Super Dragon Ball: Paradise Hysteria

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A young teen glided across a mountainous creek landscape and planted his boots on the ground by a capsule home attached to a larger wooden house. Gohan entered the Son family home with hopeful eyes, looking a tad surprised to see both his parents in the kitchen. Goku was sitting at the table with a squinted pair of eyes and a rich smile. He kept his head locked on the door as if he spent hours waiting for his son to come back from school.

Chi-Chi's back was turned to her son. Strangely, she didn't turn around and react even when Gohan greeted his family upon entering the family home. The silent housewife just kept on brewing in her own enclosed world of ingredients. Her shoulders looked relaxed, almost to where it weirded Gohan out a little. It was as if his mother shut herself off from the surrounding world and focused on her cooking, but she wasn't all there either.

"Hello, I'm home..." Gohan repeated, waving his hand and taking a step closer to his absent-minded mother before Goku's grave voice made Gohan jump up and turn to his father, startled.

"Hey there, son. How was school?" Goku followed Gohan with his strangely malevolent stare. "You settling in the new place alright?"

"Umm... Yeah, Videl is incredibly popular in school, so being friends with her helps to be noticed a lot. I'd probably be lost without her, I've never really attended school before and the only people I've ever interacted with were our friends, aliens, and demons so... I'm really glad I've got her to ground everything for me," Gohan looked up, pondering of his early impressions of having started middle school in Central City while the Orange Star and East Cities were being rebuilt from being grounds zero of the Machine Mutant invasion. With some luck, Gohan and Videl might get to come back to their proper middle school next year.

"That's great! You've grown really close to that girl, you should invite her for dinner sometime," Goku leaned and rested his head on his fist.

"R-Really... Would that be okay, Mom?" Gohan turned to Chi-Chi, who still kept her back turned at her son and just really went to town on cleaving that fish and onions to bits.

"Do what your father says, Gohan-chan," Chi-Chi replied with an absentminded and floaty voice.

"Umm... Okay... Though, I'm not sure inviting her over is such a great idea. Videl-san lives in a huge mansion and has servants taking care of her home and chefs making food for her... I just... I don't know..." Gohan sighed, looking down at the spotless kitchen floor. His moderate surprise at how well-maintained the house was became shrouded by his creeping doubts and fear of what Videl might say seeing his routine of living the simple life in a modified capsule house out by the mountainside in the middle of nowhere.

"Well, think it through," Goku leaned back in his chair, at long last reminding Gohan of how his father used to act before the space trip. "I've been thinking, it's been a long while since we trained. You wouldn't want to start slipping in battle, would you? Honing your mind is important and all, but you can't let your body relax for too long or you'll start bleeding out your wild strength. How about we go for a few rounds after dinner? It'll do wonders for helping you tune out from your school routine and the fatigue will knock you right out when it's time to go to bed."

"Oh... Umm... I actually planned to go to the amusement park in the city with Videl-san," Gohan tucked his chin and bowed in apology.

"Oh, well..." Goku snickered with his mouth while his eyes never really dropped the malicious squint which they now carried around everywhere. "Some other time then."

"Some other time, Father!" Gohan bowed and darted off to the main room and up the staircase that led to his room. He had to get ready for that meeting with Videl after all.

*****

Emeralda wrapped her arms around Yamcha, hugging the famous pro athlete, and pressed herself against his body. Yamcha's cheeks flushed with red as he looked down at the top of his girlfriend's head. She's never hugged him this firmly before. He could feel her fingers digging into his back as if they were trying to rip his back open and make it flap like wings of fleshy straps.