The Wizard of WACCC

           By Remande, Fcrocker, and a truckload of gweeps

            who do not care to be connected with this book

Somewhere in the University of Kansas: there was a young liberal arts
freshman named Dorothy (dot@comp.ukansas.edu) who had a dog named Toto
(grrr@arf.obedience.edu).  Dorothy didn't like being at UKansas. In
fact, she didn't like being in Kansas. Life in Kansas was too quiet for
her taste. She wanted to have a good times she wanted to live a
Iittle; in shorts she wanted to get laid.

Often, Dorothy would dream of transferring to one of those wild
colleges in New England. She didn't want MIT or Harvard but something
more like UMass or Clark. But her parents wanted her at UKansas
because she could commute on her ten-speed rather than live in a
dormatory. And her parents ran her life because, although she was
eighteen sibs couldn't pay her own tuition. Soo she rather unhappily
rode her bicycle to and from schools dog in handlebar bags for a
B.A. In Liberal Arts that wouldn't get her a decent job except as a
secretary. But that's what good Kansas girls are supposed to go to
college for.

One day, Dorothy was walking to class when a big gust of wind
came. She looked up and saw a huge wind funnel. "Oh, no, Toto, it's a
twister!" Toto gave her a quizzical glance in return. Then he looked
up, saw the twisters and proceeded to empty his bladder onto his
mistress' stockings.

Dorothy failed to reproach the dog, thus hindering its performance at
obedience school due to lack of negative encouragement. Though this
detail appears to mean little now, this misdemeanor on Dorothy's part
will create extreme difficulty at a key point in the story.

Meanwhile, Dorothy still maintained enough head on her shoulders (I
know what you're thinking, pervert!) to try to find a shelter. There
was nothing around except an old maintenance shack. She and Toto
quickly climbed inside and shut the door. It was an old wooden shack,
and Dorothy wondered if it could hold up under the storm. Not being an
engineering students she had no clue. But the inside of it was filled
with lawnmowers, snowblowers, powered post-hole diggers, power saws,
and practically three quarters of the Black and Decker Catalog. These
were all utterly worthless to Dorothy for two reasons. First and
foremost, Toto knew much more about power tools than Dorothy; he could
bite the cords and render them useless. Almost as importantly, there
was no outlet, so all this machinery stood impotent In the face of the
windstorm.

When the storm hit, the building toppled over. There was a floor on
the shack, and it stayed with it. Obviously, some piss-poor architect
neglected to bolt the room to the foundation. Amazingly, Dorothy had
enough horse sense to stay in the building. I say this is amazing
because horse sense has nothing to do with storm etiquette. She felt
the hut lift into the air and decided this was the socially correct
point In time to faint dead away. Toto, fresh out of urine, had
nothing better to do than fall asleep as well, his wet nose in her
exposed (See? I knew you were a pervert!) underarm.  Both the freshman
and the terrier awoke to a loud thud which signified to both that the
storm was over and the shack had landed. The but was still at an
angle, so Dorothy was careful in opening the door. Unceremoniously,
Dorothy and Toto fell out because she failed to notice that the door
was facing downward.

They looked up, and saw what seemed to be a very queer
place. "Toto," she said, "I don't think we're in UKansas
anymore." The dog gave a quizzical whimper.

The shack had broken into a roof and had entered what appeared to be a
lobby. The room was vacant, though bookbags and half-eaten lunches had
been left by whoever used the place. The room was obviously designed
by someone with a hangover, as the two long walls were at about thirty
degree angles relative to each other. Benches and tables grew right
out of the floor and appeared to be integral parts of the
building. The curved side of the room was all window, and showed a
beautiful view of an ugly, snow-laden quadrangle. A door opened from
behind her, though she never realized it. A man walked out with all
the stealth a ROTC student can muster, and grabbed hold of her mouth
so she couldn't scream.

"Oh, shit!" she thought, "I landed in Russia! Where did I leave my
passport?"  Her mysterious apprehender spoke. "Are you a good gweep or
a bad gweep?"

"Mmh mm mff mn mtttff?"

"Are you a good gweep or a bad gweep?"

Toto, almost as stealthily as this mystery man, sneaked up to him and
proceeded to tug on his pant leg.

"No! Not my dress uniform!" The man let go of Dorothy to put all of
his Armed Forces skills to work on a dog he outweighed fifteen to one.

Dorothy immediately spoke. "I'm not a gweep at alll I'm just a
freshman from UKansas.  Where am I?" Toto, seeing that Dorothy was no
longer in danger, released the tasteless polyester/cotton mix and
Jumped into her arms.

"Welcome to WPI Tech!"

"Whoopie Tech. I'll have to transfer to this school. Sounds fun!"

