[Neo Zone] Population: 23 Kids

Pancake Emporium

Sungchan rubbed the sleep out of his eyes as he headed up to the kitchen above the cafe, his brain trying to figure out what he was smelling while waking up at the same time.

"Good morning." Yuta greeted. 

"G'morning."

"Oh hey, Sungchan. There's pancakes under the tin foil, and sausages and eggs on the stove." Taeyong pointed out, giving him a side hug in the process before flipping the pancakes that were on the gridle.

Sungchan's brain woke up enough to recognize there had to be at least forty pancakes already under the tin foil, and it was eight in the morning. Based on the amount of batter still in Taeyong's bowl, he had a long way to go.

"That's a lot of pancakes."

"Well there's a lot of us." Ten sassed, which is when Sungchan noticed that Ten, Yuta, Johnny, WinWin, Kun and Xiaojun were already eating at the table.

Okay, so Yuta, Ten and Kun were eating. The others looked like they had already ate based on the plates that had syrup smudges on them. Johnny and Xiaojun were having a Pokemon card battle while WinWin looked over Xiaojun's shoulder and made comments.

Sungchan's brain wasn't awake enough to recognize what was going on right off the bat.

"How long have you been cooking?"

"Maybe three hours? Not sure. At least three, though." Taeyong answered.

"But it's eight..."

Sungchan couldn't quite trust his brain at the moment, but he was pretty sure if he's been cooking for three hours, that means he's been awake for a lot more. Taeyong had to have been up since at least four, which Sungchan thought was a bit much for pancakes.

"Yeah, I woke up in the night and couldn't go back to sleep. Shotaro saw the light on from the street and came in, so we talked for a bit before we decided to make pancakes."

"Taro's here?!"

"No, he left before his parents got up. He did eat, though."

Sungchan frowned. He was really hoping those two weeks of detainment were up already.

"Why don't you go wake everyone up?" Kun suggested, having to talk over Xiaojun who was going on about a big brain move he just pulled on Johnny who was complaining about his big brain move being spoiled.

"I'll help." WinWin offered, following Sungchan down the stairs.

Waking up those who were still sleeping was definitely a two person job. Maybe a five person job to keep them from going back to sleep.

They swore they had to wake everyone up at least three times because by the time they went through all the beds shaking them, the first one they got to had fallen back asleep. It was a never ending cycle until WinWin shouted in frustration that there were pancakes and they jolted awake, racing each other up the stairs.

Except for Doyoung. But they figured if he was still awake after that mess, he earned a few extra minutes.

Yuta was now battling against Taeyong with the pokemon decks, Kun having voluntarily taken over the pancake cooking. It was a good thing that Taeyong already had forty some odd pancakes made when everyone stampeded up there, because after everyone grabbing two, there were only a few left.

For some reason two competitions started. No one remembered how they were started, but they knew they got intense. One of which was a pokemon tournament and the other was a pancake eating competition.

The only problem was the pancakes were very thick and fluffy, so no one could eat more than four without feeling extremely full. That had been Taeyong's plan from the start.

"If I eat another pancake I'm going to explode." Lucas grumbled, leaning back in his seat.

"Then don't. Admit defeat." Haechan teased, knowing he was going to win seeing as he was already one pancake ahead of Lucas.

"Just quit then, Cas. I don't want to clean up whatever mess comes with exploding." Jeno added in.

"Wow, I see how it is."

"I demand a rematch! Chenle shuffled this really badly and I couldn't get any good cards." Jaehyun complained, but Taeil was already packing up after defeating everyone.

"Your fault for letting him shuffle."

"Yeah, we all know I'm the worst at shuffling." Chenle commented, the room collectively nodding.

The only things they could agree on after that was one: Taeyong and Shotaro make very good pancakes, and two: the only reason Haechan and Taeil were champions was because WinWin wasn't competing.