Disclaimer: All familiar ideas are not mine (and athingofvikings helped me refine a couple of world-building details); you know what to expect.

Feedback: Appreciated as always.

The Doctor's Dragon

Crouching outside the ship, watching grimly as the Drationans led the other Riders into the ship, Astrid tightened her grip on her axe and prayed nobody would look for her.

Right now, she was remembering all of Hiccup's talks with her about the reasons he valued her instincts over Fishlegs' own raw intelligence and hoping that she'd guessed right about the Drationans' level of knowledge. If they hadn't clearly seen the Riders in action in person and had just been relying on their controlled dragons to do the job, it was just possible that these… things… assumed she and the others rode each dragons on a one-by-one basis. If that guess was right, it was just possible that these things thought Barf and Belch only had one rider rather than needing two, particularly when the twins had been so close to Stormfly and their own dragon before they were trapped.

She hated the fact that she'd instinctively dived off Stormfly when she'd seen the Deathsong amber approaching her dragon, but she'd managed to hide behind a nearby rock until the Drationan leader had come down to take the others into the ship. As Hiccup had often reminded them, it wasn't cowardice to avoid a hopeless battle, and with a Deathsong still in play and virtually all other Riders and dragons trapped or about to be trapped, getting out of sight had been the best plan of action.

Looking around the small clearing between her current position and the ship that had brought her unknown enemies here, Astrid supposed that she should just appreciate that there wasn't any Drationan immediately around her.

The only problem now was how to get inside that ship; she had little doubt that the doors they'd used to get the others inside would be heavily guarded, and that hull looked too strong for her to just try and break in on her own. As she carefully studied the ship, her eyes widened as they settled on the enclosed sections where the Drationans had taken Stormfly and the other dragons. She couldn't see any obvious way into those cages from the outside, but if she could just find some way to signal the dragons from outside their cages… so long as they hadn't added those control device things the Doctor had been so worried about…

Astrid didn't care what Piervin had said about his people creating the dragons; she wasn't going to let anyone turn Stormfly into some kind of sick weapon for whatever war they wanted her to fight.

Strapped to a chair in a large room, with Turlough and the dragon riders sitting/strapped in other chairs around the room, the Doctor wondered what it said about the nature of the universe that this kind of cliché interrogation technique dated back so far. He admittedly had no way of knowing whether this interrogation room was something that had been in the ship originally or had been added after they acquired it, but the fact that they had retained the room in the first instance wasn't exactly encouraging.

Still, on the upside, at least the Riders had spent enough time in proximity to himself and the TARDIS over the last few days for him to have discreetly shared his ship's translation capacity with each of them; he could only imagine the complications if he and Turlough had been the only ones able to understand what Nicarlet and the other Drationans were saying…

"I trust you're comfortable?" Nicarlet said as he walked into the room, grinning around at his prisoners as he nonchalantly adjusted a sleeve of his robes.

"Is there a reason we're like… well, this?" Fishlegs tried to wave his bound arm at himself. "I mean, I don't want to be locked up, but-"

"We don't exactly have standard cells available for more intelligent prisoners such as yourselves, and I'm hardly going to be keeping you all around long enough for such an issue as your long-term comfort to matter," Nicarlet replied with an easy grin on his face that put the Doctor in mind of those occasions when he witnessed the Master interacting with people who didn't know just how twisted he was, when his old friend wanted to make people think he was 'harmless' before he killed them anyway. "Now then, as long as you're here, maybe you could explain how you ended up in control of such fascinating creatures?"

"Firstly, we don't 'control' our dragons, and secondly, if we're going to tell you anything, maybe you could answer a few of our questions about this whole… I mean, if you really created the dragons, how did that even work?" Hiccup asked.

"And why did you leave them here rather than keep them… with you?" Turlough cut in, a brief glance at the Doctor the only sign that he'd remembered they didn't want to discuss other planets yet. "This has to be fairly… well, you clearly came a long way to leave them, so why not keep them nearer?"

"And where did you get this ship in the first place?" the Doctor added with a polite smile, looking around the hall with casual interest. "I'm not going to deny that you're clearly an intelligent race, but your attire… well, it suggests to me that you haven't reached the right stage to achieve this level of technology culturally."

"I see," Nicarlet said, looking at the Doctor with a particularly blank expression. The Time Lord was briefly concerned that his observations had pushed their current opponent too far, but Nicarlet finally smiled and nodded in acknowledgement at the Time Lord. "You have a surprising degree of insight for someone from such a primitive background."

"This group is… a lot smarter than you'd assume," the Doctor said defensively; he appreciated that the twins and Snotlout in particular weren't conventionally intelligent, but the twins had a creativity that made up for that and Snotlout had potential if he could be convinced to apply himself. "As Hiccup said, if you answer our questions, we'll see what we can do about answering yours."

"You expect me to believe you understand even the idea of genetic engineering?"

"Taking samples from different animals and mixing them all together to create something new?" Hiccup observed.

"Yeah, we got all that," Tuffnut said, actually managing to sound bored at the concept (the Doctor chose to interpret that as him just being good at hiding his feelings rather than him exaggerating his understanding). "Seems like a lot of effort for not that much on your part; we're the ones who got the cool partners out of your work, after all."

