SIX:

There were crowds lining the streets of Berk as the remaining soldiers of the Berkian regiment returned home, proudly wearing their uniforms as they marched through the Plaza. General Stoick Haddock led his men, accompanied by his closest friend and supporter, Major Gordon 'Gobber' Belcher, as they tramped down until they pulled to a halt in front of the Great Hall.

"RIGHT TURN!" Gobber yelled. "STAND AT....EASE!"

In a final flourish, the men pulled a perfect halt and turned to face the people of Berk. Stoick 'the Vast'-General, patriot and father-turned to look at his people. His family had helped run the town for centuries and he felt a responsibility to the people of Berk. There were men in the ranks, wounded in body and mind who would never be the men they were before and they would need taking care of-not by a country with no welfare or system to help them but by the man who had asked them to follow him into battle. Stoick would never shirk his duties.

"People of Berk, the War is over," he announced, his voice booming across the crowd. "Four years ago, we marched out of Berk, filled with optimism and not a little arrogance, imagining the enemy would just roll over. He did not-and we paid for it with our blood. Even in the last days of the war, the enemy fought furiously for every yard of ground as he retreated, still taking a horrible toll on our numbers. But we endured and in the end, peace was won."

There was silence: no cheering or clapping because everyone was weary. Weary of loss, weary of sadness, weary of bad news and shortages and men going and never returning.

"The men are home. To you who have returned, I say-savour what has been granted you. A second life after the trenches, a chance to move on in the knowledge that you will honour those who will not. Any man who needs work or who needs help should come to me and I will see that he has a place in one of my businesses and that his family are provided for." There were a few ragged cheers then. "And to those of you who are here, with no one to return, I thank you for your sacrifice, knowing that words are hollow and meaningless. So I make the same offer. I will help support you and your families in honour of those who did not come home."

He paused and blinked, his right arm rising in a stiff but heartfelt salute as he moved to 'attention' for one last time..

"DISMISSED!"

And then the ranks broke, the men running for the families they had sought out while standing listening to the speech. All around, there were the squeals and gasps of reunion, kisses and hugs and overwhelming joy and relief.

Heather was being swung around and around by Fishlegs, her face buried in her neck and her body shaking with sobs of relief. Tears were streaming down her face as they kissed, his powerful arms wrapped around the women he loved and he had left a couple of days after marrying her.

"Did you miss me?" he asked her gently and kissed her softly. She nodded.

"You big meatlug," she smiled. "I have been waiting for you for over two years. Now I finally to get to take you home and be the wife you deserve!"

"Oh thank Thor," Fishlegs sighed. "That makes it all worthwhile..."

Standing back, the wriggling shape of Valerie in her arms, Astrid watched her friend with an unreadable expression on her face. In reality, absolute jealousy was consuming her, that Heather had her husband back...at the cost of Astrid's. And though she had her daughter, she wanted her Hiccup. So she watched for a long moment, then turned away. She almost ran into Snotlout, who was standing to one side, his face carefully expressionless. She frowned.

"You okay, Snot?" Astrid asked, seeing the expression she had learned to recognise as him having a flashback to the trenches. Gently, she extended her hand and touched his shoulder. He jerked away, eyes frightened and body tensed until his vision cleared and he recognised her. Offering a wan smile by way of apology, he sighed.

"It's just...seeing them return...and so few faces I recognise," he murmured. "And I know I should be among them...if I wasn't such a coward..." She leaned close, her eyes locking on his.

"Simon Snotlout Jorgensen, listen to me," she said intensely. "For the very last time, you are not a coward. You fought at the front for two years until the wounds you sustained became too much. And whether the wounds are obvious physical wounds or other, less obvious hurts, they exist. You served. You did your bit. Now forgive yourself and walk me home. I can't be here: it's too painful..."

"ASTRID!"

She flinched at the booming voice of Stoick Haddock, stopping with a resigned expression as the General walked up. His eyes were gentle as he removed his cap and then smiled at her.

"How are you, lass?' he asked her gently and her eyes filled with pain.

