since he was the only one the winds could complain to about being inhibited by the weird human-made structures.
On the other hand, the village was noisy and crowded—although, nothing like the future would be—compared to the soft chirping of birds and dragons. The ex-spirit couldn’t go very far without accidentally running into someone if he wasn’t paying attention and after years of being walked through, most would assume he would be thrilled at even the slightest bit of physical contact. They would have been wrong.
Jack quickly came to realize that even the slightest contact with people sent his heart racing. The first time it happened, Toothiana had laid a congratulatory hand on his shoulder after he’d taken the Oath of a Guardian, startling him so badly the Tooth Fairy thought she’d hurt him. The eternal teenager played it off as him drifting off from exhaustion and she had seemed to believe him, but her shimmering pink eyes had held a touch of doubt.
He had a feeling Sandy might have suspected something too because he would use Dreamsand to alert the immortal teenager to his presence. It also gave him ample time to move out of the way if he didn’t want to be touched. Thanks to the Guardian of Dreams, Jack was better about tolerating people touching him without any violent reactions on his part, but only when he was expecting it. However, he was still extremely uncomfortable when anyone touched him without his knowledge and unless he initiated the contact himself, he rarely felt comfortable.
Heck, before his whole Viking Vacation into the past, he still jumped whenever one of the other Guardians entered his personal space. The only ones who could get away with invading his space and touching Jack without a violent reaction were the children. Which meant, that upon entering the village, Jack had a momentary lapse and just about came out of his skin when one of the adults had brushed up against him. He had believed, just for a moment, he was invisible again. That it was just the winds and him once more, exploring and enjoying the world together.
Regardless, things were different, and not just on Berk. The winds were different. They were not the comforting mentors constantly at his side since he’d first risen from his would-be watery grave all those years ago. Years in the future now. These winds were younger than he ever remembered, more childlike than the aged winds whose wisdom he had relied upon for centuries. They were like new friends instead of longtime allies, something he sorely missed.
"Laddie,” Finn’s voice brought Jack out of his thoughts and into the present where the Viking was hauling all of his meager belongings in a rickety wooden cart. Seeing that he had the boy’s attention, Finn set down the handles of the cart and waved to the village before them. “Why don't you go and take some time for yourself?"
Yet the too-sharp smile—too fake, Jack’s mind supplied—on the tall blond’s face had the brunet realizing Finn was unnerved. The Hofferson’s blue eyes were busy taking in all the changes to the village since he had left over a decade ago and hadn't had the chance to notice on the night they had dealt with the Flightmare. After Finn had briefed the chief about the events revolving around the Flightmare, he politely asked Astrid to take him and an empty cart back to his hut up in the mountains.
The shieldmaiden hadn’t wanted to comply until she realized he intended to pack up his belongings and move back to the village. Then she quickly obeyed and Jack volunteered his assistance. Hiccup had jumped to help Finn as well and had flown the ex-spirit back to the small paradise while Finn flew with Astrid. Together, the four of them had collected all Finn's personal belongings from the hut and cleared out the remaining stores in the cave.
With the cart fully loaded, the dragons couldn’t lift it without losing some of the carefully balanced items inside. For that reason, Finn decided it best to take the long way back to the village to prevent losing any of his belongings. It had nothing to do with not having to ride Stormfly again or so he assured his niece. The Guardian thought differently but didn’t say anything.
Astrid chose to make the trip down the mountain with her uncle. Hiccup—who had to be back in the village by morning—couldn’t make the journey on foot with the Hoffersons as he would have liked but left with a promise to check up on them the next day. Jack declined the Night Fury rider’s offer to return with him and elected to stay with the Hoffersons. It was a good thing too since Fishlegs found them not four days later with a message from Camicazi forcing the shieldmaiden to leave their little traveling caravan to assist her mother in selling some of their newly hatched chicklets at the market.
The trip also allowed the ex-spirit to become better acquainted with the younger Hofferson. Jack had to admit, Astrid might have been wound a little tight but she knew how to have fun. On their first day of travel, the shieldmaiden offhandedly challenged him to a race around their campsite in the morning. Jack won, after all, racing the winds did have its advantage. Since then, they had a race each morning with the brunet always coming out on top. Although, the last race they had was pretty close and Finn had decided it was the brunet who had won by a leg.
Jack didn’t mind the blonde teenager’s vast improvement. He was the one teaching her a few new moves to even the playing field. Then again, Astrid had been the one to ask how to do a kip-up and he had been happy to teach her. It had just spiraled out from there.
