A/N: Uah. Character development time. Daarrrhgh.

Thanks for all the support! I truly couldn't have made it this far without you guys. I know it's been a long time, so this time, I put up 2 chappies at once! X3!!

P.S. Long reviews=happy author+ possibly longer chapters >_>





CHAPTER 15: Morning Routine

Someone had the collossal gall to wake her up at the unholy hour of, she forced open one eye and glared at the alarm clock, yes, heavens forbid, at the unholy hour of nine-thirty in the morning.

She groaned and rolled over, pulling the blankets over her head and pointedly ignoring the persistent knocking on the door, hoping whoever the hell it was would go away soon.

No such luck. The idiot, whoever the hell it was, kept knocking.

"GO AWAY!!" She yelled, her voice slightly muffled by the blankets.

The knocking stopped.

"Thank you," she groaned into her pillow, twisting in place until she managed to find a comfortable position.

Just as she finally got settled, however, the knocking started anew.

"AAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"

She was up now, and quite enraged. Rolling off the bed, she stormed over to the door in her bedclothes, dragging half the sheets and blankets with her and not caring if she looked like hell. Someone just didn't get the hint. Someone had disturbed her peaceful Sunday morning sleep-in. Someone was going to pay.

She yanked the door open, fully prepared to deliver the wrath of all Hells to the person standing behind it--

--and gulped.

Someone was tall. Someone was dark. Someone was incredibly handsome in a pale, sickly way.

That someone --She took another good look just to be sure-- happened to be none other than Gekkou Hayate, who looked as dead as she probably looked like. Evidently, the Chuunin Exam Preliminary Tournament Judge wasn't exactly a morning person, either.

Suddenly realizing that she was still standing before a perfect stranger (to him, anyway) in her bedclothes and staring quite rudely at him, she promptly slammed the door closed (right in his face too), thinking to change into something more presentable and run a comb through her hair a few times at least.

Just as suddenly, she realized that, quite frankly, that she didn't care.

Simply put, her brain, her vanity, and her sense of etiquette just didn't kick in until she was fully awake, which didn't happen until after 12:30 PM, when everyone else was eating lunch and she would conveniently be eating her breakfast.

Sighing in defeat, she opened the door again, averting her eyes and muttering something incomprehensible--the closest she could come to apologizing at nine-thirty in the morning.

Apparently, the Chuunin examiner seemed to understand that it was meant to be her version of an apology and nodded as a sign of acceptance.

Kicking aside the blankets as so they wouldn't be blocking the doorway, she stifled a yawn and tried to muster up an alert and respectful face due to a Jounin of his rank. She failed.

The Special Jounin coughed lightly a few times, catching her attention. "The meeting will start in thirty minutes, so the Hokage-sama sent me to notify you," he said in a soft, slightly raspy voice, tactfully choosing not to comment on her ragged appearance or the messy state of the room.

"Yes, sir" she mumbled. Peering at him through her own sleep-lidded eyes, she ventured, "You look like you haven't had your coffee yet."

Hayate coughed again and shook his head.

"Sit down," she muttered. "If I have to go to this meeting at the ungodly hour of ten in the morning, then I'm damn well going to take the half-hour I've got to wake myself up properly, Hokage or no."

She wasn't sure, but she could swear that she saw the Jounin smile slightly at that. Hmph. Well. At the time right now, she just didn't care. At this time of the day, smiling was just another thing that she-who-would-turn-into-a-zombie-if-woken-too-early couldn't do.

Grabbing the coffee maker, she dumped in two cups of water, small spoonful of citrus-ginseng tea mixture, and five heaping tablespoons of ground coffee beans into the machine--she had a sneaking suspicion that the examiner drank his coffee as black as possible. From the looks of him, it'd probably take a really strong coffee just to keep him awake, anyway.

While the coffee was brewing, she slammed herself into the bathroom and filled the sink with water. As soon as the sink basin was nearly three-quarters full, she promptly plunked her entire head down into the water.

She resurfaced a moment later, gasping at the icy coldness. Over the years, she'd discovered that dunking her head in cold water was the fastest way to wake herself up. Crude, yes, but effective.

After some blindly groping about, she found her towel and sloppily mopped up her wet face and dried her dripping hair. She glared at her own reflection, which, from her point of view, was really just a blur of black hair and pale skin; she hadn't had time to put in her contacts yet, so she did that next.

Blinking now with renewed vision, she threw on the outfit she'd laid out last night and slugged her way back into the kitchen to start making breakfast. Bacon, cheese and mushroom omlette, miso soup with rice, and some freshly sliced tangerines would finish it all up quite nicely. She made sure to make double portions for each item, arranging each neatly on clean white plates.

By the time she was done, the coffee had also finished brewing. She poured the steaming dark-brown liquid into two mugs, shoved everything on a tray, walked back outside and plunked it all down before the dozing Jounin.

Hayate blinked in surprise. "You shouldn't have gone through all this trouble..." he started, but she cut him off.

"I can't go without breakfast, and since you obviously can't go off until I'm done, you might as well eat some with me," she said in a no-nonsense manner. "Heaven knows how much energy waking up at this hour takes. If I don't eat something now, I'll just end up sleeping through the entire meeting."

"I can't possibly eat all this, though..." The Special Jounin protested feebly.

"Don't worry about it," she muttered. "I'll just finish off whatever you have left." Ignoring his look of disbelief, she plunked herself down on the chair, added five ice cubes, two packets of sugar and three creamers into her coffee, tasted the concotion, winced, and added another packet of sugar. Scowling, she quickly chugged down half the mug. "I don't really like coffee, but I need it to stay awake," she offered by way of explanation, then began to devour her morning meal at an alarming rate.

Hayate stared at her blankly for a few moments, then, shaking his head slightly, began to eat as well.

Before long, they had both finished. Despite what the Jounin had said earlier, he had finished almost everything. She cleared away the plates and sat down in front of him again, and they sat in silence for a few moments, comfortably sipping their coffee. (She noted that he did, in fact, drink his coffee black.)

However, the silence had to be broken, and after a while she did so. "So." She started. "I suppose one of the reasons that you are here is to brief me on the agenda of the meeting. Please start now, then."





A/N: Citrus-ginseng tea really does add spice to your coffee. It gives it a slight tangy taste so it's not just all bitter, bitter coffee =_=;; I like citrus but I dislike ginseng even though it's really good for your body, so find a good mixture of citrus-ginseng that you like. Depending on how exotic a taste you want the coffee to have, add or subtract the amount of instant tea mixture you put in. I usually go by trial-and-error. XD If all else fails, claim it's a rare, exotic Indian tea that does wonder for the body and spirit so your coffee-testers feel obliged to appreciate it XDDDDD I heard somewhere like girls like to talk while eating, while guys like to finish eating first, then talk. I just thought that was interesting.