"Coping," she said hollowly. "It was a mistake coming-but I came for Heather because she has been there for me all the way through." His eyes expressed his sympathy and guilt.

Should we tell Astrid? She really deserves tae know, Stoick...

We can't, Gobber. He's the shell of a human being. What can she do? She would want to take him home and that would be a burden I wouldn't wish on anyone. Let her think him lost because for now, he is. And if we can get him back, then Astrid can have her Hiccup once more.

I still think the lass should know. Even if she canna see him, she would know he was alive. Now...she's given up on him.

Please accept my judgement on this, Gobber. I am his father and I have to protect them both.

"Is this...Valerie?" His voice was soft and she suddenly realised that Stoick hadn't seen his granddaughter any more than Hiccup had seen his daughter. A proud smile lifted her lips as she moved to allow the huge man to bend forward and peer at the year old. He smiled, seeing her emerald eyes widen and the tufts of auburn hair poking out from under her knitted hat. "Thor, it's mini-Hiccup," he breathed as a chubby hand grabbed his beard and tugged. Valerie giggled.

"Oofie," she laughed and Astrid shook her head, bouncing her.

"No, it's not Toothless," she laughed. "It's GrandPoppa."

"Poppa," Valerie grinned, her two teeth visible. She grabbed at the beard once more and Stoick winced.

"She's definitely got the old Haddock grasp," he grunted. "Astrid...I will support you and Valerie as Hiccup is not here to do so. I know from Spitelout that the production of munitions will reduced drastically and though part of the factory will return to conventional engineering, Gobber will resume control since Hiccup is no longer around to do it and the female workers will no longer be required for the production line." She nodded and sighed.

"I guess things will slowly get back to normal," she admitted. "Whatever normal now is." He sighed and offered her his hand.

"Come to Dinner," he invited her. "You too, Snotlout. This is a time for family and friends and for being grateful for what we still have."

oOo

As Stoick predicted, the female workers were let go as the male workers returned to resume their jobs and part of Astrid once more resented that she went from being good enough to make the shells needed to win the war to suddenly being almost unemployable as a widow with a child. Stoick was as good as his word, supporting the woman and little girl as they got along with their lives.

Fishlegs returned to teaching at the Grammar School, apparently no different to how he was before the war, though there were moments when he stared out of the window into the blue sky and recalled his friends who hadn't returned. Snotlout helped run Berk Munitions and Engineering under the guidance of his father and assisted by Gobber, resurrecting some of Hiccup's designs and moving them forward to production. Heather, though, decided not to return to working the school: there was already a nurse in post so she applied for a post in one of the sanatoria that had sprung up to treat injured servicemen. Trained nurses were in short supply, so she was employed as soon as she could start and found herself cycling the two miles through the country lanes to the small country house that was the Merciful Freya Sanatorium.

The work was rewarding and Heather found she loved working with the injured men. Many had severe physical injuries, having lost limbs or eyes and were undergoing rehabilitation to enable them to function. But many more had severe emotional problems, raging from depression and shell shock to complete catatonia. These men required a lot of input and care, trying to make them feel human once more. The more severe cases required more extreme interventions to try to snap them out of their lethargy and Heather found she hated the idea of men being put through even more pain and distress to get them back to a semblance of who they had been before. So she looked after the men, with kindness and compassion and general brisk efficiency.

She usually worked on Ward One, looking after men with physical disabilities especially missing limbs and they responded well to the raven-haired nurse. But one cold and icy day in early March, she was pulled aside when she arrived and was asked to work on Ward Two, where there were men with mental problems as well-and being the good nurse and good team player that she was, Heather agreed. So she reported to the ward, took her instructions from Senior Staff Nurse Rose and headed for her side of the ward with a welcoming smile. And then she saw him almost immediately.

