Naruto Primer: Guys
Camping
Iruka is not a particularly CONFIDENT man. He tends to not stand up for himself so, when the four teacher jounins requested that he take their male students out camping for a character building experience, he wasn't about to turn them down.
"Why do we have to do this?" complained Chouji as he dropped some firewood into a big pile. "Haven't we done enough in a short span of time?"
"How come the girls don't have to?" asked Kiba as he, Naruto, Iruka and Sasuke pitched a tent.
"This is a MANLY character building experience!" Iruka replied.
"Besides, they would just make everything more complicated." Sasuke said. The four of them stepped back to gaze upon their beautiful tent pitching skills but, all at once, it just collapsed on itself.
"Don't worry guys, we only have to pitch five of these." Iruka laughed.
"Five?" said Naruto.
"Yeah!" said Iruka. "You'll all by sleeping in pairs and, of course, I'll have my very own."
"Hey, where did Neji, Shikamaru, Lee and Shino go anyway?" wondered Kiba randomly as he started looking around.
"Well, Shikamaru WAS getting firewood with me…" Chouji started.
"He probably got distracted." Iruka said. "And don't worry, I told Neji and Lee to go fishing for our dinner tonight. As for Shino…hm…I don't know where he is! That's crazy!"
"I'm right here." Said Shino. "I'm pitching this tent."
They looked over at Shino who had a tent made perfectly beautiful.
"When did you get back?" asked Sasuke.
"I've been here the whole time." Shino said, looking slightly annoyed.
"I guess while we're waiting for Neji and Lee to get back from getting our dinner, we can decide who sleeps in which tent!" Iruka said as he pulled out a piece of paper and a pencil. "Does anyone have any preferences?"
"How about some UN-preferences?" said Naruto, glaring at Sasuke who only glared back.
"That too." Iruka said.
After much deliberation…
"Okay," said Iruka as he put the pencil behind his ear. "If we ever actually find Shikamaru, he and Chouji will be in that tent that Shino has just finished pitching. Kiba and Naruto will be in that one that Shino finished pitching a little while ago since they have recently become friends. Neji and Lee will be in that tent that Shino pitched FIRST since they're older than the rest of you and on the same team. As for this tent that Shino is in the midst of pitching, that is where Sasuke and Shino will be because Shino is the only person that doesn't offend Sasuke."
Then he looked at the reject tent. "And I'll be in this one!" he announced. "And Shino will, of course, make it look pretty just like the rest of them."
"Whatever." Said Shino.
"Should we go and look for Shikamaru?" asked Chouji. "What if he's being eaten by a bear?"
"He's a chuunin, he'll be fine!" said Iruka ignorantly.
"Doesn't it irk you to think that Shikamaru is on the same level as you?" Naruto asked Iruka.
"No." said Iruka obliviously.
"It irks me that Shikamaru is on a higher level than me." Naruto said, crossing his arms.
Just then, Neji and Lee came tromping over completely soaked and looking all beat up as if they had just gotten into a horrible fight. "What happened to you two?!" Iruka yelled.
"Well, we were minding our own business and were fishing and stuff, when all of a sudden, a bunch of jounin ninjas came out of nowhere and demanded to fight us and what followed was a horrible bloody battle that both Neji and I had to fight our very hardest to win!!" Lee yelled as he got more and more passionate as he spoke. "We barely escaped with our lives."
Neji slapped his forehead. "Lee jumped into the river but it had a faster current than he thought." Neji explained. "So I jumped in to save him but then I realized that it faster current than I thought and we were both carried down the river and eventually tumbled over a waterfall."
"I like the first story better." Said Iruka.
"Me too." Said Neji.
"You shouldn't have told them the REAL story!" Lee yelled.
"You made the fake story too unbelievable." Neji said.
"So where's the fish?" asked Sasuke. Neji and Lee didn't answer, they only bowed their heads in shame.
"All right!" said Iruka. "Neji and Lee! Since you two are clearly fish catching incompetent, you and Chouji will go search for Shikamaru. Kiba, Naruto and Sasuke, you go catch us some fish! Shino, you stay here and finish pitching the tents!"
"I did." Said Shino.
"Then…um…you have to help me make a fire!" Iruka said.
The groups then split up with their appointed tasks, except for Iruka and Shino who stayed in the same place with their appointed tasks.
"Well, I was going around in this direction when I lost sight of him…" said Chouji as he started walking off.
"I'm chafing…" complained Lee.
"I didn't need to know that." Neji said.
"You can't tell me that you're NOT!" said Lee.
"I'm not." Neji said even though he might very well be doing so.