"We shall see," Nicarlet said, raising a pointed eyebrow as he studied the Riders for a moment before he shrugged. "Very well, if you insist; my grandfather acquired this ship in the prime of his life, although the stories vary on whether he explicitly claimed it from its previous owner or simply discovered it after the death of the individual in question. Our initial attempts to study its technology directly met with mixed results, but once we were able to grasp the context of the genetic engineering, we were inspired to explore new opportunities to improve ourselves."

"Which led to you using animals as test subject?" Turlough asked.

"Naturally," Nicarlet inclined his head. "We couldn't risk the consequences of such radical procedures on sentient beings."

"I see," the Doctor said, giving the Drationan that rare look of cold contempt that Turlough always regretted inspiring from his friend.

"What was truly amazing was the scale of the changes we were able to create," Nicarlet continued nonchalantly. "Their ability to fly was significant all on its own, and we had always intended to enhance their strength and endurance, but their unique range of projectile weaponry was the true achievement. So many different types of flame, to say nothing of the cases where they possessed poison or rock as weapons…"

"And that wasn't enough for you?" Ruffnut asked. "You could blow up anything-"

"But it was still fundamentally unpredictable," Nicarlet cut her off. "What you have come to call dragons needed extensive breeding if they were going to do anything more than blow up as soon as they tried to use their shots, to say nothing of their ability to fly being limited and unpredictable. We had a few key successes with the Alpha dragons as we devoted so much time to ensuring their own superiority, but even they would take time to grow into their powers, so we concluded that it would be best to leave their eggs somewhere out of the way to grow and develop on their own. We were able to interface with the ship to express what we were looking for, and eventually… well, here we are."

"Interface with it?" the Doctor asked, before the meaning struck him. "Of course, this ship has more knowledge than you were expecting, correct?"

"Which meant you couldn't be sure what you were looking for on your own…" Turlough smiled slightly at the Drationan.

"We understand that this ship possesses a wide database with information on a range of locations, but we have… experienced trouble accessing it in depth," Nicarlet acknowledged with a bitter edge to his voice. "The best solution we have found so far is to connect it to one of the mental amplifiers and project a general idea of what we seek into the ship's database, and subsequently 'trust' the ship to take us somewhere suitable. We were able to instruct the ship to find a suitable habitat for our creations, as an isolated spot with a primitive people who could not put that same plan into action against us, but we could not get it to give us a clear list of options in return; we were brought to this place, and we had to accept it."

"You… told your ship… what you were looking for?" Fishlegs asked uncertainly.

"I… think I get that," Hiccup nodded tentatively before he glanced over at Fishlegs. "Like how you used cards to instruct Iggy what you wanted him to fetch, maybe? I mean, you couldn't just tell him what you wanted him to bring you, but he recognised the objects; it's just that he'd only go for Alvin's sword because Alvin had it out already, something like that…"

"A fair analogy for your technological ability," Nicarlet nodded at the two Vikings, an edge of grudging admiration in his tone.

"But if you just had this ship, how did you get those fighters we encountered?" Turlough asked.

"We spent some time reverse-engineering the engines in particular to adapt them to smaller vehicles," the Drationan shrugged. "We still have some fine details to make them a proper fleet, and the initial weapons are poor substitutes for what the main ship would have been capable of, but with the dragons for additional firepower we shall have other options available soon enough."

"Reverse-engineer?" Ruffnut asked.

"Compare it to that… Dragonfly suit Hiccup told me about," the Doctor explained with a brief smile. "Just as he has been able to work out how to fly by studying dragons, the Drationans have been able to create their fighters by studying this ship and essentially working out how to copy it."

"You can fly?" Nicarlet looked at Hiccup in surprise.

"It's just a few bits of leather acting as basic wings; it's not like I can do… well, whatever you're doing with this stuff," Hiccup said, waving his hand at their surroundings before focusing his gaze back on Nicarlet. "OK, so you made those little ships by copying the big one and you're trying to get the dragons for firepower, but where does the Dragon Eye fit into all this?"

"Dragon Eye?"

"What we call the device that uses these," Hiccup clarified, reaching carefully into the pocket of his jacket to take out one of the lenses that he'd taken to keeping on him at all times.

"Ah," Nicarlet said, nodding in understanding, even as he seemed to grin around his tusks. "To deal with the obvious, those lenses are made of a psychically-sensitive metal that was found on our world, with each lens specifically attuned to each type of dragon."

"Like I thought," the Doctor nodded, drawing Nicarlet's attention back to him as Hiccup slipped the lens back into his pocket.

"Psychic metal?" Ruffnut looked curiously at the Doctor. "Like that stuff you told us about those… crystal things on the net?"

"Precisely," the Doctor smiled at the female twin, before turning his head to address the rest of the Riders. "As I previously speculated, the lenses are likely able to update themselves as the dragons develop, ensuring that whoever holds the lenses are provided with the most detailed information possible about the dragons they were designed to monitor."