Hiccup and Toothless kept their promise and stopped by, but it wasn’t a one-time deal. The two continued to come by each evening. Finn questioned the auburn-haired Viking about it, but he’d brushed it off as him spotting them during their evening flights and dropping in to make sure there hadn’t been any trouble. The Guardian, however, thought it had something to do with him wanting to check up on Astrid. Regardless of the real reason, it was kind of him to bring them some food on each of his visits and they chattered for a while before the Night Fury duo had to head back.
It was rather odd to Jack and he was confused by the sudden attention the two Dragon Riders were giving him. Sure, Hiccup and him helped each other out in the smithy and there was that one time the auburn-haired teenager offered to help him collect herbs—granted, Hiccup did try to cancel on him in favor of the training drill on Dragon Island—but they weren’t exactly friends. At least, the ex-spirit didn’t think they were friends. Were they?
Either way, he was hard-pressed to explain either Hiccup's or Astrid’s sudden friendliness towards him, especially since they hadn’t thought him capable enough to handle going with them to help cure Hookfang.
"Yeah, and let you get lost in the village. I'd rather not have to spend my evening looking for you," the brunet shook his head, bringing himself out of his vexing musings—that had him confused for the last few days—once more.
For someone who lived in the wilderness for a decade, Finn sure had a horrible sense of direction. It was only thanks to the winds heralding the immortal teenager away from an imminent fall to their deaths that they were even alive. Even then, it was a near thing and Stormfly was forced to catch Finn when he did walk off the cliff while reassuring the two teenagers they were indeed heading in the right direction. Since then, Jack and Astrid had taken turns to guide them down the mountains.
"I'll be fine, go on," Finn reassured pushing his much smaller traveling companion forward with only the barest of nudges. Jack turned and gave the Viking his most unimpressed look. "Besides, Gobber volunteered to help me reacquaint myself with the village and offered me a place to stay."
A single brown eyebrow rose up into matching locks of hair, a slight grin twitching to life on his lips. "You're not lying to get rid of me, are you? Sick of me after spending a whole week with me?"
"Laddie, if I wasn't sick of you after spending all of Devastating Winter cooped up with just you and that dragon, I can certainly say spending a week with you was definitely no hardship. But I am telling the truth," Finn laughed, reaching out to pat him on the shoulder but clumsily aborted the action. Instead, he ran his hand through his long straight beard. It would seem Sandy wasn’t the only one who knew about his aversion to touch but was too nice to say anything.
"Ah, there you are. I wasn't expecting you until later this evening," Gobber called out, hobbling towards them. His hook caught on the side of someone's cart as he waved it wildly about and he ended up getting it stuck. A few quick forceful pulls had the hook coming free and the blacksmith stumbling backwards into another Viking. The other Viking just pushed him away with a disgruntled scowl that Gobber didn’t notice, too preoccupied with staring at Finn with a sheepish look across his face.
"See, I was telling the truth," the hunter rounded on Jack, a gleeful smile on his face. "Now, get going you. You're young, go have some fun."
"Fun is my specialty," the eternal teenager remarked, grinning at his own inside joke, and conceded to the Viking’s demands. “See you later, Finn. Hi, Gobber! Bye, Gobber!”
Knowing Finn couldn’t get lost with the blacksmith by his side, Jack headed off. Pulling the hood of his cloak down, he looked around not too sure what to do with himself. Gobber was obviously out of the forge so that either left it closed or Hiccup was manning it alone. That was if he and the other members of the Dragon Training Academy were already finished with their training exercises for the day. If they were finished, the immortal teenager couldn’t hang out with the twins, not knowing where they would be wreaking havoc today. Neither could he go bother Astrid as she was still helping her mother with the chicklets and Snotlout was probably busy training at this hour.
It was still pretty early in the day, which meant the children would be busy with their chores so he couldn't preoccupy himself by entertaining them with stories. The faeries wouldn't come out to the village unless he truly needed their help—they didn't like being seen by those who didn't believe—and him being bored didn't count. That only left Fishlegs as someone he knew but he didn't truly know the boy all that well, so he didn’t feel right bugging the heavyset Viking.
"Hey, do you have any ideas on what to do?” the ex-spirit inquired, crossing his arms behind his head and leaning back to look up into the cloud-covered sky. He didn’t notice the Vikings around him glance at him oddly as he appeared to be talking to himself. If he had, he wouldn’t have cared anyways.