"That's a lie!!" yelled Lee as if it really mattered.
"Guys, we're supposed to be looking for Shikamaru!" said Chouji.
"What?" came Shikamaru's voice as he poked his head out from behind a tree.
"Oh, THERE you are, Shikamaru!" said Chouji. "Why did you wander off?"
"I didn't." said Shikamaru. "I was here the whole time. YOU just kept walking even when I told you that I was going to sit here for a little while."
"Oh. Okay!" said Chouji. "I guess we didn't need a search party then."
"I guess not." Said Shikamaru with a flamboyant shrug. So that group went back to camp.
Meanwhile, the fishing group was having their share of troubles.
"Um…current?" said Kiba skeptically as they stood in front of a river that was completely still with no sign of running water at all, ESPECIALLY any sign of a waterfall that might have potentially existed downstream.
"I guess we can assume that Lee and Neji are a lot less competent than we originally ORIGINALLY assumed." Sasuke decided.
"I'LL catch us some fish!" Naruto announced as he jumped into the water that was about knee deep.
"No, Akamaru and I will do it!!" Kiba argued as he got in too.
"I'll just watch." Said Sasuke since he didn't have any interest in getting his clothes wet for no reason. After all, he knew he was MUCH better than both Naruto and Kiba combined so he didn't have to prove it, especially if no one was there to watch him make a mockery of the two by catching infinitely more fish than they would.
Back at camp…
"Okay, I made a bunch of benches so we can all sit around the campfire together." Said Shino as he walked over to Iruka who was sitting idly by.
"Really?!" said Iruka. "Wow! I didn't even ask you to do that!"
"I felt like it." Shino replied.
"That's excellent then!!" Iruka exclaimed just as Shikamaru, Chouji, Neji and Lee all returned.
"We found Shikamaru." Said Chouji. "He was sitting somewhere."
"What a surprise!" said Iruka.
A few hours later, when the fishing group had returned from fishing with MANY fish in their arms, the sun had begun to set. And, with Shino's MAD fire building skills, they didn't have a problem with heat to cook their meat or light to live by.
"Well, so far, I think the only people who haven't really contributed to this trip are Neji, Lee and Shikamaru." Said Iruka randomly.
"Um…I'm a chuunin." Said Shikamaru.
"Oh right." Said Iruka. "In that case, the only people who haven't contributed are Neji and Lee."
"What, just because he's a chuunin doesn't mean he doesn't have to contribute?" Neji said, looking shocked.
"Neji and I could beat Shikamaru in our SLEEP." Said Lee.
"Yeah but…are you two chuunins?" Shikamaru asked.
"But anyway, what I was getting at by that comment was not to start an argument!" Iruka interrupted. "I was just saying that it should be Neji and Lee's job to prepare the food!"
"That's ludicrous." Said Neji. "Neither of us can cook. Ask Sasuke to do it. After all, he won the cooking contest for his group."
"Is that so?" Iruka said, looking more excited than he should have as he looked at Sasuke.
"Uh…I'd rather not." Said Sasuke since he only knew how to make that ONE item that he had Sharinganed.
"I'll take care of it!" offered Chouji.
Chouji and Shino ended up tending to the fish.
"Well, Neji and Lee STILL haven't done anything…" Iruka said, pulling out a flashlight from his back. "So that means that one of you has to tell a us all a super SCARY story!!"
"Lee can do that." Neji said.
"Yeah!" said Lee. "I'm REALLY good at telling scary stories!!"
"I don't really think anyone's very good at telling scary stories." Sasuke said suddenly. "And I'm not just saying that. Honestly, scary stories told around a campfire are never really scary."
"He's right." Said Kiba. "There's just no effect if there's no dramatic music."
"I'll be the dramatic music!" Naruto said, raising his hand.
"No, let's just NOT tell scary stories." Said Sasuke.
"What could we POSSIBLY do besides tell scary stories?" Iruka sighed in the 'ALAS!' tone. "Oh! I've got it!!" He reached for his backpack again and pulled out a bag of marshmallows, a few bars of chocolate and a box of graham crackers. "We could make s'mores!!"
Everyone stared at Iruka as if he was an idiot, and he kind of was acting like one.
"This is really boring…" said Kiba with a sigh.
"Can we just go back?" asked Shikamaru. "I'm not building character."
"Oh no!" said Iruka, getting depressed. "I promised your teachers that when you got back, you would all have character built up to the sky!! Now what am I going to do when I return and you guys have no more character than when you left with me?!"
"The girls don't have to build character." Said Sasuke. "They just had a party. And they get to do WHATEVER they want at their parties."