"So… you're saying that the Dragon Eye lenses… change themselves?" Hiccup looked curiously at the Doctor. "Like… as the dragons change, the lenses write themselves?"

"Most likely," the Doctor nodded. "As each dragon recorded on the lenses changes and moves around the island archipelago, the lenses record the information over time… which would be the reason you created them in the first place, I assume?"

"Precisely," Nicarlet smiled.

"How did you encode them to respond to each dragon?"

"As you have doubtless observed, each lenses relates to a particular breed of dragon; the water-dwellers, the rock-eaters, and so on. To attune them properly, we catalysed each lens by exposing them to the energies used to amalgamate the original genetic strands for each dragon, filtered through a sample of the original raw genetic material, and followed it up by having our best mind-masters encode the existing information on each lens as a starting template." He shrugged. "It obviously has the disadvantage that the material is only available through the illumination provided by the various dragons, but collecting the initial specimens is a simple enough matter."

"And the information remains up-to-date?" the Doctor asked, curious despite himself. "You don't need to do anything to the lenses themselves to make sure they record anything?"

"Like the Sazou of our cousins, the lenses have a limited awareness even when nobody has issued them commands directly."

"So… you came here to reclaim the lenses?"

"As with everything they had recorded on them," Nicarlet affirmed. "And the dragons, but I would assume that goes without saying."

"But why do that?" Snotlout asked, before Hiccup could ask a question himself. "If you wanted to learn about the dragons, if you really did create them and the lenses you've probably already got the basics; you could just go out and look-"

"Which would take considerable time, even assuming that everything had gone as planned and the dragons had confined themselves to a particular part of this island," Nicarlet smiled. "The… Dragon Eye, as you call it, provides an efficient means of gathering information on our creations, allowing us to simply retrieve the lenses and gain all necessary information on them in a few simple moves. Thanks to the Eye, we shall receive all the necessary information about how our creations have evolved, without the tedium of having to remain and keep track of such details by ourselves."

"Uh… the Eye helps you keep track of the dragons?" Tuffnut asked, the other Riders looking curiously at the Doctor. "How does that work?"

"Basically the Dragon Eye lenses are keeping an eye on the dragons as they grow and change over time," the Doctor explained, even as he kept a careful eye on the Drationan. "The Drationans started them off, but they couldn't predict how the dragons would change afterwards; as he said, the psychic nature of the lenses meant that they could keep track of how the dragons changed over time, without the Drationans actually needing to be here to do the work themselves."

"That's… OK, it's confusing, but that seems like a bit of a cheat," Hiccup looked over at the Drationan Alpha.

"There's nothing wrong with taking a shortcut in dealing with a difficult situation," Nicarlet smiled. "We get all the necessary information to confirm how our creations have progressed, and obtain the necessary information to ensure our own conquest of this world as the first step in our new army."

"Actually, there is a great deal wrong with that scenario," the Doctor countered. "If nothing else, we all have serious objections to the idea of enslaving other creatures to use as tools of war-"

"And you don't use these dragons to fight your enemies on your behalf?"

"We 'use' our dragons to help protect other dragons from people like you; none of them have to stay with us," Hiccup said indignantly. "You'd take away their choice-!"

"You talk to me of choice when your own dragon cannot even fly without you?"

"I didn't maim Toothless to control him; I just… look, the injury helped me train him in the first place-"

"One last question, if you wouldn't mind indulging my curiosity," the Doctor put in, not wanting Hiccup to get caught up in that kind of debate with someone who he doubted would ever understand Hiccup's bond with his dragon. "Considering everything I've seen, what exactly is your relationship to the Draconians?"

"Ah, the residents of our sister world," Nicarlet smiled, even as his eyes briefly widened as he looked thoughtfully at the Doctor. "They have been observed, and they are certainly formidable fighters even without our leg-up, but frankly, their focus on honourable combat is… boring."

"Boring?" Hiccup looked at Nicarlet in outrage.

"Where is the point in waiting for your enemy to engage you?" Nicarlet shrugged, even as the other Vikings shot him a cool glare. "Victory alone is all that matters; our Draconian brethren may prefer 'honourable combat', but frankly the true style comes in dispatching your enemies before they can fight back, not putting yourself at risk in the name of 'fair play'."

"An attitude that makes it too easy to resort to war to make your point and only works as long as you're certain of remaining the 'top dog'," the Doctor looked contemptuously at Nicarlet. "If there is no risk in war, than you miss the whole point of it-"

"Which is a matter that I am sure others may be happy to debate, but I am not one of them," Nicarlet cut the Doctor off, his indulgent smile shifting to a cool glare as he looked at the Riders. "In any case, now that I have satisfied your curiosity, I assume you will be more receptive to answering my own queries?"

"When we know you'll be torturing and enslaving dragons?" Fishlegs glared at Nicarlet. "Do you really think we're going to help you?"

"One fascinating thing about thought-controlled technology is that it's remarkably easy to push someone to their limits," Nicarlet said with a satisfied smirk as he studied the surrounding Riders. "Of course, we're still working out the practical applications when dealing with organic minds rather than computers, but that's the advantage of having so many potential test subjects…"