The story here is from a scene that somebody ran for me years ago—I did not write it but I adapted it.

It's a normal Stuffer Shack evening, with Stuffer Shack junk on all the shelves and fluorescent lighting making all of the late night customers look cadaverous. A zit-faced teenager is chomping some gum behind the cash register...which oddly enough still exists despite the advent of commlink payment plans. Occasionally the lights from cars shine through the plate glass windows as new customers arrive and depart in the darkness. A lone light pole at the far side of the parking lot outside flickers with a sickly yellow light.

Trianna eyes the drink selection. " I just want... a drink without kelp in it....." She looks at one bottle, frowns and clenches it in her fist, then lets out a sigh and just adds it to the basket. Her boots are falling into a nice, dull, thunk-thunk,thunk-thunk

Hugh The Hand is browsing the energy drink/pills section of the store. He seems to be looking for something that isn't there, but that isn't stopping him from looking at every item on the shelf. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, his dreadlocks swaying slightly from each shift. A big hand reaches out and plucks an item from the shelf, his mirrored shades reflect the ingredients, before the item is placed back on the shelf.

Isabella saunters down the aisles of the shack, cables from her retro earbuds swaying in step with the elf. She's got an open pack of Slurps(tm) chewy flavored jummy gummy eaty delicious candy snack and chawing on a couple in her cheeks. "Man.. huh..", she bumps past Hugh- " Watch it mister" on her way over to the Neo-Slurpee mixer. "Hell yes."

The tall, barely descript woman is somehow quick to glance at the collision of shoppers at such a busy stuffer shack. "Then again, I think they want us to do this ... this..." With a hmph! she reaches out for a particular canister of cleaning liquid... " Still ... its better than boiling lye for my boots...."
Trianna seems to be..t alking to herself and not paying much attention to Hugh or Izzy past that...

Hugh The Hand pauses in mid-reach for an item when Isabella bumps into him. The hand clenches into a fist, flexes, then releases. The mirrored shades turn slightly in Isabella's direction. "Pardon me." he mutters in reply, before picking up the next item from the shelf and scanning it.

Isabella pops another Slurp into her cheek and maws on it. The girl grabs a "Damn!" sized Slurpee cup and puts it in the dispenser, covering her eyes and selecting about five random flavors on the AR interface. While the drink fills she slides her beach shades down over her eyes and reaches behind her head to tighten her ponytail with both hands, taking only a moment to scan the rest of the patrons in the store.

As with all Stuffer Shacks, there are a few gangers lounging around outside, drinking and smoking and intimidating the less wary. Up to now, however, they've been in a pretty good mood and not caused any trouble. Right now, though, they are standing and customers inside the Stuffer Shack can hear their cat calls and see them flashing their gang signs at something far off, down the street...not quite in sight, at least not yet. There's sounds of a couple of cars stopping suddenly and horns honking.


"And this... this!" Trianna exclaims, looking forward from her now half full basket to the doors that peek outside. She freezes, thu-thunk. The woman is quick to turn down an aisle, perhaps towards the back of the shack...

Hugh The Hand puts the latest in 'staying awake' technology on the shelf and turns his head at the commotion on the street. A grunt and he's back to looking at the shelf of OTC stimulants.

Isabella crosses her arms, tapping a foot while she waits for the different colored freeze streams to mix into the big cup in front of her. *Ding!* Done baby! She snatches up the cup and takes a sip, wrinkling her nose. "Uhg." Second time is the charm. Pouring out the contents she replaces the cup under the dispenser and hits a couple more flavors.

Dots of light flicker from the street and a rumbling sound is traveling down it as well. It's not a semi and it's not an earthquake. It's a huge group of people, mixed races and species, surrounding some sort of event that is moving slowly down the road, past the Stuffer Shack. The dots of light are...torches? And the people holding them sound angry. Really, really angry. The gangers outside the door look perplexed, stop flashing gang signs, and begin to crip-walk their way toward the crowd. It's hard to look cool when you're confused.

Trianna has been walking the perimeter, at a pace that to her seems more than casual. She laughs when she looks at one product, picks up and shakes her head in disapproval at another. All the while, keeping her eyes out the door. " Why...like a pack of dogs....I'd have better luck if it were true." She nods with approval.

Hugh The Hand turns to watch the crowd. His face remains blank, but his hands clench and unclench as the torches roll past. He glances about the store at the others before he slowly makes his way towards the front. His gaze stops on the cashier. "Parade day?" he asks with a slight nod towards the street.

Isabella caps off her Slurpee cup, satisfied with the flavor this time. Turning without much care for which way she's going the elf strolls to the exit of the shack, slurping slurpee with one hand and snapping to the beat with the other. Just as she's about to clear the front door she stops on her heels, the crowd outside dancing across her shades. "Well......", slumping her shoulders with a deafeated sigh.

