Fanfic / The Long Road (2015)

The Long Road, by fanfiction.net author Dire Kumori, is a Rise of the Guardians and How to Train Your Dragon crossover first published in January of 2015 and not to be confused with Drakthul's Dragon Ball fanfic of the same name. The story can also be found here on Archive of Our Own.

When a distress call from Father Time turns out to be a trap set by Pitch, Jack ends up lost in a time before the Guardians with only Baby Tooth at his side. The pair are lucky enough to be found by a group of (somewhat) sympathetic teenagers whom they quickly befriend, and even though he is effectively stuck, Jack finds he doesn't mind taking the long road back to the present.

The story went dormant after 2016 with a quiet edit in 2019 before becoming active again in September of 2021. It is now in the process of being rewritten, with individual altered chapters being swapped with their older versions as each is completed.

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Tropes Appearing in The Long Road:

A-L

• All Love Is Unrequited: So far, anyways. See Love Dodecahedron for details on just how complicated the background relationship drama is turning out to be.

• Alternate Timeline: The story acts as one to the events of the TV series. Word of God explains the Canon Welding of the crossover by setting both series within the same world—the difference is that Jack's presence allows the Vikings to be aware of the more supernatural elements around them. Thus, Jack's presence is the direct and indirect cause of all deviations from canon events; were he not there, the events would have unfolded as they did in the show.

• Ambiguous Situation: One has been noticably created with Jack's characterization, due to the Canon Welding of the film and book series. Despite the author of the Guardians of Childhood series, William Joyce, claiming that both stories are part of the same fictional universe, the book and film seem to operate on slightly different characterizations of Jack. The differences include things like backstory, relationships with other immortals, and a far more extensive list of powers than were on display in the film. Because Long Road!Jack seems closer to the film characterization and has so far not even mentioned these book-canon facts or powers, the fact that The Long Road still incorporates the Guardians of Childhood character backstories into the movie characters makes it is difficult to discern which parts are true for Jack in The Long Road. It doesn't help that Jack's storytimes with the kids, which serves as the primary means of establishing what's been Canon Welded between the books and film, never involves any of Jack's own adventures (with one exception, and even then it was just the plot of the film)... meaning the information that Jack is least likely to confirm through storytelling is information specifically about himself (at least, until his secret is out).
  • The ambiguousness became much more important after it was revealed that Book!Jack is an amnesiac Nightlight, that the memories and identity he'd claimed weren't actually his, and that he was never really human. Again, how much of this will be incorporated into The Long Road is unknown, but it's worth noting that Hiccup's reaction to learning Jack is also a Guardian is to immediately and directly ask if Jack is Nightlight (Jack says no, but then, confirmed former Nightlight Book!Jack doesn't know about having once been Nightlight either, so it could go either way).
  • The 2019 edit subtly adds more book-canon details to Jack's character, such as his staff being named Twinetender (and referred to by Jack's nickname for it, "Twiner").

• An Ice Person: Jack, already a winter spirit by nature, takes this further when he creates a disguise for himself resembling a Frost Giant in order to more freely use his powers in battle without drawing attention to his faux-human identity. Every part of him is hidden under opaque layers of ice, including his clothes and his face, which becomes masked and featureless.

• Angel Unaware: Berk is hosting Jack, a weather-controlling immortal spirit, but none of the adults are aware of this and they somehow easily dismiss all of his very obviously abnormal characteristics. The only thing that comes up as strange to them is his dislike of boots and his ability to communicate with dragons, which, while temporarily causing a bit of internal conflict with Stoick, is seemingly dropped as a point of interest afterwards.

• Anger Born of Worry: Hiccup to Jack after the latter is shocked by a Seashocker, because he thinks Jack's too reckless.

• Awful Truth: Hiccup sees his sexual (and, though he's still in denial over it, clearly romantic) interest in Jack as this, and swears to keep it secret and never act upon it.

• Beautiful Dreamer: Hiccup figures out he has a crush on Jack when he realizes he's admiring Jack while he sleeps.

• Be Careful What You Wish For: Early on in chapter 3, Hiccup thinks about how he wants to keep the knowledge of Jack's existence to himself because he misses having secrets and had grown fond of the personal seclusion that comes with them during the time when Toothless was unknown to the village. He realizes how selfish this is, but he still misses it. Almost immediately he's burdened with several huge secrets: the growing presence of the magical immortal ice spirit within the village runs the risk of having the spirit hunted if exposed for what he is, Hiccup himself is subsequently more often than not getting into magical shenanigans as much as dragon shenanigans behind the adults' backs, and what is arguably Hiccup's biggest personal secret, the fact that he is growing increasingly romantically and sexually interested in said magical male best friend. The last one he's told no one, though he's so transparent Toothless has already figured it out and Astrid's pretty suspicious. Instead of giving him the romanticized personal seclusion that he wants, each secret really stresses him out.

• Berserk Button: Hiccup's over-protective sensibilities do not take kindly to threats against those he cares for. Though kept from acting on them due to his father's decisions, Hiccup's thoughts get homicidal when he believes there is no cure for the poison Mildew gave the dragons, and when Mildew turns his threats on Jack, Hiccup skips the thoughts and jumps straight to knocking Mildew flat and out.

• Betty and Veronica: Hiccup's the Archie to Astrid's Betty and Jack's Veronica. If Heather's interest in Jack is genuine, she's the Veronica to Hiccup's Betty for Jack's Archie.

• Big Brother Instinct: Jack's good relationship with children continues to be one of his defining traits: Jack quickly becomes a protective and playful big brother figure to all of the children of Berk, and they return his affection in equal measure.

• Big Damn Heroes: Jack's Stealth Hi/Bye Big Entrance inches from Alvin's face and subsequent effortless, toying Curb-Stomp Battle to distract from the rescue of Heather and Hiccup in Chapter 8 is probably the most badass moment so far in the fic.

• Both Sides Have a Point: Hiccup and Jack's small fight in chapter 11. Hiccup thinks Jack's reckless (true), and Jack thinks Hiccup's getting a bit too controlling (also true). Underlying the conflict is the fact that Hiccup has a massive crush on Jack and is thus crazy protective of him, and he feels that Jack's nonchalant risk-taking means that Jack doesn't care about how worried this makes Hiccup; likewise, Jack's been forced to be entirely self-reliant for 300 years and isn't familiar with the concept of others trying to care for him, so, oblivious to Hiccup's feelings, he takes offense at Hiccup trying to push seemingly irrational restrictions onto his behavior and then getting angry at Jack when Jack rejects them - he sees it as Hiccup not only not believing in Jack and Jack's capability to take care of himself, but usurping Jack's right to make his own decisions by demanding Jack follow his seemingly irrational orders. Jack apologizes when he realizes Hiccup was only doing this out of concern, but Hiccup still doesn't seem to fully understand why Jack was upset and internally denies that he himself did anything wrong.

