Misery, Company and Strategy
Kayo sprawled comfortably on the canopied daybed, watching the shifting shadows of moonlight through the trees above her head as she mulled over what action to take next.
The rest of the family were quite aware of the prank war now. Gordon had surprisingly not elected to try to join in but had designated himself the 'score keeper', keeping tally of who'd pranked whom, tracking their 'wins' and rating their pranking technique.
As the self appointed judge, Gordon had decreed Kayo's latest venture a tie- with the aid of her co-conspirator (to hide her purchases) she'd gotten a quantity of the colour powder that would be thrown around at Holi festivals and ambushed Scott with fistfulls of it one evening as he was coming back after a swim at the beach. Unfortunately she'd miscalculated exactly how quick fighter-pilot reflexes could be and a colourful and still damp Scott had pounced on her for a 'loving' big brother hug almost exactly like what had started all this off in the first place.
To top it all off, when she finally got free of him (he'd been trying to carry her over to the pool, intending to jump in and take her with him but she squirmed out of his arms and shoved him in) and got back inside to clean up and get some sleep, she found that he'd resorted to one of Gordon's favourites and at some point during the day he'd short-sheeted her bed.
Now she was left with a conundrum- what exactly to do next? The rules of 'no IR equipment, nothing that would impede a rescue, nothing broken or permanent, clean up after yourself' had been laid down years ago and enforced by Grandma. Nor could she copy something he'd already done, that Just Wasn't Done in the Tracy family pranking rule book.
Kayo rolled over onto her side and dragged a pillow under her head so she could watch the moonlight on the almost glass-calm sea as she pondered. Trip wires rigged to party poppers was considered and dismissed in the light of Scott's personal history, a whoopee cushion was too infantile, swapping the salt and sugar in the kitchen risked collateral damage- no one wanted to chance Grandma's wrath if she was caught in the crossfire- and she rejected a few other ideas as needing supplies she didn't have access to right now.
However she did still have a lot of the colour powder left and she knew that one of Scott's few indulgences was a hot bath at the end of the day. A little work with some rice paper and she could make a little packet to stuff into the tap or hide inside a wash cloth for an impromptu bath bomb.
Kayo smiled into the night as she calculated exactly how to go about her latest scheme. Another call to her co-conspirator was in order.