The Search for Ball Zero (22 page)

They opened the door and walked into what
looked like a low budget mad

scientist’s lab. Boiling liquids in test
tubes above bunsen burners, but at the same time some ingredients
were kept in soda bottles. There was trash everywhere. Back behind
a wall of computers and web of wires hanging from the ceiling, a
colorful baboon face emerged. It’s eyes behind round glasses, with
attachments on the glasses that looked like magnifying glasses and
other different colored lenses. Behind the baboon, a wall of
computers hummed, flashing lights like a science fiction movie.
Many different monitors hung from all different directions, all
focused on the Baboon. It wasn’t just a science lab, it was a
computer lab also.

“
Ohh, hello!” The Baboon
said.

“
He Einstien.” King
introduced. After a short pause King continued,”All computer, we
steal from warstore.”

Tony walked up, carefully taking steps over
the terrain of junk on the floor. He

stared at the computer monitors, trying to
see something that looked familiar. Tony had spent thousands of
hours on computers, he knew how to program a bit. It wasn’t
Windows, Mac or Linux. “What OS is that?”
“
OS?” The
Baboon asked.

“
What kind of computer?”
Tony simplified his question.

“
Company.” King tried to
answer.

“
Company only.” The baboon
continued. “I not know Human computer. But I see in notes, Company
make their own computer. Prevent human hack.”

Tony looked at the monitor the Baboon was
staring at. It was unique, the Elohssa Corporation logo was built
into the operating system. Tony looked in amazement at Perry and
L.

“
Smart.” Perry
said.

The baboon pushed up his glasses,”Easy to
learn. I learn.”

Tony pointed to part of the screen, the
Baboon looked and said something to

him, they began talking about details on the
screen the other beings in the room couldn’t see.

“
I show you more of our
home?” King asked, mostly to L and Perry.

“
Yea.” Perry
said.

“
Sure.” L
replied.

“
Where do you get those
worms!?” Perry wanted to know more about those powerful
hallucinogenic white worms he was treated to earlier.

King snorted a laugh and nodded to the
right, like “Let’s go.”

“
We’ll leave the nerds.”
Perry said looking over at Tony and Einstein.

Tony was looking excited. “A simulator?” He
asked Einstein. Einstein shook his head like he wasn’t sure and
Tony looked up as the others were leaving the room. “I think this
thing as a warstore simulator!” Tony pulled up a chair excitedly
and Einstein put a headset on him, Einstein was talking, pointing
at different parts of the keyboard as Tony nodded.

Axl, King, L and Perry walked. These
underground hallways seemed to go for miles, connecting hollowed
out trees along the way. Sometimes the hallways were so long and
straight, if you looked forward or back you could seemingly see the
curve of the Earth.

Perry looked around, “This place is fucking
amazing.”

“
We make worm.” Axl said
as they approached a door.

King opened the door,”She make worm.”
Another mad scientist room. This time no computers. An orangutan
that could only be described as a Janis Joplin lookalike sat behind
a low table on the ground. Silently L bet that was her name
also.

She looked up at the group and closed her
eyes, head up with a gigantic smile.

Her mouth barely moved, “Come iiin.”

There were small pillows around the table
that seemed liked seats, everyone

took one while the orangutan got up and
shuffled at the table behind her. She was pouring tea. She looked
back and counted the heads to make sure, then walked around the
table, handing everyone a small cup.

“
Hello Janis.” L said
before being properly introduced.

Janis stopped in her tracks, she looked at L
in amazement. “How did you know that?!” Then Janis looked to King
before she could answer. “Psychics?!”

L answered,”Janis Joplin. I love her.”

Janis quickly shuffled over to L, putting
the tray of tea down on the table and

hugged her. It was a long, warm hug, one of
the best L had ever felt. Janis whispered in L’s ear, “You are so
completely welcome here, my long lost friend. What’s mine is yours.
I love you.”