"Seriously, you have to be a gweep. Only a gweep has the power to do
that!" He pointed to her hut, and Dorothy saw that the maintenance
shack had landed directly on a man in a business suit, instantly
killing him.

"Oh, no! What have I done?"

"You've saved us all from the Un-American forces of monopoly, tyranny,
and sentient linguini. He's Ed Murphy, director of DAKA." He turned to
the door from whence he came.  "Its safe, my fellow wedge rats! The
DAKA Duke is dead!"

Instantly, a group of about three dozen odd creatures, some dressed
normally, others looking like hippie throwbacks, ran out of two doors
on the same folding wall to witness the end of an era better off
forgotten: the reign of DAKA over the land. The army type called out
to one of them, shouting, "Call the owner of Boynton Pizza! We can
clear out the kitchen and have him up and running In twenty-four hours
If everybody pitches in!  We 'II even move In the pizza ovens for
him!"

A snappy salute was the reply. "Yes sir, Crocker!" He ran out to find
a telephone.

Meanwhile, the rest of the populace was in celebration. About a
quarter of them started chanting "Boynton Pizza! Boynton Pizza!" The
rest, however, began a more complicated song:

Ding Dong! The Duke is dead!
(The Duke is dead! The Duke is dead!)
Ding dong! The DAKA Duke is dead!

Several natives proceeded to formally enter Dorothy into their society:

We represent The Wedge Rat Corps,
The Wedge Rat Corps, the Wedge Rat Corps.
And in the name of the Wedge Rat Corps ...
...We'd like to welcome you to Morgan Wedge!

Finally, a biotech student went over to the stiff and checked for a
pulse, then announced that not only was he going for a short ride in a
long black station wagon, but that his vital organs were all rendered
untransplantable.

After all the brouhaha (and the brew as well), Boynton Pizza was
installed where Daka had once stood, and there was much
rejoicing. Yaaaay. Dorothy, however, realized that she had just missed
an exam for Advanced Techniques in Home Economics that she needed to
pass the course. She was in big trouble. "Crocker, how do I get back
to UKansas?"

"Where's UKansas? "

"It's in the south of the U.S."

"Sorry, can't help you in that department. We rarely even get off the
campus, so we're lost outside of Massachusetts."

" Well, who would know how to get to UKansas? "

"That would take the wisest man on campus. That would take..."

Dumm dumm dumm!

"Hey! Who's the jerk with the stereo? That would take the Wizard of
WACCC."

"The Wizard of WAC? What do I look like, a ROTC girl?"

"No. The Wizard of Doubleyou ay see see see: the Wizard of WACCC.  His
username is..."

Dumm dumm dumm!

Crocker spied a rather large and stupid-looking man wearing a Lens and
Lights Jacket.  He stood beside a hand truck. On the hand truck stood
two large speakers a cassette deck, a receiver, and a mixing
board. The L&L man stood with a shit-eating grin (colorful phrase!) on
his face. Crocker looked at him, then walked over to the assorted
audio junk on the hand truck. Crocker touched the eject button on the
cassette deck, confiscated the cassette, ran a large magnet over It,
and returned it to the tape deck.

"His username is Drdt. You must see him, and ask him how to get back
to UKansas. The Wizard holds his court in..."

Da da da dumm!

The L&L man was still there. The antenna on the receiver was
extended. He offered an explanation to Crocker: "Beethoven's
Fifth. Classics 102 FM."

Crocker took the radio, tied the antenna into an overhand knot, and
returned it to the L&L man.

"He holds court in Fuller Labs in the WACCC facility Itself. Wait a
minute: I know what you need." He rifled through the Duke of DAKA's
pockets, and from them emerged a small scrap of paper. Crocker handed
this to Dorothy. "It's a username and ID. The Duke was one of those
'never logged in' Jerks. The Wizard won't talk to you realtime. You'll
have to hit him on talk mode on the Encore system. Are you familiar
with the Encore system?"

"Of course. I'm 'dot' on comp.ukansas.edu and this here's 'grrr' on
arf.obedience.edu."

"Alright, so here's an account for you."

"NO!"

"No?"

"No? "

"Woof?"

"NO!" Crocker broke the chain. "Who the fuck are you?"

"I am A ... E... J!"

Fortunately, Crocker happened to be wearing a pendant shaped like the
Cray logo.  Unfortunately, thrusting It In AEJ's direction had no
effect. This was a man to be reckoned with.

The figure spoke. "The WACCC doesn't need another gweep, especially a
foreign gweep.  Take your xtank and your IRC and play it at UKansas or
Obedience, but not at WP! You!  Yes, you, Dorothy! Not only do you
kill my partner in tyranny, but you have the gall to steal his user
account! Have you no shame?"

Dorothy was speechless. She said, "".