• Butch Lesbian: Heavily implied with Camicazi, given her frequent flirting with Astrid.

• Butterfly of Doom: To avoid this hypothetical scenario, Jack has decided to keep the fact that he's from the future a secret.

• The Cameo: The Spirit of the Forest, a spirit who, in the Guardians of Childhood novels, turns those who try to steal the treasure upon her body to stone, appears briefly in the first chapter as the main cast of Guardians fly through her forest. As she waves to Jack, her raised palm drops gold coins.
  • Camicazi, from the original How To Train Your Dragon novels, appears in chapter 14, though she is somewhat changed: before, she was the heiress of the Amazon-like Bog Burglar Tribe; now she is a lone burglar on Breakneck Bog and the Bog Burglar Tribe does not seem to exist.
  • Besides showing Hiccup, the time machine plays scenes from Brave, Frozen, and Tangled. Later, an old woman heavily implied to be the Bear Witch shows up to deliver a magic compass.

• Can't Live with Them, Can't Live Without Them: Not in the sense that they dislike each other, but after Hiccup realizes he has a crush on Jack, he initially can't really function with him around and does everything he can to avoid him. After Jack goes missing, however, Hiccup quickly realizes that if there's one thing worse for his sanity and stability than having Jack around, it's not having him around and being unable to know if he's okay. The resolution of this particular internal conflict adds even more fuel to Hiccup's overprotective streak.

• Chronic Hero Syndrome: Hiccup feels the need to throw himself into dangerous situations to spare others despite those others being objectively better suited to handle the circumstances than he is. After said dangerous situations he tends to get very overprotective of those close to him, sometimes to the point of absurdity. It's implied to come from a combination of the growing expectations for him to be a leader in the community and his past social ostracism; whether he's willing to admit it or not, he simply doesn't trust anyone else to handle these conflicts in a way acceptable to him. This is heavily deconstructed: Hiccup's apparent lack of faith in others to handle themselves can lead to him acting like a Control Freak and puts significant strain his personal relationships, particularly with free-spirited Jack.

• Clingy Jealous Guy: Downplayed, as they're not frequent or acted on, but Hiccup has some hilariously catty thoughts while unaware of his developing crush, becoming subtly annoyed when others receive Jack's attention and affection and internally preening when he notices that Jack is more vulnerable and trusting with him than with the others. Later, when trying to suppress his crush by avoiding Jack backfires, Hiccup gets in the habit of going out of his way to spend as much time with Jack as possible out of paranoia that Jack will disappear again, including unnecessarily flying him everywhere. It's implied Hiccup isn't as taken with Heather as he was when she was introduced in canon because the close interactions she has with Jack get on his nerves.

• Closet Key: Jack is clearly Hiccup's, judging by the self-loathing Freak Out Hiccup has after realizing he's sexually attracted to him.

• Conveniently Precise Translation: Averted. Though Jack has the ability to understand all forms of language, words with implied, rather than direct, connotations don't translate well (for example, "Seiðmaðr" can be translated as "sorcerer," but the very idea of a man practicing magic is so heavily negatively gender-coded that it doesn't translate because "Seiðmaðr" and "sorcerer" communicate very different cultural attitudes, despite referring to the same literal thing). Also, nonhuman entities frequently communicate in other mediums that don't translate well into human speech, like the quasi-empathic mode of communication the Sandman and Flee the Moonbeam seem to have, or the scent-movement-sound hybrid language the dragons use. These communications of nonhuman mediums are rendered as sentence fragments in-story, making it difficult to tell the extent of Jack's abilities - but, his abilities do seem limited to the language medium used by the individual to whom he's talking (for example, there's no indication that he'd able to start speaking Atlantian around Hiccup and his friends, because despite his ability to understand and communicate seemlessly, a point is made in chapter 1 about how he can't actually speak Atlantian). These communication issues also show up in how Jack is referred to throughout the story: Jack is called "Icicle" by dragons because, since he can't often register the differences between the languages, he doesn't realize his name is a pun on the word Icicle in Norse.

• Cool Mask: Literally. Jack's Frost Giant mask is made of red wood at its base, but covered with layers of sharply patterned mostly-opaque ice, making his face look like a dark and featureless oval or, under a bright light, a purple one, atop an otherwise white, sharply crystaline body. Word of God says the mask and disguise were inspired by Princess Mononoke, a Shout-Out that is fitting for Jack, considering his book-canon title, the King of Wild Things.

• Crush Blush: Hiccup gets these quite frequently, especially after becoming self-aware about his attraction to Jack. He usually either turns his face away so others don't notice or hopes the environment around them stops people from seeing.

• Deliberate Values Dissonance: The fic goes out of its way to highlight some aspects of Viking culture that the series glosses over or doesn't represent completely. For example, the hypermasculinity the Berk Vikings have in canon is taken to its logical extreme, and no attempt is made to dodge the Double Standard set up by this.

• Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: Snotlout, having insisted that Jack is some kind of man-eating monster or giant or something, is not happy with how the rest of the Riders quickly accept Jack into their number, and can't believe Hiccup would willingly invite him.

• Double Standard: The Vikings' reasoning for why magic should only be performed by women is heavily implied to boil down to the idea that men using it is a dishonorable advantage, as their role in society should be achievable by the masculine ideal of pure strength or cleverness (especially in combat), while women need magic as a handicap because they're just not as competent as men—thus, guys who use magic are stigmatized as using an effeminate handicap and reneging on the honor of their gender. Regardless of if this implication is correct, according to Hiccup male magic users are usually (at best) alienated from society and (at worst) killed on sight. Hiccup seems to become aware of some of the problems as he explains this to Jack, but temporarily digs himself into a hole by trying to argue that the standards of mortal men don't apply to Jack because he isn't human (something else Jack is particularly sensitive about). Hiccup's babbled attempt to explain this cultural belief ends with him feeling increasingly petty and embarrassed; see Troubled Sympathetic Bigot further down the page.
  • Hiccup's overprotective tendencies mean that he often takes risks that he gets upset at others for taking.

• Eating the Eye Candy: Even before Hiccup became self-aware about his crush on Jack, he frequently internally admired things like his snowflake eyes, flawless skin, and brilliant "flirtatious" smile, often catching himself staring for too long. In more than one instance he ruminates on Jack's hands, which he notes to be flawless and softer than anyone else's that he's ever met.

