Title: Off the Beaten Path
Author: texaspeach (both here and on DA)
Rating: PG – Due to the large number of authors participating in this event, rating is subject to change at any time.
Disclaimer: None of the authors taking part in this Round Robin claim to own Dragonball/Z/GT.

Summary: Round Robin. Gohan and Videl get lost in the woods, and Videl doesn't know about Gohan's powers! What's a demi-Saiyan to do? (Plot donated by texaspeach.)

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Chapter One

Videl looked around, surveying the trees, bushes, and dirt with distaste. What was she doing out in the middle of the woods, again? She glanced back at the school bus and sighed heavily.

Ah yes, the annual Orange Star High School senior field trip. Normally, the class would go somewhere in the city, like a play or a museum or some other "educational" activity, but both the lead actor and his understudy had come down with the flu (furthering the stereotypical image of the male thespian, in Videl's humble opinion). The museum was being renovated and the security being enhanced after a robbery in which Videl had (somehow) lost the perpetrator. Of course, as per the usual, the Great Saiyageek had swooped in at the last minute, carrying the man by the seat of his pants.

The girl growled, fists clenching. She wanted to pummel that guy into the ground until he finally begged for mercy and showed her just who was under that stupid trash can of a helmet!

"If you keep that up, you'll scare away all the bears, Videl," a male voice teased. Videl whirled around, coming face-to-chest with the newest student of OSHS. Gohan Son (or Son Gohan as he so often introduced himself – he was definitely from the country) was extremely tall, the tallest in their class. She tended to get a crick in her neck trying to see his face from this close, so she took a few quick steps back to save herself the pain. The girl opened her mouth to ask just what the hell that was supposed to mean when she was interrupted by a loud squeal and a flash of blonde hair as Erasa glomped her best friend.

"Videl!" the blonde cried. "I haven't seen you in so long! I missed you so much!"
Videl tried to slip out of the choke hold on her neck and failed, shooting a glare at Gohan when he laughed at her predicament and yet made no move to help her. "Erasa!" she gasped. "I can't breathe! And you just saw me yesterday at school, you dimwit!"

Sharpener, who'd been trying to sneak up behind Erasa and scare her (until she had thrown herself at Videl), laughed and peeled the girl off Videl's neck. This proved to be a mistake – Erasa merely squealed louder and transferred her affections to him. While the poor teenager tried to wrestle his friend away, Videl turned narrowed eyes on Gohan. The boy in question backed up, hands held up in the universal sign of surrender, still with that infuriating grin. Videl opened her mouth to rip him a new one when she was interrupted yet again, this time by the science teacher whose brilliant idea to come out and study the natural world was slowly starting to look like a bad idea.

"Okay, kids, gather around!" he shouted. When they were all congregated into a loose circle around him (save for Erasa and Sharpener, the latter of which was still trying to get the girl to let go of his neck), he cleared his throat slightly. "I'm going to just let you explore the woods. Bring back an interesting specimen for me to look at and you'll get a 100 for the final exam and won't have to take the original one. Now, pair off and get going! And for the love of all that's holy or not, STAY ON THE PATH!!!" Videl took one look at the hordes of guys crawling over each other to get to her, then at the horde of girls trying to pair up with Gohan, then at Sharpener and Erasa (Sharpener was weakening – the lack of air was getting to him), and then grabbed Gohan by the arm and dragged him toward a random path that led into the forest.

"Thanks, Videl," Gohan said gratefully. "I'll never know how to handle all those girls."

"Get a girlfriend," Videl shot back, grinning slightly. "They'll back off." She stopped, thinking about it, before resuming her walking. "Probably."

"Probably?" her companion repeated jokingly, easily keeping pace with her.

"You can't forget about the stalkers," she reminded him, and he laughed loudly.

They walked along in companionable silence, though Videl kept watching Gohan out of the corner of her eye. He looked more relaxed than she had ever remembered seeing him. But it made sense, she thought. He was from the 439 area, a place that until now she had believed was practically uninhabited. The big city was probably torture for him, all cars and planes and people and noise. He could probably survive in the wilderness with nothing but the clothes on his back, maybe even less.

The girl's thoughts were cut short when Gohan knelt down by a tree, gently fingering a flower. "These don't tend to grow around here," he remarked, sounding puzzled. "I'll bet that Mr. Barnes would like to see this though."

"What is it?" Videl asked curiously, bending over slightly to get a better view. It was very pretty, pure white and small.

"It's an edelweiss flower," the other teen replied, frowning as he stood up. "People call it 'Queen's flower' as well. It normally grows in much higher elevations than this."

Videl shrugged. "Well, if we don't find anything else, we can always show him this," she reasoned. "We don't even have to pick the flower; we didn't walk that far away."

"True," Gohan said. "Want to keep walking?"

"Sure," the girl shrugged again. "Nothing else to do."

The path meandered along and over a river, or rather along and across the edges of its banks. The rushing water had cut down through stone until it was about ten feet below the edge of what could probably be called a cliff. There were several bridges that crisscrossed the gorge at various distances in front of them. Videl looked cautiously at the wooden planks and metal framing of the scaffolds, but from what she could tell, there was neither rotting wood nor rusting metal.

They reached the first one and Gohan jokingly bowed, making a grand sweeping gesture with his hand. "Ladies first," he said. Videl mock-sniffed at him and stepped carefully onto the bridge. Just because she hadn't seen any corrosion or rotting didn't meant that it wasn't there. However, she and Gohan both made it across with no mishaps, not even a squeaky piece of wood. First one down.

Neither teen saw anything more interesting than the edelweiss flower from before, so they continued along the path in silence. As before, it was a companionable silence, one that didn't need to be broken. Both were habitually quiet and neither felt the need for small talk. It wasn't long before they reached the second bridge.

It happened suddenly. Videl went first again, wincing at the creaky sound of the boards on this bridge. This one hadn't been quite as well maintained, she realized. She turned around to say that they probably shouldn't be crossing this bridge when the sound of cracking filled her ears. The girl automatically grabbed at the metallic framing to keep herself from falling, but it wasn't her. Gohan's surprised face filled her vision before he plunged through the hole in the bottom, revealing the underside of rotting wood. Videl leant forward in time to see Gohan's form disappear beneath the water.

There was no time to think. She raced to the other side of the gorge, looking frantically for Gohan to reappear again. When he didn't, she prayed that the river was as deep as it looked and dove in.

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Beta'd by Ms. Videl Son (aka, megaminoeien on DA)