"Zell! Zeeeell!" called one of the kids from the back of the trail. "I'm
boooored. Howzabout we all sing a camp song while we hike?" she suggested.
Zell brightened. "Sure!" he said. "That'd be great!"
The group immediately started belting out the camp 'theme' song, a tune that Zell soon discovered he didn't care for in the least. So he stopped, turned around, and waved his arms to get the kids' attention.
"I have a better song to sing!" Zell told the kids, who look around questioningly at each other. "What song is it? Sing it for us, Zell!" crowed the girl from the back of the line. "Okay!" yelled Zell as he resumed walking up the trail. "Here goes!"
"I wish I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner! That is what I'd truly like to be! 'Cuz if I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner, everyone would be- BEAR!"
"Everyone would be a bear, Zell?"
"No, LOOK! A BEAR!"
"AAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"
The kids scattered and ran to hiding spots in the nearby bushes. Zell, not wanting to lose track of his first group, didn't bother to tell them that the bushes wouldn't help hide them at all considering the bear's keen sense of smell.
Instead, he decided it had been long enough since he had used any martial arts last, and that the kids would probably like to see a bear get beaten up.
Which didn't take very long. Soon the bear was down, and Zell was yelling at it. "Take that! BOOYA! That's what happens when you mess with my hikers, baby!" He proudly turned to the bushes where the kids still cowered in fear, giving them a thumbs-up and a big smile.
And then he got hit in the head by a bear paw. Regaining his senses, Zell spotted 3 more angry bears preparing to simultaneously jump him. One, who had creeped up behind him, pawed at his back, opening Zell's backpack.
And the bears forgot all about Zell as they feasted on the hot dogs that had fallen out of Zell's backpack, Zell watching on in dismay. The kids ran down the path back to camp for lunch, a couple staying behind to drag Zell away from the sight of bears eating the hot dogs Zell had saved.
~*~*~*~
"Ha! Yeah, you better run!" called Seifer after the kids at his station, as he pumped the spare water gun madly. All he could say is that beach chairs and lemonade only get you so far.
It had only taken him about half an hour before he decided to grab a gun and douse the little brats. It was nearing lunchtime, and Seifer was still completely dry. 'Man, I'm good!' he told himself.
"A bit confident, eh? I wouldn't get too cocky if I were you; you'll get hit eventually, giving the kids full bragging rights," reminded the blonde sitting in Seifer's beach chair.
Oh yeah, that's the other reason he had left his restful seat; Quistis' group was at his station. She needed someplace to sit, and he wanted to show off. So it worked out perfectly.
"I won't get hit," stated Seifer simply. He turned to face Quistis. "So where's that last little brat of yours? I've already soaked those four," he said, motioning to four shivering, soaked children hiding in the bushes.
"He said he had to go to the bathroom right before we came to this station. He should be back soon," she told him, sipping Seifer's lemonade through the bendy straw.
Seifer heard a gasp behind him, and he turned around to see Pavan running up to hug him. "Don't tell me this is your fifth little brat," Seifer asked as the redheaded child latched himself onto Seifer with a giant bear hug.
Quistis giggled as she took another sip of lemonade. "Yup. Seifer, it seems like you've made a little friend," she teased. His face turning a bit red, Seifer pried the pest off of himself and shoved a water gun into his hands.
"Now, Pavan, since I'm in a good mood, I'll give you to the count of ten to run. But I'm warning you, if you don't get far enough…" Seifer warned, letting his voice trail off as he motioned to Pavan's shivering groupmates in the bushes.
Pavan beamed. "No need to worry! I'm an expert water gun fighter! My brother even taught he how to-" started Pavan. But Seifer cut him off. "Yeah, yeah," said Seifer with a roll of his eyes. "Now, I'm going to start to count. One, two, three, four, five, sixseveneightnineten!"
Taking his hands off of his face to place on the water gun handle, Seifer was taken by complete surprise as Pavan let loose a huge stream of water from the boy's own gun, hitting Seifer square in the face.