• Erotic Dream: Attention is drawn to Hiccup having had them at the beginning of Chapter 10. They used to involve Astrid, and the fact that they don't anymore just adds to Hiccup's stress levels.

• Evil Me Scares Me: Hiccup seems to view his sexual interest in Jack as a symptom of some part of him actually being evil—wishing to actively harm Jack. Because the only knowledge he has on sexuality between men is rape used to violate and humiliate warriors in battle (set in the context of a hypermasculine culture where being associated with anything "feminine" is a slur), he equates his own sexual and romantic interest with the desire to sexually assault Jack. Since Hiccup views this as unmistakably cruel, he rejects this aspect of himself with fear and deep self-loathing, and he seems to only resist the temptation to avoid Jack altogether because Hiccup's ridiculously overprotective and the one thing Hiccup fears more than he himself hurting Jack is something else hurting Jack while he's not watching.

• Eye Scream: Alvin striking Heather's face with a hot weapon leaves her scarred and half-blind.

• Fairy Sexy: According Norse myths, Jack certainly fits the definition of an elf as he died and was reborn with supernatural abilities instead of normally passing to the hereafter. And Hiccup certainly describes him as beautiful and elegant.

• Falling into His Arms: How Hiccup and Jack initially met, after Jack fell out of the time portal in the sky and Hiccup flew up on Toothless to catch him. Despite the typically romantic nature of the trope and the eventual direction of their relationship, the actual meeting isn't romantic at all: Jack is out cold from being drugged by Pitch Black, and due to his unmoving state, lack of breath, and natural chill, the entire group assumes he's dead—so everyone on the scene is shocked, scared, sad, and/or mildly traumatized.

• Familiar: Baby Tooth is Jack's, having magically bonded with him prior to the story's start. Through the bond, Baby Tooth acquired snow magic from Jack, and Jack acquired the Gift of Tongues from her. They can also feel each other's emotions and thoughts, and occasionally Jack can see through Baby Tooth's eyes. It's not a master/servant relationship, but a close partnership—they consider each other their "other halves," and dialogue choice implies an emotional parallel between Jack's relationship with Baby Tooth and the Riders' relationships with their dragons.

• Fantastic Romance: It's hard to consider Jack and Hiccup's relationship normal when Jack's an immortal personification of Winter and the only reason they met is because the lord of darkness and nightmares threw him through a time machine.

• Free-Range Children: The Riders, of course. Justified thrice: by the fact that their parents are toughness-obsessed Vikings, by the fact that they're seen as approaching adulthood in the eyes of the community, and by the fact that they really don't want their parents knowing about most of what they're doing. Only the first justification works for the kids younger than them, though.

• Friend to All Children: Jack, of course. Though he's as friendly and playful as ever, he still manages to come across as a responsible caretaker figure when necessary; during times of crisis, he ensures their safety while still gently granting them as much comfort as possible. This talent with children is put in direct contrast with Astrid, who's good with the responsibility but not so much the comforting—however, all of the Riders develop more into these as time moves on and they gain more experience with the children who flock to Jack; by the aftermath of The Heather Report, all of the Riders have taken a much more active interest in the lives and wellbeing of the younger children in the village.

• Fish out of Water: Jack has issues with fitting in with human society, but not because of his inhumanity. Having lived as an invisible observer outside of civilization, Jack behaves as something of a Wild Child. He sees no reason to value money or shelter or new goods beyond the simple fun and pleasure he could have with such items (he doesn't even value them for practicality, because as an immortal being, he doesn't share a human's necessities to live), and so Jack doesn't understand the discomfort his new friends have with the idea that he owns nothing but his staff and the clothes on his back. And while Jack can at times be perceptive about others' situations, he has little awareness for the expectations their society may have for him. The differences in behavior between Jack and the Vikings is what often confuses each involved party the most.

• Fish out of Temporal Water: Pitch tossing Jack through Ombric's time machine lands him in the Viking era about a millennium in the past. Played With, as Jack adapts to the actual time difference fairly well—though the idea of waiting centuries to see everyone again makes him sad, it's not the time-based change in society that throws him off, but adapting to living in any human society again. Ignoring his nonhuman characteristics, he actually fits into the village quite well.

• Foil:
  • Astrid and Jack, in terms of their relationship with Berk's societal roles. Both are love interests for Hiccup, both take on protective leadership roles with the children of the village, and both are themselves inversions of Viking gender norms. Jack, though male, is gentle, nurturing, magical, fairly passive unless serious combat is strictly necessary (discounting his mischievous tendencies), and despite his wild streak, he's also fairly domestic in his skill at sewing and storytelling, and is even training in healing; from the perspective of Viking ideology towards gender roles, he's bizarrely feminine. Meanwhile, Astrid—while protective, and loved by children as a role model, leader, and protector—is more violence-oriented and quick to combat, with very little domestic or nurturing capabilities (can't cook, and is terrible at dealing with children outside of training); indeed, she fits their masculine ideal better than anyone else in the younger generation does. Jack is told his more "effeminate" qualities must be downplayed or he will likely face trouble and rejection from their society—but Astrid's "masculine" ones are openly and widely admired.
  • Perun to Jack, though we only briefly hear of Perun. Perun and Jack are described as exact opposites in powers and character traits: Perun's a sociopathic, solitary-based spirit who elementally is related to fire, lightning, and heat, while Jack is a highly sympathetic and empathic being rooted in the desire for company and communication and elementally related to wind, water, and the cold. If Perun really is Dagur and Dagur is kept consistent with his canon characterization, then Jack and Perun are both former mortals raised to immortality with romantically-toned aspects to their relationships with Hiccup.

• Gayngst: Hiccup is likely bi and, due to being a product of his culture and environment, occasionally crosses into Troubled Sympathetic Bigot territory—this was pretty much inevitable.

• Gendered Insult: Being a hypermasculine culture, most of the insults tossed around Viking society are this, like "Fuðflogi" (a sexually impotent elder man), "Soft Cat" (a man who is sexually uninterested in women) and especially "Argr" (a sexually submissive man)—all of which relate to the Vikings' ideas on masculine sexuality. Seiðmaðr zigzags this, because while what it means isn't necessarily a literal insult (it's a term for a male magician), it's still so intensely negatively gendered that it can get a man killed or exiled if labeled as such. All of this is Truth in Television.

• Gender-Restricted Ability: People seeing Jack using his magic powers are noticeably unsettled and disturbed as he's a boy, with a little kid having to hear several times that no, Jack isn't a woman but still able of sorcery. There's nothing biologically preventing a male to become a magic practicioner, but the cultural prejudice is so strong the male will be driven away (at best) or outright killed (at worst).