The man was sitting in a wheelchair, rake thin and bowed, his shaggy and untameable auburn hair flopping over his pale face, his hands grasping a photograph. His right foot was in a simple slipper and the left leg terminated at a bandaged stump. A Chinese green silk dressing gown was wrapped and belted tightly around his skinny frame and he didn't respond as she walked up to him. Frowning, she reached out and rested her hand on his, feeling warm flesh hardly move.

"I'm sorry...Astrid, I'm sorry..."

She froze...for she knew that voice. She shook her head. Impossible...

But she gently grasped his head between her hands and slowly lifted lifted his head back, revealing the familiar face, though hollow from lack of food and lack of hope, the emerald eyes dulled and desolate.

"I'm sorry..."

"Hiccup," Heather breathed, her eyes wide with shock. In her heart, she had resigned herself to losing both her brothers-blood and adopted-and to find him here, broken and abandoned, was beyond shocking. She glanced down at the dog-eared picture of Astrid and her newborn daughter and her eyes prickled with tears, realising what he had clung to as the last shred of his sanity. So she she did what any human wound do: she wrapped the broken man in a huge hug, cradling his head against her chest and holding him tight. And she rocked him, weeping, feeling him slowly-so slowly-nuzzle into her.

"H-Heather..." The broken voice was scratchy, hesitant and scared but she pulled back and looked down into the huge emerald eyes. "Is-is it you?" And though her cheeks were wet with tears, she nodded and forced herself to smile.

"Of course...brother," she told him and he blinked then nodded in slow motion.

"And...Astrid?" he whispered, his eyes shining with tears.

"She's well," she forced herself say. "She's waiting for you..."

"This isn't a dream?" he asked, his brow furrowing. Her heart clenched: he was clearly one of the worse cases, treated according to the prevailing wisdom of doctors that seemed excessively cruel to the woman who guessed what Hiccup needed was love and warmth and support to draw him back into the light from whatever hideous nightmare he had been drowning in. She shook her head.

"No, Hiccup," she said softly. "The War is over. You're home. You're safe." Slowly, he inclined his head and peered at the other broken men around him.

"Doesn't feel like home...or look particularly safe," he noted with a trace of sarcasm. She managed an astonished gasp, recognising her brother's typical response to any unfamiliar situation.

"You need to learn to walk again," she said softly. "And we have to get you stronger...because a puff of wind will blow you away." His mouth quirked very slightly.

"You know me...always a talking fishbone..." he murmured and curled up. "I can still see them," he murmured. "Please don't leave me, Heather. Don't leave me here..."

"Nurse Ingerman! Mr Grayson needs your attention!" The clipped voice of Senior Staff Nurse Rose had Heather looking up and then she looked back urgently at Hiccup, who was curling back in on himself.

"I'll be just over there, Hiccup," she hissed urgently. "Just there. You can see me, okay? Hang on-and then I can tell you all about Astrid..." He nodded.

"Astrid...I'm sorry..." he mumbled and closed his eyes.

"Nurse Ingerman!"

"Coming!" Heather said through her teeth and turned away, her blood boiling at the fact Hiccup was here-meaning someone knew he was alive-but was keeping it a secret from his devastated wife and fatherless daughter. Heather already guessed who it was-and she knew what she had to do about it.

oOo

Astrid noticed something was wrong when the Cenotaph was erected in the centre of the Plaza at the end of March and Hiccup's name wasn't on it. The names of PRIVATE T THORSTON, PRIVATE R THORSTON and PRIVATE D BAZERK were all listed but nowhere was Hiccup's name, either alphabetically or chronologically. And there were names there of Berkians both killed and missing in action. So she was furious and beyond hurt that her beloved was missed off the Memorial, devaluing his sacrifice once more. And all she could do was vent to Heather, raging and crying and railing at the utter unfairness of the world.

So it was with shock that she heard Heather's solution to her distress.

"Come with me to work," her friend had asked her. "You can wear my spare uniform. I really think it will help you." Astrid shook her head.

"I'm not a nurse and seeing injured and broken men isn't really going to help," she sighed but the other woman wasn't to be deterred.

