The Gym didn't burn down but the cops were called and the Meathead intruders were arrested...along with Tuffnut who stole a cop's cap and ran off round the school grounds with it. The gang all caught up at Astrid's the next afternoon, the boys looking the worse for wear with various bruises and black eyes. But Fishlegs was astonishingly philosophical.

"You should have seen the other guys...no, seriously!" he told Astrid and Hiccup, who were snuggled on the couch, Astrid sitting on Hiccup's lap. "Half the year attacked them...including Roland. Boy, he can punch when he's mad!"

"Who knew?" Eret murmured, sitting back and allowing his eyes to drift to Tuff. Hiccup wrapped his arm around Astrid.

"Yeah...people never stop surprising you, right?" he added. Astrid snuggled back against him.

"And you pulled the fire alarm!" she grinned.

"The Gym was on fire!"

"Yay!" Tuff grinned. "My bad!" Astrid and Hiccup shared a look.

"You were right, Milady," he murmured. "Thorstons." Then Ingrid walked in, the phone in her hand.

"Sorry to break this up, guys...but I've a call for Hiccup," she said.The boy's green eyes widened.

"M-me?" he said, his face suddenly uncertain. He accepted the phone and gulped. "Hello?"

"Hiccup? It's Mala Tydon here. The Judge just called me. A case has just been withdrawn from court and the case starts tomorrow."

"The case? You-you mean...?" His faced blanched.

"Alvin Treacher's Trial," she confirmed. "It's not ideal. Can I come round to see you in...an hour? I need to talk you through what will be happening..."

"Sure...you know the address?" he said faintly and then nodded. "Okay, see you then." He handed the phone back to Ingrid.

"What is it, babe? You look like you've seen a ghost?" Astrid asked, rising to stand by him. He nodded.

"Al's Trial has been moved up. Starts tomorrow," he said tonelessly. Heather glanced at Astrid and nudged Fishlegs.

"It's time we were going anyway," she said. "I know DA Mala will contact us when she needs us, won't she?" Astrid nodded and murmured a few goodbyes. Hiccup forced himself to smile and nod as they left...but Astrid grasped his hands and stared into his ashen face.

"You okay?" she asked and he stared into her face, then shook his head.

"Not right now, not facing him," he admitted. "Mrs H-DA Mala is coming here to talk to me. Is that okay? I...um...can't really see her in my bedroom..."

"Use my study," Martin offered. Hiccup stared at him and then nodded.

"Um...thanks, Mr H," he said quietly. "Promise not to break anything..." Martin patted his shoulder.

"I know you won't...or I'll set my daughter on you!"

Mala Tydon arrived an hour later as promised, dressed in a dark suit even on Sunday and followed Hiccup into the study. Astrid watched the door close and looked at her parents: they looked as concerned as she felt.

"He's not okay," she murmured, feeling her mother wrap an arm around her and hug her. Martin stared thoughtfully at the door.

"It's likely he'll have to relive a lot of the abuse during the Trial," he murmured. "I doubt Treacher will go down without a fight. And he's done a lot of damage to that boy." Then he turned to his daughter. "And that damage lasts, Astrid. Just...be careful. He may have anger and trust issues..." She sighed.

"He does," she admitted. "And he recognises it as well. He doesn't want to be what Alvin made him. And he does want to be with me. I...trust him, Dad."

"Be patient with him," Ingrid added. "Now come and help me make the dinner." Martin stared at his wife and then his daughter and rolled his eyes.

"Really? Are you trying to kill me?" he asked as wife and daughter both huffed at him. "Hmm...I may go and join Toothless and Stormfly in the doghouse," he muttered.

oOo

It was almost two hours later when the DA left, declining a cup of coffee and smiling in apology for the disturbance of their Sunday. But Hiccup remained sitting in the study, his face expressionless and eyes glazed and Astrid glanced at her parents...then walked calmly into the study and perched on the desk by the boy.

"Hiccup?" she asked. He swallowed slowly then blinked, focussing on her.

"Astrid." The word was toneless.

"What did she say?" the girl asked gently. His hand cautiously curled around hers, warm fingers gently stroking her skin.

"He'll make me go through everything," he said hollowly. "He'll paint me as a troublemaker and a violent hooligan. He'll play on his position in the community and lack of witnesses."

"But there is the video from the Crematorium and all those witnesses...and Cami..."

"...saw me come back bleeding but not who did it," Hiccup groaned. Astrid winced and then a stray memory struck her.

"I did," she breathed. "That day Dagur and his gang beat you up, the first day you were homeless...he met you at the front of the school..." She paused and closed her eyes, seeing the scene-and she shuddered. "He slapped you twice, punched you and kicked you about three times before he got into his car and drove away."

Hiccup sagged and nodded. "Yeah. Stellar parenting as usual." He took a few breaths. "I'm not sure I can do this, Astrid. I'm not sure I can sit in the stand, with him glaring at me..."

"So you want him to win?" she asked softly. He shook his head and sighed.

"No...but I will literally have to go through everything. And losing Mom all over again..." She pulled him close and he rested his head against her chest, closing his eyes as she wrapped her arms around him. She tenderly kissed the top of my head.

"You know, my bad boy boyfriend wouldn't let Al best him," she murmured. "He'd do his damnedest to fix him once and for all. He'd snark and be sarcastic and defiant and he would make sure that bastard paid for what he did."

