Androids Watch From Paradise

In the clear morning of a new day, Mr. Welsing had chosen to sit on a rather comfortable swivel chair while smoothly sipping a cup of coffee. He didn’t like coffee. In fact, he would have preferred a nice glass of orange juice over his current form of refreshment, but it didn’t seem quite as professional. Welsing sighed as he looked at the bitter reservoir that sat at the pit of his mug.

“Just like my life,” he said aloud, “a useless glop of disgust.” He looked outside at the bright sunlight shining upon the grass. The town in which he lived was essentially a mass gathering of suburban communities. It was nothing significant; just a pleasant little point on an unpleasantly large map.

“Why am I living here?” Welsing asked himself. “I could be somewhere else; rich, famous, and with a purpose in life besides sitting in this office, drinking coffee.”

A knock on the door interrupted his sulking, and an employee walked in. “Hello, Mr. Welsing,” she greeted him. “I copied the file.”

Welsing lazily acknowledged her presence with the wave of a hand. “The statistics? Thank you.” He accepted the document. The moment the employee stepped out the door, he chucked it in a nearby trashcan. Once again, he raised the coffee mug to his lips; it was going to be a long day.

At 1:00 PM, Welsing received a direct call to his office. This irked him on some level, for he believed in a philosophy that degraded the taking of calls to a receptionist-only job. But when calls came to his office, he took them, for they could only be one of two things: his overbearing mother, or a matter of great importance. Unfortunately, it was usually the former.

“Hello. This is Mark Welsing of the local police speaking.” There was an ominous pause before someone answered.

“Oh, hello Mr. Welsing. My name is Jon Miller.”

Welsing was expecting Miller to continue the conversation, but apparently his hypothesis was incorrect. A moment of silence ensued. “Well Mr. Miller, what can I do for you?” Welsing asked pleasantly. In actuality, he was not feeling pleasant at all.

“I would like to present something to the chief of police. Could you please inform him?”

“I AM the chief of police,” Welsing replied irritably.

“Oh, okay then. I’ll be arriving at your office at exactly 5:00 PM.”

“Wait...!” Welsing groaned when the caller hung up. This was terrible. He may have hated calls to his office, but a meeting?

Unheard of.                   

<><><><>

In its waning days, the research test facility had started the process of cash hoarding. In great need of funds, they decided to take matters into their own hands, hoping to make the money they needed to continue the operation of the facility. It wasn’t easy. First they attempted the marketing of lemonade. Unfortunately, the scientists were too incompetent to create the beverage and instead, manufactured a liquid that caused spontaneous combustion. This did not bode well with the jury when lawsuits were filed.

Their ensuing failures included a hoagie stand, a gift shop, and worst of all, a donation pool. Apparently interest in science was rare these days, for most did not bother to even throw a glance at their advertisements.

So in this time of need, who could deny the employee who suggested tourism? It was a brilliant idea. Not only that, but it worked, too. They were able to build up the cash they needed to continue operating their machines...and inventing new ones, of course.

This fact explained the dozen or so people bustling together throughout the hallways of the research test facility. Sure, it may have been a little distracting, but without money, they would lose their jobs. Without their jobs, they would make no money.
A troop of tourists were tagging behind the tour guide, who, on the way, explained their situation. “We are now in the historical exhibit. As we move down this hallway, we will observe how science has advanced over the years and perhaps we will even have a little peak at the near future. That is of course, if we have enough time.” The crowd followed her down the long, narrow corridor.

“On the left,” the guide pointed out, “is the original laser-based handgun. It is quite the dinosaur, so please don’t touch it.” The onlookers snapped photos of the dusty old weapon. When they had concluded their photography, the troop followed the guide onwards.

“Here you can see the very first blueprint for the teleportation device,” she said, gesturing towards a preserved drawing behind a piece of glass. “You can find the scale model next to it.” A sculpture that resembled the picture stood on a stand neighboring the blueprint.

“On an unrelated note,” the guide stated plainly, “the door over here leads to the chemical testing room, where laboratory mice are used to find the effects of the chemicals. So please be courteous and keep your voices down. You don’t want to be poisoned, blown up, or parasitically eaten.” It probably wasn’t just a threat, and several threw side glances at the door just to make sure a crazed scientist wouldn’t burst out, shoot them dead, and drag them to their nest. They made it past alive and arrived at the next exhibit.

<><><><>

“Have a cup of coffee, Mr. Miller,” Welsing offered.

“Thank you, thank you.” Miller took the mug and placed it in front of him. The two men were sitting in Welsing’s office. There was still a considerable amount of light streaming through the large windows for the sun had not yet struck the horizon. However, the atmosphere of the room was strangely dark and caused a certain air of unsettlement.

Welsing frowned. “So, Mr. Miller...what seems to be the problem?”

“Hmm...? Oh yes, the problem.” Miller took a sip of coffee before he spoke. “This morning, a very strange happening occurred.”

“A strange happening?”

“Yes, yes. I was searching for something. Yet I did not know what it was, I did not know what it looked like, and I did not know when I started. In fact, I could not fathom why I was searching at all. It was as if the lord had taken my free will.”

Welsing didn’t speak, for his first impression of this guy was that he was clearly insane. He considered phoning up the psychiatrist, but decided to listen to Miller’s story a bit longer.

“I disregarded everything,” Miller continued. “I threw my possessions this way and that without a single thought. I smashed vases, paintings, and family photos. And then, I found it.”

“Really?” Welsing asked in surprise. He had expected Miller’s story to be a fluke, but if he really found what he was searching for, that was a different story. “What was this object?” asked Welsing.