The hug was so long that Axl made a face,
grabbed the tea tray and handed out

the rest. Perry smelled the tea, no doubt it
was mushroom tea. He silently

thought,”Damn, they just hand out shroomin
tea and don’t even tell you. FUCK YEA I

LOVE THIS PLACE.”

Jimi popped out of Axl’s jacket and grabbed
a sip of Axl’s tea. The humans had forgot Jimi was even here.

Janis returned her attention to all of her
guests. “How’re things my friends?

Are you two ready for the show?” She asked
Jimi and Axl.

“
Fuck yea ready.” Axl
stated.

Jimi followed, after a sip of the tea,”Ohh
yea man.”

Perry and L didn’t know what they were
talking about. Axl informed them,”The Winter show is in two
days.”

“
Yea man.” Jimi
added.

Axl continued,”We know how to party.” Jimi
made a metal face and banged his head. “We learned how to do good
metal shows from watching human shows, videos.” L and Janis talked,
leaning into each other.

King added, talking mostly to Perry since L
was involved, ”It’s great, you love.”

Then he made a face like he remembered
something,”Ohh, day after show, attack Company.” King smiled, “You
love attack too.”

King and Axl left the humans, they would
meet later for dinner. Perry and L went back to find Tony. As they
approached the door to the Einstein’s room, the hallway became
crowded. A bunch of primates were standing in the hall, looking
into the lab. L and Pery looked at eat other and rushed to the
door, not knowing if they should be scared or not. They heard some
yelling and then a big cheer, which eased their nerves. They looked
in the door, it was hot and crowded. There were about 20 monkeys,
primates and Tony all intently staring at monitors. They were all
playing a game, the same game. Explosions blasted from speakers and
beings bounced in front of their monitors, either from dying or
getting a kill. It wasn’t a game Perry or L had ever seen before.
Perry stared at some of the monitors, they were all playing as
warstores, in some sort of deathmatch. Tony was one of the last
alive. In a hail of missiles, explosions and dodging in and out of
cover, everyone in the room yelled as one warstore emerged from the
smoke.

Tony shook his head, he didn’t win. It was
a chimpanzee with dreads who had

won. He had a big smile and slid his head
back and forth in celebration. He wore a baggy sweater with
Jamaican colors. “Yeah mon!” he said, looking back and forth at his
dead competitors. “Bring it!”

They started another round. Tony nodded to L
and Perry and they made their way over to him through the
crowd.

“
What the hell man, you
started a LAN party?” Perry asked.

Tony was excited, trying to tell a story
and concentrate on playing this warstore

game at the same time. “This Elohssa
computer shit is sweet! It’s so easy to use!” In the game Tony’s
warstore moved out from in between 2 buildings and fired 2 giant
tank turrets. He stopped talking for a second to concentrate on the
game, his warstore went in reverse, back between the buildings and
explosions went off in front of him. As soon as the explosion was
almost over, he rushed forward firing where he knew an enemy was
even though he couldn’t see through the smoke. Massive explosions.
A baboon on the other side of the room screamed and put his ass in
the air. He looked at Tony and pointed at his Baboon ass, shaking
it in disbelief.

“
Nice!, Perry
said.

“
Yea these tank turret
guns are the best. They’re supposed to be a backup weapon, but
their pretty effective and have nearly unlimited ammo.” His
warstore charged from behind a giant rock and emerged behind 2
other warstores focused on fighting each other. Tony hit both as
they destroyed each other, then focused on finishing off whoever
won. As he fought to finish off the wounded warstore, he
continued,”The tank turrets are way better than the main gun.
Everyone uses the main gun.”

From behind Tony he was hit with a flurry of
missiles, then a barrage of tank

turret shots, before he could turn his store
around he was dead.

“
Ohh yea mon!” Bob Marley
the chimpanzee yelled out again, doing his

signature back and forth head slide. He won
again.

Tony conceded,”That guy’s good. He’s
sneaky.” He got up and someone else

sat in his spot.

