If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours. If they don't, they never were."
–Kahlil Gibran

Seemingly overnight, Hiccup had become a hero when he befriended a dragon. He threw away everything he ever had, and gained everything he never knew he always wanted. However, the most important things in life sometimes become lost by hiding in plain sight.

A/N:
Hey, FizzleMcSchnizzle, will you write a story on HTTYD 2?
– No.
Fizz, write a story on HTTYD 2.
– I don't wanna.
Fizzy Wizzy, I really like that one story you wrote.
– Thanks!
And you should totally write a HTTYD 2 story.
– I said-
Yo Fizz-
– Fine!

At least, that's about how I think it went. I actually had some ideas knocking around in my head ever since I finished my first story, Dragon Whisperer, for a HTTYD 2 story with my telepathic dragons shenanigans. I just never really felt all that motivated to write a story on it because, well, I hope this doesn't make us enemies, and excuse me while I hold up a riot shield, but I didn't really like the 2nd movie.

Now, don't get me wrong, it was a fun movie with great graphics and cute and adorable Toothless being all cute and adorable. However, the plot was… well, too many ideas only half-baked and poorly implemented. "Oh, gee, what's-his-face died. I am totally crying tears of sadness because I had developed such strong sympathy for him yeah not really. Oh no, that one other dude died. It's a good thing I saw the first movie; otherwise, I wouldn't know I'm supposed to care."

So, I got some ideas to flesh out some of the plot elements the movie sorta glazed over.

Oh, and show some love for Colorful Crayola. She's beta-reading my story for me. If this is looking a bit more polished than usual then we have her to thank for that.

Obligatory Disclaimer:
I don't own HTTYD. In fact, nobody does because Toothless has no master!

Taken

A dragon soared through open sky, above the snow and clouds. He reveled in the thrill of flight that never faded, in the crispness of the cold air that he breathed in deep, the way his black scales luxuriated and basked in the warmth of the bright ball of fire above, the gentle caress of the icy wind across his sleek body and under his broad wings. Everything was exactly as it should be. Everything was perfect!

RAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Except his rider, of course, his poor little Firefly, who was roaring in frustration. This land-strider never was one to dream small. He had heard of some sort of new threat moving into this area, something about some land-strider warlord who was supposedly amassing a large flock of dragons to fight for him as he conquered the world.

Of course, as a dragon, Toothless thought nothing of it. Land-striders, being masters of drama, have always done this sort of thing, gathering under one alpha, adding to their pack and killing those who would not submit. The part about amassing a flock of enthralled dragons was new, though.

Firefly's sire came to the obvious conclusion that wiping out this threat would be a good idea. Hunt, strike, kill. Simplicity itself! However, it was no surprise that Firefly vehemently disagreed. He was always a strange one, the poor thing. In spite of what others did around him, he had always been the one to find a more peaceful solution. When others bared their teeth, he would present tribute. When others growled, he crooned. When others fought, he asserted himself into the middle of it all and, well…

Toothless shook his head. It always drove him crazy how his precious rider, his little Firefly, would always risk his own life for the benefit of others, including his enemies, for no other reason than "it just felt right". Toothless would feel his heart plunge into his bowels whenever his Firefly rushed headlong into mortal danger, leaving his dragon to frantically claw his way to save him.

It was always so tempting to chide little Firefly for taking foolish risks to try to be everyone's friend. After all, everyone knew that any dragon who refused to crack his own egg would die trapped inside. Obstacles needed to be broken down until they no longer presented a threat. It was the way of nature to meet opposition with aggressive force.

Firefly, though, was nothing like that at all. Were he trapped inside an egg, Toothless was convinced he would somehow befriend the egg, convince it to allow him out, then make it his stout ally in overcoming some even greater obstacle.

As silly as that sounded, even to Toothless, that was simply what Firefly always did. He stood up for the very dragon all of his kind hated the most. He showed kindness and compassion to a dragon for whom such concepts were foreign and strange. He brought dragons and land-striders together by taking uncountable risks of unfathomable magnitudes to end a seemingly unending war of attrition. If it wasn't for that very same drive that Firefly had to befriend his enemies, the one that always drove Toothless crazy with worry, dragons would still be enthralled by a demonic queen, groveling as mindless fodder and fetchers of food.

Consequently, Toothless felt helpless to even passively hint at Firefly to change his ways. It was as if Firefly had voices whispering in his mind, telling him that taking some foolish risk would give him the ultimate victory that nobody could have ever seen coming.