The winds came up from behind him without any kind of answer but just a joyful laugh. Jack frowned, wondering what had them so amused, which was when he ran smack-dab into someone. The laughter in the air increased a few folds and the immortal teen wondered if this was how the winds of his time felt when he played juvenile pranks for his own amusement. After a few more sniggers, the winds pulled on his clothing in an attempt to see if he was alright seeing how he hadn’t moved after the collision.
“I think I’ll just lay here for a bit,” Jack answered the winds' worried queries, gazing up at the clouds. His view was obstructed a second later as a wet tongue lapped at his face. “Oomph!”
“Toothless!” Hiccup’s voice called out from behind the mass of black scales. In the next second, the auburn-haired teenager was in front of him, pulling the Night Fury off of him. “I am so sorry. He usually… Jackson?”
“Hi, Hiccup. Hi, Toothless,” the brunet greeted the pair from his position sprawled out on the street in the middle of what was clearly an intersection if he had bothered to pay attention.
“I didn’t think you’d be back until this evening,” Hiccup moved back, giving Jack enough room for his kip-up. The ex-spirit didn’t disappoint and was soon standing, brushing off the dirt from the mantle of his cloak.
“Took a little shortcut, knocked half a day off our travel,” Jack explained as he finished brushing off all the grime. His amber eyes then found vibrant green and he smiled, leaning his weight against his staff. “So, how did your rescue training exercises go? Or is that where you’re headed? Ooh, can I play the rescuee?”
“No, no. Just coming back from that actually and trust me, you didn’t want to be the rescuee,” the Head of the Dragon Academy grimaced and the ex-spirit knew he was thinking about everything that had gone wrong with the rescue drill.
“That bad?” Jack probed, curious to know what had occurred to cause the Viking’s face to contort in such a way. Toothless bumped his head against the brunet’s free hand and the Druid rubbed the dragon’s head absentmindedly watching as his rider’s face went through an array of emotions and finally settled on lackluster.
“Snotlout knocked the head off our dummy and then set it on fire,” the Dragon Rider dully offered, running a hand through his hair, messing it up even further than it already was.
“Ouch,” the immortal teen winced in sympathy for the dummy, his hand falling away from Toothless’s head as he focused his complete attention on the dragon’s rider. “It couldn’t have all been that bad, right?”
“It was,” Hiccup groaned as the Night Fury came around to his side and begged for attention from him seeing how the brunet was no longer petting him. He was rewarded with a scratch behind his ear-plate and a quick pat.
“How so?” Jack asked turning the corner, following Toothless who had taken the lead now that there was no one paying him any attention.
“It’s the others. They got it in their heads that competition is the very essence of life itself or something like that. But we’re supposed to be a team. Everyone has their own role. No one person is better or more important than another,” the auburn-haired teenager’s voice rose and he began gesturing his arms around forcefully, getting it all off his chest in one outburst.
The Guardian let him rant; allowing him to unwind somewhat because he really wasn’t going to like what Jack had to say. “Hate to say it Hiccup, but they are right. Competition is good for a group, keeps the members motivated and working to better themselves to prevent being left behind. It also helps stimulate new ideas and keeps things from being repetitive.”
“But—," Hiccup was completely prepared to defend his side but the ex-spirit didn’t give him the chance.
“—but, you are right too,” Jack continued as if the Viking hadn't spoken, gracefully stepping out of the way of a woman holding two sheep on her shoulders. “You are a team, everyone has their roles to fulfill and each is important in their own way. Competition is good only so long as it is friendly and fun and not taken too seriously. Otherwise, it can lead to inner team fighting. There’s a balance there which just needs to be maintained, that’s all.”
The chief’s son was quiet for a moment. “I never thought of it that way. You and your Druid ways of balance just have to make sense, doesn’t it? Maybe this won’t be so bad after all.”
“Me and my Druid ways? Wait, what won’t be so bad?” the immortal teenager asked, his curiosity getting the better of him. This was turning out to be interesting, especially with their former topic. There was some kind of competition afoot which had a high probability of being fun. Now if he could only find a way to join.
“Don’t exactly know, but Fishlegs is setting up something to prove who is the better dragon trainer on equal fields,” Hiccup dashed the Guardian of Fun’s idea of participating in the competition. Well, not as a contestant anyways.
“Cool, can I be the judge?”
Green eyes glanced over at him, definitely taking in how he was vibrating with excitement at the prospect of being included. “Uh, sure; if the others don’t mind that is. They should be at the Academy now, if you want to ask them yourself.”