"They didn't get a party." Said Iruka.
"Oh?" said Sasuke, raising an eyebrow.
"What night was it?" Kiba asked.
"I'm not sure…maybe two nights ago." Sasuke replied.
"Aw man." Said Kiba. "I didn't get ANY prank phone calls and no one rang my doorbell and I definitely didn't catch any girls peaking in my window and taking my picture while I was changing…"
"Yeah, they were annoying me all night." Sasuke said. "Trust me, you didn't miss a thing."
"Oh man, I hate it when that happens." Said Naruto. "I mean, they were just phoning me all night and every time I turned around I saw a flash from a camera."
Everyone averted their eyes from Naruto because they knew he was lying.
"All right…" said Iruka. "Now that we're done with THAT conversation, I just remembered that it's VERY important that we have water! Especially if we're going to eat. So, while we're waiting for the fish to finish cooking, I'm going to have to send Lee and Neji down to get us some fresh water!"
"Aw man!!" whined Lee.
"On second thought, they might end up falling in and being swept downstream again…" Iruka said, scratching his chin.
"I'LL supervise them." Said Sasuke, standing up.
"We don't NEED supervision." Neji said, looking angry.
"What a good idea!" said Iruka. "You three go off and get us some water!"
With that, Neji, Lee and Sasuke went off to fetch some water. They reached the little river area they had within a few minutes and then stood and stared at it for a minute or two.
"Now that we're HERE…" said Lee, looking around and feeling his pockets. "Um…does anyone have a bucket or a pot or something?"
"…No…" said Neji and Sasuke.
"Well that's too bad!!" said Lee. "You two stay here and guard the water, I'LL go and get the bucket back from camp!!!" Then Lee ran off as fast as he possibly could.
"Yeah, guard the water." Said Sasuke. "As if someone's going to try and take it."
"As if it's going to try and get away." Neji added.
The two stood there and laughed ever so slightly, but tried not to laugh TOO much or else they might lose their stoic exposition.
In the meantime, Lee had made it back to camp.
"Back so soon?" said Iruka as he took a big chomp of fish.
"Yeah, we forgot to bring a bucket!!" Lee said passionately as he struck a dramatic pose. "So while Sasuke and Neji stayed behind to guard the water, I came back to get some…say, why are you guys eating without us?"
"Chouji was too hungry to wait and we didn't want to just sit here and WATCH him eat or else we'd get hungry too." Said Shikamaru. "But we'll save you some. Don't worry."
"There's a water jug right there." Said Iruka.
"OKAY!!" said Lee as he grabbed the jug and ran off faster than the speed of…SOUND. He reached the river again where Neji and Sasuke were guarding it ever so…lightly. "I brought the jug!! Let's fill it up and head back to camp because they're eating the fish without us!"
"Well that's rude." Said Neji.
"It's because Chouji was so hungry and they weren't about to just WATCH him eat!!" laughed Lee. "That would have been silly."
"Okay, let's hurry up then." Said Sasuke as he took the jug and dunked it in the water. The three waited there for a few minutes for the jug to fill up and then pulled it out.
"So…who carries it back?" said Neji.
Immediately, Lee put his finger on his nose. Sasuke followed suit after a moment. Neji stared at them both with fingers on their noses. "…What?" he asked, suddenly feeling self conscious that they were trying to discretely tell him that there was something on his nose. He couldn't have THAT so he touched his nose slightly.
"Ha-ha!" said Lee. "You were last! You have to carry the jug!!"
"What was that?" Neji asked.
"Just carry it." said Sasuke, handing the jug to Neji.
Neji figured that since he hadn't done anything yet, it was fair ENOUGH. So he took the jug and three of them started walking back to the camp only to find that all the other men had successfully polished off all the fish!!
"I thought you guys said you would save some for us!" whined Lee.
"Oh…well, I guess we forgot…" said Iruka. Then he laughed as if it was funny. The rest of the group chimed in. Except for Shino. He just sat there.
"But I came back and you said that you'd save some for us!" complained Lee.
"It's all right, I brought my own lunch anyway." Said Sasuke as he pulled out a paper bag from his personalized backpack with an Uchiha Fan patch sewn on it.
"It's fine." Said Neji, sitting down. "I'll just sit here and stare at all the empty plates. Maybe I'll drink some water."
"That's not fair!!" Lee yelled.
"Well, I think it's time we all hit the hay!!" said Iruka.
"What…?" said all the smaller people.
"You heard me!" Iruka said. "Time to crawl into our tents and count some sheep! Tomorrow is another BIG camping day!"