To prank, or not to prank.

Little did Corvin know - he was being watched.

From beyond the three-dimensional space the boy could observe, his hall parent was watching him. From every angle, all at once, this vast being scrutinized the boy's behavior.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING," boomed a deep, wet voice. It came from all directions at once, but it was not angry. It was monotone, as though produced by a sort of computer. It had the inflection of a statement, rather than a question.

A pair of sunglasses emerged from the floor, held aloft by a pair of slimy blue tentacles. The sunglasses were aimed at the boy, "looking" at him. Goodall had switched from hats to sunglasses lately. Sunglasses make you look cool, and Goodall wanted to be both cool and relateable.

Goodall was silent for a moment.

His appearance seems to have unsettled the boy, which broke his concentration and made his contraption fall apart. At least he was able to catch the bag of powder material before it hit the floor and ruptured. Powder materials were very difficult to clean.

But the purpose of Corvin's original exercise still eluded him.

"I APOLOGIZE FOR STARTLING YOU. PLEASE DO AN EXPLANATION OF WHAT A PRANK IS."

Goodall realized after he said it that he said that sentence incorrectly. He should have said 'explain,' not 'do an explanation of'

"I THINK THAT I UNDERSTAND," Goodall said. In a pocket dimension beyond Cor's ability to observe, Goodall was already looking through a dictionary to check what some of those words meant.

"I WOULD LIKE TO DO AN OBSERVE. PLEASE CONTINUE TO ASSEMBLING THE APPARATUS OF PRANK."

This was a rare, wonderful opportunity. Goodall had never observed this kind of behavior in humanoids before. He had to see it, and to record how the other humans responded to it. He was also curious about the purpose of the flour: how would the flour enable Cor to establish any sort of deception? Was he going to take advantage of some sensory limitation in humanoids to engage in the deception? Was that what the flour was for?

This left Goodall even more confused.

"YOU TRICK THEM INTO COVERING THEMSELVES WITH FLOUR. THIS CAUSES THE AMUSEMENT. INFORM ME WHETHER OR NOT MY ASSESSMENT IS CORRECT."

Humanoid behaviors were completely baffling to him. Why would being covered in a fine white powder cause the humans to be amused? Was it because it was a deception? Was there some strange evolutionary reason that white powder caused amusement to humans? Goodall once saw a man inhale white powder through his nose, and when he asked his coworker about it he learned that this is illegal, and his job requires him to inform the campus police if he sees a student with white powder.

After investigating several of Goodall's reports and finding them faulty, they taught him about illegal drugs. Goodall still wasn't convinced that the cocaine's status as a white powder was entirely irrelevant, and this situation was causing him to doubt that claim even further.

"IS IT AMUSING BECAUSE IT IS WHITE POWDER OR FOR SOME OTHER REASON." The inflection was as a statement, but Goodall intended it as a question.

"I WILL DO A QUERY OF PSYCHOLOGY DEPARTMENT," Goodall resolved.

But in the meantime, he still wanted to observe this 'pranking' come to fruition. He withdrew his tentacle from the three-dimensional plane; there was no longer any evidence that Goodall was here and watching. "WHEN PRANKING APPARATUS IS COMPLETE I SHALL DO A STOP OF TALKING SO I DO NOT RUIN THE DECEPTION," his voice boomed.

He would stay there and wait for a prank victim to appear.