Yes, I DO love Ryu. When DOA Online or whatever the heck it's called comes out… expect to see a retard out there by the name of Kurmoi being an idiot with Hayabusa! Woo! Err… *cough*

"I have an idea…" Hitomi voiced nervously.

"Yeah?"

"What about we get him a haircut?" she asked.

"Hey, that's a good idea!" Tina exclaimed, for lack of any better ideas. "You know there's something wrong when a guy uses more conditioner then you do,"

"Jeez, he uses more then I do," Kasumi rolled her eyes. "Oh well… at least I always know where to get spare stuff from if I run out…"

"He uses conditioner?" Jann-Lee looked stunned.

"Of course. Your hair is beautiful if you use conditioner. Therefore you're beautiful," Helena smiled.

Without saying anything, Jann-Lee pulled out a notepad and added something to his shopping list. Must buy conditioner.

"We could get him a pet, like a dog, or a snake, or a giraffe…" Tina suggested. Christie, for lack of better things to do, snatched Jann-Lee's pad of paper and wrote down the ideas, followed by a few of her own.

Leifang glanced over Christie's shoulder and her eyes slowly widened. "Gas chamber? Electric chair? Machine gun capable of blowing guys' balls off?" she shook her head at the platinum haired woman. "Where do you expect us to find stuff like that?"

"I have my sources," was the cold reply.

"Well, they're ideas, I guess…" Helena said. "Any others?"

"What about we get something each and it adds up into one big present?" Hitomi asked.

"What do you mean?" A perplexed Helena asked.

"Dude! Like, a puzzle?" Zack asked.

"Something like that," Hitomi shrugged.

Hayate came back into the room. Holding a knife. With red stains on it.

"Uh, Hayate…?" Hitomi asked cautiously. "Why are you holding a knife with a menacing look in your eyes when you went to the toilet?"

The unspoken thought was hanging in the air, more obvious then a bad smell. Did Hayate just… did he…?

"Hell no," Hayate licked the knife, avoiding the blade. "Darn jam sponge cake… err…"

The unspoken thought disappeared, followed by a greasy from the other nine people in the room. Hayate looked sheepish.

"Hey, come on. It's not like half of you were actually going to eat it, what with you dieting and all…"

The dirty looks increased tenfold. "I was planning on starting my diet next week," Christie informed him icily.

"I went off mine just so I could enjoy myself this week," Ayane hissed.

"I wasn't planning on eating it, actually," Zack said, rubbing his stomach. "Don't wanna get that puppy fat, ya know?"

"Anyway," Helena intervened crisply. "Does anyone have any more ideas about presents?"

"A budgerigar!" Kasumi exclaimed happily.

Everyone turned to stare at her, except for Ayane, who was glaring at her, and Hayate, who had his eyes to the floor muttering something that sounded like 'Kasumi is dead' over and over. She smiled, and held two fingers up in a peace sign.

"Everyone knows what good companions budgies are. And you know, seeing as he's known as the solitary super ninja and all, he could be less solitary with a nice budgie companion!"

"Good idea," Helena complimented, while Christie drew a picture of a budgie on the paper, followed by several arrows spearing the poor bird to the edge of the paper, with a generous pool of blood seeping underneath it.

"What about we make him up?" Ayane suggested. "Make him look all pretty,"

"Ooh!" Leifang exclaimed. "Yeah, we could do his nails, and give him nice lippie…"

"Ooh!" the other girls said in unison, minus Christie. Meanwhile, the guys (and Christie) in the room were trying to hold their lunches, or in Hayate's case a certain jam sponge cake, down.

"Let's do that!" Hitomi smiled. "We can do something else too, but let's do that!"

"Yeah!" the girls exclaimed. Hayate buried his head in his hands.

"Poor Ryu. Even he doesn't deserve that,"

"He'll never be able to recover from it," Zack added.

"Even he doesn't deserve that, and that's a lot coming from me," Jann-Lee agreed.

There was a pause. Hayate was in thought. Had Jann-Lee finally forgiven Ryu for that comment in the second tournament he had later heard about?

"Have you seen the way Leifang makes up?" Jann-Lee shook his head. "No-one deserves that. Nobody,"

Sort of, Hayate thought.

There were some sudden muffled noises from outside the room before Hayabusa rushed in, shutting the door and locking it behind him.

"I'm going to get you!" came the voice from the outside.

"If you do, you'll be up for a new door!" Hayabusa retorted.

"Oh," came the sullen response from outside. "Well… I'll get you when you come out then. I'll be waiting…"

Hayabusa fell into a chair, shaking his head. "He's insane," he declared.

"Who?" Helena asked.

"Bayman. He popped up out of god knows where and says he wants to practise torturing people. For some reason he didn't like it too much when I told him to practise them on his…" a pause. "…let's just say his thing. He got angry and started chasing me around,"

"Thing?" Zack burst out laughing. "Sorry… just we had a talk about that before,"

Ryu looked at them oddly. "You were talking about Bayman's thing?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Not… Bayman's thing," Hayate said hastily. "Just… things in general,"

"Things in general?" Both of Hayabusa's eyebrows were raised by this stage. "Why? Actually, I don't want to know," he sighed, and stood up. "I better go out now and face the crunching. Better now then when I'm not expecting it,"

"Have fun," Jann-Lee mock-bowed to him, gesturing at the door.

"I'm sure," the super ninja said sarcastically before walking out.

Everyone fell silent, listening for what would happen. There was a thump, before some giggling.

"What the…?" Zack started, but got shut up by nine angry glares.

"…T-t-that tickles!" they heard through the door. "S-s-stop it! I'll…"

"You'll?" Bayman's gruff voice was audible through the solid wood.

"…Get off me!" there was another thump and a crack. They all winced as one, realising that it was the crack of a bone.

"That does it!" Bayman's voice was heard. "You're off my Christmas card list now!"

"What?" Hayabusa sounded indignant. "You started it!"

"You made my leg make a funny noise!" the assassin yelled.

"You tickled me!" the ninja's voice was just as loud. "And you poked me in the eye too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Anyway…" Helena's voice snapped everyone out of their reverie. "I hereby call this meeting, if you can really call it that, to a finish. If anyone has any ideas, please tell me before the fifteenth,"

They filed out, only to see Hayabusa and Bayman squaring up in the corridor.

"I'll crunch you!" Bayman roared.

"Well… I'll… stab you!" Hayabusa retorted.

"I'll stab you first!"

"If you stab me first, I'll stab you second! If not, I'll stab you first!"

"Hey, guys?" Hayate tapped Hayabusa on the shoulder. "Dinner time,"

"Dinner?"

"Yep," Hayate smiled. "Your favourites…"

Anyone in the hallway was trampled as the ninja and the assassin raced down to the dining room. Leifang blinked.

"Well!"