Hey everyone! I'm back again with another chapter. I know it's rather short but bear with me. I have 2 essays and a project to do by Monday.

Once again, I do NOT own DBZ.

Last time...

"Time to go to bed, kids," Bulma said, ushering the tired teenagers to their rooms. "You have a long day ahead of you."


Training Day One

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At 4:00 the next morning, someone blasted the Reveille at full blast over the PA systems installed in the students' rooms for this event. All the teens fell out of their beds at awkward angles, each wondering where the fire was.

"Everyone report to the gym. You have 10 minutes," Bulma greeted the teens over the intercom.

Groggily, the students made their way over to the gymnasium where they saw Bulma standing next to a short man with black hair and a tall man with a scar on his face. Needless to say, the martial arts enthusiasts recognized them both and they all recognized at least one of them.

"Take a seat, everyone," Bulma stated, gesturing to the floor. All the students plopped down and listened attentively. "I'd like to introduce you to your trainers for this camp, Krillen and Yamcha. I'm sure you all recognize Yamcha as a baseball player but he is a rather good martial artist as well. Krillen has made it to the semi-finals in the WMAT. I'll let you guys take over now."

Krillen and Yamcha smiled in greeting at the students. "Good morning, everyone," Krillen said. "How about you all introduce yourselves?" The students complied, each saying their name.

"Well, we obviously cannot let you guys go out into the wilderness without some survival training," Yamcha began. "We are going to teach you guys the basics of martial arts this week so that you will be able to defend yourselves if needs be."

"Well you can count us out!" a pompous jock retorted. "Me and my buddies have trained under the Champ!"

Krillen rolled his eyes, unimpressed. Referring to Hercule's show of attitude before the Cell Games he said, "I'm afraid smashing nine out of ten blocks isn't going to help you out there. You're going to need to be able to do them all."

The jocks and Videl expressed their displeasure at the subtle thrashing of their hero. However, their complaints were ignored. Well, if they weren't going to listen to them, they had to prove they were superior. They were sure whatever little training routine they had planned would be walk over.

"Anyway, how many of you have had at least five years of martial arts training?" Yamcha asked. About ten jocks who were Hercule's students as well as Videl, Sharpner, Lime, Trunks and Gohan raised their hands. "Stand over there." The students shuffled over to the other side of the gym.

Turning to the students Yamcha had singled out, Krillen asked, "How many of you have had eight or more years of training?" Four jocks, Sharpner, Videl, Mirai and Gohan raised their hands. Videl smiled in pride. She always prided herself in beginning her martial arts training when she was only six years old. She was sure she started before anyone else there. "How many of you have had fourteen or more years of training?" Krillen asked again.

Videl was about to open her mouth to respond that that was impossible when Gohan asked, "Krillen, how old was I when I started again?"

Krillen smirked. "If my memory is correct, I believe you were four," the former monk responded, earning a jaw dropping stare from the rest of the students as Gohan alone raised his hand.

Videl felt faint. Gohan had been training in martial arts since he was four years old? That was insane! How could his parents allow that? How could he even understand what to do at that age? They were going to have a little talk about this.

"Alright, Gohan," Yamcha smirked. "Looks like you'll be helping us train the more advanced students. Go easy on them."

Gohan made a face. "Do I have to?" he whined like a petulant child.

Yamcha just ignored him. "All those with eight or more years of training go with Gohan. Those with five to seven years of training go with Krillen and all the newbies stay with me." Yamcha responded.

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Gohan sweatdropped as he watched the advanced students staring at him, waiting for instruction. "Um, ok. How about we start with a light warm up? Twenty laps around the gym, one hundred push-ups, fifty pull-ups, sounds good?" With that everyone except for Mirai stared at him in disbelief.

"You call that a light warm-up?" a random jock exclaimed. "That's a whole damn workout…for a week!"

Gohan blinked at him sweat dropping. No wonder you're so weak. Deciding to have a little fun, Gohan challenged with a smirk, "Well, for the pansies here I guess we can cut it down to three laps, ten ladies push-ups and five pull-ups."

"There are no pansies here, right Sharpner?" the jock replied, feeling insulted.

Sharpner only smirked. "Sure," he replied sarcastically. He had been training under Hercule since he was eight years old but only when Gohan started training him the week after he started school did he know what real training was like. He only looked that way but he wasn't stupid. He knew Gohan could give Hercule a run for his money any day. He wasn't going to be as star struck as to be blind to that fact. Gohan worked you to the bone but he had to say the results were phenomenal. He was now twice as fast as he was before and twice as strong. No one was able to defeat him in any of his matches so far. He knew these guys wouldn't last ten seconds with Gohan. It served them right for trash talking Gohan behind his back all the time.

"Alright then," Gohan piped up. "Let's go!"

The students made their way to the starting line and took off. Mirai and Gohan headed the pack with Sharpner and Videl not too far behind. By their fifth lap, the four began to lap the other jocks who had by now, run out of steam.