“Well, Mr. Welsing. I have it right here.” As Miller reached into his trench coat pocket, Welsing looked on in genuine interest. What could it be?

And in a rather anti-climactic twist, Miller took out a small piece of paper. The size was perhaps that of a business card, and it seemed to be in good, if not new, condition. Welsing eyed the card with disappointment.

“What am I staring at?” he asked gruffly.

“In all honesty,” Miller replied, “I do not know.”

“What!?” Here was this guy, wasting his time with a little piece of paper and he didn’t even know what it was? “Mr. Miller,” said an irritated Welsing. “I cannot believe you would waste my time on something that you—“

“No, no. It’s not that,” Miller said defensively.

“Then what is it?”

“I mean the words,” clarified Miller. “I cannot read them.”

“And why is that? Have you not learned how to read your own language?”

Miller handed the card over and sighed. “See for yourself.”

The words were tiny, so Welsing donned his glasses. It was true. A strange, symbol like language was inscribed upon the paper. Seven spaces at seven different places indicated an eight word sentence. Welsing squinted at the tiny message and tried to make sense out of it, but he could not.

He did not have any true interest. However, what he did find interest in was the opportunity to end this conversation. “Why don’t I leave it to the forensics team to decipher this?” suggested Welsing. “We’ll give you a call when we figure it out.”

“Hmm...yes. Perhaps I should clean up that mess that I left at home...” said Miller speculatively.

“Sure, sure,” Welsing encouraged. This was a good situation. Miller was getting up to leave. “Get home and get some rest. We’ll do all we can to help you.” The moment Miller stepped out the door, Welsing crumpled up the piece of paper, strolled it over to the trash can, and was about to chuck it when he felt an odd force hold him back. His hand moved to his table as if it had a mind of its own and dropped the card on the desk. Welsing blinked for a couple of seconds. Convincing himself that it was a trick of the mind, he swallowed, and looked down once more. The card still lay there, pitifully crumpled. Welsing took it, stood up, and left his office.

<><><><>

The hallway ended and the troop of tourists stopped in front of a set of large metal doors obstructing their path.  The tour guide pulled a keycard out of her pocket and swiped it in front of a security device. There was a click, and they knew the door had unlocked.

“I am about to show you all a glimpse of the future,” said the guide excitedly. She grabbed the handle of the door, and swung it open with great force. The tourists found themselves looking at a massive, chrome plated machine that sat in the middle of an even larger room. Hundreds of control boards lined the walls and filled every corner that the laws of physics allowed. And in every seat placed in front of these control panels sat exactly one researcher, either intently watching the screens, or pressing their headphones against their ears. The tour guide dramatically swept over to the machine.

“Behold!” the tour guide cried. “The coup de grace of the research test facility! An inspiration that took years to carry out! Our single greatest achievement! This, my friends, is EARTH!”

“Earth?” one of the onlookers asked. Or perhaps it was but a statement of sheer wonder.

The tour guide bowed as if she had created the phenomenal machine. “It is an acronym for Environment And Research Test Habitat!” She beamed while the troop examined it.

A skeptical man looked and shrugged. “What exactly does it do?”

“EARTH is a miniature scale model of our planet!”

“That’s all?”

“Not even close. It is not only a scale model...it is a working scale model.” She paused for dramatic effect. There was an excited murmuring in the crowd. “The entire replica functions,” she continued. “The nature, the weather, the organisms...everything. These living beings were created in a laboratory to be exactly similar to the ones found on our planet. Even extinct ones. There are birds, insects, cats, dogs, and best of all, humans.”

An excited college student swooned as he promptly fell in love with knowledge. “So you can create miniature human beings?

“Precisely! These mini-humans have the complete thinking process grown into their little minds! They are accurate, scale models!” The crowd’s murmuring had grown to a louder whisper by now.

“Well, my friends,” the tour guide stated, “can you see the potential? I’d like you to think about that. Just imagine the practical application! This technology brings new realms to all branches of science, including psychology, biology, chemistry, meteorology—everything! We can test the mind in any situation.”

The tour guide walked over to one of the control panels and gestured for a researcher to explain.  A tall, thin man answered her beckoning and swept his hand over hundreds of keys in a show of display. “As your guide has stated, we can cause literally anything to happen.” The man clicked one of the keys. The tourists watched the model in awe as a volcano erupted. On the close up screen, they could see hundreds of humans running in all directions as molten rock showered them like raindrops.

“As you saw there,” said the man almost sadistically, “we can create natural disasters. Now let’s try something different!” He clicked another key. This time, a large tower toppled over and killed hundreds of miniatures. The man grinned as their screams filled the speakers. He then turned back to the tourists. “In fact, we can even cause happenings on an individual scale.”

A tourist raised his hand. “You mean person by person?”

“Yes, I do. In fact, we planted a certain secret in a suburban dweller’s house today. In essence, we were able to bend his will and force him to hand it over to the police. He was jailed the next morning.”

The crowd rustled. “For what?”

“So you want to know what it was?” he asked smugly. “Well it was a document. A very short document that contained the plans for world peace.”

They looked at him incredulously. “You mean our plan for world peace?”

“Yes. Exactly the same.”

“I wonder what they were so afraid of?” one of the younger onlookers suggested.

The researcher laughed and whipped out a piece of paper. Its size was akin to that of a business card. He held it up for the tourists to see.

TO OBTAIN WORLD PEACE, HUMANS MUST BE DESTROYED

He took the card back into his coat, grinned rather robotically, and bid farewell to the androids.