The Watch Flower
By Skip Starbuck (copyrighted)
“I’m sorry to disturb your dinner Mr. Householder but you have two guests at the door.”
“Virtual or otherwise, Aunti?”
“97.8% probability of telepresence representation,” the home A.I. responded.
“I see Aunti, what form are they taking today and I assume you have already looked for I.D. scans.”
“They are fourth generation avatars and one appears to be a terrestrial rabbit and the other a monkey, both are using I.D. masking.”
“Dismiss them Aunti, I’m in no mood to waste my time with door-to-door salesmen or charity groups.”
“They claim they have talked to you before, about two months ago and you asked them to return. They also state they have important information for you and are not trying to sell anything.”
“Hmm, I wonder if this is some of the guys at work trying to pull a fast one on me. All right Aunti, announce my intention to answer the door personally but initiate level three security precautions.”
“As you wish Mr. Householder. I’ve now dissolved an opening in the door from you waist to face for interpersonal interaction. EMP, laser, and infrasonic security are now established. You can reach out through the door but they cannot reach inside.”
“Okay, who are you guys and what do you want? If you’re trying to sell me something, save us both some effort and look elsewhere for some pushover.”
The monkey answered in a male voice, “I’m Leaf Lover, you might remember that we had an enjoyable conversation some weeks ago about your relationship with God. You expressed interest in knowing more about the Touch of the Lord.”
“Oh, shit. You must be more of those damned Prog-Jawer’s. I should have known you idiots take the slightest hint of kindness to mean someone is receptive to your ideological crap.”
“That is Progressive Jehovah’s Witnesses, replied the rabbit in a soft feminine tone. We are only interested in helping you realize your true potential as a servant of the Lord. If you would let us…”
“I’ve had enough propaganda from you people before, what does it take to get you to take me off your list for good?”
The monkey opened its small hand and a small glowing green disc with a pulsating yellow “W” in the center caught the attention of Mr. Householder.
“Don’t you assholes even get any ideas about trying to genetically infect me with religious fever. I know exactly what happens when someone touches one of those Watch Flower virus buds. And if you don’t…”
The rabbit suddenly fell backwards, laying spread eagled on the porch and at the same moment the monkey launched itself at Mr. Householder with the Watch Flower protruding from its hands. There was a shower of sparks and flames that exploded outwards when the monkey reached the invisible security perimeter. Mr. Householder, shaken by the attack, reeled backwards yelling for his A.I. to seal the door and call the security services.
The remains of the robotic monkey littered the porch, the rabbit was quickly gathering up the pieces when the speaker interrupted the audience’s attention by saying, “Thank you brother Lavender for playing the role of Mr. Householder, sister Proxmier for your role as the home Aunti and brother and sister Dnater for your portrayal of the two Witnesses.”
The speaker continued, “Now brother and sisters of our Kingdom Cyber-Hall 38, what can we learn from this fine demonstration of theocratic warfare? Please tell us something more than this was a failed attempt to place a Watch Flower in the hands of the worldly ones.”
“Okay, I see I have comments waiting from Elder Landberg. What do you have to share with us about our presentation?”
“I thought the presentation went fairly smoothly to the point of actually getting the householder to the door, although I would have personally used an intelligent agent to have gotten more personal information about the householder, including his interests, name, and if possible any psychological profiles created by direct marketing firms. However, where things clearly went wrong was in the flawed attempt to implant the Touch of the Lord with this individual. It should have been obvious that he was hostile towards the Truth and that he needed to be lured outside of the home security perimeter to make physical contact with him. Sister Dnater did do a fair job of distracting the householder by acting out a fainting but brother Dnater wasted an expensive avatar in the vain attempt to impregnate him with the Watch Flower.”
“Speaking of brother Dnater”, the program speaker added, “I see he has logged on again with us after his virtual death. May I ask how you are feeling brother Dnater?”
“I’m still a bit shaken from the experience brothers and sisters but I would gladly redo it again if it helps us become better theocratic warriors for our God.”
“Thank you again brother Dnater for your fine demonstration and encouragement to us. Before your virtual resurrection, we were just discussing ways that we can be more effective in planting Watch Flowers with people we meet in the door-to-door ministry. Do you have anything else to add to our discussion on this topic?”