Turning to Mirai, Gohan asked, "Didn't the Almighty Champ teach them anything about endurance?"

Hearing his remark, Videl retorted, "It isn't my dad's fault they're muscle-bound idiots."

Gohan raised an eyebrow and began jogging backwards so he was facing her. "Actually, I think it is. The student is the product of the teacher, you know."

Videl frowned. "That's not true. My dad trained me and Sharpner and we're right behind you guys," she responded.

"Yet you obviously haven't trained under him in a long while and I've been training Sharpner myself during the past month." Gohan replied.

Videl would have crossed her arms over her chest if she wasn't still running. "You were training with him and you never told me?" she turned on Sharpner.

Sharpner shrugged. "Hey! Every time I asked you, you told me a true martial artist never reveals their secrets. So after seeing him hold his own against you the first day, I asked him and he says yes. We've been training every other day at my house after school."

Videl looked down, ashamed as she recalled the many times Sharpner had begged her to train him and she'd shot him down with her pompous attitude. Here was this guy he barely even knew and he was the one to help him and not his long-time friend. She could see the training was really paying off too. Sharpner was neck and neck with her and was barely even breaking a sweat, something that could have never happened before he met Gohan. "I'm sorry," Videl said.

"It's ok. It's nice to learn a new fighting style once in a while. Kami knows Gohan knows a ton of them," Sharpner responded shrugging it off.

"And how many do you know?" Videl asked Gohan.

Gohan just shrugged. "Maybe six or seven," he replied nonchalantly. "I never bothered counting."

Videl stopped in her tracks, her jaw dropping in shock. How was it possible for him to know so many styles at such a young age? This was crazy! Seeing she was falling behind, the dark haired girl picked up the pace finishing right behind Sharpner as they concluded their twentieth lap.

The four friends made their way over to an empty corner of the gym and began to do their push-ups. Once again, Videl's eyes widened in shock as she saw Gohan and Mirai doing their push-ups at an almost frantic speed, using only one hand! What was even worse was that Sharpner was keeping up with them although he was using both hands. Suddenly she felt inadequate. She had thought she had reached her pinnacle. She was the second strongest in the world and all she had to do now was defeat her father at the WMAT to become the strongest. This was definitely a wake-up call for her. Sharpner was at or slightly above her level and Gohan and Mirai seemed to be miles ahead of her. In order to keep up, she would need to do some extensive training as well.

So lost was she in her thoughts that she didn't realize the boys had already moved on to their pull-ups while she was only on her fiftieth push-up. By the end of the warm up, Videl was exhausted and hurting in places she never knew could hurt before. She was hunched over, breathing hard, her eyes closed in exhaustion. She strained an eye open and looked at the three boys who were getting a glass of water, talking and laughing like they hadn't completed that torture routine moments before. Looking back at the jocks, she felt a little better. They were strewn about the track course, passed out. The big talker was trying and failing miserably to make it to his knees.

"Videl," Gohan called. "Come and get some water! We have lots more to do!"

Videl sent him a glare. Was he on crack or something? This wasn't a training session this was a friggin boot camp! The only thing she wanted to do right now was sit under a nice cool fan in a comfortable bed and go to sleep. However, to keep up her image she complied.

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Two hours later, every single member on Gohan's team was passed out save for Mirai and Gohan himself. They were all on the floor, small groans of pain escaping their lips every once in a while. Krillen, Yamcha and the rest of the students looked on in shock. What did this boy do to them? Never were they so happy they weren't put on his team.

"Which part of go easy on them didn't you get?" Yamcha hissed at the Son boy.

Gohan just grinned and shrugged. "I offered them an easy alternative but they decided to take the hard way," he responded in a sing-song voice.

"And I bet that wasn't in a nice way was it?" Krillen responded. "Take them to their rooms, you two. I don't think they'll be doing much else for the day. When you're done you guys can go get some breakfast."

Mirai and Gohan consented, slinging a jock over each shoulder to the students' amazement, going upstairs to their rooms and tossing them on their respective beds. They left Sharpner and Videl for last.

Gohan held Videl bridal style while Mirai tossed Sharpner a bit more gently over his shoulder. While Mirai ventured off to Sharpner's room, Gohan smiled as Videl subconsciously held on to his shirt and snuggled deeper into his arms. He opened the door to their room and sat on the bed with her in his lap, to remove her shoes. He gently laid her on the bed and watched her sleep for a moment.

There was just something about this girl he couldn't explain. He admired her determination. Even though she was the brink of exhaustion, she kept on going and never once complained. He liked that spark in her, especially now she had begun to lose the attitude. Maybe they could become more than friends. He would just have to wait and see.

Blushing at his thoughts, he got up only to find Videl was still holding on to his shirt. He carefully extricated himself from her grip but not without disturbing a sleep a little. "Comfy…warm," she said groggily. "I'm…good fighter…too."

Gohan chuckled quietly at her babbling. "Yeah," he whispered. "I know you are."

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