"You have killed the Duke of DAKA, but you shall never vanquish the
Superuser! I'll get you, my pretty!"

AEJ was wearing brown pants that day.  Unfortunately for him, dogs are
colorblind. Toto saw red and mistook him for a fire hydrant. AEJ was
obviously pissed, as well as pissed upon. Smoke came from his ears,
and a flash of light emanated from his nose not unlike the sight of a
blown fuse.

"And your little dog, too!"

He pulled out a cigar box, removed a sign from it which read "WEDGE",
punched the button on the sign, and was gone from sight.

Dorothy broke the silence. "Who is he?"

"He is AEJ. He is in charge of host WPI and the DECstations. He
basically owns WACCC."

"I thought the Wizard owned WACCC."

"Politics. Actually, there's, a power struggle going on right now for
control over the CCC. AEJ has the administration behind him, and the
Wizard has us gweeps behind him."

"Oh. Where's the nearest terminal?"

"It's right down there, in Daniels. Down that hall and on your
right. There may be a line to wait in, though."

The natives began to sing:

Follow the hall.
Follow the hall.
Follow the, follow the, follow the, follow the, follow the hall.

"Can't you keep a tune?"

"Where, Crocker?"

"shut up!"

Dorothy started down the hall and, within five feet, met
somebody. This was an odd looking man, rather tall and very thin. He
was walking in towards her, and he wore a ball cap. The ball cap had a
small paper sign attached to It. The sign read "De-Gaussing Button".

"Who are you?" asked Dorothy.

"Arf!" said Toto, who was obviously lying.

"Hi. I'm Mike O'Malley, but you can just call me Fmeyer. Who are you?"

"Oh. I'm Dot, and this is..."

"Grrr!"

"How come I've never seen you on the net?"

"My home net is at UKansas, and his is on Arf. You have to go through
three nets to get here."

"Ah hah. Quick question: I have a long job running on the Encore, and
I want to keep my terminal window open. How do I do it? "

"Oh, that's easy. You hit control-Z to get a prompt, then BG to put It
in the background. By the way, how can you be so dumb?"

"Well, I used to be really smart.  Heck, I even got accepted to WPI."

"What happened?"

"I enrolled here. Now that, my friend, is a dumb move." And he began to
sing.

Oh, I would while away the hours
Conversing with the flowers,
And learning Diff EQ's.

I could pass all my classes,
Learn the chemistry of gases
If I only had a clue.

"Why is everyone so odd here?"

"WPI's an engineering school. What can you expect?"

"Hmmm."

Pant, pant, pant, pant.

"Fmeyer, I have a great idea! I'm going to talk to the Wizard to find
my way home to UKansas. Maybe he can give you a clue!"

"Clue? Who's the murder victim?"

"Then again, you may be beyond even his help."

"It can't hurt to try!"

"True."

So, the three: dog, freshman (who was definitely not the dog), and
zombie, stomped off to the Daniels terminals.

When they got there, both terminals were occupied by a man who looked
rather wild, and did not quite "look like th'inhabitants of th'
earth". This little piece of useless Shakespearean trivia is just one
example of what Dorothy needed to learn to graduate from
college. Anyway, back to the man at the terminal. He had his hands on
both keyboards. One screen displayed a map from Stellar Empires: on
the other was viewed an emacs window, and this particular gweep was
transferring information from the former to the latter. He was in the
full Gweeptrance, utterly unfazed by anything undigital.

Dorothy, not knowing Gweeptrance, knocked on his head as if it were a
door. "Anybody home?" No avail.

Fmeyer, with a rare inspiration, turned off the game terminal. The
user finished entering his emacs data, turned, and visibly dropped his
jaw. He then looked up at Fmeyer.

"Spudcrl, we need to use a terminal."

"So? Buy one!" He looked at his other visitors. "Hey, babe, you new in
town?"

Toto, not being a homosexual, replied "Arf! Arf Arf!"

After Spudcrl's eyes adjusted from monochrome to live viewing, he
repeated the question to Dorothy.

"Why, yes, Spudcurl."

"No. Spud_crl_. Pronounce it with a U, but spell it without one.

"Sorry, Spudcrl."  It sounded the same, but was written
differently. "Again, can we use a terminal?"

"No. I need both of 'em." The user turned the terminal on and noticed
a fuzzy black shape at his keyboard. It had already killed the game,
had typed In "rm ~/*.*", and had its paw right over the return
key. Spudcrl admitted defeat, and Toto typed in "exit"

As Fmeyer logged in, Dorothy asked Spudcrl, "How can you be so cruel?"

"Actually, it's rather easy. You see, I have no heart."

"But you're still alive!"

"That's the funny thing about it." He passed her his driver's
licence. "Look at this."

It read "Organ donor".