The cashier looks at Hugh impassively, chomping his gum.

The crowd stops a little short of the light-post out in the parking lot, and the gangers move on out to join them, craning their necks to see over the heads of the others. There's a disturbance in the middle of the crowd, all still yelling at something. That something eventually emerges from the midst of the crowd. It's an Ork. Looks like a Longshoreman if you were to judge from his clothes: a flannel shirt, a pair of well-worn jeans, and a stocking cap. He is dragging on a chain...no, he is dragging another ork who has chains wrapped around his body. The chained ork has clearly been beaten, and badly. His short sleeved white shirt has streaks of blood and muck all over it, the chest pocket hangs by a thread to the body. His gray slacks are tattered and torn.

"So they think that they the dogs they are can just bark and wave their dog-firesticks in the air, when my beautiful bike is out there amidst their woofing rabble! " Triana just keeps talking and doesn't really take whoever is in lines feelings as she juts in close to the front. " And here I am stuck paying for horrible 'essentials'..."

Hugh The Hand forgets about the clerk and strolls over to the window for a better look. He watches in silence, the scene outside distorted by his mirror shades.

Isabella turns on her heels and makes her way to the coolers in the back of the store, brushing past Trianna and shaking her head. In a show of professional grade pouting she chews on the straw of her drink and grumbles into the air.

The beaten ork weeps and screams while the Longshoreman yanks on the chain and pulls his captive right up against the light-post. The Longshoreman flings the chain around it, wrapping the man tight to the post, then steps back while a human woman steps forward and puts a spare tire around the captive's neck. The woman is weeping as well. There's something written on the tire in white chalk, but the word can't be made out through the store windows. The crowd is now cheering. The smarter gangers are engaged in conversation with crowd members. After a few moments, they too begin to cheer at the chained man.

Trianna says "Ah! So now even this turns to good fortune for me! " The woman moves ahead to slam her 'detested' carry-all of odds and ends. Tapping her commlink, she finally quiets herself as the odd lull of the transaction goes through. " Thanks shack-keeper. " She boldly walks out the door with her plastic bag and walks out with a ding, standing outside and closing in her eyes. She takes in a deep breath, then exhales, opening eyes again to see who might care of her balcony view."

GAME: To (Isabella, LaDonya) Isabella rolls 5 dice: 2 3 5 5 6 (3 Hits)
You paged Isabella with 'You can make out the first three letters. M O L ...'.

Hugh The Hand pays little attention to the talking crazy lady, but follows her out anyway. He continues past her and towards the crowd. He doesn't seem in a hurry, his booted feet moving in a slow march.

Isabella leans off of the coolers in the back, popping the earbuds out and letting them dangle over her shoulder. "Huh." She makes her way to the front of the store to watch the bait test to see if they can get past the crowd, of course, before she tries anything.

Another man steps forward now, this one human, and holding a bucket full of something. With a snarl he flings the contents of the bucket, a clear liquid, onto the chained ork. The chained ork continues to gibber and scream. The volume of the crowd raises, fists pump into the air, and the torches bob up and down. The Longshoreman puts an arm around the woman who decorated the captive with the tire and the two of them seem to be crying together now. From somewhere in the crowd, a rock flies toward the chained ork and misses him by a couple of feet.

<OOC> Trianna says, "Are there other humans that might be visible from this storefront angle?"
<OOC> LaDonya says, "Sure, humans, orks. Couple of trolls. Maybe even an elf or two. For the record, the crowd seems to be made up of working class folk, to judge from their clothes."

GAME: Trianna rolls 10 dice: 1 2 2 4 4 4 4 5 5 6 (3 Hits)
You paged Trianna with 'You can get close. There are maybe two people between you and him. He's fallen off to the edge of the crowd, still holding the bucket.'.

Trianna was standing afront the store a moment ago. Since the crowd is so busy yelling, she decides to make her way in, pushing past a few cheering trolls and an elf who seems to be talking in AR to a friend about the details. Surprisingly when she wants to she can shut up, and pops into view to those watching a few people away from where the only noted human in the bunch was mentioned, bucket man.

GAME: To (Trianna, LaDonya) Trianna rolls 7 dice: 2 2 4 4 5 6 6 (3 Hits)
You paged Trianna with 'you smell kerosene.'.

Hugh The Hand doesn't attempt to get past the crowd. He comes to a stop behind the nearest cheering ganger. "What's going on?" he ask in a deadpan voice, as if this were some sort of boring street theatre. He stands at a relaxed attention, hands clasp behind his back, head tilted to one side.

