Gohan was satisfied. Not full, but satisfied.
Despite the slight obstacle of ten-second Plum, the class had been able to order and eat their totally awesome, yet totally health detrimental McDowell's food. Though they had to settle for several orders of Joyful meals—about a metric ton when it was all said and done—it was just enough to sate the appetites of many teenage stomachs.
Unfortunately though, the bus driver was still at the counter trying to order his quite specific McDowell's worth meal. It appeared he was on the verge of a heart attack with how red the man's face was. If he wasn't careful, he could jeopardize his health trying to get that artery-clogging food.
Some people just couldn't win.
"Videl!" Gohan suddenly heard someone shout. Since the demi-saiyan was sitting at the table the Satan girl was at, it was natural for him to give his attention to a desperate-looking student as he charged at their table. For a moment, it looked as if the student was going to crash into the table, causing the Son boy to unconsciously grip onto a half-finished Joyful meal box.
Sharpner seemed to think the same way, but his reaction was completely different. Seeing a way to score some points with a certain dark-haired individual—not Gohan, in case anyone was wondering—the blond jock stood up to shield the table from the charging young man. Unfortunately for Sharpner, a small puddle of spilt soda just happened to be right next to their table; a puddle that Sharpner just happened to step in and lose his footing, causing his foot to slide out in front of him and his other to stay in place. The result was a resounding ripping of pants and a high-pitched cry of pain.
Yet, the action had the positive affect of stopping the desperate student, his hands reaching down to his groin as he held himself gently. A look of horror was on his face as he saw Sharpner in the splits position, the same look that was on almost every male face in the restaurant. Even Gohan had moved one of his hands from his coveted Joyful meal box to protectively guard his special place from any residue pain floating about.
"Umm, Videl," the teen said, his voice unconsciously going up a couple octaves. "We have a problem. A bunch of kids went into the big room here and discovered a huge maze of plastic and fiberglass. Everyone was curious as to what it was and went to explore it, but they haven't come out. We've sent a couple of people to go look for them, but they haven't returned either. I even went in there but only managed to get out a couple minutes ago. Videl, we need your help."
Videl stared at the teen for a moment before saying, "So let me get this straight. A bunch of the students are lost in the playscate."
"Yeah, pretty much."
"And you want me to go look for them."
"Uh huh."
There was a moment that Videl just stared at the teen before letting out an exasperated sigh, shaking her. Gohan faintly heard the girl murmur "Sometimes I'm just too nice to these people."
"Alright," the Satan girl then said, getting out of her chair. "Lead the way."
Curious, Gohan got up as Videl and the student left, following behind them to see what exactly was going on. He failed to notice Sharpner still in the splits, trying to figure out the best way to get out of the position without causing anymore necessary pain. As they reached the playscate, Gohan sweatdropped as he became witness to a harden plastic obstacle course. Just looking at it, one could see that it wasn't very big, going up to possibly three stories. It ran the length of the room, which at most was twenty feet if the Son boy wasn't mistaken. All in all, it would take a person trying their hardest to get lost in it.
Who would've thought a teenager would be such a person?
Videl seemed to be having the same thoughts as her facial expression deadpanned. "Our classmates got lost in that thing?" she asked, not even trying to mask her annoyance.
"Yeah, this is the place," the student said, not sounding as if he caught Videl's tone. "It's a whole 'nother world in there."
"I bet," Videl said sarcastically, rolling her eyes. That was when she took notice of the demi-saiyan's presence. "And what are you doing here?"
Gohan looked towards the smaller girl. "Oh, I just wanted to see what exactly the place where our classmates got lost. It doesn't look like much…"
"Yeah," she agreed, turning to look back at the playscate. "Hard to believe they ever made it out of pre-school."
"Now Videl," the student said, sounding very serious. "We don't want you to get lost while looking for everyone, so you need to tie this rope around your waist. We'll tie the other end somewhere over here so that way you can follow it back out."
"No thanks. I doubt I'll be getting lost in there."
"No Videl, I won't send you in there without doing it. I refuse to be the one responsible for putting Mr. Satan's daughter in danger because I sent her on a fool's errand."
Gohan sighed to himself. He had a feeling that no matter what, Videl was not going to tie the rope around her and the longer she and the student argued about it, the more time their classmates could get further lost, a possibility the demi-saiyan didn't want to know how they could accomplish. It seemed he was gonna have to take one for the team.
