The Watch - Part 7

He stood there, waiting for me to respond. I was lost for words at this completely uncomprehending situation. I sat on the sofa; all pain in my leg was numbed from the shock of this man’s appearance. Minutes went by before my brain was able to process some of this moment and allowed me to speak.

“W... Who... Who are you?” I asked after stuttering.

“I am the watch’s interface and am here to help,” the strange man said again.

“H... How? What with?”

“I am here to answer any questions you have regarding your newly obtained watch,” the man explained exceptionally clearly and professionally. At his mention of questions, thousands of them burst into my mind all at once - they just wouldn’t settle down long enough for me to say them.

Another couple of minutes went by in total silence. The only things I could hear were the clock ticking on the wall and my heart beating ten times faster than it usually does. Eventually, I managed to get my head on straight and say another question.

“Why did it hurt when I put it on my wrist?” I asked.

The man answered without delay, “I had to scan your DNA so that I could calibrate the necessary settings so that I could adapt to your unique body.”

“Why did it feel like something was running through my brain, as if it were looking for something?” I asked.

“I had to scan your brain so that I could calibrate my settings according to your intellectual levels.”

“Why did you need to calibrate your settings to my body?” I asked simply. Now that I’ve started, the questions are pouring out with ease.

“I am a unique watch - the only one in the Universe - thus very powerful. I had to calibrate my settings to your body so that you would be able to use the watch to its full potential.” I have noticed that he only answers to what I ask. Nothing more and nothing less, meaning I will have to keep asking questions instead of answering everything with one answer.

“Does that mean that I won’t be able to take this off?” I asked, looking down at it, imagining it attached to my skin and if I were to rip it off, my skin would come off with it.

“You do have a choice as to whether you want to keep it on or not,” he said, “but I can sense that you are wondering what I am capable of, since I had to go through all that trouble to set myself up,” he said, reading my thoughts. I was going to ask how he managed to read what I was thinking, but I answered that question myself by just remembering that he said he had to calibrate his settings.

“Is it dangerous for you to be reading my thoughts?”

“I can assure you that no harm will come to you. However, if it will make you feel better, I can turn that function off.”

“I think that would be for the best,” I said.

“Very well,” he bowed with agreement. A couple seconds passed. “I am now unable to read your thoughts,” he said. “You do have the choice to turn on that function when you feel like it,” he said. I had a feeling that I wouldn’t need that option for a little while to come.

Once more, we stopped conversing and seeped into silence. I stared at my watch with curiosity. He was right, I was wondering what this watch is capable of since it did have to take a sample of my DNA and scan my brain to turn itself on.

“What are you capable of?” I asked.

“Why not you look for yourself,” he said. All of a sudden, the screen changed from plain white to a greenish-blue colour that wasn’t quite turquoise. I have never seen that colour before. Then, bold black lettering slowly faded into view. They had to fade in all the way before I could read it properly.

The word read: BODY. Before I could question what this word meant, the strange man said, “to find out what else I am capable of, just turn swipe the screen to the left.” I did exactly that. Gently placing my index finger on the screen and slowly swiping across. As I did, the words slowly transformed.

They read: PARALLEL UNIVERSE, TIME and PERSONAL.

“What do these words mean?” I asked after the words had gone around in a full circle and came back “body” again.

“The first option, “body”, the man started explaining, “allows you to change your appearance, whether it’s clothing or your physical body.” I needed that explained further, but he continued onward without stopping so I tried my best to hang onto each word. “The second option, “parallel universe”, allows you to travel to any parallel universe you can think of, or you can hit the random button, I will then transport you to a random parallel world. The choice is completely and very random that not even I will know where I will be taking you.

“The third option, “time”, allows you to travel to any point in the past, present or future either on this world or in a parallel world. It also allows you to manipulate time however you wish, including by not limited to: stopping it, fast-forwarding, and reversing.  And the last option, “personal”, allows you to keep all your favourite songs, movies, pictures or browse the internet wherever you are, even in the middle of nowhere as I run off the energy from the Universe itself.”

The more answers he gives, the more questions pop up in my head. Twice as many questions outweigh the very few answers he has given me.

“What do you mean I can change my physical-self?” I was, at this point, very confused.

“You can change your appearance. For example, you can change your skin colour from the pale colour you have now to any colour you want: Gold, green, red, blue, and so on. Not only can you do that, but you can also change the texture of your skin so as well as having the skin colour of gold, you can also have your skin actually be gold.”