Isabella stands motionless, leaning against the glass entrance of the stuffer shack for a few long seconds. She chews over something, figuratively in her head and literally on her slurpee straw for long seonds. "Fine." Spinning on her heel she peruses the isles until she finds the throwaway comm isle, purchasing a cheap Neonet link. That finishes she makes her way out of the store, turns the corner sharply and walks away from the crowd. With a flick of her wrist the throwaway comm opens, dials through AR and she's finished with it, tossing it to the wayside.

The ganger answers Hugh as if he were a comrade in arms of long standing, making wild gestures while continuing to pump a fist in the air in solidarity with the rest of the crowd.

You paged Hugh The Hand with 'It be Chester the Molester, omae. Six year old girl. Gonna make him pay! Somebody did that to my lil' sister, you KNOW homie'd be fuuuucked up!"'.

Isabella pages: Dialed lonestar! Booking it :3

Somebody in the crowd pushes a torch at the Longshoreman, who wipes clots of snot from his nose and lets go of the woman. He reaches for the torch. The crowd backs up some, and the longshoreman parades back and forth at the front of the crowd, holding the torch up high, yelling again. The crowd is getting to frenzy level now, and a few more rocks sail past the Longshoreman and at the chained ork. Some of the rocks make contact with him, the tire, or the chains. The chained ork now begins to howl in a completely inhuman (unorkly, perhaps) way. His struggling takes on a whole new level of desperation each time the torch passes by.

Trianna pages: so whats the human doing, and the people, what exactly are they chanting now that Im in the midst?
Trianna pages: just cheers for blood?
You paged Trianna with 'Mostly cheers for blood. But a few are chanting "Rapist, rapist."'.
Trianna pages: aha! what is bucketmans expression, if i can still see him?
You paged Trianna with 'Really really angry'.

Trianna moves with the crowd, but her scowl seems to look more like her own hatred for the offending ork. She tries to push closer with the momentum of their cries. " Racist! Racist! " She yells

Hugh The Hand grunts at the reply and continues to stand and watch. He doesn't seem concerned, or cheery. He's just watching, seemingly bored with nothing else to do. Behind him, his hands clench and unclench, an almost absent-minded action.

Now that Hugh and Trianna are close enough to hear things more clearly, they can hear the chained ork's screams more clearly as well. While the crowd increasingly take up a communal chant, "Rapist, Rapist!" the ork screams, "It's not me! You've got the wrong guy! Please, god, somebody, you've got the wrong guy!"

Trianna grunts, not much a fan of what she thinks will come. "This is terrible...terrible..." She can't bear watch in her heart but her gaze remains fixed on the longshoreman...

Hugh The Hand rolls his shoulders and shifts his weight. "Set him on fire and be done with it." he mutters, apparently getting impatient with the crowd's sense of swift justice. He glances around the outskirts of the crowd, looking at those that may be hanging back.

The Longshoreman stops right in front of the chained man, turns his back on him, and raises the torch high over head. The crowd's chanting slows and stops. Everything gets quiet for a moment, except for the weeping of the Longshoreman's woman. "For my daughter," the Longshoreman says, then turns and touches the torch to the tire. "NO!" screams the chained ork, still struggling, flames leaping up to obscure his face, "NOT MEEE!"

Trianna bites her lip. " Horrible...what causes such things to happen here..." She hopes someone overhears her, almost looking around to provoke a glance her way. Her nerves are starting to get to her in this volatile group.

Hugh The Hand watches the ork burn. He doesn't turn his gaze away, he doesn't smile, nor does he frown. He watches as the flesh starts to bubble and fall off in clumps, he watches well after the screaming stops and the black tire smoke fills the evening sky with the smell of cooking metahuman flesh and oily residue.

After an immediate crashing cheer when the flames first flared up, the crowd begins to quiet down. The chained ork thrashes, screams seeming to get louder while the crowd quiets, but after a few moments the thrashing slows down as well and the screams peter off, first into a hollow whistling sound and then nothing at all. The flames travel down the chained ork's clothing, following the trails of the liquid that was thrown on him. A pool of flames sprouts at his feet. The body sags against the chains. The tire smokes horrible, acrid smoke that billows over head and is carried by the winds off toward the mountains to the east.

GAME: To (Trianna, LaDonya) Trianna rolls 7 dice: 1 2 2 4 4 4 6 (1 Hit)
You paged Trianna with 'Well, all bucket man will tell you is that they found candy on him. The news will carry the story tomorrow, though.'.

Trianna covers her nose and mouth with the back of her hand, turning away from the horrid sight and smell. A vain attempt at asking some of the crowd members questions seems to put that scowl right back on her face and Trianna decides best to find her bike and watch from there. "This is not the type of pack I yearn to run with..."