"Astrid-I haven't asked for a favour ever," she said seriously. "But I have to insist you come with me tomorrow. Senior Staff and Sister will both be off so I am in charge of Ward Two-and I want you to come in. There is something you need to see."

"Heather..."

"Astrid-do you trust me?" the raven-haired woman had asked her and for a second, Astrid paused.

"Well, yes-but this is very crazy talk," she admitted.

"Then do this one thing for me," Heather said urgently. "And bring your wedding photograph."

"Now this really is..."

"Astrid. Please."

"Okay-but who's going to look after Valerie?"

"I'll ask Martha Ingerman. She'll be delighted since she claims she wants practice for when we have one of our own." Astrid smirked.

"Are you?" she asked and Heather shrugged.

"Not yet...but maybe soon," she said. "I'll pick you up at seven. Bring your bicycle."

"If this is some joke..." Astrid muttered.

"No joke. Seven. And bring the photo."

oOo

It was a drizzly morning and wind made cycling to the Sanatorium less than fun but the two woman finally pedalled up the long drive and racked their bikes. Then they walked in and Heather showed Astrid where to store her coat and then the way to go. Astrid looked very convincing, because she could always walk with confidence and she followed her friend straight onto the ward and without hesitation, to a bed at the far corner.

Astrid frowned, seeing a man curled up under a sheet, his messy hair flopped over his features, but Heather was already walking forward, grasping the man's skinny hand.

"Hello, Hiccup," she said and Astrid gaped as the man slowly lifted his head.

"H-Heather?" he asked roughly. "I-is it you?" The raven-haired woman nodded and smiled, grasping his hand.

"I've brought you a visitor," she said gently and moved aside as the man raised his head and the familiar emerald eyes came into view. He blinked and his eyes widened.

"A-Astrid?' he breathed. "It can't be...it must be another dream...Astrid's at home...far, far away..."

Frozen, unable to move, to speak, to even breathe, Astrid could only stare.

"No, it is Astrid," Heather argued gently, insistently pulling him up into a slumped sitting position. Astrid noted his left leg seemed shorter than the right under the sheets. "She's here, now. Astrid...please..."

"Hiccup?" The word was disbelieving, hesitant...but his head snapped up and his eyes widened.

"Astrid?" he breathed. "You-you're here?"

The paralysis left her and she lunged forward, throwing herself against him, arms hugging him against her, lips crashing into his before she buried her face in the crook of his neck, his scruffy stubble scratching her cheek. His arms wrapped tightly around her, feeling her solid and warm in his grasp once more. And then he closed his eyes.

"Milady," he breathed.

"My Hiccup," she breathed against his skin. "My poor Hiccup. What have they done to you?" He shivered and swallowed hard. She lifted her head and stared into his face, seeing the broken look in his eyes intensify.

"I-I can't say," he whispered. "It's cold and dark and so...frightening...and I-I will be sucked back there unless I apologise...it was my fault, I shouldn't have been there and..." She grasped his face between her hands and stared into his panicking eyes.

"Babe," she said sternly. "I'm here now. And I forgive you because you had to do it. You wouldn't be Hiccup if you didn't. And I am so, so proud of you because you saved Fishlegs and Gustav and the rest of the patrol...and we thought you were dead..."

"I was buried," he whispered. "There were bodies all around me and mud and I couldn't get out and all I could think of was you and finally...it all went black..."

"Stay with me, Hiccup," she said, her voice thick with tears at his desolate words. "You're here with me now. Stay in the light. Stay with me. We'll get through this...together..."

"I say! What are you doing with my patient?"

Both women snapped their heads round as Hiccup curled fearfully against Astrid-but the woman was fired up now, her supposedly-dead husband alive and in her arms and needing her as never before.

"Who are you?" she demanded in a cold voice.

"I don't like your tone of voice, nurse," an upper class accent sneered and she rose, her fists balled.

"I'm not a nurse," she growled. "I am his wife. And you have precisely ten seconds to explain why my husband is kept locked up here without my knowledge or you will need a surgeon to reattach the parts of you I will be cutting off. Is that clear?"

