A/n- I'M BACK!

Disclaimer- Not mine! Though I can own stock from their company.

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17. Camping

“So…” Jak said. “Who exactly gave us this all-expenses-paid camping trip anyway?”

“It’s for me,” Daxter corrected, “but it said to invite all of you guys. I can only imagine that someone fell for my marvelous charms, and yet another conquest of a female’s heart belongs to me!...”

Everyone tuned him out, of course. Except for Torn, who threw his knife at him, causing him to squeak and duck out of sight.

All of Jak’s team was on an all-expenses-paid-by-a-mysterious-benefactor camping trip in the Forest. They didn’t know why, but they were.

Anyway, the point is they were camping in a godforsaken wilderness, with big, freaky dinosaur-like metal heads and strange sounds from every direction and-

Readers: GET ON WITH THE STORY! WE’VE WAITED FIVE MONTHS!

Author: Yeah, yeah. Silence, minions!

At the current time, they were sitting around a campfire roasting marshmallows and hot dogs, which, by a convenient plot hole and immense bribery on the part of the author, have been thrown into this three-dimensional computer-animated video game by the game designers. Daxter was now standing behind Torn, and whenever said elf’s head was turned, he mimed stabbing the dreadlocked dude with his poker. Everyone else was struggling not to laugh.

“So,” Jak repeated as Torn began to chase the diminutive rodent around the fire with several sharp, pointy knives and threats of turning him into purses and/or fur stoles. “Who gave us this thing, anyway?”

Grus jumped in, pulled out a note, and re-read it. “Not sure. It just says ‘We hope you enjoy this fun trip to the godforsaken wilderness with big, freaky dinosaur-like metal heads and strange sounds coming from every direction and ghosts. Please enjoy this trip that costs you absolutely nothing. Signed, a lot of people who can’t wait to sca- see you happy.’”

Ashelin thought for a moment. “It doesn’t sound suspicious,” she said slowly.

“Nope,” agreed both Jak and Keira.

“And it was all for Daxxie!” Tess said cheerfully. “I’m glad he’s found a new friend…”

Silence.

“Right,” Jynx said. “You just go on thinking that if it’ll make you happy.”

Of course, Razor and Emi were sitting by the fire… together… and they agreed with whatever was just said. Yeah.

Another silence fell over the group. Except for the background screams of Daxter and the angry yells of Torn.

Grus fidgeted and poked the chicken. Jak glared at the fire. Ashelin glared at Daxter as he ran around screaming.

“Hey!” Jynx said suddenly. “Let’s tell ghost stories!”

“Why?” Grus wanted to know. “They’re pointless.”

“But I know this really good one!” the ottsel protested.

Jak shuddered. “I hate ghost stories,” he complained.

“Why?” Ashelin asked curiously.

Instant anime-style depression hit the blonde-slash-green guy. He drooped.

“Ghost whumpbees,” Keira whispered behind her hand to the K.G. captain.

“Oh.”

“So… we’re gonna tell them now, right?” Jynx said.

“Yeah,” everyone but Jak replied in unison. Torn chased Daxter off the cliff.

“OKAY!” the blonde rodent cheered. “Once there was this happy little boy who looked a lot like Jak. Anyway, he stepped on a whumpbees nest, which made them all angry, so they came after him and stung him a whole lot. He squished them all, and their ghosts came back to haunt him.” Jak had whimpered at this point. “And the worst part was, they could continue to sting him forever because he couldn’t kill them!”

Everyone else was like “…”

“The End,” Jynx finished proudly.

“That sucked.” Ashelin said flatly.

Jak was rocking back and forth sucking on his thumb. Keira got up to comfort him.

Grus was trying to stab the chicken with her poker to roast over the fire. The little glowy muse stared hungrily at it.

Razor and Emi were in their own little world…

Sarea had fallen asleep. Tess had jumped over the cliff after Daxter.

Buzz. Buzzzzzzzzzz.

Jak screamed. “WHUMPBEE GHOSTS!” He tried to crawl under the log he was sitting on. Everyone stared at him. Keira tried to calm him down.

Buzzzzzzzzz. Buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

“Are you hearing that?” Grus asked cautiously. She looked slightly scared.

Jynx patted his ears which he had stuffed with cotton. “Nope,” he said proudly.

Ashelin looked uneasy. “I don’t think so,” she said slowly.

BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

“AHHHHHHHHH!” Ashelin and Grus shrieked. “WHUMPBEE GHOSTS!” They jumped and clutched each other, chicken forgotten. The muse glowed sadly away, knowing it would never get its chicken dinner in this chapter.

And then…

LITTLE GLOWY BLOBS APPEARED!

This, strangely enough, terrorized Ashelin and Grus into running screaming back to the city. Emi and Razor looked up from staring at each other, and ran to join them, screaming all the way. Jak up and fainted, taking out Keira as he whacked her with his gun.

Sarea sat there sleeping… and sleeping…

…and Jynx fell asleep as well, since he had by this point completely lost interest in this portion of his life.

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Samos’s team was cackling behind the bushes as Errol manipulated the glowy blobs with a vague resemblance to whumpbees around.

“Buahaha,” cackled Damas.

“Muahaha,” snickered Kleiver.

Liz and Andrea had duct-taped their mouths shut so they wouldn’t give away the prank by their incessant giggling. Cir looked strangely triumphant at the sight of an unconscious Jak, and Desperado eyed Keira’s knocked-out and shapely form.

“That, my friends, is revenge!” sniggered Samos. “Thank you Errol, though it feels strange to say that, for providing ghosts for us!”

Errol waved a vague hand. “Whatever.”

Andrea seemed to pass out from lack of air. Liz followed suit at the sight.

“Yup…” the ghost trailed off.

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A/n- :P I am evil. I know. I haven’t updated this is… what… five months? Six months? Oh well…

To catch you guys up, I am spending my first night in our old house back up in Fresno tonight… it’s the sixteenth of July when I write this… and because our DSL isn’t hooked up yet, I can’t get on the internet. Sigh. We moved in yesterday, but we spent the night at our friends’ house instead of sleeping here.

While editing on FFnet: It's 12:01 on the 21st right now. I haven't been able to get on for a bit.

Reason for not writing: I lost interest in the Jak and Daxter series. (BAD ME!) :P I gained a renewed interest in Naruto, and so I started writing… a lot… in that section… (I have eight Naruto stories: Five one-shots and three multi-chaptered fics. Only one FMA fic, and of course, this story, too.) And then I regained interest. So… yeah.

Yep. I’ll just leave it at I’m back and I have until next Sunday to write until we go on a ten-day trip to Ecuador!

-animedragongirl