Quistis, at the sight of it, began to laugh hysterically. Seifer just wiped his face dry in disbelief and stared at Pavan. Pavan grinned widely. "Did I do good? Huh, did I, Seifer? Did I, did I?" the freckled boy asked enthusiastically.
Seifer narrowed his eyes in anger. Not only had he been doused by some little pest, he had been made a fool of- in front of Quistis, no less! Seifer grabbed his gun and yelled, "Get back here, boy!" as he took off after the sprinting redhead, Quistis still not able to control her laughter.
~*~*~*~
'Well', thought Squall, 'though nothing interesting has happened today, at least nothing bad has happened either. Except for the management making me wear this pointless bucket hat,' he reasoned, flipping the oversized, ridiculous-looking hat out of his eyes for the umpteenth time.
He rolled his head back in boredom, and stared at the clouds in the sky. 'Hey, that one looks like Angelo…'
Just then, he was snapped back to attention by a shout from behind him. He could tell by the voice it wasn't anyone he was in charge of (he had memorized the screams of the kids he was in charge of), but he looked anyways, out of curiosity.
Squall frowned as some redheaded kid holding a water gun broke through the brush across a field from the beach, screaming his guts out (the boy, not the beach).'What? The water gun station is on the other side of camp!' And he heard another voice, an all-too-familiar voice he thought at first he had imagined.
But he hadn't. Seifer broke through the brush soon after the boy, yelling angrily. What Squall found most amusing was that occasionally the boy would stop in his tracks and shoot Seifer with the water gun, then keep running. He watched as they crossed the field and started toward the Mess Hall.
Squall, with surprising calmness, turned back to watch the kids he was watching play in the sand, wondering if he had really seen what he had just seen.
~*~*~*~
"That's not a butterfly!" accused a little girl with long black hair trailing on the ground. "Yes it is," said Rinoa. "See? There's its wings, the antennae-" she began to explain. "It looks like a lost emu," pouted the younger brunette.
Rinoa frowned in confusion. "A lost emu?" she queried, turning her head sideways in hope to see the emu the girl was so determined she saw in Rinoa's picture of a butterfly.
"Now this is a butterfly!" stated the small blue-eyed girl who saw the emu. As she held up the flawless butterfly sketch, Rinoa's jaw dropped. Grabbing hold of the picture, Rinoa marveled at the child's drawing. It looked so real! "How did you…where did you find…Wow!" said Rinoa, clearly at a loss for words.
And it wasn't long before she found out most of the kids in the arts & crafts cabin at the time could draw better than her. And most of them thought her butterfly looked like a lost emu, too.
~*~*~*~
Well, Irvine certainly knew how to saddle up a chocobo. But that was about as far as his training went concerning the large chickens. 'So far, so good,' he told himself. He hoped he wouldn't have to actually ride the thing, just lead the kids around in a circle with a lead rope or something.
But his luck had been wasted on the chocobo trainer, or so to him it seemed. Because as soon as Lynna saw Irvine entering the ring with Giovanni, she brightened and waved. "Hey, cowboy! We don't have any groups coming around here today. Wanna race?" she asked. Irvine watched her mount her chocobo as he desperately tried to come up with an excuse.
Taking Irvine's silence as a yes, Lynna pointed down a trail to the left of the ring. "I'll take that route over there," she told him. Then she pointed down another trail to the right. "You go down there. They both loop around and come back down the same path. Perfectly symmetrical, too," she added.
She frowned as Irvine awkwardly mounted Giovanni. But when she saw him sitting atop the chocobo perfectly fine- or at least appearing to be- she smiled. "You ready?"
In fact, Irvine was ready. He had an idea that not only would excuse him from riding any chocobos, but would also win him some respect. "Yeah. You go first- I'll give yah a head start. Yah'll need it," she told her, winking.