“Yes, I do. As many of you know, my wife and I are doing progressive pioneering this month and as we get closer to the end of the month, we spend more time each day engaged in theocratic warfare. I’m happy to say that things are going well this month and through a contact I’ve made with a brother I know in New Bethel, we have made arrangements to use on a trial basis the latest technological avatars to use in public testing. These avatars have full holographic, voice and even tactile stimulation that can be up linked to Kingdom Cyber-Halls anywhere in the world for real time experiences, so everyone in our congregation can actually see, hear and feel exactly what happens to us when we are out in public theocratic warfare. Even more importantly, they have a wonderful new innovation that implants the Touch of the Lord through a hypersonic injection system. We don’t even have to get them to touch the Watch Flower directly; with this new device we can implant it as far away as 8 feet.
“Praise Jah, brother Dnater. This is so exciting. When do you get to try out one of these new avatars”, the speaker asked?
“Well, brothers and sisters, we can actually do this right now. You see I’m ready to go live with the telepresence uplink with another pioneer from the New Bethel area and we can go witnessing in Los Angeles right now. I know that L.A. frightens a lot of us but New Bethel assures us that even in this wicked city that there are many who deserve the Touch of the Lord and we are there to do his bidding. So, if it would be all right to preempt the programming tonight for this Theocratic Warfare Meeting, then we can collectively spend the next 30 minutes in a historic testing of this new Kingdom tool, the Energizer Bethel-5 Super Bunny avatar.”
“I think I can speak collectively for the several hundred of us gathered here virtually tonight brother Dnater, in that we would be delighted to experience first hand this privilege of historic service. We will all now collectively link into your cybernetics on your signal. If any of you wish, you may also contact other Witness friends of yours and invite them to participate in our shared experience.”
A few moments pass with a sudden intense mental rush that mental up links bring…
“Wow! This is so beautiful. It is a warm day with a slight breeze and a clear sky. I’m at the top of a small grass covered hill that slopes gradually down to a small lake about 200 feet away. There are trees on both sides of me along with a winding cobblestone walkway leading down to the shoreline. Are you experiencing this as near real brothers and sisters? Why, I can even smell the grass and clear waters.”
“I’m sure they are, a small pink bunny behind him replied, at least the over 80,000 of them that are now logged in.”
“Brother Francisco, I hope?”
“Yes, it is I, brother Dnater. I’m happy you could join me today along with your fellow brother’s and sisters from the European congregations. In a few moments, we should be joined by additional tens of thousands of Progressives from around the world, as New Bethel has sent a special announcement today of this historic trial of the new tool for serving God.”
“I thought we were going to be field testing the new avatars in Los Angeles, this place doesn’t look anything like I’ve seen on holo-vision for LA.”
“As you know brother Dnater, we have many enemies who would love to see our movement stopped and us disbanded from our outlawed preaching. It was decided at the last moment to switch the location of the field-testing to a safe small rural location in the northern United States. I chose this location because the brothers at New Bethel feared an unpleasant experience for all of us collectively if we happened across some of the more violent anti-Witness groups in Los Angeles. Right now, you and I are somewhere in the state of Minnesota.”
“Ah, Jehovah has given you wisdom. Where though are people that we can share the Touch of the Lord with?”
“If you turn around and face the lake again brother Dnater, you should see a small table down by the shoreline. It has a sign in front of it that says, “Free Worms.” We had a field agent put it there last week, along with several coolers full of earthworms for local fishermen to enjoy using while on the lake. Judging by the amount of worms being used each day, we should have anywhere from one to two dozen people each hour come by here that will allow us easy contact with them, without any security systems interfering. You can look at it as us being “fishers of men.”
“So appropriate Brother Francisco, as the Bible speaks of fishers of men. I’m sure the Lord will offer us a bountiful catch today.”
“Speaking of which, I see that our good will and free bait is about to pay off, as there is a small boat approaching the dock. Let us hop down there brother Dnater and make a fine Witness to these people. You should find there is no need to worry about adapting to new controls as this model of avatar makes direct neural links. Just walk with me and it will automatically translate into hopping.”
“Hello,” Brother Francisco said to the fisherman opening up one of the bait containers.
“And who might you be”, asked the fisherman?
“I’m a fisher of men”, said the rabbit, just as if this were a normal conversation.
“Is that so? So, why do you do this, to eat something besides recycled rabbit stew?”
Failing to appreciate his weak attempts of humor, Brother Francisco continued, “Well, not exactly sir. You see we are representatives of a class of mankind who has found great happiness in serving God and wish to share this with as many people as we possibly can. We fish for men in the sense that we find only those willing souls who also wish to follow their desire for happiness.”