• The Generation Gap: The children and teens of Hiccup's generation seem to be developing a completely different set of beliefs and values from those of their parents', judging by their lack of faith in many of the adults' social and cultural mores. While rebellion is a bit more expected with Hiccup's age group, even Hiccup is surprised at how okay the younger kids are with deceiving their own parents to protect Jack. Seemingly every young child we see find out about Jack instantly (and independently) both accepts Jack for who he is and concludes that the adults cannot be trusted with such knowledge, each instantly realizing that their own parents would be a danger to him. It's not a good sign for the parents' relationships with their children that no one needed to tell their kids to keep their mouths shut.

• A God I Am Not: Jack knows he's a spirit and a guardian, of course, but he can't mentally accept the idea that anyone would consider him a god, so he dismisses the label right off the bat, and the rest of the gang, especially Hiccup, keep trying to guess at what kind of being Jack is and how he fits in with their mythology. Which briefly touches on a subtle background theme of the story—that divinity is semantics. While Jack does not consider himself a god, as a personification of winter itself, he's basically a god from the perspective of humans. By intervening to act against their enemies, he's even acting in the capacity of a protective deity to the people of Berk.
  • Inversely, Perun, Slavic god of war and storms, is mentioned as a fellow spirit, further emphasizing the idea that 'god' is just a label humans sometimes give to powerful spirits with whom they come into contact. The fact that Perun and Jack are both actually the same thing emphasizes the semantic nature of godhood within the story and contrasts with the Vikings' need to categorize Jack as one of many possible different beings in their belief system.

• Greeting Gesture Confusion: When he and Hiccup first introduce themselves, Jack extends his arm to shake Hiccup's hand. Hiccup, being a Viking, has absolutely no clue why Jack does this, and so Jack smoothly rescinds the arm and minimizes the awkwardness by continuing to talk. Later, Jack attempts to do a fist bump, and instead of backing out at Hiccup's confusion, he patiently waits until Hiccup figures out how to reciprocate. Baby Tooth eventually clues Hiccup in by miming the gesture with her fists.

• Guardian Entity: Jack, obviously, functions as this to children, but also seems to adopt the Riders and the Island of Berk as Protectorates as well.

• Hidden Depths: Hiccup notes that despite Jack's outward playful behavior, he can be far more somber and serious when they're in private. Though Jack's occasional internal melancholy saddens Hiccup to an extent, it also makes Hiccup feel "smug pride" at the fact that, of all their friends, Jack allows Hiccup alone access to his more vulnerable side. Hiccup himself has a surprisingly petulant and irrational side despite his outwardly rational and sarcastic demeanor: like with his father, his more illogical moments tend to go hand in hand with his overprotective ones.

• "Hell, Yes!" Moment: Chapter 8, end of the line, bottom of the ninth, Alvin's successfully ransomed Heather and her parents' lives to capture Hiccup, Heather's been slapped with a hot blade that blinds her eye, and she's collapsed on the ground, brokenly giving up... when suddenly, a familiar "sound like windchimes" comes over the wind, it slowly begins to snow, and Heather, despite the circumstances, smiles. And with a single "Boo," onto the scene arrives Jack Frost.

• Holier Than Thou: Hiccup's a socially-awkward teen who is now frequently being validated for his nonconformist opinions in the long run regardless of anyone's initial disagreement, which unfortunately seems to have spawned a bit of this in his personality. When Hiccup thinks he's right, he thinks he's right; his stubborn streak means he rarely if ever backs down or reconsiders and his self-awareness regarding his uncommon intelligence means he can get quite condescending about it without even realizing it. For example, when he and Jack have their Both Sides Have a Point argument in chapter 11, Hiccup is the only one of the two not to sincerely be sorry for their part of the conflict, only apologizing because he feels he "has to" in order to make peace with Jack, and his understanding of Jack's perspective of the conflict can be summed up in this quote: "In a way [Jack] was like a child resenting rules set by adults; it didn't matter that the rules were only meant to keep him safe, only that they stopped him from doing as he pleased." Rather than respecting Jack as an equal and trying to understand why Jack regarded Hiccup's stance as such a violation, Hiccup analogically places himself as the adult who must reign in an unruly child.

• Hypocrite: Hiccup becomes increasingly protective of Jack as his feelings develop, which makes this aspect of his character far more apparent. Frequently, he's willing to put himself into danger, but becomes upset if Jack takes similar risks—which naturally gets irrational to the point of ridiculous because Jack has (as far as anyone knows) Complete Immortality, meaning that between the two of them, Hiccup is perpetually more vulnerable and risking much more by taking on the dangerous stunts himself. Case in point, in Chapter 11, Hiccup gets mad at Jack for attempting to pet a unknown, apparently non-hostile dragon (actually a Seashocker) and accidentally getting shocked (through no apparent malicious intent on the dragon's part)—but in just the previous chapter, Hiccup attempted to do much worse with Dragon Nip to tame Nest Killer the Whispering Death, a dragon that, unlike the Seashocker, definitely was exhibiting hostility and had a history of aggression—and Hiccup, unlike Jack, is all too mortal, meaning that his insistence on taking risks himself is putting more people in danger than need be. Unfortunately, he's yet to self-reflect enough to fix this issue: though he acknowledges that he needs to apologize for getting mad at Jack, he still mentally insists he wasn't wrong and that Jack is being childish, and his decision to apologize is only motivated by a desire to keep the peace—a very condescending and self-righteous position.
  • In Chapter 13, Hiccup confronts Jack about how Jack worried everybody by not telling them where he was going when he left for Glacier Island. But Jack actually couldn't tell Hiccup where he was going—because Hiccup wasn't there to tell. Hiccup himself had left without telling Jack where he was going, or even that he was leaving at all, and had even taken the rest of the Riders with him; because Hiccup had taken basically everyone who was in-the-know about Jack being a spirit with him and deliberately left Jack on his own, Jack couldn't tell Hiccup or anyone else in their group that he needed to leave. At least this time Hiccup realizes he's being a hypocrite.
  • And he backslides briefly again in Chapter 14, where he insists he should go off alone to search for Trader Johann and wasn't intending on telling the others he was leaving. Jack briefly calls him out on the hypocrisy, directly mentioning Hiccup's frustration with Jack leaving without him for Glacier Island.

• Identical Stranger: Jack panics at the sight of Dagur as the guy strongly looks like Perun, an extremely violent fire spirit. It might be a subversion if Dagur actually ascends to become said spirit.

• Immortal Immaturity: Though Jack acknowledges the teens as temporally younger than him, he still mentally recognizes them as peers and equals, and acts completely on their level emotion-wise. It's again played-with, though, as despite his occasionally juvenile behavior, he occasionally shows his own kind of unique wisdom that seperates him as much from the children as his apparent physical age separates him from the adults.