"Oh, you think you're hot stuff! We'll see how well you do! Hya!" she cried, as she took off onto her path. Irvine watched her go down the path until she was out of sight.
Once he was sure he could no longer see the chocobo trainer, Irvine dismounted Giovanni. Now all he had to do, he reasoned, was wait for Lynna to come back, and tell her he had finished a long time ago. 'I'm so brilliant,' he told himself.
~*~*~*~
"La dee da dee da…" sang Selphie boredly as she stirred some batter to something- she had forgotten what it was exactly. She wished Hortense would let her sing at least, but she had gotten way annoyed at her when she found the perky SeeD standing on top of a table belting out 'Eyes On Me' into a fork.
And so now she was walked around in circles stirring this batter Hortense had thrusted into her hands. Walking by the window and glancing out, Selphie spotted Pavan and Seifer running towards the mess hall. Sparing a glance at the clock, Selphie muttered "It's pretty early for breakfast…"
But looking out the window to see the fast approaching pair of water- gunners, Selphie shrugged and smiled, chirping out an "Oh well!" as she walked toward the front door.
"Hiiiiiii, guys!" Selphie yelled, waving at Pavan and Seifer. Once inside, Pavan threw down his water gun and stared, wide-eyed and panting for breath.
Seifer's eyes seemed to widen, too, as he noticed he had run across camp, almost as far away from his station as possible. "Aw, shit!" he said violently. Pointing at Pavan, he spoke again. "It's all your fault if I get in trouble, kid!" he said through clenched teeth as he started back towards his station.
Pavan watched as Seifer left, then he looked up at Selphie. "Why was he so mean to me?" Pavan nearly whispered, staring at Selphie with adorable, doe- like eyes. Selphie's face fell sympathetically as she hugged the small sniffling boy. "Awww! Poor you! Seifer's just a big meanie, don't you worry! He's like that to everyone," she told him.
"But I wanted to be his friend," protested Pavan. Selphie sighed. "It'd probably be safer if you stayed away from him. Especially since you soaked him like that! Teehee!" giggled Selphie as she began to crack up.
The group immediately started belting out the camp 'theme' song, a tune that Zell soon discovered he didn't care for in the least. So he stopped, turned around, and waved his arms to get the kids' attention.
"I have a better song to sing!" Zell told the kids, who look around questioningly at each other. "What song is it? Sing it for us, Zell!" crowed the girl from the back of the line. "Okay!" yelled Zell as he resumed walking up the trail. "Here goes!"
"I wish I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner! That is what I'd truly like to be! 'Cuz if I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner, everyone would be- BEAR!"
"Everyone would be a bear, Zell?"
"No, LOOK! A BEAR!"
"AAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"
The kids scattered and ran to hiding spots in the nearby bushes. Zell, not wanting to lose track of his first group, didn't bother to tell them that the bushes wouldn't help hide them at all considering the bear's keen sense of smell.
Instead, he decided it had been long enough since he had used any martial arts last, and that the kids would probably like to see a bear get beaten up.
Which didn't take very long. Soon the bear was down, and Zell was yelling at it. "Take that! BOOYA! That's what happens when you mess with my hikers, baby!" He proudly turned to the bushes where the kids still cowered in fear, giving them a thumbs-up and a big smile.
And then he got hit in the head by a bear paw. Regaining his senses, Zell spotted 3 more angry bears preparing to simultaneously jump him. One, who had creeped up behind him, pawed at his back, opening Zell's backpack.
And the bears forgot all about Zell as they feasted on the hot dogs that had fallen out of Zell's backpack, Zell watching on in dismay. The kids ran down the path back to camp for lunch, a couple staying behind to drag Zell away from the sight of bears eating the hot dogs Zell had saved.
~*~*~*~
"Ha! Yeah, you better run!" called Seifer after the kids at his station, as he pumped the spare water gun madly. All he could say is that beach chairs and lemonade only get you so far.
