They were all packing up the clothing they'd brought to the cabin, as well as the snacks and trail-mix that Ulysses had bought. Their sleeping bags, already rolled up, were strapped onto the bottom of their packs.

Raven, who was physically the weakest in the family, was only required to carry his own pack. Ulysses had agreed to take his sleeping bag for him, provided Raven had rolled it up first. Since Raven had already done that, all that remained was for Ulysses to clip the sleeping bag to his pack.

Once he was finished, Ness and Cain came back down the stairs. They had finished packing their clothes, and now they just needed to get their food and sleeping bags, and then they would be ready to go. Quickly packing up the snacks left out for them, Ness and Cain set about rolling up their respective sleeping bags and clipping them to their packs.

Once they were done with this, all eleven of them gathered together in the living room.

"Well, that takes care of the easy part," Ryan said, dusting off his hands and taking a deep breath.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious, for that little piece of information," Fritz said, with a sidelong grin at Ryan.

"Well, if we're all done with the preliminaries, let's get going!" Shara enthused, settling her pack more firmly on her shoulders.

"All right, let's do that!" Ulysses Carter laughed heartily, ruffling Shara's hair as he turned.

Ryan, falling into step behind Shara, smiled. Shara seemed to be in her element here, laughing at a joke Cain had just told. Something about guys walking into a bar or something, Ryan was too absorbed in his thoughts of Shara to really pay attention. She was amazing, there was really no better word to describe her.

***

Leaving the cabin behind, the Carters and their guests made for the deep woods. They knew they were going to be walking for most of the rest of the day, then they would stop, eat, and make camp for the night. They were a bit tired from school, but all of them were looking forward to the trip.

They walked on through the afternoon, stopping now and then for a quick snack and a drink of water. They saw a lot of birds and squirrels up in the treetops, just before those animals disappeared into their hiding places. Cain and Ness had had dropped a little bit behind the rest of them, just far enough to be able to talk without being overheard.

"So Ness, what are you going to do with that blue box you found?" Cain asked.

"I don't really know." Ness thought about it for a minute. "I guess I'll just keep it at home, maybe use it as a paper weight. Although, it does have a lot of weird symbols on it." He grinned. "Maybe it's a Tok'ra artifact."

Both of them, recalling the subject of their conversation at school, burst into contained laughter. Neither of them wanted to attract the attention of any of the others. Once they were finished laughing, someone called back to them from the front of the group.

"Are you two coming, or what?"

"We're coming, Conrad. We're coming," Ness called back.

"What were you two doing, anyway?" Conrad asked, when the two of them had rejoined the group.

"Nothing," Cain said.

"Talking," Ness said at the same time.

Conrad shook his head, fighting the urge to laugh. Ness sidled up to Cain, leaning close so he could whisper in his brother's ear.

"Paranoia, thy name is Cain."

That earned him a smack on the back of his head.

***

Much later, all eleven of them sat together in a large clearing, toasting marshmallows over a roaring campfire. They had earlier cleared the area of anything that might have caught fire, and had also gathered up a generous amount of fuel. Right now, some of them were debating just what it meant to toast a marshmallow.

"Ahh, just the way I like them," Fritz said, pulling his marshmallow out of the flames, just as it had caught fire.

"Char-broiled marshmallows, ick," Cain said, blowing on his nicely golden-browned marshmallow to make it cool off faster.

"Oh, says you," Fritz shot back. "Yours isn't even fully cooked."

"I happen to like the taste of marshmallow more than the taste of burned goo, thank you very much." Cain tossed his head, humphing at Fritz.

"You're crazy."

"Well, you're a nut."

"Well, you're a dork."

"Well, you're an idiot."

"Boys, settle down," Ulysses said, long used to having to break up these kinds of 'arguments'.

"Yes, dad."

"Whatever you say, Mr. Carter."

Ulysses sighed, watching Fritz and Cain stick their tongues out at each other. Apparently, they just couldn't resist taking one last shot at each other. Conrad yawned then, and most of the others around the fire did so as well.

"All right everyone, I think it's long past time for all of us to go to bed," Ulysses said.

"But dad, our beds are at home."

"You know what I mean, Cain," Ulysses said tolerantly.

They all split up after that, going to their respective tents to sleep. Katherine and Conrad shared a tent, and so did Cain, Fritz and Ness. Ulysses Carter had his own tent, both because he was the oldest, and because no one wanted to sleep in the same tent with him due to his unfortunate habit of snoring.

Raven, Ryan, Devon, Shara and Cindy were all sharing a tent.