“Dad, I don’t want these stupid games. I want the real VR games all are playing right now.” The child constantly pestered his dad.

The boy and the dad were standing in a gaming shop. The shop didn’t look new at all, in fact, among the constant generation that had spent their whole energy making the shop more beautiful to attract attention. It wasn’t anything at all. But it was the same thing that had gathered the child’s father's curiosity to visit the shop.

The boy constantly shook his father's pants, trying to gather his attention.

“So this is the latest one, right?” The Dad asked the shopkeeper, his attention was on the board game that was put on the counter.

“Yes, sir, it has just been launched a few months ago. “A young man said. With a smile on his face, he showed the content of the board game to his customer.

But inside, the young man was pissed at the boy. Annoying kid. He took a glance at the boy. For an instant, his lips tightened, but they quickly returned to the normal smiling face of a young man.

With the black hair that was partitioned at the lower end, the young man behind the counter was properly giving a properly educated man look. His eyes were black, didn’t stop studying the customer, he was trying to find any details from the person, any common clue.

The dad checked the box, studying its specifications. It hadn’t been long since a new board game had appeared on the market. What the young man was showing was well over 12 months old. But the customer didn’t know that.

“Can you show me the guide? Ah, Mr…” The dad searched for a name on the young man’s dress.

The young man appeared to have donned a good green shirt that was matching with his olive green pants.

“It’s Miguel sir, as in Spiderman 2099.” Miguel looked at the man with a quirky smile. He used one of the older ones. He thought it might work on the man in front. And just as he had thought, he saw a change in the person’s expression.

“Ah, yes Miguel, I remember it.” The dad was pretty delighted. Hearing a familiar reference had ignited his inner child.

“How do you know about it?" The dad asked Miguel with pure curiosity.

The dad had kept the box on the counter, his attention fully on Miguel on the other side of the counter.

“I mean, your generation doesn’t even read comics. There was a time when we would go about not separating from our books throughout the whole day.” the dad sighed as he reminisced about his past.

“That is something I had picked up from my grandfather. He used to sell comics too at that time. So I had plenty of comics I had picked up during my childhood.” Miguel said with a smile. The first rule of selling something, as his grandfather said, was to make the person feel like there is some connection, a familiarity between the two of you.

“That is indeed true. In our days, the craze was never-ending. Now you see how it has changed. The new gaming technology has taken domination over the market.” The dad said. That was something even Miguel felt like it was true.

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As far he could remember he had always stayed away from games. It might have been okay with just the casual gaming experience of PCs and such. But the new gaming technology. AR and VR had ruined his experience even more. It wasn’t like he didn’t want to give it a go to the games. He had played the games many times before. His own younger sister had made him play many of those games. But it didn’t stick with him. That is why it was better for him to not take part in any of the new craze.

The dad looked at his wrist. Sensing the movement, the wristwatch lit up with a hologram. Miguel thought it must have been an important notification because the dad’s quickly changed to one of urgency.

“It seems that I have some work I need to attend to.” the dad said with an embarrassed smile.

He looked at the board game, taking it in his hand.

“Anyway, how much for this board game?” There was still an urgency to his voice.

“Sir it's 50 Dollars,” Miguel said after calculating the price of the board game.

The dad nodded at the price.

“Please bill it quickly,” The dad was constantly looking between Miguel and outside as if some big event was going to happen.

Miguel started billing the board game. Looking at how much in a hurry the dad looked like, Miguel suggested something.

“If you don’t mind sir, if you are in a hurry you can come back later. I will keep it for you.” Miguel said as the bill started printing from the machine.

Listening to the suggestion the man calmed down a bit.

“Thank you, actually the latest AR game, the one that had been getting hugely popular recently, has just now been released in the market. That is why I need to go.” The dad said.

“Oh, has it been released?” Miguel asked with a surprised expression. He handed the printed bill to the man.

Miguel had heard of the game. How couldn’t he, when half the world had been waiting for this new piece of invention to be launched on a global scale? Even when his college classmates had talked about the game, their expression was one of longing.

The dad looked at his son. “My son has been requesting it for a long time.”

Looking at his dad talking about the game. The kid looked pretty excited at the moment. Still, he asked his dad, “Dad, are we going to go purchase the game?”

“Yes, son.” The dad said, smiling at his son as he handed over the money to Miguel.

Hearing his father say that, the kid couldn’t contain his joy and started bouncing with excitement.

Miguel looked at the energy of the boy. At Least this time he couldn’t find fault in it. Sometimes kids were good too.

“Here, sir.” Miguel handed over the remaining money.

“Actually, I am excited too about this game. “The dad said as he pocketed the money. There was a genuine joy on the father’s face.

Miguel handed over the carry bag that contained the game to the man.

“Thank you,” Dad said. Taking the bag in one hand while holding his son in the other.

He took his son who was still bouncing with excitement, and headed outside the glass door. The duo departed in their car.

After watching as the father and the son duo were gone. Miguel couldn’t help but stretch his body in relief.

“Finally, one sale,” Miguel said to himself.

The board game was another one of the pieces he sold to the man. Others were remaining in the back, stocks of them still waiting for their turn. Though with the condition of the shop, it might take longer.

The man had certainly mentioned the game. He took the remote from the self and changed the channel on the television. He kept changing until he found the live coverage of the game.

“This,” Miguel's eyes widened as he looked at the screen. The reporter was constantly covering the footage of the line across the tech company that had taken the contract to sell the AR equipment. The drone flew far away from the ground, showing a view that shocked him. The whole area was packed. Leave the thought of a car, there wasn’t even a space for another human to stand. Every emergency department had been called there. They were all trying to keep the crowd under control.

“Crazy,” Miguel said as he took another footage of the crowd. They might have been there in ten of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people that had gathered, especially, to purchase the game.

“Crazy. These many people are crazy about the game,” Miguel said. Then he considered another fact. If that was what was happening in his city. What about the other cities? What about the whole country? What about the whole world?

He couldn’t help but gulp at the huge immensity of fans for the game.

The skies had darkened almost. Miguel grabbed the shutter and locked the shop. It hadn’t been a meaningful day in the shop. Mostly so for today. At Least he would get some customers to visit his shop on some of the days, but today had been not good. Mainly considering the fact, that game had occupied the minds of many of them. No one came after the father and son pair, so he had decided to close the shop early today.

‘There is stuff that mom has told me to purchase’ Miguel thought of the task his mom had given him at the start of the day. Someone was coming home to visit them. But as Miguel took a step forward he fell to the ground.

He first checked for any traces of bruises or scratches. Finding none of them, he finally turned around to look at the perpetrator. At first, he thought it must have been a stone. But there was something else. A box, a small box around the size of two fists was on the ground.