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[HTTYD] Hybrid: Test (theme 77)

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Hybrid: Test (theme 77) [rough draft], a DreamWorks' How to Train Your Dragon fanfic series by Raberba girl

List of themes by AngieChild, Variation 1 for the 100ThemesChallenge group on DeviantArt

 

A/N:  Continuation of "Tears."  (Finally.)

 

Again, even though the chapters are posted non-chronologically, they are listed in the correct order on my Wordpress fanfiction index.

 

o.o.o

 

Valka hated making her son bathe, because he always turned it into such an ordeal.  Yet she had to, because even though she'd been living out in the wilderness with dragons for years, she still had some standards, and Hiccup's tolerance for being dirty seemed to have no limit.

 

She had no idea what Hiccup had been doing while she slept, but whatever it was had involved more licking than usual and apparently some rolling around in the dirt.  Saliva, mostly likely Toothless's, had dried as a flaky film on Hiccup's skin, after having caught a layer of soil and bits of moss.  Hiccup looked like he hadn't bathed in half a year, and smelled very strongly of dragon.

 

Of course he protested when his mother started dragging him over to the tub, but there was no way she could let him run around like that.  "Mama NO!"

 

"You are filthy, Hiccup, we can't wait for Bath Day."

 

"No, no, no, no, belong to [Half Of Me], Toothless!  I belong to Toothless!  I belong to--!"

 

"Stop it, Hiccup!"  They struggled, at an impasse for a moment, then she managed to jerk him a couple more steps.  Toothless was crying, held captive by Cloudjumper.  "I've told you he can mark you, but this is too much, Hiccup!"

 

"MINE!  I am dragon, dragon dragon NOT HUMAN!!!"

 

She stopped, panting a little with exertion, straining to keep hold of Hiccup even though she couldn't move him farther.  As always, dragons were gathering around, watching with those unsettling aghast expressions.  (The king had once asked her if baths were a peculiar sort of human punishment for their misbehaving offspring.)

 

It was bad enough whenever she managed to get Hiccup to bathe himself.  The few times when she could only get her child clean by force, Hiccup would fight her until they were both exhausted, Toothless would grieve for the entire rest of the day, Ice Hunt would look like his heart was breaking, and the king would look solemn and confused.  Cloudjumper would hunch nearby, loyally defending his human but looking miserable and even ashamed in the meantime.

 

"Hiccup, please...please, I know you feel like you're a dragon, but you--"

 

"HALF OF ME!" he screamed.  "Half of me!!"

 

"WE KNOW!" she shouted back.  "Of course we know, how could we mistake it?!  I could scrub every last scent from your body, but you would still love each other, I'm NOT trying to hurt you, Hiccup!"

 

The king gave a commanding roar which Valka didn't understand, so perhaps it wasn't meant for her.  Valka was shocked when Hiccup went limp in her arms - though the alpha always watched unhappily, he had never interfered before.

 

Hiccup cried as if his heart was broken, but for the first time since he had been an infant, he let his mother bathe him without resistance.  His beaten despondency was difficult for her to watch.  She held up his arm and said softly, hoping to make him understand, "Hiccup, look at this.  What do you see?"

 

He shifted his head and sniffed instead.  "[Half Of Me] was close to me, [Half Of Me] loves me, me and [Half Of Me] are together--"

 

"The dirt, Hiccup.  Can you even see it?" she wondered helplessly.

 

He sniffed again.  "Burrow dirt...hiding, scared, sad, very much scared, angry...."

 

She blinked.  Hiccup and Toothless always hid in a certain burrow whenever they were especially upset and needed a good hiding place to recover.  "What happened, Hiccup?  What made you so upset?"

 

"Upset, scared....  I am dragon?!  I am human?!  I don't know I don't know I don't know!!  [Half Of Me] says 'You are my other half I love You,' is okay good comfort peace happy, Mama says 'You are bad scary foreigner, I dominate you I hurt you I make you nothing,' [Alpha] says 'Be human now [so you can be human when]--'"

 

"What?!"  Valka stared at him.  She wanted to protest, of course she never meant to accuse or insult or hurt her son - but dragons communicated not just with sound, they also used body language and expression and scent.  Perhaps she had been telling him all that without intending to.  "Hiccup, you know what's true.  I've told you so many times, you don't need a layer of saliva and dirt to prove that you love Toothless.  I love you, I would do anything for you, I've never licked you before in your life but you still know that I love you, don't you?!"