“Great! Let’s go then! Toothless, lead us to the Dragon Academy!” Jack spoke up and the Night Fury, who let out a trill and changed directions to head in the direction of the requested destination. Turning back to the Dragon Rider, a frown covered his face. “Where were we headed before?”
“I—," Hiccup started, looking around their surroundings and finding the same thing the ex-spirit had taken notice of a few moments prior. They were nowhere near where they’d run into each other and they could have been walking in circles for all Jack knew. “—have no idea. This is what we get for letting Toothless lead.”
“Well, he’s doing a pretty good job of leading us to the Academy now,” the brunet shrugged. He didn’t train dragons and if the teenager who did train dragons beside him didn’t know where the Night Fury was leading them, he wasn’t going to dwell on it. It wasn’t his expertise.
True to Hiccup’s prediction, the rest of the Dragon Riders were at the Academy. Most of them were scattered around the area, standing in various spots around the field and throwing quick glances to the middle where Fishlegs stood with a large wooden container at his feet. Jack soon found out why when his eyes were drawn to the crate as it wobbled on its own and a few odd noises came from within.
“Good, we’re all here. Now we can begin,” Fishlegs started when he caught sight of the Head of the Academy walking through the entrance. Not giving anyone the chance to say a thing, let alone greet the newly returned Druid, the heavyset Viking gestured for them all to converge around the crate.
Snotlout did nod a greeting to the brunet as he made his way toward the rumbling crate which had Jack using the hook of his staff to salute back. Astrid too gave him a quick grin as they fell into step with one another that he readily returned. However, the twins weren’t all that subtle in their greetings, waving at him which ended up dissolving into a slapping fight between the two when they kept on hitting each other. The fight came to an end when Fishlegs removed the lid of the crate with a flourish to reveal six small dragons.
“Terrible Terrors? This is your level playing field?” the brunet Viking asked incredulously, eyebrows disappearing beneath his helmet and Jack had to agree with his doubt. However, his doubt steamed from the fact those little critters seemed to have it out for him.
“As a matter of fact, yes. We'll all choose a Terrible Terror and have a day to train it. And then we'll find out who's the best,” Fishlegs replied, a proud smile splitting his face in two for coming up with such a brilliant idea.
Snotlout burst out into an uncontrollable fit of laughter after the heavyset Viking was done explaining the idea for the competition. He was laughing so hard that he started to slap his knees as he fought to get a breath of air. Jack, on the other hand, thought the contest sounded like a great idea. He would have preferred it if they had used a different type of dragon. His concern was proven correct when a green Terrible Terror spotted him slowly inching his way back—apparently, he should have gone with the get the hell out of Dodge approach instead of the slow stealthy withdrawal he had been going for—and proceeded to launch itself at the immortal teenager.
“Gah!” Jack yelped as the little guy wrapped his front paws around his neck and proceeded to sing. He tried to pull the Terrible Terror off him, yet that only made the dragon cling on tighter, he even tried to climb down the front of his white shirt.
The other Terrible Terrors looked towards the commotion and they too flew at the flailing Guardian when they spotted him. Toothless—and how could Jack ever think of him as a black menace when he was clearly a savior was beyond him—jumped before the struggling brunet, firing a warning blast at the small flock that had them dispersing. It didn’t stop the Terrible Terrors though as they flew in various directions, all heading back towards their original target.
Thankfully, the rest of the Dragon Riders had the good sense to pluck a dragon from the air and hold on to them, preventing them from going after Jack. While the Dragon Academy members captured the loose Terrible Terrors, Hiccup provided the brunet assistance in prying the little green dragon off of him, much to the immortal teenager’s everlasting appreciation.
“Oh, man. I can't keep a straight face,” Snotlout’s laughter once more rang out through the arena. “Finn wasn’t lying when he said Terrible Terrors go after you. Just wasn’t in the way I imagined.”
“I fail to see the humor, Snotlout,” Jack grumbled as he rearranged his cloak on his shoulders while keeping his distance from the green Terrible Terror trying to claw his way out of Hiccup’s arms all the while looking right at him. “And if anyone’s Terrible Terror flies at me like that again, they are automatically disqualified!”
“And that is up to you why?” Astrid asked, struggling to keep ahold of the aqua-colored terror in her arms.
“I told him he could judge the contest. He would be an impartial judge. If that's okay with you guys,” Hiccup explained, fighting with the Terrible Terror in his arms. Toothless, the savior he was, walked over to his rider’s side and growled at the small dragon. When that didn’t get the dragon to calm down, a charge began to build up in warning which had the Terrible Terror calming down.
