15 It’s a Long Way to America

15. IT'S A LONG WAY TO AMERICA Now follows the part of the story in which Hiccup travelled across the Great West Ocean.* It would take far too long to tell you what happened every minute, every hour, every day. Thousands and thousands of miles the Great Ship travelled, the puffing fiery furnace sending them skimming across the water far quicker than sails alone. Thousands and thousands of miles across the Ocean, sometimes in sunshine and glass-flat sea and windless skies, sometimes in gales and hurricanes and driving rain, surging up and down on the back of the white- topped waves as if they were aboard a great galloping horse. Travelling across the Great West Ocean is a VERY long way indeed. It is indeed such a long way, it seemed to Hiccup to be like stepping off the edge of the World and into Forever. And through wind and sun and frost and rain, this Sea-dragon followed the doomed ship, constant as a meteor orbiting the earth, just as if the ship were a planet that had its own particular moon, slowly and predictably circling it.

The Hysterics were still hale and hearty, wolfing down their smoked reindeer with gusto, and washing it down with a nice dose of bull's blood and strong cabbage BEER. They were in fine, violent spirits, joking with one another, and sometimes going too far, and so the whole deck erupted into fisticuffs, and Norbert had to break up the fights by storming into the centre of the trouble, whirring his axe above his head like the propeller of one of his mad inventions. The Hysterics sang all day and night long, of their sweethearts at home, of Jellybelly's bright eyes, and Grimhilda's magnificent chin, and fortunes to be made, and blood to be spilt, in the New World called America. And at night, as they slept, their dreaming minds drew maps of America and each map of this paradise-on-earth was drawn according to their own desires. To Nutjob it was a place of GOLD, where all his inventions worked like clockwork, and he could rule on a golden throne with a golden crown on his head and a golden axe in one hand. To lazy little Toothless, it would be a land of FOOD, with small furry animals in such abundance that you barely had to raise a claw to catch them.

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You just opened up your little tooth-free jaws, and they elbowed each other out of the way to crowd down your throat, and troop downwards, squeaking, into your fat little stomach. To Fishlegs, it was a world where nobody tried to make you play Bashyball. To Camicazi, it was a land full of sword-fights, and kidnaps, and mad, hairy opponents to burgle and tease. And as for Hiccup… Why, strange to tell, Hiccup's map of America looked a lot like Berk. Hiccup, Fishlegs and Camicazi often slept at night by the warmth of the ship's chimney, and then spent their days up in their treetop house at the top of the mast, or played upon the rigging, only coming down for Hiccup to read the ticking-thing, or to have a meal. As the ship puffed south, the weather grew warmer, and they could take off some of their stolen furs and hang them out on the crow's nest. The Sea-dragon followed them still. The creaking, clanking, shambolic little wreck of a Machine was held together by bits of old sea rope, and ancient twine. With every revolution of the pedals,

the trumpet-thingy seemed in trembling danger of falling off… …but by some miracle, the wheels still turned, and it hadn't fallen off… …yet. Every evening just at sundown, Norbert would summon Hiccup to his tent to read the ticking-thing. There he would be, pacing up and down on the rocking deck in front of his maps, all spread out on the bearskin tablecloth, and as the days went on he grew more and more impatient, clapping his great hands together, and muttering to himself, 'Nearly there now! Nearly there!' before Hiccup told him the reading for the day. Norbert wasn't a very patient man, and this waiting was killing him. He had a tiny replica of the American Dream 2, exquisitely made in every detail, but only about eight centimetres high. It had a real working sail, and the writing on the side was so tiny it looked like it had been drawn by a flea. Norbert used his axe to push this boat across the surface of his great map, according to Hiccup's reading of the ticking thing, so that he could see where they might be on the Great West Ocean. Every day it drew nearer and nearer to the great landfall Norbert had drawn on it and called

'AMERICA', until it was now, according to the map, only a day or two's sail away, and Norbert could barely contain his excitement. Hiccup was very uneasy. He remembered what Norbert had said about how they were only safe for as long as Norbert needed him to read the ticking- thing for him. Now they were so close to America, a nasty look came into Norbert's eye when it rested on Hiccup. Norbert had taken to polishing the dark side of his axe until it gleamed like ebony, whispering to it as if it were a precious pet: 'Not long now my darling… soon you shall be fed…' Hiccup did not like the sound of this at all, and he took the precaution of getting Camicazi to steal them back their weapons. He had a nasty feeling they were going to need them. So there was a great knot of anxiety in Hiccup's stomach. Especially as he watched the crew while they were having breakfast outside the Cooking Tent the next day. The Hysterics were in an excitable mood, singing their songs with great gusto: 'There's LAND ahead lads, LAND ahead, a LAND of milk and HONEY, 'We'll soon be off these rocking waves and rolling in the MONEY…'