"Would it be okay if I went in with Videl and wore the rope in her place?" the Son boy asked.
His classmates looked at him for a moment before the student replied, "Yeah, that'll work."
Videl rolled her eyes again. "Fine. Whatever. Let's just get this thing over with."
The next thing Gohan knew, their fellow student had pulled a very long length of rope from somewhere. He wasn't too sure he wanted to know where it came from. After tying it around his waist, he and the Satan girl were ready to go.
Their first obstacle was the entrance.
Like many a playscate, the creators had wanted a funky-looking staircase for the kids to climb up. Right angle triangles were placed in ascending order within the entrance shoot, starting with the triangle covering the right and top sides. The next one above that covered the right and bottom side, followed by one that covered the bottom and left side, and so on. While that wasn't a problem for Videl to climb through, which she did almost effortlessly; Gohan though, found himself at a dilemma. Due to his greater height, transversing these stairs were much more difficult than it was for the shorter girl. All she had to do was climb onto one, turn, and climb onto the next. For Gohan, his head had the unfortunate luck to hit the step that was above it. After all, this thing was made for little human kids and not full grown demi-saiyans.
"Ow," the Son boy said as his head bumped into another step. Hopefully their climb ended soon, he was getting a bruise on his head.
"A little too big for the playground, huh Gohan?" he heard Videl's amused voice say from a couple steps above.
"Just a bit," he replied, his tender head wearing down on him.
"Well don't worry, you're almost at the top."
Climbing a couple of steps, the demi-saiyan soon found a tube at the top of the playscate, leading into a different room. Videl's head was poking out of it, waiting for the Son boy to appear. "That's great," he said wearily. "I don't think I could take anymore of this."
As they entered the room, the first thing to assault their senses was that the whole room was a bright red that only plastic seemed to be able to make. There wasn't much in the room other than a small circular podium in the middle. And due to the place being made for kids, Gohan had to bend his knees in order to not hit his head on the roof, Videl once again having no problem as she stood at full height. There didn't appear to be any sight of the other teens so this obviously wasn't the place to look. Ahead of them and to their left were entrances to other rooms. As if in silent agreement, the two strode forward, entering a room just like the red one, only blue. This time though, they had three ways to go: ahead, left, and right. Looking to the right, they found a one-person room, with a steering wheel at the far end of the room. A large fiberglass window showed they were looking into the McDowell's parking lot.
Looking at their other two options, they went towards the ahead room, neglecting the left one once more. This time they encountered a yellow room like the previous two, except there was only a left entrance. Following the obvious direction, they continued to find themselves in rooms that were exact copies of the previous ones. Yellow, blue, red, and purple seemed to be the dominant colors of the place. Something interesting though caught Gohan's attention. For every red room they entered, there was always a small red podium in the middle of it; the blue always had some kiddy room directly to the right. The purple always had a large fiberglass window in them, showing them a different sight and the yellows didn't seem to have anything special about them. After some time, Videl frowned. "Hey Gohan, doesn't this place seem to be too big?"
Gohan mimicked her expression. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, looking at it from the outside, this place looked as if it could barely have four rooms in it, but so far we've gone through ten that I've counted," she explained. "That doesn't seem right and I doubt we're going around in circles."
Gohan got her point. "Perhaps we should head back the way we came and start over. We shouldn't get ourselves lost."
Videl's eyes rolled automatically. "Yeah, sure," was all she said as she started to head back. Following the rope that had been trailing behind them, they moved through a purple room and into a yellow one, finding a disturbing sight.
That sight being the end of the rope.
"Don't tell me they didn't tie the rope," Videl said as she picked the rope up. "Weren't they the ones that pressed us about not getting lost?"
Gohan scratched the back of his head. "Yeah, well I guess this rope is useless." Untying the rope, he dropped his end on the ground. "So, which way did we come from?"
"Hmmm," Videl thought aloud. "I think we came from a purple room into this one and there's a red one in front of us."
Gohan nodded his head before he looked to his right. "Wait, there's a red one over there," he said, pointing a finger at it.
Looking over, Videl frowned. "Huh, weird," she said before turning back." This time thought, something caught the corner of her left eye, causing her to turn that way. "That's one's red too," she said, frowning once more.
Almost on cue, both teens turned around to see the room they had just exited was also red. "That can't be right, that was a purple room!" Videl exclaimed. "Something's wrong."