"Unfortunately, they needed it before I died. They took mine and
replaced it with an old bilge pump from a fishing boat. Which is why
I'm here as an M.E. major. I want to learn how to fix the damn thing
if it breaks down!"

"You must be joking!"

"No, I'm serious."  He opened his mouth.

Dorothy put her ear up to it, and heard the characteristic thwup,
thwup, thwup. She then felt him licking her ear. She immediately
recoiled and slapped him in the face.  "Disgusting!" she cried. He
tried to explain himself.

I would never be complaining
And oh, so entertaining,
I'd really play the part.

I would really be quite human
(At least, that's what I'm presumin')
If I only had a heart.

"Look at this!" said Fmeyer, gesturing towards the screen.

Dorothy felt that the time was right, and pressed the de-gaussing
switch on his hat. He characteristically wiggled, and she turned her
attention to the screen. He said, "His messages are on, but he has
some routine in there where everything bounces back and says he can't
be bothered with simple talk requests. It says to talk to someone
named Tracker realtime at the door to Fuller.

Dorothy said, "I used to be a bit of a hacker at UKansas. Let me try."

Fmeyer logged out, and Dorothy logged in.  As she entered her C-shell,
she heard someone join the already full wedge terminal cage. Fmeyer
addressed him as "MacGyver", and thus Dorothy was quite
interested. She looked for MacGyver's "finger" file and found
nothing. The new user leaned over her shoulders and entered in "f
macquivr" and up popped a full report, including a .plan file. Dorothy
saw him, but found no relationship to MacGyver.

"Macquivr?"  Dorothy asked, surprising even herself.

"It's spelled Macquivr, but pronounced MacGyver."

"Macquivr?" Same spelling, different pronunciation. "Why is it spelled
like that?"

"They screwed up when they made my account. Aah, if I only had the
right username."

I'd be sane and I'd be normal,
And just a bit more formal,
I really would be tame.

I'd be a real lady-pleaser,
Not a gweeping program teaser,
If I had a decent name.

All the while, Dorothy could not find a way to break through and talk
to the Wizard.  "Well," she said, "It seems like we're going to have
to walk all the way to Fuller Laboratories after all."

Fmeyer spoke. "But still, we're off to see the Wizard!"
\begin{verse}
Weeeee're off to see the Wizard,
The wonderful Wizard of WACCC
We'll walk from here to Fuller Labs
And never lose his track!
We'll meet the Wizard of WACCC because,
because, because, because, because,
Because, because, becauusse...
Because of the digital things he does
We're off to see the Wizard
The wonderful Wizard of WACCC!

Unfortunately, Matthew (both his first name and his user name) showed
up with the hand truck blaring an instrumental, so the quartet stood
no chance of a second verse.

It took Dorothy, Toto, Fmayer, Spudcrl, and Macquivr a full five
minutes to reach Fuller labs, and they were almost exhausted by the
end of the trip (but that's another story). Tracker, standing at the
main entrance to the WACCC room, stopped and challenged the group at
the gate. "I know you three guys," he said! "and I know both women on
campus. So who are you in the dress?"

"I'm Dot, from UKansas. I was brought here in a maintenance shack by a
cyclone."

Spudcrl characteristically butted in. "That shack killed the DAKA
Duke."

"You killed the Duke of DAKA? Beautiful! Come on in! What are you here
for?"

"We came to see the Wizard. You see, I'm in big trouble. First, I have
to get home to see if I can take a make-up exam. Second, I am being
hunted by AEJ."

"AEJ? That's serious!" He typed some stuff Into a DECstation used
solely for telneting WPI, and got a reply.

"He says to enter. Come on in! He's right over there.

The Wizard was keeping court.  Surrounded by rajeesh, planet10, and
parker, he was performing those duties a Wizard must perform. He was
playing xtank. The Wizard spoke.

"I am the great and powerful Drdt! I am the Wizard of WACCC!"

"I can imagine so," Dot retorted, "Doesn't look like any girl in the
state would want you!"

"Shut up! What do you want?"

"Well, I've been trying to get back to UKansas. "

"And I've been looking for a clue."

"And I need a heart, not a bilge pump!"

"While you're at it, can you change my username? "

"Now you, Dorothy, was the one who killed the Duke of DAKA?"

"It wasn't me. It was the maintenance shack!"

"Close enough. Then you four are the people I've been looking for! It
must be a sign from God!..."

Drdt noticed a beep from his terminal and looked down at it...

[God sez: I had nothing to do with it.]

Drdt, annoyed at God, piped the Twilight Zone at his terminal. He
turned back to his own worshipers. "I can give you all of those, but
you must first do something for me!"

"Which is?"

"Terminate AEJ."

"You gotta be kidding us!"

"No! You must log AEJ off and make sure he never logs on again! Bring
back the root password for proof." He then chuckled to himself about a
"two for one" deal.

