Hello everyone! This is just a story for fun, basically something to get my creative juices flowing because I have been suffering from the horror that is writers block. But I had a dream a few days ago where I was in The Hobbit and I just started writing it out, so hopefully it's not that bad. Don't bite my head off if it's horrible, I'm writing this without a Beta.

To add a bit of fun to the story, I'm going to be adding lines from other movies, lyrics, and other thingy majigs. If you can spot them, post a comment with the line and what movie, song, etc they are from.

I OWN NOTHING! Except my characters Shane, Cheyanne, Edd, and Jessica. Well, I guess my cousins and uncle own themselves but whatever.

Chapter One: Roughing It

At five o'clock in the morning it was like any normal Thursday…Well, my version of normal anyhow. Midsummer is, usually, the best time to go camping in Nebraska, and I use the word 'usually' because it is Nebraska and anyone who lives here will tell you the same thing 'if you don't like the weather now, wait until tomorrow'. The current weather prediction was that it was supposed to be clear for the whole week, with temperatures of eighty to ninety degrees and was perfect camping weather.

A few cousins and I had been planning this trip since the winter holidays, because we were sick of being stuck indoors after so many blizzards decided to blow through after a week of fifty degree weather. Yep, you have to love Nebraska. Shane, the oldest member of our group was thirty-six, and had the 'don't screw with me' attitude but was really a huge teddy bear. At eighteen Cheyanne, also known as Chey, was the youngest member, Shane's daughter, and definitely took after her father personality wise. I was twenty-three, and the overall oddball of the family. The three of us were fairly close not just because we were family, but because Shane had introduced me to Archery and his brood of children, three girls, and I would often practice together.

My Uncle Edd, who was Shane's dad and Chey's Grandpa, had land out on the panhandle, roughly three hundred acres, and had offered us a short vacation after hearing us bitch and moan at the family party. After several months of planning, we took our Uncle up on the offer and he quickly laid out the rules of no drugs, cleaning up all our trash, and to keep away from his cattle. As if we wanted to be anywhere near the feedlot. Knowing that we were a group of bow fanatics our uncle allowed us to bring them, and, with a booming laugh, told us a story about rabid coyotes.

The memory brought a smile to my lips as I packed the last of my personal bags into the my Jeep and rearranged my hookah travel bag; after several reassurances and with my Uncle coming with to buy the Shisha to make sure it wasn't drugs, I was allowed to bring it. Pinning my bow and hookah bag securely with the tent, I nodded with satisfaction and closed the vehicle's trunk. Heading back into my apartment once more for a few bottles of water and a snack for the four hour drive, I double checked to make sure the lights were off and left a thank you note to my mom for taking care of Mischief, my ferret, while I would be gone.

Mischief, the little brat, was allowed free reign of the apartment, and had climbed up on the kitchen counter to see what all the hustle and bustle was about. With a goofy smile, I rolled Mischief onto his back and rubbed his tubby light tan belly. "Mommy is going to be gone for a few days," I told him, letting the brat nip at my fingers. "I'll see you on Sunday, be nice to Grandma." With a meaningful finger point at my rambunctious roommate, I left the apartment and began the long drive to my Uncle's ranch.

~oooOOOOOooo~

"Am I your fire, your one desire?" Belting out the lyrics of Backstreet Boys 'I Want It That Way', I dramatically brought my hand to my heart. "Yes I know it's too late, but I want it that way!"

Just as the chorus was about to play a truck passed me along the dirt road; my windows were down, the boy band music blaring, and the speed limit was slow enough for the driver, an older man, to get an earful. With an alarmed look, the man sped up and quickly disappeared in a cloud of dirt.

"Awkward…" I declared to no one, shifting my eyes around as if to say 'wasn't me' before bursting with laughter.

I had been driving for a little over two hours now and thank the gods for my iPod, if it weren't for the music I'd have probably started talking to myself or some inanimate object. Not that that hadn't happened already because my damn water bottle wouldn't open, so I started to yell at it.

Driving by myself had probably been a bad idea but Shane, although he did offer to drive, didn't have any room left in his truck or trailer because he had loaded two of his four-wheelers and my mothers' for myself. Overall though, I am glad that I had decided to drive myself because not only is there more room but I got to spend time alone before being tossed back in with people. I loved my family and friends, but I got my fair share of social interaction at my jobs and therefore didn't like to spend a lot of time around people. Thankfully Shane and Chey were pretty much the same, what I was worried about was if they fought. Yeah, being in the middle of a family squabble did not sound appealing.

Not being one to let serious thoughts ruin a perfectly good, and long awaited, vacation, I once more blared my music and started to sing. "You look better when I'm drunk, oh, oh!"

