Sucky Servers and the Ping That Doesn’t Pong

Threatened by the laser sights, Ghost knew he had to bite the bullet, hoping Rocket League was as important to Afghanistan's economy as Lil Ghani said.

If not, well, he'd die.

And if a Rocket League match was that important? Heh. He'd show these soldiers what an authentic RLCS player could do, and one of the best at that.

One of the men spoke up with a thick-accent, "Alright, we will take you up on that offer. You will play against our most skillful Rocketeers, including me."

He was burly, with a face full of stubble, head of short black hair, and a pair of metal-rimmed glasses.

Another two men stood by his side.

One was a middle-aged man with a long black beard. His facial features were sharp, standing out with an even sharper pair of eyebrows. All things considered, he looked like a hardened war-torn veteran and his physical attributes were particularly handsome among men.

The second man was much older, standing with a graceful elegance and his hair a wizened white like that of the clichéd wizard. Such an articulate aura only made him out to be the most threatening of the three.

Ghost nodded acutely, relaying the situation to the others through their Xbox 360 wired microphones and they all stood down.

Silently, they followed after the soldiers like prisoners, except for Lil Ghani.

Lil Ghani was dragged along the ground beside them, his fingernails clawing into the ground in desperation.

From the looks of it, it appeared that the soldiers were here for Lil Ghani and they managed to snag the Ghost Squad for a two-for-one special.

'Unlucky,' Ghost hung his head low, but the thought of destroying these soldiers in Rocket League was enough to raise his spirits.

They didn't know who they were messing with.

'Wait,' Ghost considered the current situation in his head carefully, 'If we decimate them in Rocket League, they might execute us in anger. We have to win by a tiny margin, enough so they don't feel disrespected.'

With a plan in mind, they soon arrived at a warehouse. Though for a warehouse, it was much nicer inside than you could imagine.

To say it was cozy like the mansion wasn't too much of an overstatement. Though it would be more accurate to compare it to Ghost's man cave from way back in his youthful days—which weren't as far back as they seemed.

"Here are our Xbox consoles," the man leading pointed at the Xbox Code Eden which speckled with a golden aura like the Holy Grail, "and here are the 8k monitors."

All of the devices were placed on individual furnished tables, with beautiful premium gaming chairs lined up at several desks, the 8k monitors towering over them like gods.

"Such top of the line gear!" Roach mumbled under his breath next to Ghost, "Maybe we can snag some to bring back with us?"

Roach's eyes glowed with greed, but Ghost couldn't reprimand him. Instead, he nodded in agreement.

It would be a waste of their Rocket League talents to be stuck playing on the old consoles after all!

The leader, with his glasses shining under the lights, looked up and said, "We will have a 3v3 match. If you beat us, you will play our Afghanistan pro team."

Ghost nodded, "Can we have a second to figure out our team?"

"Make it quick, we're expecting a good match."

Ghost returned to the others and told them the plan.

"Remember, we have to win by a small margin, ok?"

Everyone nodded in agreement and they settled on the team.

Ghost and Wolverine had the most experience and were RLCS players, so naturally they would play. And their third could only be Roach; he happened to have a little experience playing with them back on base.

Captain Price took a seat on the sidelines, carefully training Lil Ghani in his ways of music. And in this brief period, Captain Price's attainments in the Art of the Beatpad were already rapidly progressing, leaving Lil Ghani bedazzled in amazement.

Everyone else set up their cars, logged into guests accounts, and partied up for a match.

[Ghost, Wolverine, Roach] Vs. [Glasses, Blackbeard, Wizard]

[Ghost Squad] vs [Al Rakim]

Ghost felt his blood pumping, his team all running octanes on the orange side, while his opposition were blue with two octanes and a dominus.

They were about to get decimated—no—they were about to be put down gently on the ground.

This was a much harder task for Ghost to accept; it was much more difficult to accept than the day he was drafted into the military to be a super soldier.

Ghost was starting far left, and he'd be taking the kick off and leading a strong attack, ultimately setting up for the first goal of the team.

This would be an incredibly easy fast kickoff.

[3, 2]

He gritted his teeth, 'I can do it. It's just two games in a row of holding back a bit. I can do it.

[1. Go!]

Ghost just boosted forward when he suddenly felt a complete drawback on his vehicle as if the ripples of time were interfering in his movement.

'Wha-what is happening!'

His thoughts were running wild and his mouth wide open, aghast at the scene.

