A/N: Okay! Here's what I decided to do. This isn't really a story exactly, it was just my way of letting people get a feel for the characters of The Gang without having to read the whole series should they just want to pick up a random story. This 'story' includes the three new members who came in in story # 5. So for anyone reading who just wants to read about the characters, skip ahead to 'chapter' 2. Each chapter is set up like one of those email surveys, filled out for each member of The Gang. This first 'chapter' is just a little mini-story for the enjoyment of anyone reading who's already a fan. :o) Hope that you enjoy, and feel free to leave reviews even though it's not quite a story. I'm totally interested in hearing any questions or comments regarding anything I post. Thanks a lot! Author's note out. -echoes of chaos

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Precursor to the Survey

Sasha and Jake's room was unusually noisy. Everyone was hyped up something awful today.

Jake, Felix, and Arizona were on the floor, laughing and snapping off goofy pictures with Sasha's Polaroid camera.

LeeAnne, Genesis, and Garland were all sitting on Jake's bed painting one another's toenails. Garland looked up from LeeAnne's pinky toe to see what Genesis was doing to his own. "Try the gold," Garland told her. "I think that red makes them look too wide."

Sasha was feeling a little moody but not so bad that he couldn't be swept into everyone's stream. He was on his own bed, back to the wall, drawing caricatures of his friends.

Paige and Mariah played with Sasha's radio, chattering mindlessly. Mariah gasped, hitting "Beautiful Like You" on the rock station. She turned it up and began belting out the words at the top of her lungs. Everyone paid her back with hearty applause - Mariah had a voice that could turn steel to jelly and put any pop star to shame.

Morgan came bursting in the room, tripped over Felix, and landed flat on his face in the middle of Arizona and Jake. Everyone laughed. Arizona snapped a shot of Morgan's grinning face.

Garland wiggled his toes and turned around to face everyone else. "I finally finished it, guys," Garland told them. "Those friendship surveys I started working on the other day. I came up with a bunch of question things and made ten-tuplicate copies."

Sasha smiled, staring at Garland with amusement on his face. "Ten- tuplicate, Garland?"

"Yeah! I copied it ten times onto different papers. I figured we could each fill one out and maybe go around and tell our answers. It would be fun." Garland handed everyone a sheet.

Mariah cruised her eyes down the questions and made a face. "Our biggest secret? I'm not going to tell everyone my deepest darkest secrets, Garland."

"Well, we'll just tell everyone the stuff we're comfortable with then," assured Sasha. He filled out his name under question one of Garland's survey. "I think this will be entertaining."

"Okay."

So Sasha handed out pens and pencils to everyone else and they busily got to work filling out Garland's friendship survey. Afterwards, they went around and read out their answers, often laughing at each other or asking more questions. In the end, only Morgan and Sasha told their secrets. The Gang still learned a lot about each other - though some of the answers were a given. Everyone knew that Paige's favorite color was pink, that LeeAnne swore by Dr. Pepper, and that Morgan for some reason couldn't get enough of the movie Bubble Boy.

Everyone went home a couple hours later, their forgotten surveys folded into pockets. They never really got to any real "business" that meeting - everyone was a little too sugarhigh to get serious.

That was okay, though. With that group of friends, sitting around and laughing was the perfect pastime.