“No fooling huh? You say you are really into happiness. Do you mean that?”
Rabbit Dnater also responded by saying, “oh yes. It brings us great joy to engage in sharing this wonderful news and we find it very satisfying.”
“I guess it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know then that you are either the reformed Mormons or Progressive Jehovah’s Witnesses. So, which is it?”
Rabbit Francisco was slowly moving closer to the fisherman to use his built in hypersonic injection system to implant a Watch Flower to give him a Touch of the Lord. Within seconds he was in position, and then he answered, “this should show you instantly.”
A hypersonic burst coming from the rabbit’s belly button was far too fast for the human eye to see, let alone react to. Microscopic, hollowed gold pellets that contained a cultured retrovirus flew through the air and made contact with the victim’s neck. He let out a yelp, and instinctively slapped the area as it felt like a bee sting.
“Aw, crap he yelled.” Both rabbits retreated a safe distance backwards from him.
“It looks like I’m going to have a huge tattoo that spells out “Praise Jehovah” someplace on my body huh? I also thought you had to hand somebody one of those jazzed up genetic spike discs to get this Watch Flower impregnated in my genes.”
“The tattoo only grows large if you don’t attend one of our Kingdom Cyber-Halls to hear the word of God. If after hearing the word and you decide it isn’t for you, we will give you the exact genetic encryption code for you to use to easily decode the genetic sequence and make the tattoo disappear. You will typically have about two weeks before it grows large enough to notice and a few weeks longer before it spreads throughout your whole skin.”
Brother Dnater added, “due to the paranoia people have in accepting anything from an avatar we developed a hypersonic injection system that safely implants the Touch of the Lord in someone from a distance. It is safe and has no side effects.”
“Well I’ll be damned, replied the fisherman. You know, I should be really pissed at both of you but what is done is done. Before you scuttle off someplace and find your next unsuspecting victim, I wonder if you could do me a little favor first?”
“What is that,” asked brother Francisco?
“Take a look down yonder at that yacht sitting in the middle of the lake. That boat is full of college students and party types who have nothing better to do than come out here and make noise and scare all the fish away. I was wondering if I could get you guys to do your thing with all of them so I could at least fish the afternoon away in peace? Why, I would even be delighted to give you both a lift over there and back in exchange for this, as I’m sure they will not be in the mood to party once you guys infect them with genetic tattoos.”
While both bunny Dnater and Francisco were heading towards the yacht, the fisherman asked both avatars how the new injection system worked and more about the avatar uplink technology.
“So, if I understand you correctly, you are both using the Cisco Hyper-net multi-user nodes. I remember reading somewhere that this system had a big drawback of taking over a minute to disconnect neural interfaces and also had a problem with encephalic overloading from sensor arrays. What have you done to protect yourselves from these problems,” he asked in a conversational way?
Brother Dnater replied, “Jehovah watches over us and directs our work and protects us from harm. Blessed be the Lord.”
When they reached the yacht, the fisherman told the rabbits to play “dead” and he would carry them aboard, and let them have their fun.
He parked his boat astern, and carried both avatars face down, one in each hand, while he walked up the stairway.
“Hey Cowkiller, Vaporlock…I gotta little present for you.”
Brother Dnater and Francisco instinctively knew something was very wrong. They struggled to get free from the vice like grip of the fisherman’s hands but their animatronics just didn’t have sufficient power to overcome it.
“I’ve got some Prog-Jawer’s for us to play with boys. Little fuckers nailed me at the worm stand on shore and I think it is time for some payback. Cowkiller, drop what you are doing and help me setup an avatar switch. There is only a short time left before they disconnect, and we can’t have that now can we?”
Brother Dnater and everyone else in the Cisco Hyper-net were desperately trying to break their neural connection when they suddenly and collectively found themselves in new bodies. Brother Dnater discovered he was a now a nude female, covered with bruises and scars. Across from her she could see a male bound and gagged nude across a bed. He too looked very tortured, covered with giant welts and there were poisonous electro-scorpions heading for his erect male organ. In their visible fear, they recognized each other.
“Well boys, a familiar voice came from the doorway. I bet even in your wildest dreams you never thought you would end up as slaves for a sadistic BDSM master did you? And you know what, I don’t think we have been properly introduced. My name is Master Wells, but for all practical purposes you can just call me Satan. I think though what is more important is that all 400,000 or so of you in those feeling enhanced avatar bodies should experience a different kind of Touch from the Lord. Payback is a bitch isn’t it?”