• Immortality: Jack. Exactly which kind of immortality he has is a contested point between him and Hiccup, who doesn't want to risk Jack dying on him and doesn't consider immortality an excuse for him to throw himself into what Hiccup considers to be unnecessary risks seemingly without care.

• In Touch with His Feminine Side: As mentioned above under Foil, Jack is a frequent subverter of the Vikings' expected gender roles: Jack is a magic-wielding healer-in-training who enjoys looking after children and making things for them, all of which is considered the women's role and work. Interestingly, while some of Jack's traits might be considered slightly stereotypically feminine to the audience, they're more definitively feminine-coded within the story due to Viking gender norms, to the point where a young child claimed that Jack had to be "Odin or a woman, one or the other" because as far as the child was taught, men couldn't be like Jack and Odin was the only accepted exception to these gender norms. Of course, rather than Jack ascribing to any particular gender roles, traditional or otherwise, it's more accurate to say he just doesn't care. After all, what society considers normal has never had any affect on him before.

• Inconvenient Attraction: Hiccup's crush on Jack is something he feels to be morally disgusting and represses as best he can. He's failing miserably.

• Innocently Insensitive: Hiccup's amazing contortionist skills when it comes to putting his foot in his mouth occasionally crop up in regards to Jack's differences from Hiccup's norms. Within two minutes of introducing himself to Jack, Hiccup manages to insult Jack by briefly treating him like a petting zoo animal. Then there's the whole awkward "Seiðmaðr" talk...

• Irony: When the ball drops and Hiccup realizes Jack speaks about the Guardians inclusively, he quickly flits through the stories Jack's told him about the Guardians, picks a candidate for which one is most like Jack, and asks Jack directly... if he's actually Nightlight. Fans of the book franchise will know he's dead on, although Jack doesn't.
  • Similarly, when acting out the Guardians' stories that Jack has told them, the children repeatedly position Jack in the role of Nightlight because they believe he's perfect for it.

• Internalized Categorism: Hiccup, who is largely uninformed on the concept of homosexuality outside of homophobic slurs and the tendency for Viking raiders to "unman" their defeated enemies, "believes it would be impossible for a man to consent to having sex with another man" and interprets his sexual interest in Jack as a desire to sexually assault him. He subsequently spends quite a while alternating between having a nervous breakdown out of shame, horror, and guilt, and struggling to repress his interest, as he feels it's a wrong against his friend and considers his interest an actual threat to Jack.
  • In chapter 10, Jack smiles at Hiccup while attempting to comfort him over Toothless' erratic behavior and the threat of Nest Killer, and Hiccup imagines kissing him in that moment. He describes said moment as "horrifying."

• Invisible to Normals: Discussed and notably averted. Despite Jack's struggles to be seen in the modern era, he's yet to come across a person who can't see him in the Viking era. This is especially interesting considering the Fearlings were invisible until Jack told people about them, meaning Jack being visible is an exception, not a norm. Why that is has yet to be explained, but it's implied it may be because Jack's existence fits far better into the Vikings' preexisting beliefs than Fearlings.

• It May Help You on Your Quest: Heather receives a magical compass from the Bear Witch, supposedly ordered by Hiccup and intended for him. At first it seems only sporadically helpful and mostly useless, but Hiccup and Jack later work out that it responds only when the possessor desires to find something - this enables Heather to find her parents on Outcast Island, and Hiccup to find the lost gift his mother made him in Breakneck Bog.

• Leave the Two Lovebirds Alone: Tuffnut and Ruffnut snigger and lampshade this when Hiccup pulls Astrid aside to talk to her about Jack in the second chapter. It's notably and ironically the last time Hiccup's reaction implies he is romantically interested in Astrid; immediately after this, Hiccup formally introduces Jack into their social group and his feelings clearly begin to shift.

• Let's Get Dangerous!: Jack usually spends his time harmlessly cheering up children or playing with the members of the Dragon Academy, but he's still every bit the powerful, combat-talented immortal he ever was, and when push comes to shove, even the strongest human warriors are the weakest of amateurs in comparison. His fights with Alvin and Stoick each basically amount to a toying Curb-Stomp Battle, and it's made very obvious that Jack's holding back a lot. Even more impressive, he barely uses magic in these two one-on-one spars, using ice mostly just for his disguise and to imprison Alvin after he's defeated.

• Like Father, Like Son: Hiccup's crush ends up highlighting even more similarities between him and his father in adaptation than the canon versions of most episodes. They're both clever, incredibly stubborn, overprotective, socially-awkward leader-figures with a strong streak of hypocrisy when it comes to the people they love worrying them. They're sometimes incredibly difficult to reason with due to their stubborn insistence that they're right, and can delve into ignorantly self-righteous positions without realizing it. The two also seem to have similar tastes in romantic interests (sans differences in sexuality): Hiccup, despite his initial denial and subsequent self-loathing, has ever-growing romantic feelings for Jack, and Chapter 6 implies that Jack's personality and quirks strongly remind Stoick of Hiccup's mother, Valka, with enough regularity that Stoick often finds it painful to interact with him.

• Longing Look: One of the first signs that Hiccup has a crush is that he reoccuringly ends up staring at Jack for long periods of time before catching himself and becoming incredibly flustered.

• Love Dodecahedron: Subtle but starting to shape up. Snotlout (and Camicazi) frequently hit on Astrid, who likely has feelings for Hiccup, who used to reciprocate but now likes Jack, who himself is creeped out by the fact that Ruffnut keeps hitting on him and has some ambiguous moments with Heather. Interestingly, in one of the first meaningful diversions from the show's canon, Heather and Hiccup actually don't have much chemistry, largely because Hiccup is too busy being obliviously jealous over Heather's interactions with Jack. And the story hasn't even covered the events with the infamous homoeroticism between Dagur and Hiccup yet.

• Love Epiphany: Hiccup has a version of this trope in Chapter 9. He doesn't take it well.

• Love Makes You Crazy: Downplayed. While it never slips into outright instability, Hiccup's love and concern for Jack brings out his more irrational and hypocritical side.