Firefly rambled some reassurance that he would keep his dragon safe in all this, and Toothless warbled his appreciation. Of course, he didn't understand the nasally singsong sounds land-striders made as they thought with their lips. The way landstriders communicated by thinking with their lips was something dragons found amusing and pointless, like a deer with a broken leg trying to flee from a threat. Fortunately, though most land-striders didn't even know it, they would project their thoughts whenever they spoke. It usually came across as a muddy spattering, but Firefly's practice had paid off so that his thought projections were so clear and well-formed that one would almost think him to be a dragon.

As Toothless idly sifted through the thoughts his rider was projecting, it was clear that he was still going on about this land-strider warlord, rambling on and on in that nasally singsong way that passed for communication among land-striders.

Beyond the focused projected thoughts about his rider's rambling worries about his sire and this land-strider warlord, Toothless could feel his rider's passive hum. It was a background noise that all living creatures projected, and Firefly's hum had the acerbic tang of worry and doubt. Oh, sure, Firefly attempted to exude confidence, but Toothless was not so easily deceived. Inside, the rider was uncertain. He didn't know where to start or what to do in dealing with this new threat and it rankled him to the core.

Toothless was about to respond to his rider for such pointless worrying - an obnoxious yawn or a light slap to the face with one of his sensor lobes seemed appropriate - but he gave a startled yelp as something to the side caught his eye. At first, it looked like the horns on those spike-tailed bipedal dragons, or deadly adders as the land-striders called them. However, as this something rose from the bank of clouds, he could recognize it must have been a land-strider.

It - no, definitely female based on the subtle undertones in her passive hum - lurched up to reveal a dragon on which she stood. The dragon swooped in front of Toothless to cut him off and he had to backwing to avoid a collision. He took a moment to fly in place – a tiring task for almost any dragon – to closely examine these interlopers.

The land-strider was wearing what appeared to be carapace plates and spikes from various dragons. She carried some sort of stick that curved sharply at both ends into a hook. The dragon on which she stood was much larger than Toothless, with a head that rotated like an owl's, golden scales around a silver belly, two legs instead of four, and four wings instead of two. Confusingly enough, both this strange dragon and his… rider… were clearly radiating sympathy and concern.

Firefly was trying to talk to the strange dragon rider in that nasally sing-gone way land-striders used to communicate. His heart leaped into his throat at the thought that he may have actually found the world-conquering warlord with the enthralled dragons. However, she made no response.

Toothless knew that if he was going to get any useful information, it would be from the dragon she rode. As opposed to land-striders, who have developed a clumsy way to communicate vocally, dragons could simply project their raw thoughts and feelings to those nearby. Understanding could be imparted almost instantly.

Fortunately, this strange dragon did have some thoughts to project to Toothless. {Be calm, black dragon. We are here to help. My name is Cloud Jumper and my rider is known as Dragon Savior. She and I are dedicated to freeing trapped and enslaved dragons. Your subjugation to that land-strider on your back ends now. Do not move, and trust us to help you.}

Toothless wasn't sure what that was supposed to mean. He was not trapped or enslaved. What absurd nonsense this silly dragon was spewing forth!

WHUMP!

Something slammed into Toothless from below. He could feel Firefly fly off his back, but the tethers held him close. Toothless looked up to see the foreign land-strider, Dragon Savior as her dragon called her, leaping over. She cut Firefly's tethers with a quick flash of her shiny claw, grabbed him, and jumped off and onto her dragon, allowing someone else to grab Firefly in his talons.

Toothless shrieked in indignant anger. How dare she! And her dragon was allowing this?!

She was no savior. No, she was a monster! A demon! A repulsive beast!

Cloud Jumper thought otherwise. {You are free now, black dragon. Fly and be free!}

Toothless glared and ripped a venomous snarl from his throat, which gave way to a surprised yelp as he tilted left against his will. He had lost one of the two fins on his tail earlier in life, and they were critical to maintain a stable flight. Firefly had somehow fabricated a replacement, but he needed to ride Toothless to make it work. Without his Firefly, Toothless quickly lost control..

He started to plummet, both physically and emotionally, lost in shock and grief. His rider had been taken, he couldn't fly, and they were surrounded by so many dragons that all seemed to be following the lead of this demonic land-strider.

This was inexcusable! He loathed himself for not having seen this coming. The lobes crowning his head were tightly packed webs of corded nerves encased in scaly hide, and they allowed him to pinpoint the position of any dragon or land-strider in the remote area by tracking the origin of their thought projections. Even noticing just the passive emotional hum would have been enough to see the hostiles coming despite the cloud cover. Toothless growled at his own failure to maintain focus and notice their approach.

