It wasn't his idea to go to night-camp. In fact, he had been against the idea from the very start, but no matter how much he begged, how much he pleaded, his parents just wouldn't listen. The date was set, and all the little Finn could do was wait for the dreaded day to arrive.

And oh, how quickly it came.

The bus bumped as it sped along its merry way, headed for Camp Hetaliwa. The roads had been growing increasingly rough as they travelled deeper into the forest, causing the bus to bump and shake. Tino, who had been sitting near the front beside an Estonian boy around his age, was jostled awake when the bus hit a particularly large pothole. Startled by the sudden awakening, he looked around in a daze.

"Oh, you're awake." a voice said from beside him. Rubbing the tiredness from his eyes, he looked over at the person sitting beside him. His strange violet gaze eventually found that of the Estonian boy's, his forest green eyes calmly meeting his own, hints of amusement playing on his features. Realizing that this was his chance to try and make friends, Tino gave him the friendliest smile he could muster and sat up from his slouched position in his seat.

"Yeah, it's hard to sleep when the roads are so bumpy." he said, trying to spark a conversation. To his delight, the other boy shut his book and placed it in his lap, angling himself slightly towards Tino.

"The road seems to have gotten worse in the past twenty minutes." he said, adjusting his glasses and peeking over Tino's shoulder to look out the window. "I'd say we're getting closer, by the looks of it." he added. Tino sighed in relief, eager to get off the rickety bus. He still felt annoyed at being sent to camp against his will, and wanted nothing more than to curl up in bed and take a nap. Maybe when he wakes up, he'll be back home in his bed and all of this would have never happened.

"Thank goodness! My back is starting to hurt from these seats." he complained, stretching his back to prove his point. The other blonde chuckled.

"Mine too. I should have taken my parents up on their offer to just drive me up here, but I didn't want them doing something embarrassing." he said, sighing dramatically. "Too late to do anything about it now, though." he paused, then gave Tino a friendly smile. "My name is Eduard, by the way." he held out a hand for Tino to shake.

"Nice to meet you, Eduard! I'm Tino." he took Eduard's hand, giving it a shake. Tino could already tell that the two of them were going to be great friends.

The two continued to talk, learning a little more about each other. They both realized that they had a shared love of strange and unique things. The two of them talked about the various strange ideas they'd had, and began coming up with some new ones together.

"The lake has a lot of crayfish in it, and every year I always wonder if they're edible." Eduard said, adding a timid laugh, hoping his new friend wouldn't think he was being strange. "I mean, if they are, then they've got to be a lot better than the camp food."

To Eduard's relief, Tino's smile only widened. "I have crayfish with my family everytime we visit our cottage! They're really yummy." he said, fondly smiling at all the memories of his time spent at his family cottage. He missed going there. It was peaceful and quiet, and Tino could wander around outside for hours alone. He didn't like being alone, but he enjoyed the chance to get away from his parents. He loved them, but he felt like they didn't love him back. Why else did they insist on sending him to camp, other than to get rid of him for a month? Tino pushed those depressing thoughts away, and instead thought of the crayfish. An idea suddenly popped into his head, and he grabbed Eduard's arm, his eyes wide with excitement. "Eduard, do you think it'd be possible to catch some? I know how to cook them, so maybe sometime we could have some kind of crayfish eating party!"

Eduard smiled, feeling like for the first time since he started camp, he would finally have a close friend. Not that he didn't already have friends there. There was Raivis and Toris, who he had made friends with during his first year. Toris was from Lithuania, and was almost a year older than himself. They'd been bunkmates every year, and often relied on each other for support when they got bullied by their counsellor. Raivis was a family friend, and had been switched into the same cabin as himself during his second year because the little Latvian was unable to make any friends in his age group. Despite being two years younger, both Eduard's and Raivis' parents had insisted on them being together so Eduard could watch over him, and the camp saw no problem with it. Eduard and Raivis had never really been close before they spent time together at camp, but they soon became good friends.

The idle chat continued until Tino saw something in the corner of his eye. He stopped talking and turned to look, his curiosity urging him on. There, sitting right across from the two newly acquainted friends, was the most terrifying person Tino had ever laid eyes on.

He was sitting alone, quietly reading a book. He seemed to almost glare at the pages as his eyes flitted over the words, as if he was trying to set the page ablaze with a mere look. His glare wasn't the only intimidating feature. The guy looked huge! Tino gulped nervously, letting out a small noise of fear. At that moment, the giant looked up from his book, and turned, his gaze meeting Tino's. For a moment, the two just stared at each other, Tino too scared to look away. Eduard gave Tino a concerned look and waved a hand in front of Tino's face, causing the Finn snap his gaze back to his friend.

"Tino, what's wrong? You look like you've just seen a ghost." he said, turning to see what had spooked him. He tensed up when he saw the giant of a guy looking right at him and quickly turned back to his friend in a panic. "He's staring at us! He's staring at us!" he said in a loud, panicked whisper. Tino waved his hands at his friend, trying to quiet him.

"Shh! He'll hear you!" he hissed, peeking over Eduard's trembling shoulder only to see the giant sigh and go back to reading his book. Tino felt a stab of guilt, although he couldn't figure out why. He turned back to Eduard, and let out a sigh. "He's reading now, calm down." he couldn't help but take another peek at the scary stranger. "Who is he?" he whispered, not tearing his gaze away.

"That's Berwald. He's a third year. No one knows much about him, so I can't tell you what he's like. All I know is that anyone with a face like that is bad news." Tino tore his gaze away from Berwald, and set it back on his friend.

"I'm sure he can't be that bad. I mean, he's scary looking, but you can't judge a book by it's cover." he reasoned.

"That's true, but I still don't trust him." Eduard replied, glancing out the window. His expression quickly changed from concern to relief. "Ah, looks like we're here." he said. Tino turned to look out the window as well, nervousness swirling in his gut as he saw the camp gates coming closer and closer with each passing second.

A/N: I'm so, so sorry, I know this chapter sucks! I think I've figured out that I write a LOT better at 3am, than when I'm wide awake at 3pm.

So, I've only written one other fic with Estonia in it. I'm well aware that I don't portray him well. Anyone have any tips or anything...? I'd be really grateful!

This is already planned out! It's actually mostly based off of a camp experience of my own. I was thinking back on it a few weeks ago, and realized that the guy I went to camp with is actually a lot like Sweden. So then this story happened... Eheh... ^^;

Oh, and the camp name... Yeah... I'm not very creative when it comes to naming things like camps.

Anyways, enjoy!