With the grim reality that she would die if she didn't do something really soon, the young woman searched her possibilities. Which were few. At the moment, all she could think of was finding a weapon to use against him.

She had noticed during her last tumble that the latch on the back door was closed, meaning that it was locked. But that was a simple thing to open as long as the deadlocks weren't locked with it. If they were she would have to root around for keys which she assumed would most definitely not be easy to procure. And waiting around for this lunatics parents was not an option.

Plus, no one was coming for her. She hadn't told a soul where she was going. She should have spoken to Gohan, if he knew where she was, he would save her. She smiled for a brief moment, even in the heat of the situation. He was her protector, he had already saved her life once before and he would probably be able to do it again. And she had never told him that she loved him.

Feeling the grip on her ankle only tighten, she lashed out with her other foot, colliding forcefully with his forehead. With a grunt, he let go. She stood up, panting heavily. Opening the first drawer she found, she picked out the first thing that she saw that could be of any use.

A rolling pin, the perfect weapon. Hopefully with this, she might be able to give him a big enough clout to knock him down or even out for a few seconds. He stood up with her, already recovered from her last attack. She raised the lump of wood he smirked devilishly. "You wouldn't."

"Wouldn't I?"

He laughed and lunged forward. Using every last scrap of energy left in her body she darted to the side and his momentum carried him forward, passing her. She used her remaining strength to swing the pin down on his skull, wincing at the sound of the blow and the horrified look etched on his face.

He slumped heavily to the floor, colliding with a few more objects on the way down. She stood motionless for a few moments, before a groan emanated from his throat signalling that he still had plenty of fight left in him.

With a scream of pure terror, she darted to the door and almost ripped the latch off the door as she clicked it open. A cry of joy then followed as it swung open, the other locks having not been activated.

She didn't look back as she ran home as quickly as her slender legs could carry her. Her home came into view and she saw that both her own driveway and Gohan's were empty. Her father was at work, and she had overheard Gohan and his family in the morning talking of a trip to West City for a few days.

The two of them still weren't really speaking, but she had avoided him since she was forgiven, trying to summon up the courage to tell him how she felt. Her front door was fast approaching and she breathed a sigh of relief. She was almost to safety.

She almost had a heart attack however when she registered what she had just heard behind her. "Videl!" A deep, powerful voice boomed behind her. She put on a burst of pace and uttered a silent scream.

Somehow however, he had caught up to her. How could this be? When she had left he couldn't even open his eyes, and now he had caught her. She crushed her eyes shut to force the sweat that was stinging her eyeballs out.

A hand wrapped itself around her arm and she was spun around. She prepared a fist hastily and kept her eyes shut as she swung out with it. She made contact and she felt that his head had snapped back sharply from her attack. His grip didn't loosen even a notch however and she was forced to open her eyes to see her attacker.

Instead of a head of sandy blonde hair about six feet in the air, she was met with one of raven black tresses about three inches higher. "Gohan?" She croaked. She couldn't be sure if this was real or if her brain was putting him in place of Matthew in her panic.

"Of course." He looked down at her damaged face, the bruise beneath her eye, the blood trickling down her cheek and at the rolling pin in her hand with a spot of blood colouring it three quarters of the way down. "What did he do to you?"

The question seemed to stir something inside of her, and she broke down in tears, sobbing into his chest. He placed his arms around her back, holding her close as they stood in the middle of the street, stock still apart from the occasional shudder from her tears. Her dainty fingers clawed themselves into the fabric of his shirt on his chest, as they had done that time he had pulled her from the road. His hands slowly traced up and down her back, coming to rest at the base of her neck, fingers lightly brushing the dark hair that sprouted there.

They stood like that for what seemed an eternity as she slowly recovered from her ordeal. Slowly he led her by the hand back to his home and sat her down at the dining table while he rooted through cupboards for medical equipment.

"You went to West City today though?" She said, asking it as more of a question than anything else.

"Ermm..." He was in West City, but he could hardly tell her that he flew a thousand miles to get back when he sensed the fluctuations in her ki, leaving his mother and Goten at Capsule Corporation with the Briefs. "I decided to stay behind, I had some stuff to do."

"Oh..." She wasn't in the mood to pick holes in his answer.

"Will you tell me what happened?" He asked as he returned with what he needed. As he began cleaning up the wound, she told him the story, or at least everything that she could recall.

He was incensed at what he had done, but what he had suspected for a long time was true. That boy was mentally unbalanced, and something had to be done. "I need to go to Matthew's house. Right now. I'll take that rolling pin too, I think it would be best that I returned it. I want you to go home, lock all of the doors and windows and wait for your father."

"What are you going to do?"

"I need to get round there and make sure he doesn't harm himself or any others. He's mentally unstable and I don't want to think just what he might be capable of." He stood up, intent on going at that very minute. Videl stood quickly and grasped his hand in her own.

"Don't go Gohan, he might kill you! Get the police to go." He smiled, her worry was unfounded. No matter how many drugs he had taken, he still wouldn't be able to lay a finger on Gohan.

"I'll be fine, just worry about yourself. Go home, right now." He ordered. She relinquished her grip on his hand and walked to the door, Gohan trailing her. He walked her around to her own front door and waited until she was safely inside before he took off, the rolling pin in his hand, ready to return the evidence to the scene of the crime.