Chapter 30

Hands trembling, sweating bullets on his forehead, a man was anxious about something as he made his way toward the crowd of people going inside the Mall.

"How am I gonna go about this?" He asked himself. His voice raspily quivering due to extreme anxiousness. "Ahh! The security guards will see this!"

Inside his bag was his hand, holding onto something that could get him in trouble. No, not just in trouble but jail. Yes, his trembling hand held its grip tight on a gun.

About a day ago, when he was about to take the trash out, he found a letter on their doorstep. An envelope, which holds an important detail about a plan. A plan telling him how he would achieve two thousand dollars in one day. Moreover, the man found the tool he will need to use to achieve his goal of attaining two thousand dollars for his daughter's ransom.

"What is this?! My daughter? Rhea?!"

Suddenly, the telephone inside his house rang. Afraid that the voice of his daughter would be the first thing he'd heard, the man hesitated. He does not want to believe everything. He wanted to think of it as something like a prank being pulled on him. However, he just could not. The gun he was holding was real and the letter also contained what he ought to do if he did not want his daughter to die.

The phone clicked upon getting picked up. A moment of silence befell the man as the other line was not saying anything.

"H-Hello?" He began, impatiently waiting for the caller to answer or say something. "Hello?!"

"Papa! Please help me! They held me captive! Papa, I'm scared, please!"

There was an outburst of tears as soon as his daughter called for his help, begging and crying on the other line. He collapsed on the floor while still holding the telephone.

"Rhea... I'll save you!"

[Good day, Mr. Ramos. I want to play a little game. For years, you have tricked countless people, swindling them out of their hard-earned money with your fraudulent schemes. Your greed and deceit had left many in ruins wherein most of them took their lives. Today, you will face the consequences of your wrongdoings.

Before you, a .45 caliber handgun with 12 bullets and three extra magazines is delivered to you. You are to go to this address and deceive people for the last time like you've always done. Within 48 hours starting from the moment you read this letter, you are to obtain money from people inside the Mall.

Take heed, for we monitor and watch every movement you make. Notifying the officials about this will immediately lead to the forfeiting of your daughter's life, Rhea's.

Will you use your fraudulent schemes to trick everyone, or will you lose your daughter? The choice is yours, Mr. Ramos. Deceive or let your daughter die.]

How can Mr. Ramos refuse to play along with the game and think of it as a prank, when photos of him and his daughter were sent to him via email? None of it was a joke. It was more than Mr. Ramos' heart could handle, but he was not raised to back down that easily. He stood tall, steeled his resolve, and clenched his teeth in anger as he made his way out of his doorstep.

***

Joyfully, children were playing, and running around a playground while a small entertainment train roamed across the mall with either kids, teens, or adults riding it. Every age was allowed and everyone could ride.

People of all ages were enjoying themselves in the arcade, putting tokens inside machines to get themselves a prize or just playing whatever game the arcade offered them.

Aralina and Wil both played the multiplayer zombie shooting game. Aralina had signed up for a card, which can hold token credits up to a thousand points. She slid the arcade card inside and chose the multiplayer option, thus both of them picking up the toy guns.

"You press the lower trigger to reload and the upper trigger to shoot," Wil explained simply. He suddenly went serious, holding the machine gun with both hands as he accurately placed the toy's rear near his shoulder to act like a recoil stopper. "And if the zombie's head is too small for you to aim at, put the crosshair to its chest. Let the recoil guide you to hitting the zombie's head."

"You sure know a lot about fps games, huh? But what if I press both of the triggers at the same time?"

Wil looked at the manual or description written for players to learn and know what to do.

"It is written here that "by pressing both triggers at the same time, it activates the mechanic for throwing a grenade to where your crosshair is pointing at." There you go."

"Ah, of course! It is written here. Yes, yes!"

A minute passed and the game began. Wil was showing his shooting and accurate skills whilst Aralina, on the other hand, displayed how inexperienced she was at the game, pointing her crosshair all over the screen as she screamed whenever a zombie was about and bitten her.

Game over! Both Wil and Aralina got bit and died in the horde of zombie's hands. However, Wil set a new high score record, although he was unable to finish the last boss, which seemed impossible to beat.

"Wow! We got so many tickets because you beat the high score!"

Aralina plucked the end ticket and happily went to Mary and Neil to show how many tickets she earned with Wil. The latter, on the other hand, looked at the guy who was playing claw machines.

"Pretty neat tricks, I'd say," whispered Wil to himself. "Oh, he's got it."

And as Wil expected, the guy earned his prize by being good at the claw machine, leaving with a smile on his face, on his way to give it to his girlfriend.

"Hey, mister!" A kid who was about six years old called for Wil. "Can you try and get me a stuffed animal, too? I have tokens with me. My mother won't get me. She just keeps playing "that" fish shooting game."

The little girl pouted with an annoyed but cute look on her face.

"Uh, I should not meddle with someone's kid." He spoke instead of taking the tokens being offered by the female kid. "Go ask someone else. Maybe that guy who just won a teddy bear."

"Ehh, I already asked him but he also refused. Please, mister!" The female kid insisted, using her cutesy act against Wil, who so kindly declined again.

"Oh, what seems to be the problem here?"

Aralina suddenly came back, asking the female kid what was up. The kid shifted her attention to the big sister on her side, showing the tokens in her hands.

~