"Perhaps if we tried going in a circle," Gohan suggested. "If we make three turns, we should arrive in this room. The rope's right there, so it should be easy to know if the fourth room is the right one."
Videl looked at the rope and then back at the Son boy. "We might as well give it a try," she shrugged. "It's not like we have anything to lose."
Starting off, the couple left that room, making a left turn at each room they entered. As they made that last turn, they soon found themselves in a blue room, without the rope and the room obviously being the wrong color.
"Okay, this is just plain ridiculous," Videl said, frustration starting to show on her face. "There should be a rope here. Do the laws of physics just not work in this place?"
"Perhaps we're stuck in an inter-dimensional loop where we're transferred from one room to another at random," Gohan suggested, looking about the place as if it were nothing strange.
Videl stared at the boy for a moment before saying, "You've been reading science-fiction stories lately, haven't you?"
"Yeah, why?"
Videl just shook her head before heading into a red room. Gohan followed quickly behind her, not wanting to be separated by the inter-dimensional properties that seemed to rule over these places. Videl might doubt it, but he was sure that was what was going on.
Just like Captain Kurt would say it was.
As the demi-saiyan entered the room, he saw Videl sit down on the podium, letting out a deep sigh. "Alright, we need to figure a way out of this place," he heard her say. "This place is like a labyrinth, how I don't know, but there must be some key to getting through it."
Gohan started looking around, trying to follow Videl's thinking. The girl was right to think that there was some key to figuring this place out, and if there was anyone that could figure it out, it was him. After all, he did have more advance textbooks crammed into his head than the average college professor. It was only a matter of time before he thought of something.
What did he know so far? Every room seemed to have its own defining characteristic, like red rooms having podiums and purples have large windows. Perhaps they could break through one of the windows? Hmm, perhaps not. While his Saiyan strength could do such a simple task, explaining that feat to a girl with more suspicions than a politician would be problematic. So that would have to be an absolute last resort in this case. Ah Kami, why did he have to enter this place…
Wait, enter.
That's right! The first room had a tube that they entered when they climbed those stairs. If they could find there way there, they could be out in no time!
"Hey Videl, I think we can get out of here if we get to the first room," the demi-saiyan said, feeling rather proud he came up with that.
Several seconds passed without a reply from the girl.
Well that was rude. Weren't people supposed to say something back when they were spoken to? That's what all his communication textbooks told him and if they were wrong, then a lot of his books could be wrong as well, and if his mother thought he had been studying the wrong books, there was no telling how many new ones he would have to go over.
Oh hell no.
Turning around so he could make sure all of his studying hadn't been a huge waste of time, Gohan found that he was the only person in the room. What the? Had Videl just stood up and walked away without telling him? No, that wasn't the way the girl was. He was pretty sure about that…somewhat sure…maybe sure. Hercule did teach her manners, right?
Okay, this little journey was starting to prove a pain in his butt. How did someone lose part of a class in a playscate for crying out loud! Then to lose his partner that had been sent in to find them…geez, what he wouldn't give to be able to sense where they were—
For a moment, Gohan nearly hit himself over the head. Of course, he would just sense out their kis! It was so obvious! Why hadn't he thought of that before? He could've done it from the very beginning and saved himself and Videl all the time of searching for the students. It was so obvious! Why hadn't he thought of that before? He could've done it from the very beginning and saved himself and Videl all the time of searching for the students. It was so obvious! Why hadn't he thought of that before? He could've done it from the very beginning and saved himself and Videl all the time of searching for the students.
Unconsciously, one of Gohan's hands rose into the air and then punched himself in the face. Hard. Stumbling, Gohan shook off the blow, clearing his head in the process. Had he gone through a mind loop again? Yeah, he must've. Okay, it was now time to get down to business. Closing his eyes, the Son boy began to extend his senses, searching for any sign of ki in his vicinity. It shouldn't take long to locate one, since they were all in a small…large playscate area. Nope, not long at all.
Anytime now.
Just another moment now.
Annnnnnnnnd one was appearing….
Well where the heck were they?
Okay, this was getting ridiculous! He should've found something here! Was the inter-dimensional space screwing up his senses? Was this place made of material that stunted ki channeling? What was going on?
No, no, that's what this place wanted him to think! It wanted to confuse him to the point of making an error and then it would trap him in this place for who knows how long. And he wouldn't fall for that trap, after all, his textbooks had taught him better than that. Eyeing the podium, Gohan felt he needed to sit down and calm himself down. No one was going anywhere until he could figure this stuff out.