The young doctor backed up, his hazel eyes wide with shock and hands fiddling nervously with the buttons of his white coat. His job was to look after broken-minded men after the War, not deal with ferocious and very angry relatives...especially women. Women were definitely not in the job description.

"Wife?' he gabbled and stared as she brandished the wedding photograph of what was clearly the man in the bed and the ferocious blonde woman. "But his father said..." Astrid growled in her throat.

"Right," she snapped. "The General and I will be having words. Many of them loud. Now are you going to tell me why my husband is locked up in here, thin as a rake, not walking and still distressed and frightened almost five months after the damned war is over?"

"Well, modern medicine..."

"Be damned," Astrid snapped. "Get him some proper breakfast, I'll shave him and then we can start getting him back on his feet. Do you have any crutches?"

"Crutches?"

"Yes, crutches-you know wooden things you put under your arm to help you walk when part of your leg is missing?" The doctor stared at her in shock and Astrid shook her head. "Heather-are there any doctors here with the power of speech? Or common sense? Or is that too much to ask?" The raven-haired woman was covering her smile with her hand and she nodded.

"Doctor Findlay, the Superintendent, will be here in a few minutes and you can discuss Hiccup's care with him," she offered. Astrid pulled the nursing cap off her head and sat on the bed by her husband, taking his hand in hers.

"Good," she said. "Because this changes everything. We will be starting today and I will be here, every single day, to ensure that my husband gets better. Every day." The doctor paled. "Because I love him and promised I would always be there for him. There will always be a Hiccup and Astrid-and if that means I spend the rest of my life fixing him, then that's what we'll do." She stared into Hiccup's emerald eyes and saw a faint spark of hope there that hadn't been there earlier. "I love you, Hiccup. Come back to me." He very tentatively leaned forward and kissed her.

"Thank you," he whispered.

oOo

It was late May and the poppies were starting to bloom in the garden when Stoick and Gobber arrived at Astrid's house for lunch. It was a sunny day just starting to get warm and the men were shocked when Heather greeted them at the door. The appetising smells of a joint of lamb roasting were wafting through the house and Valerie was playing with Fishlegs in the Sitting Room, where he was demonstrating why he would make an excellent Dad. The General looked shocked.

"I thought Astrid was here," he murmured and Heather gave a bright smile.

"She just nipped out to collect something," she explained. "Sherry?"

"Prefer a mead," Gobber grumbled, ambling into the Sitting Room. "And how's meh favourite grandniece?" Fishlegs grinned.

"I think she's as stubborn as Astrid and Hiccup combined," he offered gently.

"Thor help us," Stoick muttered under this breath as he accepted a glass of mead and then settled on the couch, his eyes fixed on the child. She was almost the image of Hiccup, except she was a larger version-Hiccup had always been a runt until he finally sprouted at sixteen. But every time he saw her, he felt a pang of guilt that he was depriving the child of her father...though Hiccup was not in any state to act as a father to the child. He sighed. He was in the best place for him.

The growl of an engine sounded outside and a car pulled up. Heather scurried through, a smile on her face and she scooped Valerie into her arms, smiling at her husband as he levered his bulky frame to his feet, following her to the front door. "That will be Snotlout," Heather smiled. "He's very proud of his new car." Interested despite himself, Stoick rose and followed her out of the door-and then stopped, getting a huge shove from Gobber to get him out of the way so the two-limbed man could see what the fuss was about.

Snotlout was clambering out of his elegant burgundy painted Bentley, the headlamps gleaming in the summer sun, the leather upholstery spotless. Astrid was sitting smugly in the back, effortlessly climbing out from behind Snotlout's seat...but every eye was drawn by the tall, skinny shape in a slightly too-large suit with pressed shirt and green bow tie, a familiar trilby perched on top of messy auburn hair. Stoick's jaw dropped as Hiccup levered himself upright and out of the passenger seat and grabbed his stick, then limped very obviously round to grasp his wife's hand. There was a small smile on his pale face as he faced his family. Snotlout's smug smile was triumphant as he stood on his cousin's other side, folding his arms and staring at his Uncle.