"Well, how are we going to do that?"

"Leave! And do not attempt to interface with me again until you can
give me the root directory! Go!"

The four went, but only so far as the next row of DECterminals, where
they tried to find out everything they could about AEJ in order to
destroy him.

Cameraman, shift the scene to AEJ's Sanctum Sanctorum. No, not to the
WACCC Itself.  First, go to the back room, the Mecca where pilgrim lab
moniters worship the WPI host computer in person.  Look inside
there. Look on the raised floor, under which pounds of connector cable
lay. Look for a trap door and open it. Take your self and your camera
down there, down into the bowls of the CS facility, down into---

Ba ba ba bummm!

---and while you're at it, shut up that L&L jerk---

--- Down into the 8th dimension. More specifically, down into
8thdimension, named after the realm Buckaroo Banzai once traveled in
the Jet Car. The 8thdimension DECstation is only accessible by AEJ
himself, and has no screen.  Rather underneath the host WPI computer
itself is a crude Holodeck acting as a 3-d, walk-in display: One
corner of the room holds a massive Icon Box. An xpclock hangs on one
wall, telling the time. Emacs and T-shell windows hang in
mid-air. Each wall, the ceiling and floor has had the background
replaced by pornographic xgifroots.

This was a gweep's heaven, save for the fact that in the middle of the
room stood AEJ himself. AEJ was looking for a way to exact revenge on
Dorothy. Since she was logged on, he knew she was at the CCC lab
terminals. If he could get her into 8thdimension, he could play some
very interesting mind games with her and xgif. Then, after she became
completely disoriented, doing the old Ctrl-D on her would be easy, and
there would be no evidence she ever entered Fuller. But he had to get
her over there. Then he had it.  He had an unstoppable .plan. He
walked over to a T-shell window, slapped it to wake it up, and
scribbled on it with his finger, "xphone".

Meanwhile, cut back to Dorothy and company. They had yet to turn up
anything about the mysterious Superuser, although they were attempting
desperately. They heard a strange noise from behind them.

"What's that?" Dorothy said.

"Grrr." replied Toto. Amazingly, he was correct.

"I don't know," said Spudcrl, "Let's listen."

The _thomp, thomp_ of marching feet was what they heard. A few
seconds later, the wedge terminal cage was surrounded by two dozen
freshman wearing GDI pledge pins. The largest one said, "You're coming
with us." to Dorothy. The three misfit natives tried to fight them,
but there were too many pledges and they left with Dorothy. Fmeyer,
Spudcrl, and Macquivr were left in the wedge terminal cage.

Spudcrl broke the silence. "We've got to find Dorothy!"

Fmayer was quizzical. "Why?"

"Libido!"

Then Fmeyer came up with a .plan.

In the host WPI room, Dorothy was forced into the Host WPI room, and
AEJ was waiting there with a huge stack of pizzas. "Thanks, pledges,
pick 'em up, two per person."  "Thanks, dude!" The pledges left from
the building with their prizes. When they left, they saw another part
of AEJ's .plan. The student security team was guarding the
building. In their warm-up jackets, they marched around, chanting:

Oooh-eee-ooh.
Snaaaaap patrol.
Oooh-eae-ooh.
Snaaaaap patrol.

About an hour later, three more SNAP members arrived to replace
others. The old guards left surprisedly, expecting to be there all
night.

The tall guard talked to the other two. "Okay. Spudcrl, Macquivr, you
know what to do?"

"Yup."

"Good. Now will someone tell me?"

Spudcrl slapped Fmeyer in the face.

The three casually walked into the Host WPI room, all the while
singing the inane "SNAP Patrol" chant. Nobody was the wiser.

AEJ had just skipped out of 8thdimension in order to leave Dorothy to
the psychedelic x-everything program he had for her. It was merely a
matter of time for all of Dorothy's defenses to crumble and her home
net password to be AEJ's! Soon he would enslave another school. The
X-TieDye program written by kcyr would turn her brain to mush that
would be easily sifted through.

Fmeyer was starting to feel the tension. He reached up to hit his
de-gaussing switch and Spudcrl slapped his hand down.

"Don't hit that!" hissed Spudcrl.

"Why not?" asked a confused Fmeyer.

"We need it for the .plan!" shouted Macquivr.

"Shhhhhhh!" said one and all (even a guy walking out of the bathroom).

"Oh, that's right ... What was the .plan?" said a still confused Fmeyer.

"Why don't you get a clue? Oh, that's right!" Spudcrl shook his head
sadly and halted the discussion.

(Back in 8thdimension...)

Dorothy was going insane. The x-tye-dye was doing its worst. She was
in a world where all the colors were changing, not unlike the
mesmerization some feel after staring into DAKA food. This was the
closest to hell one could get without being stuck in line in
registration. That simulation was coming next.