It had only taken him about half an hour before he decided to grab a gun and douse the little brats. It was nearing lunchtime, and Seifer was still completely dry. 'Man, I'm good!' he told himself.
"A bit confident, eh? I wouldn't get too cocky if I were you; you'll get hit eventually, giving the kids full bragging rights," reminded the blonde sitting in Seifer's beach chair.
Oh yeah, that's the other reason he had left his restful seat; Quistis' group was at his station. She needed someplace to sit, and he wanted to show off. So it worked out perfectly.
"I won't get hit," stated Seifer simply. He turned to face Quistis. "So where's that last little brat of yours? I've already soaked those four," he said, motioning to four shivering, soaked children hiding in the bushes.
"He said he had to go to the bathroom right before we came to this station. He should be back soon," she told him, sipping Seifer's lemonade through the bendy straw.
Seifer heard a gasp behind him, and he turned around to see Pavan running up to hug him. "Don't tell me this is your fifth little brat," Seifer asked as the redheaded child latched himself onto Seifer with a giant bear hug.
Quistis giggled as she took another sip of lemonade. "Yup. Seifer, it seems like you've made a little friend," she teased. His face turning a bit red, Seifer pried the pest off of himself and shoved a water gun into his hands.
"Now, Pavan, since I'm in a good mood, I'll give you to the count of ten to run. But I'm warning you, if you don't get far enough…" Seifer warned, letting his voice trail off as he motioned to Pavan's shivering groupmates in the bushes.
Pavan beamed. "No need to worry! I'm an expert water gun fighter! My brother even taught he how to-" started Pavan. But Seifer cut him off. "Yeah, yeah," said Seifer with a roll of his eyes. "Now, I'm going to start to count. One, two, three, four, five, sixseveneightnineten!"
Taking his hands off of his face to place on the water gun handle, Seifer was taken by complete surprise as Pavan let loose a huge stream of water from the boy's own gun, hitting Seifer square in the face.
Quistis, at the sight of it, began to laugh hysterically. Seifer just wiped his face dry in disbelief and stared at Pavan. Pavan grinned widely. "Did I do good? Huh, did I, Seifer? Did I, did I?" the freckled boy asked enthusiastically.
Seifer narrowed his eyes in anger. Not only had he been doused by some little pest, he had been made a fool of- in front of Quistis, no less! Seifer grabbed his gun and yelled, "Get back here, boy!" as he took off after the sprinting redhead, Quistis still not able to control her laughter.
~*~*~*~
'Well', thought Squall, 'though nothing interesting has happened today, at least nothing bad has happened either. Except for the management making me wear this pointless bucket hat,' he reasoned, flipping the oversized, ridiculous-looking hat out of his eyes for the umpteenth time.
He rolled his head back in boredom, and stared at the clouds in the sky. 'Hey, that one looks like Angelo…'
Just then, he was snapped back to attention by a shout from behind him. He could tell by the voice it wasn't anyone he was in charge of (he had memorized the screams of the kids he was in charge of), but he looked anyways, out of curiosity.
Squall frowned as some redheaded kid holding a water gun broke through the brush across a field from the beach, screaming his guts out (the boy, not the beach).'What? The water gun station is on the other side of camp!' And he heard another voice, an all-too-familiar voice he thought at first he had imagined.
But he hadn't. Seifer broke through the brush soon after the boy, yelling angrily. What Squall found most amusing was that occasionally the boy would stop in his tracks and shoot Seifer with the water gun, then keep running. He watched as they crossed the field and started toward the Mess Hall.
Squall, with surprising calmness, turned back to watch the kids he was watching play in the sand, wondering if he had really seen what he had just seen.
~*~*~*~
"That's not a butterfly!" accused a little girl with long black hair trailing on the ground. "Yes it is," said Rinoa. "See? There's its wings, the antennae-" she began to explain. "It looks like a lost emu," pouted the younger brunette.