 

"Mama loves me," Hiccup whispered.  He shivered.  "Mama...loves me...."  He flinched.  "Mama dragon-say 'I am upset angry scared [frustrated],' Mama human-say 'I love you,' which is true, good?!  One is lie?!  No, not lie, is true, dragon-say is true and human-say is true, both of them are true, what?!  What?!  I don't understand, confused, scared!"  He looked up at the alpha and cried, "This human 'camouflage,' I VERY MUCH DON'T LIKE IT!!!"

 

"Practice," the king ordered.

 

Hiccup clung to his mother and shivered so much that she wondered if the water was too cold (it wasn't), but he didn't fight her.

 

He let her run a rag over his skin to scrub away the dirt, talking to himself almost constantly.  "Empty scared nothing foreign no, is true, I will say this human true, I am [half of that nightwing I love Dragonheart] Hiccup, I belong to this very good [alpha's] nest, live here home happy good, human mama human papa mate make me human baby is me but I am dragon too, human and dragon too, all very much dragon with [Half Of Me that I love] but human this ['camouflage'] human I go to human nest 'HELLO MY NAME IS HICCUP I AM HUMAN don't hurt me,' find this Eret that I like, [Half Of Me] far away I am SO SAD but hello Eret, hello I am Hiccup human, human you and me together play, go away find my [Half Of Me] that I love Hello [Half Of Me I love You I love You I love You, stay with me sorry stay with me I went away but I come back now hello I love You], all these things empty gone Mama taking them away but STILL HERE, listen to me I SAY IT NOW, I SAY IT so it's TRUE, very good [scared] smells are gone but TRUTH IS STILL HERE, I AM SAYING IT NOW."

 

As soon as they were released, Hiccup and Toothless ran to each other.  Terrified, Toothless started rubbing scent all over his erased other half, unable to stop himself from licking a bit as well, even though he knew how much Valka hated it when he licked her precious thing.  Hiccup tried to keep his arms clamped around the dragon's neck, licked him and even bit him a few times, then yelled up at the alpha, "I PRACTICED!!"

 

"Must practice more.  Later.  Now you can be dragon."

 

"Dragon, I am dragon," Hiccup hissed.

 

"Mine?!  Half Of Me?!" Toothless exclaimed, still desperate for reassurance.

 

"YES ALWAYS OF COURSE.  [You are Half Of Me, Toothless!]  These sounds I make, they mark You, they mark You so HUMANS know You belong to me!!"  Hiccup's eyes lit up as he finally reached the conscious realization.  "Smells are for dragons, sounds are for humans!!  MINE, this Half Of Me dragon that I very much love is MINE!"

 

Valka was a little afraid to approach him when he was so worked up, especially when she felt guilty for forcing a bath on him.  But he didn't run from her or hiss at her - his shoulders hunched warily, but to her surprise, he allowed her to get close and to touch him.  "Hiccup," she whispered.

 

"Mama can't make me nothing," he muttered, his eyes fixed on her and his arms fixed around Toothless's neck.  "Smells are gone but sounds are still here.  I make these sound-marks, this is ME and this is TOOTHLESS [Half Of Me], mine!"

 

She put her arms around him, and when he saw that she wasn't pulling him away, he cautiously let go of Toothless so he could hug her back.  "Oh, Hiccup...."  She burst into tears.  She held her son for a long time, and Cloudjumper curled around her as she wept.

 

After a while, Hiccup squirmed a little, then began to purr and nuzzle her and lick her cheek.  "Mama is very sad, Mama is crying, I comfort you Mama, don't be lonely, your other half that you love is here close to you, your precious thing that you love is here close to you, you are safe here in this good nest, it's okay, Mama."

 

"I know...oh, Hiccup...."  She kissed his temple.

 

"Bath makes Mama sad!" he said indignantly.  "Mama I am telling you something, don't make Hiccup do that horrible bath, you won't be sad anymore!"