I struggled to comprehend such availabilities. Yet, even though it was difficult to get my head around it all, my imagination started to flare into life, and I thought what it would be like to change my skin to gold.

“And I can change my appearance to anything I like,” I said.

“Within my database, there are a number of beings that you can transform into,” he carried on. “Not only that, but you can also change your internal self as well, but giving yourself powers.”

“Powers?”

“The ability to fly; create fire in the palm of your hands. Within my vast database is an array of powers that you can give yourself. Whatever you like.” This was starting to sound a little too surreal. I mean, this feels like something a kid would think of, if you know what I mean. A watch that is the most powerful object in the Universe that can grant you the power to do anything I want. If I were to believe that this was a dream, about now would be the time. But, I came to the conclusion that this couldn’t be a product of my imagination for it just doesn’t feel like it is. Again, it was weird to describe, but I think you know what I mean. I continued onward, trying to understand more.

“So I can change my physical appearance, my clothes and give myself powers.”

“Anything you like,” he nodded.”

“And I can do all three at the same time?”

“Yes,” he said not reacting to how my mind was constantly being blown. “I will warn you though that it may take a couple of goes before you will get the hang of it,” he added, which made sense.

“And I can change my clothes as well.” I know I’m repeating myself, but all I was trying to do was understand it all.

“Within my memory, I have stored every piece of clothing this world has to offer,” he said, “and many other different types of clothing that exists outside of this world. And due to my vast amount of memory, any clothing that I do not have in my data banks, you can scan the clothes and store them in the watch so they can be used when you feel like it. From the expression you are pulling, you are in awe with my capabilities already, yet you have yet to understand everything else I have to offer.”

I wasted no time in asking all the other questions I wanted to ask. “You said I am able to travel in time to the past, present and future.” He nodded. “And what about the paradoxes that I will create?”

“You are correct in saying that travelling through time always creates some sort of paradox,” he said agreeing with me. “However, you are able to resolve any paradox you wish by changing time. Again, you can do anything.

“Cool,” I said as my imagination flared up again. The possibilities are endless. How many famous people could I meet? How many events could I watch?

“You said you are able to take me to any parallel world I can think of or a random one?”

“I do have a database full of many parallel worlds that I’m sure you wouldn’t exhaust any time soon, however, since there is an infinite number of possibilities when it comes to parallel universes, if you want to travel to a parallel universe that is not on the list, you can type in where you want to go and I will take you to that universe that best represents the words that you have typed in. Or, as I have explained earlier, you can press the random button, and we can travel blindly to a parallel universe.” All that sounded exciting. Yet, for some reason, at the back of my mind, a small voice told me that this was all fake and I shouldn’t believe anything that I am seeing or hearing. Again, the feeling that this was all a dream flared up again.

“I can assure you that this is as real as it gets,” he said reading my facial expression. “But if you are still unbelieving, you can try out any one of the options and see for yourself.” He was all calm and collective throughout this conversation, which has helped me to keep calm instead of becoming panic-stricken.

“Is there a help section?” I asked jokingly.

“I will always be happy to help you understand something.”

All this was blowing my mind. I have only just realised I’m still sitting on the sofa. Maybe I will be able to comprehend and understand everything if I do have a go with something. But what do I do first.

“What do you suggest I do first?” I asked.

“That is up to you,” he said unhelpfully.

“Well, since this watch is capable of doing so much stuff,” I said working something out (although I still had my doubt on whether it would actually work; still feeling like a dream), “in order to help me process everything, I think I should start with something small, say, changing my clothes.”

“As you wish,” he said.

I looked at my watch, then back up at the man.

“How do I do that, by the way?”

“You swipe your finger to the left until the option “body” shows up, you tap the screen with your preferred finger, and it will open a section which will give you two options, “Clothes” and “Physical”. After you have chosen the “clothes” option, it will open up the database, which is in alphabetical order and type of clothing. Once you have chosen your clothes, they will automatically appear on your body. If you would like to save an outfit instead of having to keep selecting the items individually, you can select “save outfit”, which will save the current clothes that you are wearing when. If you accidentally forget to save an outfit, there is a history section, which will bring up a list of all the current clothing that you picked, and you can reset your clothing back to what you have on now and save the outfit before wearing a new one.”

That was a very detailed explanation on how to do stuff. I’m getting rather excited, but I think it’s my brain’s way of expelling any incomprehension, so, I can’t say for sure whether I am actually getting excited. Anyway, let’s do this…

TO BE CONTINUED...

Thanks for Reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)