“Seems fair to me,” Snotlout grimaced as the purple Terrible Terror latched onto his arm—thankfully over his arm bracer—by his teeth and didn’t seem to be letting go any time soon.
“Agreed,” the twins said in unison, head-butting each other. The action also resulted in their yellow Terrible Terrors banging heads together as well, knocking the dragons out and putting an end to their struggling. Both of them then held up the limp yellow dragons to eye level and looked them over. Not to make sure they were alright as Jack would have thought but to trade the identical dragons with one another.
“Well, I guess,” Fishlegs agreed hesitantly and the ex-spirit could tell he was not happy his contest was being taken over when it really wasn’t. Jack was only the judge to prevent favoritism and the Gronckle rider had already laid out the rules, so it was still his contest.
Luckily, the orange Terrible Terror in his arms began fighting for its freedom, diverting the heavyset Viking’s attention elsewhere before any protests could be brought up.
“It’s settled then, Jackson will be our judge,” Astrid nodded, flashing him a smile which was returned.
“This is going to be fun!” the Guardian of Fun all but jumped up and down, giddy with anticipation. “Okay, we’ll meet up tomorrow at midday for the judging. In the meantime, I’ll stop by to check on each of you to see your progress and provide some advice.”
“Sounds fair,” Hiccup nodded in agreement, clearly relieved the competition wasn’t going as horribly as he envisioned. He would have continued, but the one facet of competition that seemed to be mandatory between high-spirited individuals finally bubbled to the surface. Jack had expected it, but he knew the auburn-haired teenager definitely was not going to appreciate the trash talk.
“You don't have a chance to win this, Fish-Face, and you want to know why? Because there are readers, and there are doers. And while you've got your nose buried in The Book of Dragons, I'm out there kicking names and taking butts,” Snotlout boasted and the ex-spirit had to hide his smile so Hiccup wouldn’t notice and disapprove. He was marveled by the brunet Viking, for a boy who had such a demanding but absentee father, he’d surrounded himself with a good group of friends that kept him grounded while he pushed them to do their best.
“I think you meant that the other way around,” Astrid corrected, handing her aqua-colored Terrible Terror to Stormfly to keep the little menace from escaping and going after the ex-spirit.
“I mean… shut up, Astrid,” Snotlout flailed, trying to figure out what he had gotten wrong in the middle of his trash talk, and ended up conceding when he figured he’d already been bested in the little verbal play by the shieldmaiden.
“Uh, guys, come on,” Hiccup tried to defuse the situation that—in Jack’s opinion—did not need defusing.
There was the right amount of friendly competition mixed with discord to keep things alive and exciting while pushing each other to do their best to outdo one another. It reminded Jack of the race to collect teeth with the other Guardians which had ended up with him coming in last. Not that he cared, he had more fun during their race than he had in a long time, having someone to compete with other than the winds had been nice.
“I'll tell you what, Snotlout. You're so confident in your dragon training superiority why don't we make this interesting?” Fishlegs challenged, moving the orange Terrible Terror under his arm so he could point at the dark-haired Viking.
“Pff. All ears,” Snotlout shot back while Jack began to wonder about the brunet Viking’s pain tolerance. For throughout the whole conversation, his purple Terrible Terror was still hanging off of his arm and there was only so much protection his leather bracer separating the tiny dragon’s teeth from his arm provided. Yet, Snotlout hadn’t done more than wince and groan once when the little guy’s jaw attempted to clamp down tighter.
“Losers clean the winner's stall,” the Gronckle rider offered as if it was the worst inconvenience he could think of. Although, for all the immortal teenager knew, it very well could have been. “For a month.”
“Done,” the Monstrous Nightmare rider agreed without hesitation.
“In,” Astrid was only a second behind with her answer, having to duck out of the way of the twins ramming their helmets together. Everyone took that to mean they were in too.
“Great! I’ll start by giving the twins advice. They’ll need it the most,” Jack offered, having to duck himself to keep the twins’ helmets from ramming into his head. “Afterwards, I’ll visit Snotlout, Fishlegs, Astrid, and then Hiccup in that order. Any complaints?”
The other teens watched as the twins butted their heads together for the third time and quickly agreed with him. Tuffnut and Ruffnut would need more work than all of them combined, which was how the immortal teen found himself leaving with the two Thorstons, but not before Toothless demanded to be petted one last time.