M-Z

• The Masquerade: Played with. Berk has fantastical elements in their everyday lives, like dragons and the magic-weilding Gothi. However, an aspect of this is still going on in small scale, beginning when Hiccup decides to keep Jack's inhuman nature a secret from the rest of the tribe and convinces the rest of the riders to cooperate. What begins as keeping Jack a secret from the adult vikings who may try to harm him quickly expands into keeping the many more magical aspects of the world at play a secret from them—or at least, keeping the teens' involvement with them a secret. Justified as it's implied that part of the reason Hiccup so strongly advocates for secrecy is because, despite deeply loving and respecting his father, he still has trust issues over Stoick's initial reaction to Toothless, and doesn't want to chance something happening that can't be taken back. Hiccup's shown to have a number of learned behavioral scars from his long mistreatment at the hands of the tribe, chief among them being a disinclination to trust others and a subsequent tendency towards secrecy. He's explicitly stated that he fears the tribe will hunt Jack if they know.

• Mayfly–December Romance: The primary romantic focus of the story is between Hiccup, a 15-year-old human teenager, and Jack, the immortal personification of Winter merriment. Said personification is over three hundred years old (or, minimum, several dozen millenia old, depending on if this story chooses to include that he was once Nightlight). If they maintain any kind of stable, long-term romantic relationship without a significant change in circumstances, this will inevitably occur—not to mention people will eventually notice, given that Jack doesn't age.^* Although how much Jack's visible aging will be an issue will depend on the Ambiguous Situation mentioned above regarding Jack's characterization—according to William Joyce, author of the Guardians of Child series, Book!Jack gained several new abilities after becoming a Guardian, one of which was the ability to alter his physical age at will.

• Master of the Mixed Message: Because of how Hiccup views his feelings for Jack, his attempts to simultaneously stay away from Jack (to protect him from his own desire) and stay close to Jack (to protect him from other perceived dangers and maintain their friendship) confuse the Hel out of Astrid, Toothless, and Jack himself.

• Merlin and Nimue: Played with. Jack and Gothi do have a master-apprentice bond involving magic, but the typical aspects of the trope are skewed: rather than an older woman teaching a younger man, Gothi is old, true—but her apprentice is an immortal youth with centuries more worldly and magical experience than her. However, she still has things to teach him, given that Jack's understanding of practical magic isn't particularly deep in terms of its use with humans. Also, because men aren't supposed to learn or use magic, the magical aspect of the apprenticeship is secret; ostensibly, she's only teaching him medicine.

• Mood Whiplash: Chapter 9: "Normalcy," details the calm aftermath of the fight over Heather's parents at Outcast Island and appears to be a Breather Episode; the teens play with the younger kids, Jack and Hiccup discuss their pasts, Hiccup decides to train in sword fighting... and after a short nap, Hiccup wakes to find Jack's head on his shoulder, realizes he's sexually attracted to Jack, and flees the scene in horror and self-disgust.

• My Sensors Indicate You Want to Tap That: Dragons communicate with scents as well as sounds, meaning that Toothless can literally smell Hiccup's Inconvenient Attraction and doesn't really understand why Hiccup's freaking out about it. Still, he respects Hiccup's privacy and hasn't brought it to Jack's attention.

• Myth Arc: The fic seems to be setting up one that is slowly deviating from the established canon of the series, and several details imply a larger, more complicated plot going on in the wings.

• Noble Bigot: As the story goes on, it becomes more and more clear that most of the villagers in Berk are this to varying extents, especially the adults, as they're affable, protective, and generous to all who come in peace—but they're still Vikings and still a part of Viking culture with all the prejudices that come with it, which drives their own children to hide Jack's differences from them out of fear for his safety and an inability to predict how the adults will react.

• Nothing Is the Same Anymore: Hiccup laments over this after his Love Epiphany causes a major disruption in his and Jack's friendship.

• Oblivious to Love: Probably because of Jack's long period without socialization and zero experience with anything related to romance, Jack doesn't pick up on the fact that Hiccup has a crush on him, despite the latter being terrible at hiding it. To be fair, no one besides Toothless has as of yet, though this doesn't mean much as the rest either aren't paying much attention or aren't the sharpest swords in the armory. Astrid's pretty suspicious though, and she's already realizes something's off with how Hiccup acts around and involving Jack in particular. For his part, Hiccup was oblivious to his own feelings until the end of chapter 9, though it was pretty obvious he had a crush on Jack before that.

• Omniglot: Having magically bonded with Baby Tooth, who acts as a kind of familiar for him, Jack has received the Gift of Tongues, which enables him to understand seemingly all forms of language and communication both human and nonhuman. This includes the Vikings, the Sandman, Flee the Moonbeam, Baby Tooth herself, and dragons.

• One of the Kids: Played straight in terms of Jack's interactions with the Dragon Riders, but admirably averted with Jack's interactions with the younger children. Though Jack is friendly, fun, and always invited and willing to join in with their games, he's clearly grown into his role as a Guardian, and still manages to come across as both a fun and responsible caregiver when necessary.

• Pals with Jesus: Any mortal who's friends with Jack, but Hiccup especially as he's the human Jack confides in most and is most open with about his life, magic, and fellow spirits.

• Paper-Thin Disguise:
  • Played for comedy, most of the time. Jack should not have been able to pass for human for as long as he has, especially since villagers keep pointing out the physically impossible things about him... and then just ignoring them, apparently. To wit, the first and only discussed thing they find strange about him is the fact that he doesn't wear boots—despite the fact that he's perpetually covered in frost. The lack of boots alone would cost a human their toes and the skin of their soles within a day in such a cold environment. Stoick privately ponders whether Jack's human after learning he can speak to dragons during the events of chapter 6, but nothing comes of it and the more obviously inhuman aspects of Jack never seem to cause concern to the adults (with the exception of Mildew).
  • Subverted when Jack is in his "Jokul" disguise. Despite being made of ice, the layers are opaque enough to obscure bodily features, and the mask he wears underneath the ice hides his face.

• Platonic Life-Partners: Jack and Baby Tooth, as well as all of the riders and their respective dragons, are written in this light. The non-human counterparts even tend to refer to their counterparts as "Love."

• Parents as People: Just as in the series, Stoick has difficulty understanding his son and his decisions but acknowledges his own flaws and struggles to make up for this. Stoick doesn't take action against Jack's display of possibly supernatural language prowess, for example, due to fearing a repeat of his mistakes with Hiccup and ostracizing another well-intentioned, if unusual, child. Confusing the mess more is the fact that Jack's personality and habitual quirks strongly remind Stoick of Valka, making it sometimes emotionally difficult for him to interact with the boy despite clearly caring about him.

• Prefers Going Barefoot: The Vikings tend to fixate on Jack's aversion to footwear — quite reasonable, since the cold climate means losing your toes if you run barefooted. The youth is noticeably disgruntled when Gothi forces a pair of boots on him.

• Pretty Boy: Deconstructed with Jack. In a culture as hypermasculine as the Norse Vikings, his slender and delicate looks are perceived as too feminine to allow him respect, with Camicazi blatantly doubting his gender and Dagur dismissing him as a weakling.

