Second Exam: Part 2

"Second Exam, Part two," the pink-haired woman proclaimed. "And my dish is...SUSHI!"

Everyone looked at each other. What the hell is sushi?!

"I see that sea of blank faces," Menchi giggled. "I'm not surprised. Sushi comes from a small island country. But don't despair!" She walked into the department house. "Come on in!" Everyone followed her.

Inside the building, many rows of counters, complete with sinks, knives, cutting boards, and all sorts of cooking utensils.

"Fully equipped sushi stations!" Menchi announced, standing amidst the culinary work tables. "You have all the tools you'll need and the key ingredient, rice, is cooked and waiting. Oh, and here's an important point: I'm partial to nigiri sushi-hand molded." She paused so the information could sink in. "Man your stations! As before, the test is over when the examiner-that's me-is full. Until that point you can make as much as you like."

Everyone looked around aimlessly among their stations. Many began to mold the rice, including Gon.

"Do you think she means rice balls?" he suggested.

"These knives say there's more to it," Killua said. Looking at one of the sharp utensils.

"Maybe there's an extra igredient we have to get," Stasy eyed the tools also.

Meanwhile, the ninja named Hanzo was smiling to himself. 'What luck! That's my country she's talking about! This one's in the bag! Better not appear too pleased though. Better let the others think I'm clueless too, and then they'll have no chance.' He suppressed a giggle, and then glanced over to a nearby examinee molding rice. He couldn't contain himself, he turned over, and hugged his stomach, snorting with laughter.

Everyone ground their teeth. He so knows!

The three children were racking their brains before they heard Leorio shout "FISH?! In a FOREST?!" Everyone turned their heads and immeadiatly began to charge out of the building and towards the rivers and ponds. "Uh-oh, time to go!" Stasy shouted as she grabbed Gon's and Killua's hands, dragging them outside.

They had no time getting satisfactory fish, with Gon's fishing skills, and returned post-haste to their stations. They began to chop up the fish just like everyone else.

'I don't know what to do,' Stasy gritted her teeth in anticipation. 'I've never heard of sushi before in my life. Plus it seems like that ninja guy knows everything! Apathy, help! You're smart! You must know what it looks like!

I haven't the slightest inkling, and even if I did know, I wouldn't tell you.

Hey, you promised you would help! We all agreed that we would become hunters to find a family! You can't back out now!

Fine, I'll help you, but I still don't know anything. Reading about food always makes you hungry.

It makes you hungry, too. We share the same stomach, you know.

Before she could coax anything out of her brain, Leorio presented himself before Menchi with an interesting dish.

"One sushi, comin' up! My own on-the-spot recipe! I call it Leorio's Special!" He lifted the lid to his plate and presented an odd-looking ball of rice and wiggling fish parts.

Menchi flung the dish over her head, her eye twitching. "You're kidding, right?" she growled.

"What kinda critique is that?!" Leorio retaliated.

"You dissin' my judgement?" Menchi tested him. "Back to your station. Listen up! The shape is essential! To be nigiri sushi, it's gotta look like nigiri sushi! Nothing less!"

"Alright!" Mine's up!" Stasy announced with delight as she flourished her dish in front of the examiner. "I present to you, the winning piece!" She revealed her "sushi" and the examiner flung the dish just as she did with Leorio's. "You takin' lessons from 403?" she growled.

Stasy fell to her knees in shock. "I'm the same as...him?"

"Is it that traumatic to be compared to me?!" Leorio growled.

As everyone was sulking about, crestfallen, the ninja, Hanzo, stepped up. He brandished his plate in front of Menchi with flourish. "Here!" he announced with grandeur. "Actual sushi!"

"Now we're talkin'!" Menchi sighed with relief as she picked up the square meal with her chopsticks and plopped it into her mouth. "Nope, no good. Try again."

"W-W-What?!" the baldy gasped in appallation. "B-But sushi is just rice molded into an oblong shape and then a piece of fish slapped on it! Nothing simpler! It tastes the same, no matter who makes it!!"

He stopped and turned around warily, as he realized that he had just shouted out the answer to everyone. However, that was the least of his worries. An ominously frightening demon came up behind him.

"'Nothing simpler'?" Menchi quoted. "'tastes the same'?"

Then she grabbed Hanzo by the collar and shook him till his head rolled off. "YOU IMBECILE!! IT TAKES 10 YEARS OF TRAINING BEFORE YOU CAN EVEN BEGIN TO MAKE PROPER SUSHI!!! YOU PITIFUL EXAMINEES COULDN'T EVEN CHALLENGE A RANK BEGINNER!!"

"Then what chance do any of us have?!" Hanzo yelled back at her.

"Shut up, Baldy!" She roared. "You can't cut it; too bad!"

Buhara sighed as Menchi practically ate the ninja's head off. 'I hate it when she gets like this. Once she gets worked up, she loses all perspective. Only a handful of chefs in the world can meet her palates.'

"Phew!" Menchi sighed as she fell onto the couch. "All that yelling's made me hungry. Next challenger!"

Stasy sighed and sat on her sushi station which was close enough to view the millions of examinees that now crowded around Menchi. The crowd was so thick that the three children had little chance of reaching the examiner in one piece. When one examinee was turned down, another returned with a new dish. Stasy dropped to her knees and held her head in her hands.

"Ugh! It's useless!" she cried in frustration. "We'll never make it! I can't cook! No one can! I might as well just kill myself now instead of failing the exam over and over again, because I'll never make it as a Hunter!!!"

Gon and Killua stared at each other, utterly shocked at her sudden change of mood. "Uh, Stasy...it's not like we've lost already! You can always get stronger!"

"WAAAAAAAHHHAAAAAAHH!!!" Stasy wailed louder, enough to turn a few heads. "Stasy! Stasy! Stasy!! Always Stasy!!! Why must everyone always confuse me with her!!! Even if I die, the angels will still call me Stasy!!! If I even get to go to heaven!!"

Purple eyes stared into brown ones. What the fuck was this chicks problem? The boys were about to inquire further, but there was something different about the atmosphere. Menchi had stopped screaming her insults about everyone's culinary pieces of crap.

"I'm full now," she perked. "That's it."

Everyone was petrified. 'B-But...No one passed...' This sent the girl who hates being mistaken for Stasy on another water ride.