Roach's scream echoed out over the comms, "Dammit! I can't control my vehicle, something's got a hold of me!"

Wolverine echoed his thoughts, "Ghost, I-I-I—"

Captain Price started up the Beatpad, playing Crazy Train by the famed Ozzy Osbourne, and prompting Ghost into a mode of absolute concentration.

Ghost breathed heavily, the music reverberating in his mind slowing into elongated distortions as his thoughts slowed down, 'Calm down. All I need to do is calm down."

His thoughts started to speed up, but this time they were in his control.

And there, he saw 14,000,605 possible futures, of which he won this match in every single one of them.

A snicker formed on his face and he said over the mic, "Heh. Even with sucky servers and a ping that doesn't pong, we still win. Everyone, try to imagine yourself as the car. Concentrate and you'll feel your inner Super Sonic Senses, allowing you to tread the lag waves," he paused briefly, then muttered quietly, "Hoah Nill would've said the same."

His gaze softened while warm tears formed amidst his glossy eyes, falling gently as he thought of Hoah Nill in melancholy.

Ghost shouted strongly, "This win... this win is for you!"

While it seemed like much time had passed, the time within the game was miraculously at 4:58 with a mere two seconds having passed up.

Ghost repositioned his car as he did an insane diagonal flip while shooting out an incredulous storm of the default boost, making it just in time to fifty the ball and holding it down in mid field.

Wolverine followed up, his understanding of becoming one with the car slightly inferior to Ghost, but close enough to make it in time and win a fifty of his own, sending it far left off the wall and open for a nice aerial on net.

Sadly, Roach was just too much of a novice, shooting all of his boost as he shot forward at a ridiculous speed, missing the ball but at the very least demoing an enemy in the process.

"Toxic bastard!" The opponent cried out, banging his fist heavily onto his table.

"Only... It's only game, why you heff to be mad?" Roach lowered his head in fear.

These dudes were crazy; the last thing he wanted was to get his head blown off.

By now, Ghost was already back on rotation by this point, getting another hit on the ball thanks to the demo, while Captain Price took a hit off a bong back in the spectator.

"Ack, ack!" Ghost coughed, taking in a lot of second hand smoke, "That's some strong shit! You're gonna get us killed if we lose this, you know?"

Ultimately, his words fell on deaf ears as Captain Price and Lil Ghani were too immersed in the weed, smoking up the warehouse alongside a group of soldiers.

To Ghost's surprise, he caught sight of Snoop Dog among the group smoking weed.

"Wtf? Why is Snoop Dog in Afghanistan?"

Shaking it off, Ghost put his focus back to the match. He couldn't afford to lose this game, and maybe Snoop Dog was just a figment of his imagination, influenced by Captain Price's weed.

And just then... Roach's car stopped moving.

"You're kidding me?"

Off to the side, Roach was chilling with Snoop, hitting the bong with everyone.

"Are you fucking kidding? Wolverine, can I still count on you?"

[GOAL!]

Ghost trembled in shock as he realized this wasn't their goal—no—it was the blue team's.

"1-0? Are you fucking kidding me? Unfucking believable!"

A raging storm started to brew within his heart, but he still held on to his sense of clarity.

Wolverine started, "This is going to be a tough game—wait, look, just over there!"

Their three opponents dropped their controllers and left to go smoke, leaving the two to score open nets while the time ran down; they still made sure to only score two goals, winning by just one.

Who knows how the soldiers would react once they took a break from the weed.

The old man, Wizard, smoked heavily, taking it all into his lungs before coughing up several splotches of blood on the ground and collapsing.

Everyone burst into laughter at this sight, with Glasses patting his back and Blackbeard jeering off to the side. They had completely forgotten about Rocket League....

This was an incredible let down of a game, and it was all thanks to the weed.

Watching this scene, Wolverine started to get PTSD as he described some earlier similarities with his old teammates—The Borshnero Bros.

"It was always like that when my old team, Mandinga, would have a movie night. The Borshnero Brothers, Bergio and Bolonso, would smoke some weed and then sleep during the whole thing...."

Some things never changed, but regardless of how it happened....

[Winner! Ghost Squad!]

They won and during this time, Ghost and Wolverine practiced tricks to adapt to the bad ping, readying for their future games in Afghanistan.

This was only the first match; the second one was against Afghanistan's pro team.

Ghost had only one thought in his head.

'I'm ready.'