After the whole ordeal Agren and David were apprehended, so Ball no longer had a shadow to walk around with.
She was given the choice to either get a substitute shadow for the day, or to just go home. She choose to go home, but planned to come back the next day with Craeggs' key. She knew what to do, but it just wasn't the right time to do it. Johnson was in a building right next door the called 'the science museum'. For now he was planning on a new exhibit to be made there. It hadn't anything to do with Ball, so she just wandered the sunkissed day halls of the science commission building.

She hadn't a clue of what to do with her time. Eventually though, she found herself in the waiting room to where she always found her yoyle 3. The lights were off leaving it in a dreamlike pause.

She thought about how she never got the time to give David the gummies, or that she hadn't seen Dora since their first day together.

Rocky was still on the table. She remembered that Oscar hadn't said anything about it the last time he was here. Leaving the door open she walked in and toward a couch. Getting onto the couch she then jumped over to the table. She then used her foot to throw Rocky up on top of her head. At that point balancing wasn't so difficult, although she didn't know why.
Ball hopped off the table and went down the hall to where her room was. She then placed Rocky on the ground and sat across from him. She sighed.

Tonight...

When Johnson visited her for the night he had returned with a familiar task.

"Just like your first day of life. You're gonna make a painting! Just like before, it can be of anything you like," He uncurled a large rolled up sheet of paper, and taped it down to the carpet floor. He then went into the closet Ball had almost forgotten existed, and took out the paints. All the while Ball was thinking of any way to keep the door from shutting on Johnson's way out.

At the moment all she could think of was was putting her foot out before the door could click into place.

What about using Rocky as the doorstop? Or maybe I can use him to weigh down the door handle somehow.

"Well, I'll be going now. Get to your painting. I will see you in the morning for another day of school. Ta ta!" As Johnson was about to shut the door Ball rushed over to it. She put her foot in the way of the door, but found that instead of stopping the door it crushed her foot in between the doorway. She stopped herself from letting out a yelp. It was apparent now that her original plan of escape had been a failure. She quickly jerked her foot out of the doorway. It throbbed, but it wasn't her main conundrum.

Ball still needed to get out. She really didn't feel like waiting another day to get the key and bring Rocky to life. The door had to be opened manually.

She remembered how she had gotten out of the waiting room.

The handle can be lowered by exerting some sort of force down on the lever-like handle.

All the doors in the building were made that way, except her now open closet. She again wasn't tall enough to reach the door to the hall, but there were no advantage points she could use to jump on the handle. She looked over at her desk.

The chair! She rolled her eyes at herself. The chair currently wasn't a vantage point for the door, but it was available for pushing. She walked over to it and swiftly began.

It didn't have wheels even though it looked like it should, but it didn't matter on the carpet. Using the chair as a vantage point, she hopped onto the seat, climbed up the backrest, and leapt onto the handle. The door gently opened.

Now all Ball had to do was make sure that nobody would see her when she left. It wasn't too difficult if there was nobody currently outside the door. She hopped down on the floor to take a look.

There wasn't anybody, so Ball rushed Rocky on top of her head, and began down the hall. In leaving she worried that the door being open was a sure sign that she had left. There wasn't much she could do about that though. She needed to get back in her room, but there was no chairs out where she was going.

It became laughingly ironic when Ball arrived at the other door. She couldn't reach the keypad to type in 7, 7 times. Ball didn't want to think about it, but she was going to have to get some sort of tool, or ask for help. She retreated to her room to think it over.

I would need something long and sturdy to punch in the numbers. It would have to be small as well to keep my appearance at a minimum.

Ball looked over to the closet. It wasn't usually open, but for now whatever that was inside could be used to her advantage. It was mostly miscellaneous with the slightly recurring theme of art supplies. Wire clothes hangers had Ball thinking of twisting them all together to make a long useful wire. That plan evaporated when she discovered a box full of little wooden rulers. Using duct tape and popsicle sticks, Ball eventually got a long stick that was sturdy enough to punch the numbers.

With her new tool she went out with it in her mouth. Once at the door she input the code with it. Next she had to open the door. Ball had thought about using Rocky to push down the door handle, but it was unlikely she would be able to throw him. She thought about whether rolling over on her back would work.

Maybe I can roll over and toss him using my legs for a source of force.

She was about to try it when Johnson came walking down the hall. There was absolutely nowhere to hide so she just stood stiff. The professor was walking rather oddly, and had an entourage of short lengthy rectangular prisms. Although way shorter than the average person, these dark gray prisms were about 6 inches taller than Ball (Ball standing at around 22 inches herself). By their oddly deep voices she could already tell who they were. They weren't at all what she had imagined. The prisms had 6 legs almost like an insect. Two under the front, two in the middle, and 2 in the back. These legs weren't very different from her own, which she found surprising.

Up on the top of the prisms stuck 4 arms, 2 on every top corner. They relaxed up in the air making them resemble antenna most of the time (as they were very sticklike as well.) Their faces were one of the most extraordinary thing about them. The eyes were exactly like Ball's but the mouths were like flexible speakers. The extraordinary part about them was how they moved. The prisms' faces could move anywhere about them. With that fact, the creatures didn't really have a front or back. They laughed and pranced as Johnson stumbled around.

"Hey~ uh, Ball what are you... you up to -woo?¿" Johnson asked her. It sounded like his last word was the one before it backwards.

"Nothing..." Ball noticed that he was acting rather drunken. She feared when he would snap.