Sitting down, Gohan let out a sigh. Yeah, this was the ticket. He could feel himself calming down with each moment that passed. This was good; very good. Tilting his head up to the ceiling, the demi-saiyan thought of what his next action should be. Hmm, that was weird. The ceiling seemed a lot further up than he remembered it. And why was he having a falling sensation? He was sitting down on something so that shouldn't be happening. Nor should the walls be within touching distance and moving upwards…
He was falling wasn't he?
The next thing the Son boy knew, he had landed on some sort of ground, which caved beneath his body, then covered him a moment later. What in the world was going on? Ground didn't do that unless he had been thrown into it by someone that just happened to be stronger than him and that strong guy was nowhere in sight! And…this ground stuff…it didn't feel like normal ground, nor did it look like it. In fact, if his vision wasn't messing with him, it looked as if he were surrounded by a bunch of colored balls. What were balls doing down here?
That was when he felt a hand grab one of his arms and pull him up. The next thing he knew, his head was in the open, along with the arm that had been grabbed. "Come on, Gohan, help me out here," he heard Videl grunt. Videl! So she hadn't abandoned him! Hercule had taught her manners!
Pushing with his legs, he soon found himself on a platform of some kind. In front of him was what looked like an entrance covered with netting. There was a thin opening in the netting, so there was a way through it. In fact, all around the room the two teens were in the walls were covered in the netting. That was when Gohan saw that the floor was covered with brightly colored balls as far as the eye could see, which just so happened to be a wall several yards away.
"Videl, where are we?" the Son boy asked.
"A ball pit," was the Satan girl's answer. "Don't even ask me how they got one in this place."
Looking about the place again, Gohan soon realized that they weren't alone. Off in one of the corners were two little kids, a boy and a smaller girl, both with black hair and appeared to be wearing ragged clothing. For some reason though, Gohan felt as if he had seen those two before.
On another side was a lone kid that looked as if he were a space traveler of some kind. Then another place held a man in an oriental formal wear, a thin mustache and glasses on his face and a head of curly hair. This one made Gohan feel a little anger for, though he wasn't too sure why. However, unlike the kids before him, he was in the middle of the ball pit; and did it seem like he was sinking into it? Weird.
"Gohan? Is that you?"
The demi-saiyan jerked around in surprise. Next to him was a young girl in red overalls and a yellow shirt looking at him with brown eyes. Her brown hair was braided into twin pigtails and she seemed to come to a realization that he was who she thought he was. He on the other hand was having a déjà vu moment. Here was another person he could've sworn he met previously. Oh woe was he, cursed with having only a canon memory.
"Umm, yeah," the demi-saiyan said hesitantly. For all he knew, this girl was some demon in disguise that wanted to drain him of his bodily fluids and he needed these fluids to stay right where they were.
Seeing that the boy was still confused, the young girl promptly tried to clear up the confusion. "It's me! Lime!"
Lime? Lime! Now he remembered her! It wasn't everyday he met a filler character that had an X chromosome. "Hey Lime! How are ya doing?" he greeted.
"I'm okay," she said, seemingly pleased. "My, you've grown up."
"Uh huh," the Son boy began scratching the back of his head. "And you…look the same. What are you doing here?"
Lime frowned. "I'm not quite sure. Grandpa and I came to the city after that Cell thing and we decided to eat at this place called McDowell's. They had this playscate thing that I could play in and I somehow wound up in this place. I've been here ever since."
Gohan looked alarmed. "You mean we're stuck here?" he exclaimed. Upon hearing this, Videl got her own alarmed expression.
"That's an even stranger part. It seems that certain people can come and go. Like Chico and Romu over there." At this, Lime pointed over to the two kids Gohan had seen previously. "They claimed to be orphans and were here before I arrived. Then there's that man with the glasses over there, but he muttered something about being discriminated against because he's a filler character. And then some other people would come and be able to leave."
"Maybe we can leave this place then," Videl spoke, looking intrigued. That was when Lime took notice of the short girl.
"Umm, Gohan, who's this?"
"Oh, this is a classmate of mine, Videl. We came looking for some of our other classmates who got lost in here as well."
Lime seemed to eye the Satan girl for awhile before saying. "Well, a big group of teenagers showed up here before you appeared. They're in the next room."