Hiccup looked up into her eyes and there was a surge of gratitude and love in his emerald gaze. "I don't deserve you," he said softly. She smiled gently.

"Nonsense," she told him. "I'm the lucky one...to have you!"

oOo

It was worse than anyone expected for the Berk press were very interested in the case of the respected Principal of Berk High, accused of abuse but the school's bad boy. Much was made of his record as an educator, the most successful Principal in Berk's history with an unblemished record and excellent testimonies from parents. Hiccup was painted as an ungrateful troublemaker, a deliberate vandal and criminal, almost as if he and his now-dead mother deliberately entrapped and abused his trust.

He stared at the floor as eyes and lenses focussed on him, sitting behind the DA with Astrid at his side. Martin and Ingrid sat on his other side, with Gobber on the row behind him. Alvin's lawyer played hard on Hiccup's appalling school record, his detentions and repeated suspensions from various subjects, his truancy and defiance. And then he felt Astrid squeeze his hand and lean against him. Defiantly, he lifted his chin and glared at the man.

And then DA Mala Tydon stepped up, her cool eyes glittering as she paced slowly across the court. The Jury all stared at her intently, wondering what she could say against such a well-respected person.

"This case is indeed a tragedy," she said calmly. "But the tragedy of not that Alvin Treacher has been wrongly accused of abusing a young man in his care: no, the tragedy is that this man has misled the people of Berk for so long when he is an abusive, manipulative, violent and avaricious man who should be kept as far from vulnerable children as possible."

There were murmurs in the court.

"Hiccup Haddock was a young boy, not even thirteen when his family was shattered," she said, walking slowly back and forth. "He lived with his loving parents, an only child. When his father went missing as his plane crashed, he was suddenly left to protect and provide for his ailing mother. Mrs Valka Haddock had two severe disabling and life-limiting conditions-which killed her in February this year. Hiccup was charged by his father to protect his Mom. But the banks refused to release Mr Stoick Haddock's estate as there was no body, leaving his wife and son penniless. Valka Haddock was unfit for work and her son was too young...but he tried, working in a local garage to provide some funds and spending all his savings and the money his father had begun to set aside as a college fund to keep the family home and pay for food and heating. But eventually, he had spent every penny they had and they lost their home."

Astrid felt him shiver and turn to her, burying his face in her shoulder. She began to understand what he had gone through and her heart shuddered in sorrow for him.

"By now, Hiccup had started High School and his Mom attended the Parents' Evening...and met the Principal, Alvin Treacher. It is certain around this time that their relationship began...and within a month, Valka and her son moved in. Her marriage to Stoick was annulled two weeks later on the grounds of abandonment...but as he was only missing, not legally dead, a divorce was issued. Valka married Alvin Treacher a week later. And it is likely that the abuse started not long after...because Hiccup was a boy whose father was missing, presumed dead. He didn't need or want someone stepping into his place. A caring man would accept this...but Alvin Treacher demanded obedience...and enforced his will."

She sighed.

"It is certain over a period of years that Hiccup was physically and emotionally abused and neglected," she told the Jury. "There were marked changes in his personality and his attainment at School. He entered High School as a straight A student...but he became rebellious and fell in with a bad crowd. He cut classes and truanted. He stopped working. All point to a poor home life...and a responsible and caring teacher would ask why a boy with an exemplary school record, who had maintained that for a year after his father died suddenly loses his way. But Alvin Treacher didn't: he didn't care. Hiccup was repeatedly suspended and put into detention. Over time, he was penalised in all classes, always the first one to be picked on, always hauled up for any transgression when other students were let off with a warning.

Hiccup has scars on his body, repeated burns from a cigar on both arms, There are scars across his back from being beaten. He was underweight and dressed in threadbare clothes. He possessed almost nothing-no phone, no computer, no games-just a sketch pad and pencil and a photograph of his parents. There was a lock on the outside of his bedroom door and bars on the window. But he remained at the home because his mother was there-his ailing, vulnerable mother whom he helped with her chores. Who ignored her own son being slapped and beaten before her. He was finally thrown out of his home on October 22nd and told not to come back. He was seventeen at the time and penniless. This was the Principal of the High School throwing a boy out into the cold Berkian night without a place to go.

I shall present testimony from doctors who can characterise the abuse, psychologists who can explain the changes in the boy's behaviour, witnesses of abuse and most damning, testimony of Alvin Treacher's behaviour at his wife's funeral where he attacked the boy and his craven attempt to steal Hiccup's inheritance, revealing finally his true motives for marrying Valka Treacher in such a hurry. Finally-and most damningly-I shall present the testimony of the nurses who cared for Valka at her end, of how Treacher tried to have the son she summoned to her death bed chased away and how he threatened his dying wife for calling her only child to be with her at her end. He then left her grieving son to pay her hospital bills and arrange her cremation. He refused to answer any phone calls and missed the service for her funeral.

Alvin Treacher is a loathsome and despicable human being who married a desperate and vulnerable woman with his eyes on her missing husband's inheritance. He abused and neglected her son, casting him out to starve in the Berk winter. Only the kindness of a fellow student spared him from freezing." Mala turned to glare at Alvin. "He needs to be locked away for his crimes."

Alvin glared back to her and sneered "RUBBISH!"