~oooOOOooo~

Four hours into the drive, I got a call from my Uncle telling me the dirt road to turn onto that would lead me to his house. Shane and Cheyanne had already arrived and were offloading the four-wheelers, I had spoken to Shane for a few minutes on the phone to let him know that I was still twenty minutes out and would need a bathroom break the moment I stepped out of the Jeep.

Luckily it didn't take twenty minutes to get to Edd's, and like I told Shane the first thing I did was scream 'bathroom' before taking off into the small farm house. Their laughter followed me as I frantically searched for the toilet and, sighing dramatically and contemplating bowing before the porcelain throne, I found the restroom. Life was good again.

Emerging from the house with a hop to my step, I loudly exclaim, "Let's get the party started!"

Shaking her head, long curly dirty blonde hair tied back with a thick ponytail that swayed across her back, my cousin popped the Jeep's trunk and took out the tent. "Jeez Jess, there is just one tent in here, right?" The bag was bulging, the zipper closing only halfway.

I shrugged, grabbing my two hip-quivers and attaching them to my belt. "My brothers were the last ones to use it," slinging the cloth bow case over my shoulder, I reached in to grab my hookah bag. "I didn't have the time, or room, to get it out and fix everything."

Chey shrugged, grabbing the gym bag that held my clothes. "Dad has been talking about really 'roughing' it; he already took my S'mores supplies." Closing the trunk with a loud thump, she nodded her head to where her dad was offloading my four-wheeler, the shiny black standing out obnoxiously next to their camouflage colored vehicles.

"Keep him away from my gym bag; I have Oreos and Nutella in there." I winked slyly at her as we neared the vehicles.

Shane had just slammed shut the trailers tailgate and watched us from over his shoulder. "About time you showed up," he teased, shaking his head in mock annoyance. "Has Chey told you that we're not taking any outside food to the campsite?"

"Yeah, yeah, something about you taking away the amazingness that is S'mores." Pointing my finger accusingly at him, I declared loudly, "you sir, are evil. EVIL!"

Rolling his eyes, Shane brushed his hands off on a pair of ripped up and stained jeans. "It'll be fun, Dad said there is plenty of rabbit around and we have plenty of jerky." Fingering the tips of his arrows, which rested in one of his hip quivers, he grunted in disappointment, "too bad it's not hunting season."

"Yeah," Chey replied sarcastically, setting my bags on the back of the black four-wheeler. "Because we really want to waste one of our permits on a deer that'll probably go bad by the time we got back home."

"Shut up, boy." Shane said affectionately punching his daughter's shoulder, therefore starting a play fight between the two of them.

Laughing at my cousins, I began to properly attach everything to the back of my four-wheeler. Shane, having three girls, made a huge effort to make them as Tom Boy-ish as possible and would often call them 'boy' because, well, he had only girls. With a grunt, Shane had successfully pinned Chey and was now sitting on top of her; the, unfortunately, familiar sound of him farting was soon followed by Chey screaming for air. And here I thought I was the family oddball.

Giggling at their antics, I swung my leg over the four-wheelers seat and watched Cheyanne hit her father hard in the ribs, squirming out from under him as he fell forward gripping his side and laughing. "You guys are weird."

Shane had managed to calm down enough to sharply retort, "Says the girl who brought her hookah."

Sniffing in mock disdain, I came back with, "at least I'm not bald." Starting my four-wheeler I drove up beside Chey's; her four-wheeler was slightly bigger than my own, the rumble louder, but hers was a 4x4 and mine wasn't. "Ready to go?"

Nodding quickly, she looked over her shoulder to Shane, who just realized that we were about to leave him behind. "Catch up if you can!"

With a whoop, we gunned our four-wheelers, the tires throwing dirt and grass at the frantic male figure behind us.

The girls won the race to the designated camp site, though Shane had put up a real fight in catching up, passing us several times by using short cuts. Damn him for knowing his own home better than we did. But ultimately we won, which meant that we had our choice in either setting up camp or hunting rabbit, gutting said rabbit, and cooking it. Setting up camp it was.

"Jess," Chey had pulled out two small plastic shapes from the tent bag. "Your brothers are stupid. They didn't pack the big tent in here, they packed two small ones."

Looking up at her from the fire pit I had just finished building, I arched a brow and made my way over to my annoyed looking cousin, "okay…do we have all the poles for them?"

Bending down once more, she began to pull out the poles and stakes. "Yeah, we have everything."

"Then who cares if it's two small tents instead of one big one?" Rolling my eyes, I took one of the plastic squares and began to unroll it, "this means that we can have one of them and your dad can have the other, and it'll make hiding the snacks easier."

