Katja's Halloween 'protection' haul.
Katja Wagner smiled with glee at the harvest she'd reaped from her little campaign. It was a genius idea. Offer her teammates immunity from her Halloween tricking in exchange for a 'down payment' of candy. She was still grinning as she sorted out the mess of junk food on her bed. It was time to see who had earned themselves immunity...and who had not.
She picked up an enormous box of jellybeans, upon which there was a sticky note with Remi Lebeau's name on it. "An entire box of Jelly Belly jelly beans from Remi. She's safe for the next year or so."
Setting it aside, she grabbed a paper bag and sifted through the contents. "Twenty miniature boxes of Milk Duds and fourteen lollipops from Drifter. Good enough. I'll spare him."
On to another bag. "Fifteen miniature candy bars and four full-sized ones from John Grey. That will do. At least he got my favorite kinds."
A plastic baggie was next. She smirked in amused disbelief. "Nine rolls of Smarties from Lauren Worthington. Note to self, some pranking is definitely in order..." She made a note of it on a little paper pad.
Sighing and setting Lauren's meager offering aside with the rest of her haul, she moved onto another paper bag, this one rather weighty. Astounded, she counted the contents carefully. "Eighty-four small Tootsie Rolls. Twelve medium-sized ones. Two big ones. All from Summer Scott. Wow. I guess that will do. I had a really good prank just for her, but she's earned her immunity...rats."
On to a plate, carefully wrapped in plastic wrap. She smiled. "Four chocolate-chip cookies and three pumpkin-face cookies... from Xavier. I wasn't going to prank him anyway, but he must have assumed 'better safe than sorry'..."
Resolving to munch on the cookies while she thought up pranks, she moved onto the rest of her reaping. A large popcorn tin caught her interest...it had Jake Lee's name on it. Opening it, she discovered not popcorn, but candy. "Thirty-eight pieces of that icky rock-hard pink bubble gum. Ninety-six foil-wrapped chocolates. One pack of Wrigley's spearmint flavor. All disgusting. Probably left over from several past Halloweens. Again, note to self. Hit Jake hard this Halloween."
She picked up a mug, wrapped in colored plastic wrap. It was from Ben Braddock. "Three orange Tic Tacs and twelve autumn-color Hershey kisses. Also a cheapskate. Hit him too."
She came to a very cold cookie tin, and opening it, she found two strange objects, encased in a block of ice. Bobbi Drake, no doubt. "One tube of slime candy and one pair of bubble gum fangs. Bobbi, they're interesting at least. Points for creativity and presentation. I'll let it slide."
Nearing the end of her pile, she picked up an unopened store-bought bag of candy corn. It was from Rampage. "Two hundred thirteen pieces of candy corn, both the yellow stripe kind and the brown stripe kind. Fifty-seven candy pumpkins. Nineteen candy cornstalks, cats, witches, and ghosts, total. Heh, I'm not fond of candy corn, but pranking Rampage is always hazardous to my health...I'll skip her."
Finally, she was down to one last item--a box wrapped in Halloween paper. A tag marked it as from Helen McCoy. Curious, she opened it, and could not restrain her amused smile. "Last and not least, one bottle of Pepto Bismol from Helen, as well as ...one toothbrush."
She almost smiled at the irony. A pile of candy almost bigger than she was, and one poor little toothbrush.
"Helen, it's so witty, I think I'll spare you this Halloween anyway."
Satisfied for the most part, Katja flopped backwards on her bed, munching on some of her spoils.
"Now comes the fun part...thinking up pranks for those who didn't meet my expectations. Where's that pad of paper?"
She found it under the bag of candy corn, and reviewed her little list.
"Let's see...Lauren...Jake...and Ben. Phooey. I'd hoped for more, but they'll do."