They sat in the middle of an intense LAN
party of primates and monkeys, playing a super realistic warstore
deathmatch game on a custom system of elite computers made by the
richest corporation on Earth.

“
Look” Tony pointed behind
them, L and Perry looked. There was a large stack

of what looked like jet black, featureless
boxes. Each individual box was about the size of a Red Bull 4 pack,
almost square, a little taller than wide. They were featureless
except for a little green LED light on each one. There was a stack
of them, about 10 wide by 20 long. Tony snapped one off like a
Lego, the green light turned red. “They’re totally interchangeable
and redundant.” He stuck it on the big stack in a different spot,
it connected easily and the light turned green.

Tony pointed around at each monitor the
monkeys and primates were playing

on. “Each box is called a Stacker. And each
one is like a processor, monitor and touch screen combined into
one. Look at their monitors.” Tony pointed, then Perry and L
noticed, the screens weren’t monitors, they were playing on smaller
sets of connected Stackers. “They’re not monitors,”Tony
explained,”It’s just the side of a bunch of these connected
Stackers. It’s like computer Legos!”

Perry looked more closely at the monitor in
front of them, it was a a stack of Stackers, three high by four
wide. Tony grabbed four off the big stack and began attaching them
to the top with strong snapping sounds. Then he snapped four on the
side and when he attached the final one, the screen adjusted to the
new size and filled up the empty space, now it was four high by
five wide. The screen adjusted while that monkey was playing.

“
The more you connect, the
more powerful computer.” He touched the big

stack, “This is running the game, each of
the others is connected it to wirelessly. They just know.”

Tony was excited and continued,”It all just
works perfectly together. I’m guessing cuz they made it completely
custom.”

Einstein interjected,”And no viruses, no
else have.”

“
There’s no restrictions,
because these computers only exist on warstores. There are
instructions in there. I was reading em. They basically think
warstores are impregnable. But each box can be wiped in an
emergency.” Tony seemed to learn a lot in the few hours they left
him. “And if you wipe it, there is no trace of the OS. It’s just a
dead black box.”

Tony snapped another box off the stack, held
it up near his face so everyone

could see and touched it with one finger.
The face of the jet black box lit up, Tony moved his finger which
selected through a few menus. It popped up a screen that showed
everyone’s screen currently playing the warstore game. He pulled
his finger off and the side of the box went black. “So fucking
cool. They stole these directly from a warstore.”
“
How?” Perry asked.

Tony answered,”I guess they broke in. I’m
not sure how they did, but that’s what Einstein said.”

Einstein continued,”The guys make another
run day after rock show.”

“
Ohh that’s what they were
talking about.” Perry put it together in his head.

It was pretty late in the night, no one knew
what time, at least none of the humans knew. Tony was so excited,
he was alert and in this hot LAN party of a room, he was sweating
and people were yelling all around him. He was in his element. L
was tired, it was a long day.

“
I’m going to bed.” She
yelled so Perry and Tony could hear.

Perry agreed,”I’m tired too.”

Tony wasn’t done yet,”I’m gonna stay.”
Einstein and a small group of other monkeys were looking over his
shoulder. He was showing them the video pinball game he had
downloaded on his phone. They were enthralled. “See ya.” Tony
said.

Perry and L went back to the room and met
with clone Perry, Perry’s girlfriend

and Fozzie. They had been here a few days
now. Perry, his clone and girlfriend all shared a bed. Tony and L
shared a bed. Fozzie got a bed and the other bed was for storage.
Perry took off his clones and jumped into bed naked with his clone
and woman. They greeted him with open arms and laughter and went
under the sheets giggling. L laid down, Fozzie jumped up in bed
with L. They slept.

A few hours later, Tony crept in quietly and
laid down next to L and Fozzie. He closed his eyes moments before
the sun came up.

Inside the slick cockpit of an Elohssa
warstore. It was quiet, except for the humming of computers and
muffled monotone voices in headsets. It kind of sounded like the
ambient sound effects in the line at Space Mountain in Disneyland,
if you were alone.