Despite the serious cases of poison ivy, paranoia, and short shorts the group finally managed to get the lean-to erected. By that time it was high noon and they were all hungry as hell and couldn't' wait to find some food, even if it meant moving around in pain for Light and Mello.

Having finally pried loose of Matt Near approached Matsuda and said, "Since you're the one with prior Boy Scout knowledge I expect you know what is food in these woods and what is not. Think we can find something in here?"

"Um, this forest has plenty of mushrooms and other fungi which is edible. Just don't pick up anything without telling me about or you might just die. Lots of poisonous things out here. And maybe some roots and bugs would taste good-"

"I draw the line at eating bugs. I'm not that hungry." Mello said from where he was crouched over painfully, standing next to Light who was in the same position.

L was staring at both of them with his hands in front of his mouth trying in vain not to laugh. "You look like you have hemorrhoids. I didn't know it occurred in people so y-young-HAHAHAHAHA!"

"I WILL STRANGLE YOU." Mello threatened darkly, but could only walk very stiffly in his direction. "Stop laughing,!"

"Keep laughing, fashion reject. Come night at least I'll be in full coverage and not shivering in the cold because of my fashion malfunction. Though I have to say it looks good on you, except for the pasty legs." Light sniped at L as he tried to stand up straight and follow Matsuda and Near into the forest.

Still making quips at each other the rest of them followed Matsuda in search of food with Matt bringing up the rear. They scoured for what seemed like hours until they came upon a tree that had almost everything at once under it. Edible mushrooms and flowers, nutritious roots, even a berry bush.

"Woot, jackpot! Come on everyone, there's enough to go around and maybe we can roast some of the roots in a fire when we go back to the lean-to." Matsuda said happily as he began to gather handfuls of the stuff.

Everyone began to fill their arms, except for L who was staring up into the tree branches.

"What's up Short-shorts? Can't move to help?" Smirked Near as he loaded up on mushrooms.

"squirrels." L muttered quietly.

"What did you say?"

"I said, SQUIRRELS!"

Suddenly a hail of acorns began to rain down on the heads of the campers below. Matt took off like a startled deer into the woods. Matsuda was cowering with his arms over his head, not able to see where to go in the volley of nuts. Near was trying to save the stash of edible mushrooms he gathered to no avail since the acorns just obliterated them in his arms. Light had lifted up Mello and was using him as a human shield.

"Put me down you MOTHERFUCKER!" Mello shouted as he struggled in Light's arms. He opened his mouth to say something else when three acorns launched themselves down his throat. Now Light had to lower his shield to do the Heimlich maneuver while getting pelted with acorns.

But L was the only one not panicking. In fact he was throwing the nuts back at the squirrels. And hitting them with stunning accuracy. Squirrels were getting stunned left and right with bullet strikes from L's lithe arms. "I. CAN'T. STAND. SQUIRRELS!"

Taking their cue from L, the others started returning fire to the squirrels above. But there was so many of them. Every time one retreated another came to take its place and the acorns from above never slowed down. After a rapid ten minutes the campers abandoned the fight (and their food) and ran back toward the riverside to the lean-to.

When everyone came back they saw Matt sitting by a small fire with something silver glimmering beside it. He looked up at the approaching group with the first real smile he'd shown on his face since this disaster started.

Picking up the glimmering thing he ran to the others excitedly. "Hey guys! Get a load of this thing!" He held up a gigantic bass, it's fins still moving slightly. "This could feed everyone and maybe even provide seconds!"

"Finally you do something productive! That's my Scaredy-Cat!" Mello said, cracking his own smile and giving Matt a thump on his shoulder. L and Near gave their congratulations as well and Light grudgingly gave a small thank you. But Matsuda was looking at the fish wearily.

"Where'd you get that fish, Matt?"

"Oh, further down the river just out of sight of the camp."

"What did you use to fish for it?"

"Nothing. It was just lying there. Why?"

By this time the others were beginning to get the full picture and was backing away slowly.

"Why? What's wrong? It's fish, isn't it?" Matt said wonderingly, still holding it up. "You guys don't like fish?"

"It's not that we don't like fish, but something else may like fish even more-"

"RRRRAAAAAWWWWRRRR!"

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~

Come to me Winnie! Come to me! He misses Matsuda.