7. Don't decorate a yard with bloody corpses

"A decorating service?" Hiccup asked with a raised brow as he heard his cousin spout his latest business venture.

"Yes, and with Halloween right around the corner I'll be raking in the money. I'm also offering a clean up service," Snotlout sniggered. Hiccup could already imagine it. If this was a cartoon there would be dollar signs in Snotlout's eyes.

"Well he does have a point there," Astrid muttered as she took a sip from her tea as they all sat in the living room. "You know how I loathe putting up decorations for holidays, it's a pain just thinking about the time it will take me to clean them up."

"That's only because each year you get tangled up in the tinsel Astrid," Hiccup deadpanned, causing Snotlout to guffaw.

Astrid shot both men a glare but then turned towards Snotlout again "And how are you going to advertise? It's not like you have a spur of the moment portfolio."

"Well, the twins have agreed that I can decorate their house this year," Snotlout stated, looking rather proud. "I'll start small and see if the decorations attract any of the overworked neighbours into hiring me also,"

Once Snotlout left Astrid turned to Hiccup and asked "The twins have a betting pool open, don't they?"

"Whatever do you mean Astrid?"

"Don't play innocent with me mister," she grumbled as she shut the front door. "There was a betting pool for Snotlout's cake business, his dog walking business, and the hedgehog farm. Also, what in Norns name was up with that one."

"Don't forget the rabbit cafe," Hiccup mumbled.

"AHA! So there is a pool!" she stated triumphantly.

"Fine, fine, the twins said that the buy-in is 20 dollars, with four to one odds that something blows up, nine to one odds something with electricity happens, and a hundred to one odds nothing happens." Hiccup recited. "Snotlout put money on the nothing happening one."

"He bet on himself?!" Astrid now raised a brow in confusion before thinking.

"Hey, he did win the bakery shop pool." Hiccup shrugged.

"That was only because Fishlegs got involved with that large mixer and you know it!" Astrid crossed her arms. "That shouldn't have counted."

The following day Snotlout arrived bright and early at the twins' place to decorate. He had on one of those handyman tool belts and Ruffnut, who was still clad in a tomato red bathrobe, answered the door while holding a steaming mug of coffee. She looked Snotlout up and down and then smirked behind her coffee mug before saying "Me likey, come in."

Ruffnut led Snotlout into the kitchen and poured him his own mug of coffee. The shorter man saw Tuffnut nearly facedown in his Cheerios, spoon almost slipping from his grip.

"Don't mind him, he's not a morning person." Ruffnut muttered before shouting "Tuffnut eat your cereal! We'll be late for school!"

"But I don't wanna!!!" Tuffnut whined. "Can't we just play hooky!"

"We're the teachers you dolt!" Ruffnut shot back.

"Oh, right," was all Tuffnut said before his head hit the marble counter of the kitchen island.

Ruffnut just groaned while Snotlout excused himself to get started decorating. He went back outside, leaving the cup of coffee on the wooden table on the front porch as he got his ladder from the pick-up truck. By the time the twins came out of the house, now dressed for work with Chicken under Tuffnut's arm, Snotlout had been stuffing hay into large black bin bags while grunting.

He barely heard the twins say goodbye as he reached for the duct tape so he could mold the bag into a human shape. More decorations came out, including carved pumpkins, some headstones, spiders and spider webs as well as a large collection of severed limbs and fake blood.

It was nearly noon when Snotlout was done. He stood back and admired his work. The twins' house looked like something out of a slasher movie. On the roof of the front porch lay a mannequin facedown. It wore generic clothing, i.e. a button up shirt and khakis. There was also an axe buried in its back with realistic looking blood spatter around it. A bloody chainsaw was placed on the front porch next to the carved pumpkins that now also had blood spatter on them and the roses had been covered with the fake spider webs. The two human-shaped body bags Snotlout made were also resting near the front door. One slumped over slightly as if to suggest it was dragged.

There were two other mannequins on the lawn as well. One was on the walkway, laying face down with an anvil crushing its head. Snotlout took particular pride in that one as he had spent time painting the cardboard anvil to look realistic. The other mannequin lay dismembered next to a bloody tree stump with an axe embedded in it and there was a wheelbarrow with more blood and severed limbs nearby.

Snotlout, still covered in fake blood, was about to take some pictures to use as advertising when the shout of "FREEZE! PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR! THIS IS THE POLICE!"

Before Snotlout knew what was happening, he'd been tackled and cuffed. Later that night Hiccup was on the phone with the Tuffnut who was telling him all the details.

"Did Snotlout win?" Astrid asked as she put down her Sudoku book.

"No one won." Hiccup replied. "Snot would have won if the neighbours hadn't called the police on 'A maniac in a blood-covered leather apron dismembering bodies'..."

Astrid thought for a moment "You know... if it was so believable to the neighbours then your cousin might actually have a knack for this decorating thing. He gets into weird business ideas every time he has writers block."

"You don't think he'll make a book out of this do you?" Hiccup questioned.