• Protectorate: Innocent or kindly humans, especially children, to Jack, and Jack to Hiccup (at least, from Hiccup's perspective). How weird it is for Hiccup to get so protective of Jack is lampshaded in-story.

• Red Baron: There are hints that Jack's Frost Giant disguise will become this; not only are his actions implied to be inspiring the stories of the legendary Jokul of Norse myth, but he's appeared in this form before three of the most prominent clans and their leaders and wiped the floor with all who stood against him in spectacularly dramatic fashion—there's very little chance that the stories won't spread.

• Romantic False Lead: Played with in terms of Astrid, whom Hiccup seems to have mutual romantic intentions with in the very early chapters but in whom he subtly loses romantic interest in almost immediately after Jack's arrival.

• Semi-Divine: Despite having no clue what exactly Jack is (as what he is doesn't one-to-one translate into their mythology), most of the Vikings that have encountered him in his undesigused form (and actually realize he's not human) interpret him as some variation of this.

• Shipper on Deck: Toothless won't stop his unwavering and obvious support for Hiccup's interest in Jack, no matter how much Hiccup wishes he would.

• Shown Their Work: Despite inaccuracies and occasional over-simplifications (most of which come from inaccuracies in the canon material itself), the author spends time and effort incorporating their knowledge of real-life Viking cultures into the world of the story.

• Silent Antagonist: Jack's an inversion, as he's a protagonist acting as this kind of character to his friends' enemies. When acting in his Frost Giant disguise, Jack almost never speaks in front of those who do not know his identity, instead preferring to be intimidatingly, eerily silent. The only exception was a whispered "Boo" spoken right in someone's ear during the disguise's first appearance.

• Sixth Ranger: Despite actually being the seventh member, Jack functions as this to the teens. Though he's a benevolent version, he nonetheless has characteristics that separate him from the group as a whole and his presence drastically alters the status quo within the group. As common with this trope, the teens even have a moment of doubting his loyalties at one point.

• Sleep Cute: Hiccup and Jack end up in this position after sword practice at the end of Chapter 9. Hiccup wakes up first, and the intimate position makes him have a startling realization.

• The Slow Path: Unless Jack is retrieved by the Guardians in his own time, this is Jack's only option to getting back to the future—hence the story's name.

• Stable Time Loop: In Chapter 8, the Bear Witch drops several hints that possibly imply a future Hiccup has interfered (and/or will interfere) with the present cast by ordering the magical compass for our current Hiccup, which would mean at least one of these is at play (the other option is that it's one of the other two Hiccup Horrendous Haddocks, who was also somehow connected to the more hidden magical side of the world and somehow acquired supernaturally specific knowledge of the distant future). Given that Jack himself is a time traveler, there may be more Loops, depending on how the Trapped in the Past conflict is resolved.

• Star Power: One of the few things currently known about Hiccup's compass is that it runs on Celestial Magic, a kind of magic common during the Golden Age and the same kind of magic Sandy, a former shooting star, uses.

• Starting a New Life: Though Jack still remains faithful to the idea that he will eventually get back to his time, the likelihood of it taking a long, long time, combined with his growing place within Berk's community, means that Jack's life is beginning to show aspects of this as Jack settles in for the long haul.

• Stealth Hi/Bye: Being fast and able to levitate and make himself weightless, Jack can easily pull these off; his Big Damn Heroes moment in chapter 8 begins when he appears from nowhere on top of Alvin the Treacherous's head, leans down inches from Alvin's face (while still upside down), and whispers "Boo."

• The Storyteller: Jack quickly becomes known for his skill as this to the children of Berk. This also acts as a Worldbuilding Info Dump for the reader, calling attention to story elements from the Guardians of Childhood universe that have been Canon Welded here with Rise of the Guardians.

• Stunned Silence: When Jack reveals he Speaks Fluent Animal in chapter 6, Mildew, Stoick, and Gobber are dumbfounded. When Mildew recovers enough to suggest that Jack is unnatural, a danger, and should be killed, Hiccup, who'd been bottling up an intense amount of resentment towards the man throughout the duration of the chapter, calmly and swiftly knocks Mildew flat. Hiccup spends the second silence that immediately follows menacingly glaring at Mildew's unconscious body while rubbing his knuckles.

• Talk to the Fist: In Chapter 6 ("How to Speak Dragonese"), Hiccup's already furious over Mildew's attempts to kill the dragons, but when Mildew begins frantically insisting that Jack is unnatural and should be left to die, Hiccup's self-control breaks and he silences him by delivering a single punch so hard, Mildew immediately loses consciousness. This is so unexpected (for a variety of reasons) that it stuns everyone else into silence.

• Temporal Mutability: This comes into play because Jack doesn't know which of the time travel theories is true, and so is trying not to affect things too much just in case. He's failing, sure, but he's trying his best to avoid a Butterfly Effect or Time Crash. It's also possible You Already Changed the Past, in which case Jack's efforts are kind of pointless, but it never hurts to be careful.

• There Is Only One Bed: A blink-and-you'll-miss gag in The Long Road's version of "The Heather Report" (Chapter 7) uses this trope; Stoick tells Heather that Hiccup and Jack share a bedroom, but when she enters, it's quickly apparent that there's only one bed. Her awkward reaction to this implies she concluded that they sleep together until Jack, ignorant of her conclusion, offhandedly mentions that he sleeps in the rafters. Notably, in real Viking times, it would have been perfectly normal for multiple children to share a bed, so her clear discomfort indicates she made the more... adulterated assumption.

• Trapped in the Past: This is the basic plot of the story—Jack has been thrown a thousand years or more into the past, with no way to get back. Luckily, and unusually for this trope, he's immortal - so he'll get back eventually, one way or another.

• Troubled Sympathetic Bigot:
  • Hiccup may be forward-thinking and open-minded for his time, but he's still a product of his culture, and there are many instances when he ignorantly makes judgments based off little more than the ingrained cultural prejudices he's been raised with. For instance, when explaining the Viking prejudice against men who use magic, which roots itself in sexism and the Vikings' hypermasculine ideal, Hiccup feels increasingly petty and embarrassed and briefly struggles to come up with a reason why (instead of the prejudice being wrong) such a slur simply doesn't apply to Jack—and in doing so accidentally lands on another thing he's been insensitive about before, which is that Jack isn't human and thus human standards of behavior and gender norms shouldn't apply. Furthermore, this ingrained heteronormative, misogynistic thinking drives him to being prejudiced against himself, once he realizes he's sexually attracted to Jack, believing that he's a terrible person for having such feelings as well as a horrible friend.
  • Stoick has a less extreme and more quiet conflict at the end of Chapter 6 where he contemplates what little he knows about Jack and what that could possibly mean. He's obviously troubled by the possible origins of Jack's differences, but also does not wish harm to come to a child just because he's different. It's clear that he's learned from what he put Hiccup through, and that his culturally constructed concept of right and moral (Viking culture) is struggling against his experience constructed concept of right and moral (he ponders on whether Jack might just be a "little different" like Hiccup - i.e. whether Stoick rejecting Jack because of his differences would be the right thing to do, or a repeat of the same mistakes he made with Hiccup).