A hole opened in the floor of the place. Three people, wearing SNAP
warm-up jackets, entered feet-first, defying all laws of gravity. What
Dorothy couldn't have known was that they were obeying the laws of
gravity while she wasn't.

"Dorothy! We've got to get you out of here!"

"Watch out! AEJ's coming back any minute!"

Spudcrl started things rolling. "What is this place?"

"It's a DECstation display. You might be able to get back to a shell!"

"Thanks. Macquivr! Put xeyes on the walls and something on the floor
to get his attention!"

Macquivr throw his entire weight into one wall, shocking the x-tye-dye
back into the icon box and revealing a tcsh window. He immediately
threw an Internet Relay Chat on the floor, and xeyes on all four
walls. Meanwhile, Spudcrl was busy slapping some Five-Minute-Only glue
from the Materials Engineering department on his, Fmeyer's, and
Dorothy's (with more care on her than normal) backs. When Macquivr
finished, he got stuck-up also. All four undergrads adhered to the
ceiling.

The hatch opened again. AEJ saw the IRC window and was wondering what
happened. Dorothy was gone! AEJ immediately leapt into the rooms and
Macquivr threw a sticky pointer at him. All xeyes were on him. He
turned around and found nothing but xeyes and IRC.

Now was the time for the coup de grace. Macquivr motioned and Fmeyer
tossed his hat onto AEJ's head. Spudcrl threw a tcsh cursor at the
button on the hat.

AEJ hadn't been de-gaussed for a long time. He needed a good
de-gaussing, more than anyone on the campus. Unfortunately for him,
this was the exact wrong time.

Now the average reader at this time would be wondering what exactly
it's like to get degaussed. Perhaps this little description will
help...

Ok... picture in your mind, !f you can, a break dancer doing a
"popping" routine. Now take this whole little maneuver and speed it up
ten or twenty times. Got It? Ok... now here comes the tricky part. Get
about ten or twenty of his best friends and give them all a can of
paint containing some awful fluorescent shade. (Technicolor Yawn
#2345TCY) is a recommended color. Now while the poor soul Is going
through this "Maniac Popping" all of his friends will throw the
various cans of paint upon him creating an incredible collage of
colors (kcyr has been trying for this effect for years). The final,
and most miraculous bit of this is that once the dance routing ends,
the "victim" returns to perfectly normal appearance with no signs of
anything having ever happened to him...

Well, I tried... Just take my word for it... AEJ was not amused.

In fact, he was going through the entire de-gaussing process for about
ten minutes. The walls changed color around him, and five troops of
Boy Scouts in Omaha got lost.  Professor Hilsinger got some very
strange results from his accelerator experiment, as antiprotons
committed suicide on the metal walls.

After the glue wore off, AEJ was still busy de-gaussing. The three
gweeps and one UKansan tried to get while the getting was
good. Unfortunately, the one egress from 8thdimension was
locked. There was no way out. Eventually, AEJ finished degaussing. He
tossed his hat back to Fmeyer and the freshman promptly de-gaussed
himself, though nowhere near as dramatically as the superuser. "You
will never kill me!" AEJ said, "And I will soon reduce you to
non-users all!"

Macquivr, remembering that they needed the root passwords used the
direct route and asked "What is the root password?"

AEJ replied, startling even himself. "The root password is ... No! I
won't tell you!"  He began writing the commands on a tsch window that
would rm Fmeyer from the face of the net.

Dorothy was piqued. "Don't you do that!" And she swung at him.

As mentioned earlier, Dorothy's failure to reproach Toto for urinating
on her would cause distress later in the book. This is later !n the
book. Toto, utterly lazy, was laying down by her feet. Dorothy tripped
over him, missed AEJ completely, and fell face-first into the Icon
Box.

What neither Toto nor Dorothy saw, though all else did, was the effect
of that simple misstep on AEJ. AEJ began with a simple look of terror
on his face. He lost all control over bodily functions. All his
muscles locked up. He was speechless. Then things rally started to get
Interesting. AEJ gravitated towards the Icon Box, never moving a
muscle, simply floating over. His foot touched an icon in the box
labeled "AEJ" and disappeared. The AEJ icon solidified itself, and all
that was left was his clothing.

Spudcrl said "You iconified him!"

Macquivr was already at a tcsh window. "One minute. I've always wanted
to do this". He entered In a few commands, asked for a csh, and,
curiously enough, xtank popped up on the floor. With a back-breaking
effort, he pulled the AEJ Icon out of the box. He then placed it on
the floor, and watched bbugger scoot around and mine it to
smithereens.