"Yeah, I guess," she mumbled, setting up the other tent a few feet from the other. "But your brothers are still stupid; they have a random tent lying around their room instead of where it should be. No wonder the bag wouldn't close."

"Umm..." Looking over the half set up tent with a bemused expression, "wouldn't that mean that the bag would have more room, because it's two smaller tents instead of the bigger one plus the smaller one?"

Pausing in her work, Chey met my own confused look with one of her own. "I didn't look through the whole thing, just the main part. What do you think's in there?"

Brushing my hands off on my camouflage overalls, I stepped around the now erect tent and to the bag. Unzipping a bulging side compartment, my eyes widened and I began to laugh hysterically.

"What?" Cheyanne asked, rushing to my side and breaking out into laughter as well when she caught sight of what was in the bag. "Are...you kidding...me?" Her hazel eyes filled with tears of mirth.

Pulling out the full bottle of Parrot Bay Rum from the protective cloth wrapping, I shook it accusingly, "I have been looking for you for a damn year! Those sneaky little thieves!"

"Oh my god! I still remember the look on your face when you realized your Rum was missing, ha!" Shaking her head, Cheyanne nudged my shoulder good-naturedly, "you're sharing that, right?"

But I didn't answer her; I was too focused on curling my body possessively around the sorely missed bottle of Passion Fruit Rum, stroking the length of the glass bottle as if it were a baby. The bottle had gone missing a while back and I had asked all my friends if they had taken it, or if they knew anything. Sure it may have just been a bottle of Rum, but I had bought it the same night I had adopted Mischief, as a celebratory drink because I wasn't alone in my apartment anymore. Perhaps it was silly to have been so upset that it had gone missing, but no one should ever touch my precious Rum. Ever.

"You're weird," Chey said, drawing my attention away from the bottle of alcohol. "You better pick a tent and hide that in there, never know when Dad might come back."

Nodding in agreement, I searched for any sign of Shane before dashing towards the tent I had set up. Placing the bottle in one corner, I once more left to gather the remainder of my bags and set them up on one side as Cheyanne set up on the other. She had brought along a thick sleeping bag, something that would, in my opinion, suck, because even though it did cool down a bit during the night it would still be really damn hot. Along with her green sleeping bag, Cheyanne had brought along a large squishy blue pillow; the type of pillow with the small beads in it kind of like a bean bag, I have no idea what it's called…Bean Pillow? Whatever.

"You plan on sleeping in that?" I nodded my head toward what I considered to be a sweat dripping nightmare.

"I thought we'd be able to go back to the house and shower," she answered defensively. "Are you going to sleep on that?" She gestured toward my single large blanket, with a large wolf head stamped on it, and the small cotton pillow.

"Heck yeah," I replied, smirking at her as I folded the blanket once length wise and snuggled inside. Though, when I laid my head on the pillow…"I think you had the better idea, bringing that bean pillow."

She shrugged, laying on top of her blankets and staring up at the top of the tent. "I don't think we were prepared for this," she gestured with her hand in a broad sweeping motion, and I noticed that her usually well groomed fingernails had become chipped.

Humming in response, I rolled over to peak out from the tents entrance. "At least it's not that late yet, it's only…" Reaching around for my phone, when I remembered I had left in the Jeep, along with my iPod, because there was no reception. "Damn, what time is it?"

"I don't know, Dad made me leave my phone in the truck." Peering out at the risen sun, Cheyanne was silent for a moment before answering, "I'd say it's around…Ten, maybe eleven."

Taking her word on the time, I once more looked around the camp before unzipping my clothing bag and opening the Oreo package. "Here," I offered her two of the cookies, "a nutritious breakfast brought to you by the letter 'O'."

She snorted, twisting off the top of her first cookie and licking the creamy center, a look a pure bliss passing her face. Following her example, I too began to nibble on my sugary breakfast while keeping an eye out for Shane.

Several hours pasted and Shane had not yet come back, neither Cheyanne nor I were worried about him though because of the walkie-talkie's that Shane had given each of us during our trip. Seriously, the man had taken so many survival courses and he wasn't new to the hunting game; the only thing he had to worry about was getting a sunburn on his bald dome. We killed the time by changing into our swimsuits and tanning; Shane had laughed when we told him we had packed them, but now it appeared we had the right idea. The sun was high in the sky and the temperature had risen considerably, if we had remained clothed in our overalls we'd have been baking, at least now we were baking in a considerably preferable manner.

"God I'm going to be burned," Cheyanne mumbled, tilting her head to look at me.

Chuckling, I looked over at my considerably paler cousin. "Yeah, sucks to be you." Rolling onto my stomach, I untied the back of my suit so I wouldn't get tan lines.

