First Fool

First Fool


Stan Musso chuckled to himself as he finished setting the desk's last booby trap.  This'll teach you to mess with The Master, Korbin!  Oh, and don't worry, Robbins and Clayton--you're next.  Closing the door quietly behind him, Stan headed back to his room.

He still couldn't believe those amateurs thought that bucket of water over the door would actually work!  Rookies!  Although they'd made a fairly decent attempt to conceal the trip wire, Stan's senses were on high alert this first day of April, and he'd easily spotted the short length of fishing line peeking out from the top of the door frame.

Stan was a junior at Abalone State, and the undisputed terror of the dorm on April Fools Day.  Few had escaped his pranks, and even fewer had succeeded in pulling one on him.  He'd almost laughed out loud, when he'd overheard the three freshmen plotting to "take him down".  Nobody gets the best of Stan Musso, especially not if I've got advance warning!

He grinned to himself as memories of past exploits played in his head.  He worked hard at embarrassing or inconveniencing his victims to the greatest extent possible, while keeping the pranks simple enough to avoid serious retaliation.  Putting honey in his sister's hair conditioner was one of his favorites, even though the cost had been a month's grounding, and adding food dye to Masters' windshield washer fluid had been a real hoot. 

Two floors down, Kevin Robbins, Roger Korbin and Cal Clayton were gathered around Cal's computer.  The screen's image had been split into four squares, each of which showed a similar, but different, dorm room.

"You're sure this'll work, Cal?  There's no way he'll figure out he's being set up?"

"If his questions in Computer Lab are any indication," Cal replied, "Stan's challenged every time he has to change the font in a text document.  He's going down."

"And you can combine all four video outputs into one outgoing transmission?"

"Piece of cake."

"Hey!" Roger exclaimed, "there he is!"

Sure enough, Stan had just entered the room shown in the lower right video frame.  He was holding a note in his hand as he went directly to his room's computer.  The picture from the concealed video camera was clear enough to show him opening a web browser and then, referring closely to the note, typing in a URL.  On Cal's monitor, a countdown timer began running just below the video feeds.

"See," Kevin said, "I told you he'd never be able to resist that "For hot videos..." note.  Okay, Cal, do your thing!"

Cal selected some menu options on the media player, then highlighted all four video squares and dragged them to the chat room he had set up on the campus intranet.  The room's status currently showed as 'Private'.  He started typing.

'Hi, Stan!  Welcome to Musso Cam!'

On the monitor, Stan jumped when the chat window opened unbidden.

'Who is this?' he tapped out.

'Someone who's a little smarter than you thought.  Recognize anything?'

The four squares, now labeled 'Kevin's Room', 'Cal's Room', 'Roger's Room' and 'Stan's Room' lit up.  Video clips began playing in the first three, and each one clearly showed Stan setting booby traps.

Stunned by the video evidence of his escapades, it finally dawned on Stan that there was a camera somewhere in his room.  He began looking around, although he remained seated.  The flashing screen caught his attention.

'Hey, Stan!'

'What do you want, loser?'

'See how this chat's set to 'Private'?'

'Yeah.  So?'

'Check out the clock at the bottom of your screen.'

On the monitor, they saw Stan look down as the timer reached ten seconds.

'Okay, Stan, check the status now.'

The indicator changed to 'Public', just as the timer reached zero.  Roger and Kevin each pressed the button on the remotes they were holding.  A small, well-concealed strobe light began flashing and Stan clapped his hands over his ears.  Although there was no audio, it was clear that something was making a lot of noise.  A caption appeared at the bottom of the screen: PRANK KING GETS PRANKED!

'In case you're interested, this video is now being broadcast over Abalone's intranet and displayed on the main monitor in the Student Union.  We win--you lose.  Have a nice day, Stan.  Signed--the new Prank Kings!'


[733 words]