Both dark-haired teens perked up at this. Turning to the netting with the gap in it, the couple looked through it, finding their lost classmates, who looked utterly clueless, you know, just like in school. "At least we found them," Videl commented.
This caught the group's attention causing many a cheer. "It's Videl!" a chorus of them shouted as they rushed over to them. "You have to help us Videl, we can't figure out how we got here!" one of the teens said.
"Everyone calm down. We'll be out of here in a moment," the Satan girl said, though she didn't feel too sure about that statement. Why cause a panic with people who could barely use both sides of their brains?
That was when Gohan felt someone glomp onto him. "Gohan! You've come to save me!" that head-pounding voice said, causing the demi-saiyan to wince. Why did Angela have to be one of the lost teens? Really?
"Uhh, hi Angela," the boy said, though he was trying to back out of the red-haired girl's arms. "I'm glad…you're safe."
"Another classmate?" Lime asked, not looking impressed with the other girl.
"…yeah," Gohan answered as he looked at the girl. "I'll tell you all about it some other time."
This time Lime shook her head in amusement. "I'll hold you to it, though I'm guessing you want to get out of here."
"Uh huh."
Pointing to the room with the teens, the young girl said "In there you'll find a hole in the wall. It looks like a slide if you look into it. I don't know where it goes but you might want to check it out."
"Thanks Lime!" the demi-saiyan said cheerfully. "Well, let's go!"
Moving into the next room, the Son boy felt a little different. That caused him to pause, wondering what it could be. He seemed to be in one piece, so there wasn't anything physically wrong. All of his classmates and Videl were together. So why was it he felt as if something was missing?
Wait a second, where was Angela?
Looking around, Gohan soon found that the girl was nowhere in sight. Confused, he turned around and looked back into the ball pit room, finding Lime dusting her hands off satisfied. Looking before her, he soon found a mass of red hair sinking beneath the sea of balls.
Hmm…perhaps he should leave it at that.
Turning back around, Gohan hurried to his classmates. "Hey Videl, Lime said we should checkout that hole in the wall. She thinks it might be a way out."
Videl looked at the Son boy before nodding her head. "It's worth a try," she conceded before heading to the very hole of discussion. "This one, right?"
"Yep."
Looking at the students, Videl then grabbed one of them and tossed them into the hole, the student giving a yelp of surprise as he disappeared down the alleged slide beyond it. Leaning to look in it, the Satan girl gave a nod of approval. "I think your friend might be right about this."
"Umm, Videl?"
"Yeah?"
"Why did you throw our classmate through there?"
"To test it. I'm not going through something without knowing where it leads."
For a moment, Gohan felt as if he had to say something about that before giving up. It was time they got out of this weird place and he didn't feel like defending the rights of the people that brought them here in the first place. "Okay."
For the next few minutes, the two teens hurried their classmates into the slide, hoping they had everyone, minus Angela of course. She had become another victim of the filler pit after all and there wasn't much they could do for her now.
Their numbers eventually dwindled down until only they were left, both looking at the hole. Turning to the Satan girl, Gohan said "Ladies first."
"Okay," was the girl's answer as she climbed into the hole and disappeared down it. After a few seconds, Gohan did the same, finding himself sliding down a windy tube, picking up speed with every second. For a moment, the demi-saiyan wondered if his increasing speed was a good thing. Twisting one way, turning another, going through a surprise loop, there seemed no end to this thing. Plus it was making him feel sick.
Then out of nowhere the Son boy went flying out of the tube, crashing into a large pile of arms, legs, and bodies. Shouts and protests of his sudden collision came soon after as Gohan fought off his bout of nausea. Looking around, he let out a sigh of relief as he saw the outside of the playscate. Thank Kami for small mercies.
"Eh hem," the demi-saiyan suddenly heard. Looking back, he soon found he was staring at a lot of black. Hmm, he had to admit, it looked familiar. Raising his eyes, he soon found the black became white, and then the white became a skin tone, and then skin tone soon became two blue eyes that were burning into his.
Slowly, Gohan lowered his eyes back to the black, soon realizing on each end of the black was the same skin tone as from above. In fact, he would dare say they were legs…
Oh crap, this couldn't end well.
Whoa, it's been quite awhile since I wrote a chapter this long. I'd really have to think about the last time. When you get going, you really get going lol. I do say, I did like the filler pit there. A possible answer where filler characters go when they're done being used, not that there was a question to begin with. Just doing a pre-emptive answering on my part.
