The Watch - Part 9

“Are there any rules that I have to follow?” I asked him.

“There are no rules,” he said simply.

“No rules?” I said sceptically. “I can do whatever I want, however I want to do it?”

“There is no point of having any rules to govern the watch as you can just put everything right again if you do make a mistake,” he explained.

“I can sort of see that logic,” I said thoughtfully, “but, surely, this watch comes with its own set of rules, otherwise there would be mistakes happening all the time.” He didn’t say anything to that. I wondered if it was a sentence that needs a follow-up, so I decided to carry on. “How about I come up with my own rules, just so that I can follow them and not make any mistakes?” I asked.

“You can do that,” he said simply.

“Let’s see,” I said, pacing up and down, thinking hard. I thought about all the films and books where the protagonist gains these awesome powers, where he can do practically anything and everything with, but is governed by certain rules that if he ended up breaking, he would be punished or the powers would immediately be taken away from him. I also thought about how I was now standing in a scenario that is something straight out of a fictional world, which was awesome

“Usually,” I said eventually, “anyone who gains amazing powers cannot tell anyone that they’ve got them or draw attention to themselves that they have them,” I explained. “Does that make sense?” I asked.

“It does,” he said simply.

“And, normally,” I said, “with powers like these in films and other such media, the main protagonists are not allowed to control free will. But, hang on,” I said just realising something, “I saw no option that allows me to control free will, so I won’t be able to do that anyway.”

“You will have to dig deep into the watch’s mechanics to find that option, but it is there.”

“And what are the chances of finding that option?” I asked curiously. I’d hate to think what would happen if I accidentally stumbled upon that.

“Pretty remote, if you are not looking for it,” he said, “but if you are, then you will, but it will take you a very long time to.”

“I don’t want to waste my time trying to find something that I said I couldn’t do,” I said. “You cannot argue with that logic.”

“It is full proof,” he said.

“Now,” I went back to thinking. “Usually, there are three golden rules, but I can’t seem to think of anything in particular. If I can’t think of anything, do you think only having two rules is enough?”

“I cannot comment. If you believe having two golden rules is enough, then that is all you need,” he said.

However, I did have a stab at seeing if I could find that third golden rule. I thought of many sources, including films, books, games, TV programs. You name it, I thought about it, except those I haven’t seen, like comic books. Now that I think about it, having knowledge of comic books would be very helpful right about now, considering they mainly do something like this all the time.

“How about,” I said after a lengthy thought session, “not manipulating outcomes to my advantage?” I asked instead of casually saying it because I wasn’t entirely sure. I elaborated on that after a couple of seconds of more thinking. “What I mean by that is: If I am losing in a game, I can’t manipulate the situation so that I will come out on top at the end of it. Does that sound reasonable to you?”

“It does,” he answered.

“Right,” I sighed, satisfied with those three rules. Hopefully, with them set in place, I will be able to use my watch and not make any mistakes. I know he said that I can simply put things right again if I do mess things up, but I would rather keep things from messing up before having to put them right.

“I would like to do something with the watch,” I said, pushing the rules to the back of my mind where they can sit and remind me what not to do.

“Name it and you can do it,” he said as if he was advertising it to an audience.

“Well, we may be here all night if that’s the case,” I was unable to form an idea in my mind since there was so much that I could do.

“Time is irrelevant to me,” he said. “It does not matter how long it takes for you to make a decision.”

I chuckled at that.

“Alright,” I said after a couple of minutes of furious thinking. “How about we take a trip to a Parallel Universe?” I asked. “If I’m honest, I have always wanted to know if they were real or not, and I was asked a couple of years back if I would like to travel to one, and I didn’t hesitate to say yes. Now, by incredible luck, I guess, I now have that chance.”

“Where would you like to go?” he asked.

“I have absolutely no idea,” I said. I backed out of the massive virtual wardrobe and entered the main menu again. I scrolled down to the “Parallel Universe” option and selected it with my forefinger. Immediately, an alphabetical list of every possible Parallel Universe that I could have imagined popped up on the screen.

“This doesn’t help much with my deciding,” I said.

“There is a random button,” he said.

“That will help,” I said scrolling down until I found it, which was right at the bottom, meaning it did take a couple of minutes for me to reach it.

Then I got a thought. “Won’t people not recognise me there?” I asked, “I don’t much fancy turning up in the middle of a street somewhere and causing an uproar, although, I guess I could choose where to go?” I asked.

“All Parallel Worlds will recognise you. With all the infinite possibilities out there, ever Parallel World a version where you will be automatically recognised when and wherever you turn up will also exist,” he explained.

“What are the chances of that,” I said rhetorically.

“The odds are incalculable with there being infinite possibilities,” he answered anyway.

“I should have guessed that answer myself,” I said to myself, laughing at how obvious it was.

“Well, here goes nothing,” I said, taking a deep breath and pressing down on the random button.

Then everything went black.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)