"I have someone here who you need to meet," Heather said, walking forward and handing Valerie to her mother. Astrid smiled and then turned to her husband, lifting the eighteen month old up to look into her father's eyes.

"Dada!" she said immediately and reached out her hand to rest of his cheek. He started and his eyes teared up, breaths accelerating...but Astrid was with him and smiling and he raised a shaking hand to tenderly caress the soft cheek of the little girl.

"Hey, Valerie Rachel," he murmured. "It's good to finally meet you." He looked up. "How-how does she know me?" Astrid gave her most smug smile.

"Every day, my love, we say good morning to Dada-the photo of you in your uniform on the mantlepiece," she explained. "There was no way my daughter was not going to recognise her father when he came home. And I knew in my heart, you would come home-or I would wait for you until we met in Valhalla. You are the only one for me, the one true love of my life and these years without you have been agony." He leaned forward and pressed a tiny kiss on Val's forehead.

"For me too," he said in a soft voice as Astrid stared at her father in law.

"Oh, I found him," she told him unnecessarily. "And I enforced my rights as his wife and legal next of kin to get him properly treated, not rotting in that sanatorium you sent him to." She glared at the shocked Stoick. "I have done more with him in three months than you and your doctors did in the rest of the year since he was wounded." The General blushed.

"I-I only did what I thought was the best for him and you, lass," he stammered, wilting a little under her laser glare. She took an angry breath.

"I cannot thank you enough for finding him and bringing him home...but you should have told me the moment you knew he was alive!" she snapped at him. "I love Hiccup and I was half a person without him. And no matter how wounded and broken he was, I should have helped heal him. Instead, you let me grieve and think him lost. And I will forgive you...but maybe not today or even tomorrow." She took a deep breath. "But you are part of this family and we are all here for one another-even if you are massively stupid."

"Yeh deserved that," Gobber commented and Stoick rolled his eyes.

"Thank you, Gobber," Stoick replied ironically and then turned to the tall lean shape, watching him warily, still pressed close to his wife and child. "Son? Can you forgive me?"

Hiccup chewed his lip and his head dipped, but he took a deep breath and looked up again.

"I will," he said quietly. "Because you found me and brought me back here. But Astrid healed me. Just...ask, next time?" Astrid gasped and then pressed a kiss onto his cheek.

"Babe," she said sternly, "there isn't going to be a next time. Because I am never letting you go again..." He managed a slight smile.

"Scary wife," he murmured.

"And your scary wife says get in the house, babe, because lunch will be getting cold," she said and he wrapped his arm around her, leaning on her hard as they walked past the red poppies in the flowerbed and into his home, safe once more.

oOo

In time, Hiccup healed, though he was always prone to the occasional flashback and remained nervous around loud noises for the remainder of his life. He resumed working at Berk Munitions and Engineering and worked well with the new manager, his cousin Snotlout. He and Astrid went on to have two sons, Finn Dagur and Stoick Timothy, named in honour of his fallen friends. Heather and Fishlegs had twins, Darren and Angela, who among the naughtiest children in Berk while Snotlout married a young woman from out of town and had single daughter, Anna. Fishlegs remained at Berk Grammar and eventually became Headmaster, generally acknowledged as the best they had in the school's history. Heather gave up work when she had her children, though she campaigned for humane and personalised treatment for men still suffering from Shell Shock.

Every November the Eleventh, as well as celebrating their firstborn's birthday, the Haddocks were in the front row of the Armistice Day celebrations in Berk. No one was more happy than Hiccup when the poppy was adopted as the symbol of Remembrance, recalling the pressed flower he had sent to his wife from France as his promise to return to her arms. In return, her love had dragged him back from hopelessness and restored him to life and as a reminder of that promise, they always kept poppies growing in their garden for the remainder of their days.

The End.

A/N: Dedicated to all those who have fought and suffered for the cause of freedom and peace.

"Lest we forget..."