u/Key-Assignment2947

The Blu-ray case had been staring at him from across the small, unkempt concrete pad that passed for a driveway in rural Oklahoma.
Joe had noticed the sign while driving the winding, bumpy, dusty country roads that led wast toward Oklahoma City, where his business was urgent but not pressing. As he had passed the bright neon poster board with its large, blocky text proudly stating "Yard Sale," offering rough directions to follow the hopefully posted signage further down the road. His mother's voice echoed in his head: "Pull over there. Could be something good. You never know." Usually, it turned out to be an old lady selling smoke-stained porcelain figurines at a premium, but occasionally, you'd stumble upon gold. That was what Joe was hoping for today.

The late spring sun shone warmly down on Joe as he navigated the maze of tarps and tables, eyeing the various wares and myriad knickknacks deemed no longer useful by their current owners. He passed gifts from distant uncles received on seventeenth birthdays--appreciated for the thought, perhaps, but ultimately useless. This thought crossed his mind as he pondered a small dog outfit made to look like a farmer, complete with a tiny pitchfork hanging lazily from floppy plush arms attached to the overalls that made up the majority of the dog-fit. He figured it was probably from a pet who had recently died, or, as Joe hoped, just a relic from a dog who fiercely disdained clothing. After all, clothes were a human construct; you couldn't rightly expect man's best friend to adapt to them as well as they typically have the built-in variety and no need for modesty. Judging by the weathered and leathery skin of the old man so absorbed in his carving that he took no notice of his wandering, it was probably the former that and the lack of barking typical of breeds this size.

He didn't ask. At that exact moment, his collector's eye caught what it so desperately searched for.
Anyone with an expensive hobby is always hunting for a bargain. Yard sales and secondhand shops present opportunities so sweet that the temptation of a deal—or the allure of a white whale— a grail found in the dumpsters— as so seemed to happen to the other collectors on the forums that he frequented—overtakes everything else. The Blu-ray case stuck out sharply against a modest collection of standard DVDs. Joe hadn't noticed it at first, but now it shone in his mind as brightly as the sun glinting off the glass of the litany of security cameras posted around the property. Joe hadn't distinguished them before, but as he was nearer now, he could hear the mechanical whir of the zooming lenses and of the automatic tracking heads as they followed his every move. Seeing as he was on property that was not his, he didn't really have much of a say. They had creeped him out, though their movement seemed off, too delayed, too human-like for what he figured must've been a hell of a purchase back in the late 80s when he assumed, based on their yellowed and worn appearance, they were new and expensive.
As he approached the small, manufactured-wood bookcase holding his potential dream find, a small voice croaked out from near the house. Joe snapped his head up much faster than was comfortable. He'd been so hyper-focused he hadn't even noticed the small man sitting in an even smaller folding chair, perched behind a table with a cash box. In his hands, Joe could see a small metallic glint, and judging by the growing pile of wood shavings by his old leather boots, which tapped to a rhythm unheard by all except the man in which it originated, he was whittling.

"You interested in movies, are you?" An old and weary voice
Gathering his composure, Joe replied, "I'd reckon so. I have a pretty large collection at home."
"Well, you have yourself a good look. My husband loved movies too. You'll probably find something you'd like; my Bobby had them all, or so it seemed," the ancient man wheezed out slowly and with seemingly great difficulty. He continued after a long pause to catch his breath and wipe the drool that had seeped out from between his dried lips. "You just missed out. A young man swung by earlier and durn near cleaned me out of the Blu-rays. He left just the one, but I ain’t getting up to see what he’d left.” Something about the way the mans eyes wondered around listless in his head only seeming to come into sharp focus when the crossed over Joe had unsettled him and he hadn't been in much a talking mood anyways. Joe gave a half mumbled "oh. Yeah" and got back to his browsing.

Joe could feel the air tense as the man began to speak and slowly release, as if someone had almost pressed (jokingly) the big red button that would launch the world’s supply of nukes—but this was just a small trailer and a concrete pad some forty-five miles east of the Oklahoma City limits.
Joe turned his attention back to the bookshelf, regarding it with the intense focus usually reserved for a man driven by obsession. He began flipping through the titles, purposefully saving the mysterious Blu-ray for last as a treat for his patience. Physical media was his great love, but standard 1080p Blu-rays were his sweet spot. To Joe, they were the perfect intersection of accessibility and quality—the ultimate home cinema format. The shelf contained lots of the typical fare you'd see if there did happen to be a DVD stash: religious videos, old workout DVDs, burned copies of kids’ movies you'd get from your one cousin who suddenly lost a ton of weight, sanity, and teeth thanks to a certain crystal. When he finally picked up the prize, the case looked like it had been through hell and a hand-basket. Fortunately, Joe knew the discs themselves were hardy. He popped the plastic casing open. The paper slick inside had been so heavily ruined by sun exposure and water damage that the cover art was totally blank and the paper like totally warped too.
Inside, the disc itself had no official artwork. There was only a clear semi-transparent surface, with a single title scrawled across it in black Sharpie: The 6th Process.
A series of dense chills and goosebumps ran over him despite the muggy atmosphere of that early June day. He hadn't known why nor could he have possibly seen the cause for his reaction, as the old man moved much too quickly and much too silently for Joe to have noticed that he had jumped onto the table before him and had been staring bullets into the back of Joe’s head, his wrinkled face twisted into a caricature of hatred. Joe turned back quickly only to find that man where he had been whittling away and paying him no mind. He decided to go on and git, so he took the Blu-ray, paid the crazy price of 25 cents(no wonder that guy had cleared him out earlier), and he almost peeled out of the gravel road leading up the concrete pad and trailer. He swore he could still feel the 22 eyes of the cameras and the man burning into him as he made his way to his destination, but as the miles between him and the city lessened, so did his anxiety.