I've Already Posted About This Before, But There Is Something So Intimate And Sweet About The Riders

I've already posted about this before, but there is something so intimate and sweet about the riders all living on the Edge for a year.

Before RTTE they've been slowly drifting apart. After the end of Riders and Defenders of Berk Hiccup is still leading searches to the farthest corners of the archipelago with his friends, looking for whatever dragons they haven't discovered yet. One by one they found jobs within the tribe and stopped coming on those expeditions. Eventually, even Astrid finds a different calling.

But when Dagur came back, Hiccup needed them to help stop him. And, somewhat reluctantly, they agreed. They planned on heading out and stopping him, not staying away from Berk. But then Dagur got away and they found the dragon eye.

Hiccup realizes that he's gonna have to spend some time away from Berk exploring and fighting Dagur, and he doesn't want to have to do it alone. And he doesn't have to.

They're all right there with him, just like they used to be in Riders and Defenders of Berk. They're a team again, but they're rusty and they need to learn how to work with each other and fight alongside each other like they used to.

When they find the Edge, it is an empty island. They design it together, and they build it on their own from the ground up.

They build their huts and the stables and the clubhouse from the ground up together, and they make the banners that hang in the common spaces together, and they carve the dragon figures that sit on top of each building together, and they paint the walls of the buildings and landing decks together. Those little details make Dragon's Edge their home.

Over the course of a little over a year, they become a family. They become familiar with everything about each other, from their major traits to the tiniest idiosyncrasies.

They know what time the others wake up, and their favorite foods and colors.

They make breakfast and dinner for each other and they make sure that the dragons are fed and taken care of.

They sleep in the clubhouse some nights just to be together.

They bandage each other's wounds and they always have someone to talk to when they feel lonely.

They know how to read each other's emotions, can tell when it's a bad day for someone, and know how to cheer them up.

They can tell the sounds of their footsteps apart from each other as they make their way down to the clubhouse in the morning.

They see each other before they are fully awake. When their hair is messy and their minds are still foggy.

They stay up late talking and forget to sleep.

They have an endless slew of little inside jokes and know each other's habits intrinsically.

They hear each other humming when they think no one can hear them and have memorized the others' laughs.

They get on each other's nerves and push each other's buttons in the way that only family can.

Because by the end of the year, that's exactly what they are.