He shook the doubt out of his mind and let rage wash over. He had almost forgotten that he could still fly. Firefly had done something to the tailfin that involved a twisted piece of iron that wanted to untwist but could not unless Firefly lifted his foot off the thing that normally controlled the tailfin-

Whatever! Toothless didn't care how it worked so long as it did. He flicked his tail and heard the telltale clicks of the fin engaging in the neutral position. It would limit his agility, but he would be able to fly. It was enough. It had to be enough.

Toothless saw only red. He screeched his anger as he thrust his wings hard to catch up. {Release my Firefly NOW or I will kill you!}

Confusion swept through the whole flock of dragons. This clearly was not the anticipated response.

He snarled in contempt. What, did they think he would just capitulate? Did they think they could take whatever they wanted without consequence? Did they really believe Toothless would just abandon his precious Firefly?

Oh, the painful lesson they were about to learn!

Toothless caught up to the rear of the flock. He dug his claws into the tail of a dragon and used the traction to lurch forward, springing off its head to gain more speed, ignoring the pathetic creature's pained cry.

Toothless just gave a derisive snort. {Be grateful I am not taking the time to kill you for flying between me and MY Firefly!}

He thrust his wings hard and caught another dragon in flight, springing off her and towards the next, closer to Firefly. However, the dragon lurched to the side and Toothless couldn't reach with his claws. Out of desperation, he bit down hard on whatever he could, which happened to be the dragon's wing. He hauled himself in to slide over to the torso and leap off to the next dragon.

His latest victim shrieked in pain and started to fall with a lame wing. Two other dragons dropped down to catch her, struggling with their added burden to not lag too far behind the rest of the flock.

That brought an idea to mind. The dragon that Toothless was currently clinging onto gulped and looked back at his baleful expression.

Again, one bite to the wing took three dragons down. Toothless felt no remorse for those who made the mistake of placing themselves between him and his precious rider. They would all know regret!

Toothless jumped from dragon to dragon, clawing and biting. They tried to evade or fight back, but they were all large, ungainly, over-muscled beasts. He was a wasp buzzing around a bear, a lynx striking out at its ponderous prey. He knew he couldn't keep up this pace for long, but explosive bursts of energy were where he excelled.

The whole flock was in a state of bewilderment. They tried to fight back but could not keep up with Toothless. Lightning was his name and fury was his game. Firefly was his goal and they would regret being in his way!

He made one last leap to the dragon holding his precious Firefly but something slammed into him from the side. Toothless found himself in the clutches of that large owl-headed dragon, Cloud Jumper, who was flying him farther and farther away from his rider.

Oh, that was a mistake.

That was a big mistake!

Toothless gathered fuel in his mouth. His signature banshee shriek sounded out as the highly-volatile mass formed and congealed. Cloud Jumper released Toothless and tried to fly away, but it was too late. Toothless released his fire and curled up into a tight ball to reduce the impact to himself.

The fireball destabilized almost immediately after its release, just as intended, and exploded with concussive force, shoving dragons in all directions. One was knocked unconscious and limply plummeted. Two others sprained their wings from the force and fell. Dragons from the other group surged back to save them from drowning in the unforgiving waters below.

Toothless took a moment to purr with satisfaction. He would have made the fireball larger if he wasn't in such a hurry.

Uncurling himself, he saw that his fireball had knocked the demonic land-strider off her dragon's back. Cloud Jumper howled angrily as he tried to recover his flight, but Toothless was faster. He grappled onto Cloud Jumper's neck, leaped to the rear of his torso, and jumped off to snatch the demonic land-strider from her fall.

Toothless merely chuffed at the other dragon's sudden fury at this injustice to his rider. {Cloud Jumper, return my rider to me and I will do likewise for you. If you do not comply immediately then I will bite off her head!}

{TOOTHLESS, STOP! STOP NOW! PLEASE!}

Toothless's eyes widened. It was not Cloud Jumper who projected that desperate plea, nor the demonic land-strider or any of the dragons in this flock. It was Firefly. Toothless looked over at his rider who was still clutched in a hostile dragon's talons, fervently pleading for Toothless to stop.

His rage instantly whiffed away and he stared at Firefly, trying to comprehend why he was so insistent on halting this rescue.

He then glanced ahead, where Firefly was frantically gesturing, and saw a massive wall of ice. A couple frantic thrusts of his wings slowed him enough to make the impact bearable. He bounced off and ended up falling into a tunnel.

The rest was lost when he smacked his head into a rock and blacked out.