AN: High School Musical is the property of Disney. The Oregon Trail is the property of MECC. Basically, nothing is mine.

"Troy James Bolton, you better be cleaning in there," my mom shouted up the stairs.

I rolled my eyes. "I am, Mom," I sighed.

To tell the truth, I really hadn't realized how messy my bedroom was until my parents had pretty much forced me into cleaning the place. Because of my parents' incessant prodding, I was now on my hands and knees, pawing through junk, most of which I couldn't believe I had actually kept.

I caught sight of a stack of storage boxes in my closet. Knowing that they probably hadn't been touched in eons, I went over and removed the box on the top of the stack. The label on the side of the box read Troy - Grade 3 - Mrs. Carter.

Setting the box down on my bed, I blew some dust off of the lid and lifted it. The first thing I pulled out was a sheet of three-hole, lined paper with a Rugrats sticker on the top. On closer examination, I realized that it was a spelling test. I had only missed one word - couch, which I spelled c-o-a-c-h, for a 95%. I smiled to myself as I put it back.

When I pulled out the next thing, I burst out laughing. It was a project on Larry Bird. I remembered that Chad and I had slaved over books for four weeks and worked our eight-year-old butts off on that thing. I wonder if Chad remembers this project, I thought to myself.

As I put back Larry Bird, I noticed something wedged between a couple of papers. It looked to me like a CD case. Intrigued, I pulled it out to take a closer look.

It wasn't a CD, it was a computer game. A computer game called The Oregon Trail. I studied it for a few moments, trying to come up with a recollection of such a game. Suddenly, it hit me.

In Mrs. Carter's class in third grade, we would go to the "computer lab" every Thursday for an hour. The computer lab was pretty much a giant classroom with about twenty ancient computers - Apple IIs - shoved in there. On "Computer Thursday," when we reached the lab, there would always be a mad rush to claim a prized Oregon Trail disk. Everybody wanted one - well, except for Sharpay, who always played Barbie Fashion Design.

I was dying to know if it still played. My computer was already on, so I picked up the game and walked over, and loaded the game. The main screen popped up, and I typed in the number 1 to let it know that I wanted to travel the trail. It was a slow-loading game, so this took a while.

Then the game asked me if I wanted to be a banker (1), a carpenter (2), or a farmer (3). I typed in the number 1.

What is the first name of the wagon leader? the game asked me. I typed TROY.

What are the first names of four other members of your party? I typed GABRIELLA, CHAD, SHARPAY, and RYAN.

When I typedYES for Are these names correct? I felt a strange sensation. It felt like I was being sucked through an extremely thin tunnel. Then I landed - hard. I looked around and saw Chad, Gabriella, Sharpay, and Ryan around me, also looking completely nonplussed.

I blinked and shook my head. I wasn't in Albuquerque anymore. In fact, it looked almost the polar opposite. Everyone - besides the five of us - were heavily dressed. The women wore bonnets. The men wore these weird hats that looked like Indiana Jones's, except a bit different.

"Troy, where are we?" Chad asked.

I gulped. "Independence, Missouri."

"What are we doing here?" Ryan wanted to know.

"I think.....we're in 1848."

AN: I hope this is a good first chapter! Please review!