Macquivr paused the game and picked up the piece of swiss cheese which
was once big cheese, and handed it to Spudcrl, who promptly tore it to
shreds. Fmeyer rifled AEJ's pockets and found the key out of the
room. Joyfully, the undergrads returned to the Wizard.

"Here it is!" Spudcrl threw a heap of grey Icon at the Wizard.

"Beautiful!" Drdt replied, "But where is the root password? Did you
get It?"

Macquivr spoke. "Allow me."

Drdt set up a login prompt and entered "root" into it. The password
prompt came up.  Macquivr pressed the period key three times, and hit
return. Drdt was logged in to root. "Wonderful! How can I ever repay
you?"

Dorothy was angered. " I thought we told you that beforehand."

Toto looked quizzically. "What is it, Toto?"  Dot questioned. She
looked at Toto's point of interest, which was a coaxial cable leading
from Drdt's pant leg to Rajeesh.  The wizard saw this, and tried to
explain !t. "It's a power line to electric socks! To a pacemaker! It's
an MQP! An artificial artery made by BioMech majors that fell out!
It's... "

It was obvious that the Wizard was really an android. Thus, it was
fitting that the Android was really the wizard. Andrew Petrarca sat
hacking away at Realsoon.

"Okay, you got me. What can I say?"

Fmeyer motioned for Maxquivr to enter the Host WPI room. "Well, how
about giving us the demands we asked for?"

"And if I don't?"

A cry came out from the Host WPI room. "I'm at the reset switch now,
Meyer. Say the word!

Android sat in horror. "Not the..."

Dum dum dummmmm!

Your friend and mine, the bi, stupid, L&L dude was back with his hand
truck.  The antenna was still tied, but he had a new cassette.
Spudcrl sized up the situation.  This would go on for weeks.  He asked
the L&L man, "Got a screwdriver?"

If an L&L man was caught on duty without a screwdriver, he would try
diligently to hide this fact from anyone and everyone.  An L&L man
without a screwdriver is like a pledge without a pin, a cop without a
badge, or a school without a budget. Left with no choice, he handed
over his screwdriver to Spudcrl. Spudcrl used the screwdriver to
remove the protective grid plates from both speakers, then utterly
perforated each of the offensive diaphragms. Thanking the L&L man
profusely for its use, Spudcrl returned the screwdriver to him.

Android, after being so rudely interrupted, completed his
sentence. "Not the reset button!"

"Yes, the reset button!"

"Okay, okay, let's see what I can do for you here. First off, you,
Fmeyer. You think you need a clue. However, if you look in this world,
you can find many very successful people without clues. In fact, the
clueless are often better off. So I won't actually give you a clue."
Android poked some stuff into elm. "What I have given you is better.
If you check your e-mail, you will find explicit directions on how to
enter and use Boynton Hall's report card writer. You will be able to
write your own grade, even for courses you snowflaked."

"Now for your Spudcrl. You need a heart. Actually, you need an
attitude adjustment.  No-one can be that heartless for that long
without some major, obvious cause."  The Android looked him
over. "Let's get to the seat of the problem." He lowered Spudcrl's
trousers, reached for his backside and unsheathed three feet of cold
steel that had been blocking up his large intestine. Spudcrl was
obviously relieved, and Android washed the sword and gave it to
him. "Now the Nightblade is separated from its keeper.  That should be
a step in the right direction."

Macquivr entered the CCC room very slowly and defended himself. The
Paranoid Android spoke. "You, my friend, will take some work. Even
root privileges can't change your name. So, I'll do the next best
thing."

"I am currently infiltrating the networks' computer systems,
especially their character generators. All references to MacGyver will
be changed. Since Macquivr cannot become MacGyver, MacGyver shall
become Macquivr."

Macquivr straightened up again. "Thank you, O dangerous one!"

"And at last we come to Dorothy. You want to make it back to
UKansas. Well, to tell you the truth, I'm a transfer student myself
and I've been looking for an excuse to get the hell out of here. How
is the computer center at UKansas?... "

The next day was a huge event at Pearault Auditorium in Fuller
Labs. The Wizard called a general meeting of the gweeps and all else
who knew him. Three Newspeak reporters were there, as well as several
cameramen for Midnight Snack. The Wedge looked evacuated, as the Wedge
Rat Corps all attended. Every ROTC student, invited by Fcrocker
himself, attended in full uniform. The Wizard and Dorothy walked out
onto the lecturer's floor, and the crowd gasped in awe. Who would dare
impersonate the Wizard?  The Android spoke. "I am---was---the true
Wizard of WACCC. The user you have been addressing as such, Drdt, was
only a robot I controlled. I used it as a facade."

"Bull!" shouted a heckler.

"For proof:" retorted Android, and he motioned towards a door. Drdt
walked out of the door to front center stage. he then proceeded to
unscrew his head from his neck and die.