My cousin and I are both a fourth Native American and tanned easily, but she had not been outside a lot because of her new job which had her working through the day. Though I have two jobs, the hours and days off were spaced out enough that I had a decent amount of free time, mostly spent working out and relaxing at home. This was Cheyanne's first job though, and she worked long hours, so it was understandable that she would rather go home and sleep than go out. In fact, she had to request the vacation time for this trip a whole month in advance. It was a bit ridiculous but she loved her job, and I guess that is all that matters.

She yawned, rolling onto her stomach as well. "Wake me up in ten minutes," she said, adjusting her own top so she wouldn't get tan lines.

Humming in response, I listened as her breathing slowed and evened out. It was very tempting to join her in a nap, but the idea of waking up to a burnt back and bum kept me awake…for a while.

Thankfully, as I was beginning to nod off to sleep, Shane appeared with single bloodied rabbit. "What are you two boys doin?" He asked, raising his voice enough to startle Chey awake. Flicking his blood glossed fingers at us as we fixed out bikinis and joined him at the camp fire.

"Ugh, Dad that is gross," Cheyanne complained, wiping a dot of rabbit blood of her abdomen.

"No," he replied condescendingly, "what is gross is coming back here and finding the two of you in strings, don't you have anything decent to wear, like a one piece?"

Sharing a look, we rolled our eyes at the suddenly protective man and, gathering the towels we had been lying on, began walking over to the water spigot on the opposite side of the hill the camp was on. "We'll be back in a bit," we called back to him, following the dirt path to the source of water.

"It took Shane long enough to catch one damn rabbit," I said to her, rushing toward the spigot and the promise of cool water.

"Yeah," she replied, following closely and wiping the remaining flecks of rabbit blood. "He was probably farting around, took a nap or something."

We continued the short walk in silence; though Chey was preoccupied with a spot of red on her suit, I took a moment to study the landscape. Nebraska has a simplistic beauty, with its rolling hills and coloring, but what I did not expect to see was a set of mountains in the distance. Furrowing my brow, I paused long enough for Chey to bump into me with a grunt of surprise.

"What?" She inquired, stepping around and to the water spigot, turning it on and letting out a contented sigh.

Not taking my eyes from the mountains, I joined her in the quick wash down, the cold water making goose bumps raise wherever it touched. "Do you see the mountains, over there?"

"Mountains?" Squinting in the light, Cheyanne nodded, "yeah, what about them?"

"Well, I don't think we're close enough to Colorado to be seeing Mountains. We're not close enough to anywhere in general."

Sighing, she finished drying off and slung her damp towel across her shoulders. "Who cares? Come on; let's go see if Dad needs some help."

Lips tugging into a line of disapproval, I took one last look at the distant peaks before splashing my face with water and, turning off the facet, followed my cousin back to camp.

Coming back to camp, well, it was interesting. Shane's things had been moved into his tent, we could see the bulky outline of his pack, but he was not in his tent, nor was he gutting the rabbit. Oh no, instead we found one of his legs sticking out from our tent, the familiar crinkle of plastic and groans of pain filling the air.

Sharing an alarmed look with my cousin, we dropped our towels on one of the popup chairs and peered inside the enclosure to see a grimacing thirty-six year old man, shirt dusted with Oreo crumbs, and face contorted into a grimace. "I thought," he groaned, rubbing his stomach, "that I told you we were roughing it."

"You know what's sad, Chey?"

Turning to me with a questioning tilt to her head, hazel eyes sparkling with amusement, and a grin that spread from ear to ear, she giggled. "What?"

"The fact that none of us could go a day without comfort food," I sputtered, laughing as Shane continued to groan.

Heaving the large man out of the tent, we had him lean back against one of the four-wheelers. "I need a toilet," he declared, holding onto his stomach.

We would have continued to laugh at him, if it weren't for the fact that he decided to follow up his statement by farting. Looking at each other with mirrored expressions of disgust, we helped him onto the vehicle with Cheyanne jumping onto the front of it to drive because Shane looked like he'd rather roll over and die.

"Be back when he's done being himself." Cheyanne gave a jaunty wave before turning on the four-wheeler and heading back to the farm house.

Shaking my head, I watched them disappear in a cloud of dust before heading back to the tent to tidy up after Shane's visit. Thankfully there was still a row of Oreos left in the plastic box and he hadn't found the Nutella and Rum, otherwise we'd have been screwed. Stuffing all three of the goodies into my gym bag, I grabbed the pair of camouflage overalls that I had worn earlier and pulled them on over my bikini.

Searching for the rabbit, I began to clean it and prepare it for dinner, dicing up the meat and dropping it into water filled pot that Shane he brought along. Once that was done, I washed the blood from my hands and set up my hookah, content to sit and smoke while waiting for my family to return.