"... Cool. I am doing the opposite. I'm doing EVERYTHING!" He had a delayed reaction, and his burst of 'everything' had the lights start to surge. In little flashes his entire being would change a color tone.

"What is the matter with you?!" Ball was frightened. She was only a week old but she could tell that this was absurd. The prisms laughed.

"We're doing an experiment!" one said.

"It's more like a prank," said another.

"It's funny to see his reaction to the chaos that he drank," said one more.

"Chaos," Ball thought of it. It didn't seem very consumable.

"A very powerful element,"

"We've experimented with it before,"

"We'll just need to kill him before he collects any more," one pointed to Johnson who was awkwardly leaning on the wall.

"Don't kill him! He'll die!" Ball pleaded.

The 3 aliens began laughing, and Johnson ignorantly joined in even though he didn't understand what was happening. Hit by a freeze juice dart thrown at him, Johnson collapsed and shattered. The 3 laughed even harder then. Ball didn't look.

"Ah well. I hope to see you again Sphere,"

"Death is an illusion. There's nothing to fear,"

"Why do you guys keep rhyming?" Ball asked them. The 3 laughed again, it was always unnerving due to their unnatural voices.

"It's a game. It also makes us sound mystical,"

"Help me pick this hue-man up. His corpse makes us look criminal," one asked another.

"Eh, that was an medicocure rhyme,"

"Sorry I'll get it better next time,"

They chuckled again as they picked up the shattered pieces of Johnson. They walked down the hall. Some of them moved their faces to look over at Ball again, before going on to their own gossip and word games.

(Prism concepts)

Ball was by herself again. Since Johnson was dead she didn't fear being caught anymore. She continued with what she wanted to do before and chucked Rocky into the door handle while sitting on her back (this took 5 tries to get right). Once the door was open she widened the threshold and then kicked the door outward. The force brought Rocky down to the floor a 6th time. She placed him back on her head and entered the chamber.

Activator in their tanks still boiled. The tanks themselves were on top of cabinets with shelves. It wasn't hard to pull out these shelves to use as stairs, which Ball preformed swiftly. Then she was at the tank. She lifted the lid and hesitated.

There was a small metal card sitting on the tank lid. Reaching over, she grabbed it with a foot and looked it over.

"Chaotic keycard" She read quietly to herself.

Just what I was looking for.

In honesty Ball was more focused on bringing Rocky to life than retrieving the key for Craeggs. She had almost forgotten that part of the mission.

She put the keycard away almost as if she had a pocket. It was still on her, and could be taken out at any time. It was just that she had performed a gag, and that was that.

She lifted the lid again. To get Rocky inside she simply tilted her head until the lifeless object just slid in. He splashed some boiling hot activator onto her, to which she backed away.

"Ow!" Ball sat down to try and rub where she had been burned. A moment later Rocky leapt out of the tank all on his own. He was screaming due to the boiling hot activator. The stone fell off the counter and ran in circles until the heat started to disperse. After that, Rocky calmly sat on the ground.

Ball couldn't stop staring. It really made her curious to see someone so much like her. Of course Rocky wasn't round and white like herself (He was quite the opposite), but his face and legs were practicality identical. After sitting for a while he curiously got up and began exploring.

"Woah woah hey!" Ball tried to get his attention.

"Wa?" Rocky looked up to her.

"Oh. So you can talk! Have any thoughts?" Ball eagerly waited for a response.

"...Maybe. Who are you?" Rocky seemed to have completely forgotten about being burned earlier. He was calm, and mildly curious.

"I am called Ball, because that is what I am. Do you know what you are?" Ball asked him.

"I'm a rock, but my name, is Rocky!" He said eagerly.

"How did you know that!?" Ball climbed down the drawer shelves over to him. She noticed that he was a lot bigger than he was when she had thrown him in.

"I donno,"

"Do you remember anything from before?"

"Before... before what?" Rocky looked at the ceiling in a distracted like manner.

"Before you jumped out of that," Ball pointed to the boiling tank.

"Meow!" Rocky shouted a semi realistic cat meow.

"...What was that?" Ball had never heard a cat meow, or seen a cat.

"It's what I remember. Meow!" Rocky didn't understand his memory either.

"Fascinating..." Ball tried to recall if she remembered anything before she awoke for the first time. She didn't find anything.

Ball continued to converse with the new life form down the hallway. He didn't talk other than responses to some of her questions, and began to meow more often. They were just walking when Rocky compulsively vomit. Ball was unprepared, so she slipped, tripped, and rolled down most of the hall. When she finally got up again she became bewildered.

"What the heck was that!" She said.

"Stuff?... Sorry," Rocky was a little embarrassed.

"Eh well just don't do it again,"

"Ok," False.

When Ball got to her room there was still a chair at the door and a blank paper on the floor.

"Ugh I still need to do my painting," Ball was too tired to be creative at this point.

"Bleh!"

Surprisingly the vomit on the paper made for a pretty uncanny image of himself.

"Well then, maybe that can come in handy sometimes. I am going to go to sleep Rocky. I suggest that you do the same seeing that sleep is a need," Ball hopped over to her bed and closed her eyes.

"Ok," Rocky didn't seem to take this to heart, as he only used the bed as a pathway to Ball's desk. Ball opened her eyes again to see what he was up to. She found him sitting on the window cill staring out to the world ahead.

Perhaps he finds it hard to talk about how he feels. Surely he is just as curious as I was. There is so much of the world to know, how could he not want to see it all?