This in itself is a common occurrence at WPI, especially for A-term
freshmen, pledges during Hell Week, and seniors finishing up their
MOP, IQP, and sufficiency In the same term. The only truly amazing
part is, after Andrew took the head from the arms and played a little
soccer with It, he screwed It back into place and Drdt was alive
again, asking for a large dose of aspirin. The crowd was convinced of
Android's (and the android's) identity.

Android spoke. "In the same day, two great evils have been removed
from this Institute.  Yesterday afternoon, Dorothy here landed in the
Upper Wedge and utterly crushed Ed Murphy, the DAKA Duke!" And there
was much rejoicing.

Yaaaaay.

Dum dumm dummm!

"What?!? Where did he come from?" exclaimed Fcrocker.

"This time I'll definitely make sure he's quiet."

Fcrocker gathered up a bunch of his ROTC friends and they had a brief
meeting to plan the attack. Hand grenades were quickly distributed and
the assault began.

Imagine for a moment, if you will, a bunch of half-trained and
over-zealous Army ROTC cadets assaulting the projection room of this
great hall.  The entire production being executed with grace,
artistry, and the true chutzpah that makes these fine men and women
future army leader material. Now take this image and throw it out,
because this had as much resemblance to that as a Big Wheel does to
the USS Enterprise.

The other cadets fell to destroying the various speakers in the hall
and ripping out any wiring they could. Fcrocker took one look at the
wall of the projection room and realized that he'd need one of his
half-level speells to crack this stronghold. Pulling the pin from the
grenade and lobbing it at the glass, he dove for the ground and waited
for the "Ka-BOOM!!!"

One "Ka-BOOM" later...

"Heh heh," muttered Fcrocker. "Knock does it again."

Fcrocker ran into the shattered remains of the projection room and
waved his magic wand (M-16) about, thereby insuring that Matthew
suffered from an acute case of lead poisoning.

"Ok everyone, it's all over here. Continue with the summing up,
Android."

"And, just before midnight, Dorothy and some friends from this very
undergraduate program killed the Superuser, AEJ, with an xtank from
his own system." The crowd fell into hysterics, which is quite
dangerous in a lecture hall angled at forty-five degrees. Minor
injuries were reported later.

"However, the time has come when I must go. I am taking Dorothy, in a
limousines to UKansas, where I will be continuing my quest for the BS
degree in BS." The crowd was disgruntled.

"However, I leave you in capable hands. The new superuser will be
Fmeyer, not yet with a clue, but satisfied-with cluelessness.
Spudcrl, removed from his metal, will handle all user/system relations
and head the monitor corps.  Any problems will have to go through him
and the NightBlade. And Macquivr, who now even has a renowned
television character named after him, will be the chief software
improvement officer, in an attempt to create better shells, window
managers, games, and possibly curing all the ills of emacs." The crowd
gasped at the last phrase, as that seemed Impossible. Yet Macquivr was
up to the task.

"And now, I bid you adieu, for I must be going." Android, Dorothy, and
Toto left, leaving the meeting to be continued by Fmeyer, Spudcrl, and
Macquivr. A limousine was awaiting, and the three aliens to this world
entered the back seat. The limo immediately took off, going about
fifty.

Unfortunately, Yugo Automotive has entered the luxury car market, and
this particular limo was from that same producer of fine rolling
mousetraps. The driver took a hard left turn, the rear passenger door
flew open, and Dorothy and Toto were thrown onto the open road. The
chauffeur noticed the next day, and Android, having packed his
glasses, never knew until Kansas.

However, following in a small, rented, military jeep, was
Fcrocker. "Can I help you, Dot?"

"I fell out Android's Limo! I still have to got to UKansas. Can you
give me I lift?"

"Sorry this jeep can't be taken out of state. However, like all good
gweeps, I have a trick or two up my sleeve." He waved his magic M-16
(unloaded, safety on), and mystical energy filled the air. Most of it
got wasted on the air, but some actually hit Dot.

"What was that?"

"That was one of my half level spells, RLAMF."

"RLAMF?"

"Run Like A Mother Fucker. All you have to do is beat some track
records and repeat 'There's no place like the homenet; there's no
place like the homenet...'"

She took off like a bat out of hell, chanting those same words. No one
in WPI saw her again, but everyone remembered the day thunder rang in
Worcester, unaccompanied by lightning, lightnin, rain, or jet.

Dorothy awoke, realizing that her feet were kicking like mad and she
was chanting "There's no place like the homenet". Her history teacher
wished her "Good morning, Dorothy. What was that all about?"

"I was at-WPI. They had the strangest people there. There was an evil
superuser named AEJ, but a good Wizard, except he wasn't a real
Wizard, and... There's no place like the homenet!"

Later that days she went to the local hospital and tested positive for
drugs.