• Two Guys and a Girl: Though the teens act as a single social group of seven, Jack, Hiccup, and Astrid are noticeably closer friends with each other than the others, something Astrid calls attention to the most with her thoughts. The three subvert a lot of the typical tropes associated with trios with this gender ratio, however, because Astrid's a badass rather than a damsel and the way things are shaping up, she's likely not going to be the center of a Love Triangle between the three of them either. Instead, Jack and Astrid both view the other two of the group as important friends (though Astrid may possibly still have feelings for Hiccup), while Hiccup is confused because he's been sexually attracted to both of them at different points.

• The Unreveal: The Bear Witch seems to personally know Hiccup somehow, but just when Heather asks her about it, she disappears.

• Was Once a Man: Learning this about Jack surprises Hiccup greatly. On the other hand, learning this about Perun deeply disturbs Jack.

• Weird Moon: Regardless of the weather, the time of day, or the actual moon phase, Jack can always see the Full Moon in the sky. This means he literally perceives the Moon differently than those around him.

• Weirdness Censor: Jack, with white hair, snowflake irises for eyes, feet covered in frozen mud, and clad in foreign clothes covered in frost, calls attention to himself in the Mead Hall... and the first and only odd thing we hear the adults question is why he's not wearing boots. Subverted in chapter 6, when Hiccup, Gobber, Mildew, and Stoick all find out that Jack can talk with dragons, and Stoick legitimately considers that Jack might not be human. As of yet, nothing's come from it.
  • This trope is especially ironic considering how the Vikings also avert Jack's Invisible to Normals status. They can see the weirdness, they just... don't process it as that weird, it seems.
  • Played with in the 2021 additional chapter, "This is Berk." The adult villagers treat Jack's appearance as alarming, but they're less concerned with any mystical weirdness than they are that he could be Mundanger, since he first appeared to them during an invasion.

• What Beautiful Eyes!: During one of his many long moments of staring at Jack, Hiccup notices that Jack's irises have snowflake patterns in them.

• What Year Is This?: Discussed between Jack and Baby Tooth. Jack doesn't know exactly how far back he is, because the Vikings don't use the Christian-originating BCE/CE timeline as the modern era does, so asking is pointless anyways. His best guess is that he's around a thousand years back—give or take a few centuries.

• When She Smiles: Instances where Jack smiles at Hiccup in particular garner interesting reactions from the latter. Holding his hand also does this, as Hiccup notes that Jack, unlike all other people he's ever met, has smooth, unblemished hands.

• Wild Child: Used to emphasize Jack's Nature Spirit nature. It's downplayed and played with in that Jack's not feral, just so alien to the idea of being a visible, functioning part of society that he has no experience with the idea of social forces and customs being a limitation on his behavior. He actually displays many stereotypically "tame" and "civilized" social and domestic interests, such as advanced language skills, sewing, and childcare, and never actively opposes "civility," but he shows little to no initial awareness or respect towards social structures as he's used to being an untouchable exception and outsider to them, and given that he's used to total behavioral freedom, it rarely seems to occur to him that others would feel responsible for his wellbeing or expect that he should be responsible for conforming and contributing to their society as a whole. Jack rejects the idea of anyone having unquestioned authority over where he should be or how he should behave, although he does cooperate when others' wellbeings are at risk, and whenever possible he refuses conforming to the hallmarks of human society that he views as unnecessary or unwanted for who he is, such as the use of beds and shoes. He's become aware that others see this as something to pity—the Guardians apparently were sad for him when they found out the reason he doesn't prefer beds, and the Riders found it awkward when Jack openly admitted to owning nothing humans would consider valuable—but Jack sees nothing wrong with this, because he has no reason to see those things as valuable and thus no reason to see his situation as lacking anything important.

• With Friends Like These...: Hiccup immediately regrets promising to introduce Jack to his friends, as he semi-sarcastically comments that he should have just pretended he didn't know them and he can really only trust Stormfly not to offend.

• Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: What Jack is to the humans not in the know, though he's a benevolent example and it's very much played with. Jack is already an unusual example of this trope because the Wolf in Sheep's Clothing is rarely the point of view character, but his Frost Giant disguise introduced in Chapter 7 makes this even more complex. The "Frost Giant" is a "Wolf" facade in this analogy, and curb stomps all the humans around him in combat, but beneath the disguise is the peaceful and playful Jack (the "sheep"), whom most would think is a relatively normal teen. However, because Jack really isn't human and the power is absolutely genuine, beneath the everyday "Sheep" presumption is a true "wolf." Therefore, when playing the role of the Frost Giant, Jack plays with the Wolf in Sheep's Clothing by being what is essentially a benevolent "wolf" playing the role of a "sheep" disguised as a "wolf." Visually this is punned upon by Jack's wolf-skin cloak, which he is given by Stoick but doesn't usually wear - except for when he includes it in his Frost Giant disguise, or when he's sleeping in the Winter Cove and doesn't have to pretend to be human.

• Women's Mysteries: Magic is considered women's territory, and men who use it are outcasts. Truth in Television... kind of: in actual Viking times, Prophetic magic was considered women's magic, while rune magic was considered men's.

• The Xenophile: It's not an obvious part of Hiccup's personality, but there's an element of this implied to be present in Hiccup's character, given that his best friend is a dragon his people had previously never seen and his best humanoid friend is the only humanoid friend he has that isn't actually human. Hiccup's never disgusted or afraid of things that seem other worldly; he's far more likely to be fascinated and afraid of other people's reactions should they be afraid. Even the things Hiccup most admires about Jack are the ways Jack differs from what's expected of a Viking male. In fact, Hiccup's noticably more comfortable among the characters his society would consider strange than he is among much of his own society.

• You Remind Me of X: In quirks and personality, Jack reminds Stoick of Valka, which is one of the reasons why Stoick occasionally has trouble dealing with him. It also reinforces a subtle parallel between Stoick and Hiccup, both having irrationally overprotective tendencies towards similar individuals they have romantic feelings for.

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