Rinoa frowned in confusion. "A lost emu?" she queried, turning her head sideways in hope to see the emu the girl was so determined she saw in Rinoa's picture of a butterfly.
"Now this is a butterfly!" stated the small blue-eyed girl who saw the emu. As she held up the flawless butterfly sketch, Rinoa's jaw dropped. Grabbing hold of the picture, Rinoa marveled at the child's drawing. It looked so real! "How did you…where did you find…Wow!" said Rinoa, clearly at a loss for words.
And it wasn't long before she found out most of the kids in the arts & crafts cabin at the time could draw better than her. And most of them thought her butterfly looked like a lost emu, too.
~*~*~*~
Well, Irvine certainly knew how to saddle up a chocobo. But that was about as far as his training went concerning the large chickens. 'So far, so good,' he told himself. He hoped he wouldn't have to actually ride the thing, just lead the kids around in a circle with a lead rope or something.
But his luck had been wasted on the chocobo trainer, or so to him it seemed. Because as soon as Lynna saw Irvine entering the ring with Giovanni, she brightened and waved. "Hey, cowboy! We don't have any groups coming around here today. Wanna race?" she asked. Irvine watched her mount her chocobo as he desperately tried to come up with an excuse.
Taking Irvine's silence as a yes, Lynna pointed down a trail to the left of the ring. "I'll take that route over there," she told him. Then she pointed down another trail to the right. "You go down there. They both loop around and come back down the same path. Perfectly symmetrical, too," she added.
She frowned as Irvine awkwardly mounted Giovanni. But when she saw him sitting atop the chocobo perfectly fine- or at least appearing to be- she smiled. "You ready?"
In fact, Irvine was ready. He had an idea that not only would excuse him from riding any chocobos, but would also win him some respect. "Yeah. You go first- I'll give yah a head start. Yah'll need it," she told her, winking.
"Oh, you think you're hot stuff! We'll see how well you do! Hya!" she cried, as she took off onto her path. Irvine watched her go down the path until she was out of sight.
Once he was sure he could no longer see the chocobo trainer, Irvine dismounted Giovanni. Now all he had to do, he reasoned, was wait for Lynna to come back, and tell her he had finished a long time ago. 'I'm so brilliant,' he told himself.
~*~*~*~
"La dee da dee da…" sang Selphie boredly as she stirred some batter to something- she had forgotten what it was exactly. She wished Hortense would let her sing at least, but she had gotten way annoyed at her when she found the perky SeeD standing on top of a table belting out 'Eyes On Me' into a fork.
And so now she was walked around in circles stirring this batter Hortense had thrusted into her hands. Walking by the window and glancing out, Selphie spotted Pavan and Seifer running towards the mess hall. Sparing a glance at the clock, Selphie muttered "It's pretty early for breakfast…"
But looking out the window to see the fast approaching pair of water- gunners, Selphie shrugged and smiled, chirping out an "Oh well!" as she walked toward the front door.
"Hiiiiiii, guys!" Selphie yelled, waving at Pavan and Seifer. Once inside, Pavan threw down his water gun and stared, wide-eyed and panting for breath.
Seifer's eyes seemed to widen, too, as he noticed he had run across camp, almost as far away from his station as possible. "Aw, shit!" he said violently. Pointing at Pavan, he spoke again. "It's all your fault if I get in trouble, kid!" he said through clenched teeth as he started back towards his station.
Pavan watched as Seifer left, then he looked up at Selphie. "Why was he so mean to me?" Pavan nearly whispered, staring at Selphie with adorable, doe- like eyes. Selphie's face fell sympathetically as she hugged the small sniffling boy. "Awww! Poor you! Seifer's just a big meanie, don't you worry! He's like that to everyone," she told him.
"But I wanted to be his friend," protested Pavan. Selphie sighed. "It'd probably be safer if you stayed away from him. Especially since you soaked him like that! Teehee!" giggled Selphie as she began to crack up.