 

Valka couldn't help a bark of laughter despite her tears.  "It's not...that isn't--"  She chuckled a little and tenderly stroked a lock of hair out of his face.  "I'm sad because I'm so afraid of losing you, Hiccup.  Even when you're right here in my arms, it seems like you're running farther and farther away from me."  'No matter how hard I try to remind you that you are human, it seems like all I ever do is push you into becoming more and more of a dragon.'  "I don't know if your father would even...."  She couldn't finish the thought.

 

"I find--  found, I found a frog.  I like it, I want it, holding it this interesting thing that I like, no, it wants to get away from me, no stop that, stay here frog.  Frog is scared, frog tries to flee, I will hold this frog and keep it here close to me!  Frog is not moving anymore, insides are [slimy] all over my hands, frog is dead.  I like this very interesting thing a lot so it's dead now.  Bad Hiccup.  I must let this frog flee instead; I will play and be happy, frog will flee and be safe.  Hiccup is not hurt and frog is not hurt.  I wish I let frog flee away and be safe, but I want to play with it and hold this interesting thing, so it's dead now.  Boring, not fun anymore not interesting anymore."

 

Valka felt herself trembling as she listened to her son's story about losing forever a thing he had wanted to keep, losing it by trying to keep it.  When Hiccup wandered away with Toothless, she didn't have the strength to call him back.  No matter how much she tried to tell herself that Hiccup had misunderstood, or that she had misunderstood whatever he was trying to say, she couldn't make herself believe it.

 

o.o.o

 

Author's Notes:  This is the chapter that made me decide to use underlining for dialogue emphasis rather than italics. X'D  If you're on AO3 or DevArt, please give me some feedback on this.  (I think it's less confusing than when I was still using italics for emphasis, but I'd like to know if readers agree or not.)

Apparently FFN doesn't strip out all underlined formatting, but it does do it randomly, I'm not sure why.  I long ago stopped bothering to fix FFN's stupid mistakes, so if you want to read this fic with proper formatting, please read it on my other sites.

 

When I was first planning out Hybrid, it bothered me how much Valka was struggling as a parent.  I'm used to her appearing in other fanfiction (even my own) as cool and impressive, and warm/motherly/affectionate, etc.  Eventually, though, I decided that maybe it wasn't a flaw in my portrayal at all, maybe it actually has a kind of symmetry with the canon situation.  I like the idea that Valka as the single parent might struggle just as much as Stoick did in canon, that Hiccup really did need both of his parents to balance each other out and raise him ideally.  (And that Hiccup is stubborn and resistant to authority no matter which parent is the one raising him. XD)

 

Valka had a lot of legitimate-sounding reasons for staying away from Berk as long as she could, but I think the real reason she essentially abandoned her family and responsibilities was fear.  There were various issues she was afraid of and didn't want to face.  Decisions made out of fear are usually regretted, so I guess it's a good thing after all that she's not a perfect mother in this alternate scenario.  It probably would have been thematically unsound if she had run away from home and then proved herself right by producing a perfect child able to function easily in both worlds. *sweatdrop*

 

I've had this vignette written since the last time I updated (18 June 2015), but I totally forgot about it until now, almost five months later. *sweatdrop*  I recently also finished another vignette, so I'll update with that sometime soon, but I don't know how things will go after that.  My constantly distracted muse is into different stories now, and Hybrid-Hiccup is difficult for me to write!! X'D  By the time I find enough time to re-read enough of Hybrid to remember how to do his speaking style, I've often run out of time to actually draft anything, and the story flow isn't very good with this fic, anyway.

 

And this kid never cooperates, uuugghhhh.  Often, during my general writing process, I will "draft" out scenes in my imagination first, then hopefully find time to write them down before I forget them.  USUALLY, the written drafts match pretty closely with the imagined drafts, and any changes are usually refinements.  With Hybrid, however, Hiccup very often does stuff in the imagination-drafts but then does completely different stuff in the written drafts, so I'm constantly having to alter the story to accommodate him. X''''D  It's as if feral-Hiccup, who often changes his mind and enjoys pranking me, is a different character than fully-human-Hiccup, who is a total sweetheart and very cooperative. ^^;;;;

 

Complete:  15/100

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Komori-Moon's avatar
I think the underline works for emphasis, not that my thoughts matters after so long though .