The sun was shining brightly as he made his way to do his weekly shopping trip at Roscoes.
"My friend," screamed a protestor, one of perhaps a dozen standing near the store, on the public sidewalk, "my friend, do not give yourself to these people! They're no good! Buy Anastasian!"
One of them even offered him a bag already filled with groceries, of which there were many in a cart they had carried with them. "A gift for you! Be a patriot, don't shop at Roscoes!"
As he walked past them, they all stretched their hands out, screaming, wailing hysterically. "Don't go! Don't go! Save yourself! Save your city!" Tears ran down some of their faces as they protestrate before him, laying down their pickets and begging him, between loud sobs, not to go into the store.
He ignored them. He always ignored them. As soon as he entered the store, they would stop and go back to where they had been, holding up their signs and shouting their slogans. "Buy Anastasian! Anastasia for the Anastasians!" and so on and so forth. It meant nothing, really. Their cries were meaningless, their tears those of crocodiles.
As usual, there were large numbers of people streaming out of the store, carts packed to the brim with whatever they could buy, running, running to a truck in the distance, where they would dump everything before presumably driving away, as they did every day. They were always reliably replaced, within a few minutes, with many from another truck, who would do the same. He admired their efficiency, if nothing else.
Inside, there were still a few of them getting out of the store. And so he began his leisurely and short walk to the stationery aisle. His mistake.
The stationery aisle was where they had chosen to make their last vigil. Shopping carts blocked it off from the public; two, pretending to be employees, stood by the carts, pretending to do work, never looking up. Their hands merely flicked at products on the shelves, moving them right, then left; they seemed totally engrossed in their useless endeavor. All of this in but a minute.
Dressed in long white robes embroidered in red, wearing masks of James Mizrachi-Roscoe's face, the rest had piled all the stationery they could find in a pile at the end, Unfortunate for the interloper, their intended sacrifice. It was only a few seconds after they had walked away from the great pile of stationery on the floor, arranged themselves in two lines of six, the thirteenth of them facing them all, that he was thrown by the "employees" into the middle.
He was shivering, looking up at them, hyperventilating, eyes wide. He wiggled, tried to get up; the thirteenth stepped on his shoulders to hold him down, and he screamed, bucking up and down.
She stuffed something into his mouth; he could not spit it out. He whimpered, trying to cough, trying to scream, moving from side to side, up and down, all the while.
No matter. The thirteenth drew a knife, shining metal emerging from a hilt carved intricately, demons smiling from behind twisting and turning vines,
The twelve others joined hands, raised them in the air. "For the glory of James Mizrachi-Roscoe," they chanted, at first softly, in whispers, gradually louder and louder as the thirteenth raised the knife, as their victim's squirming became more violent, his whimpering faster, his eyes fixated on the knife so quickly plunging down, still wide.
The chorus of voices behind her, chanting again and again, "For the glory of James Mizrachi-Roscoe," continued to crescendo upwards in harmony. Two of them broke from the rest of the group; they walked to the pile of stationery; both taking matches in concert, they set it on fire, great yellow flames quickly spreading through the whole of the pile, dark smoke rising and spreading through the store. They smiled, at the fire, at each other, before running, prancing, almost dancing, onto the pile. The flames rode up onto their robes; they danced madly, without care, as they quickly enveloped their body in terrible heat.
The victim would see no more as the knife plunged into his chest. He stopped moving so significantly, his eyes still open. He was still alive; his last moments, the thirteenth thought with glee, would be so painful.
The thirteenth reached into his chest from the hole she had made, trying to reach for his heart.