Nikolai Gogol

Desperation.

It's an insufferable feeling that you can't get rid of until you manage to deal with somehow. And unfortunately you couldn't. Spending your days alone in your one bed apartment reminded you of how much you craved a relationship.

Until one day as you were walking through the isles of a GameStop and suddenly found a.. dating sim? Despite how stupid the description of the back might have seemed, the cover interested you so you decided to buy it. Maybe it would cure your need for a partner after all.

So you booted up your game console, sliding the disk in only to be greeted by a colourful and cutesy starting screen and the protagonist beside the options. Pressing start would make you save a new game. The protagonist introduced himself as Nikolai, a virtual partner that you could chat to with limited dialogue options.

You played for a while, until you eventually got bored of the same, lovey dovey and other times more suggestive questions and answers. So the game just sat at your shelves for days. Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months, but Nikolai wasn't done yet.

He had taken a particular liking to you. The questions and answers you'd choose, your appearance that he'd noticed through cameras he managed to get into and the media you consumed. But you had thrown him away like trash. As if you never even cared.

Eventually you started meeting people, going on dates. It had been months since you had quit that game. You decided to go on a date to an arcade, but little did you know that would be your worse decision yet. Shifting through your towns powerlines, finally getting the courage to reconnect with you.

Both you and your date were disturbed to have your game interrupted by.. Nikolai? What the hell was he doing here? Were you dreaming?

"You forgot about me!! You just threw me away like I was nothing to you!!"

He cried out in the usual robotic voice he always had.

"Fine. Since you don't want to play fair, I'll make you!"

He whined, his crying sprite showing up. You had never seen it before. His sprites got equally more angry before. The screen glitched before going back to the normal arcade game, but his giggling was heard by somewhere else. That was when you remembered that this specific arcade had animatronics.