I offloaded last night in the middle of an argument involving two males under the crowded bus shelter. The n-word and f-word were used in the construction of entire paragraphs of heated dialog. There were a half dozen other patrons at the stop. This is a major transfer point where the #4, #23, #24, #40 & #55 intersect. A Baltimore County cop had a motorist pulled over 100 yards to the southwest, on the other side of the bunker-like savings and loan.

I would normally walk from this point. But I had my loyal Harm City readership to consider, so waited for the connect to my other line.

The scrawny Tupac-looking trash-talking lightweight in his tight jeans and designer jacket was being dragged across the street by his welterweight girlfriend. His adversary, who was trying to stave off violence with such terms as, "We good, yo? Let’s not go dare, yo," and "Step off ‘en chill yo," was a cruiserweight in a hooded sweat shirt.

Girlfriend got Tupac across the street, but could not get him up the curb. As she yanked on his wrist, he slipped free and stepped back out onto the center line with many an inflammatory n-word-based insult.

WeKool stepped to the curb and gave the double down hand dip, “You steppin’ ta me, nigga? You flexin’ at me, nigga? Yo really wan’t dis shit, nigga?”

WeKool’s wingman, who I have ingeniously named BeKool, held him by his shoulders, stepping into the gutter himself to keep his primary from crossing his cop-infested Rubicon. This seemed to work, then Tupac snapped, “Yo notin’ but a big bitch, afraid a dis shit hea!”

That was it. WeKool did the menacing side-to-side hunched shoulder walk as Tupac pushed Girlfriend away. When they came face-to-face just over the center line eastbound traffic was stopped by their presence. They circled at arm’s length in the headlights and put up their fists. WeKool snarled, “Dis what you need, nigga?”

Tupac leaned back on his heels and fired off a lazy looping jab and an arcing overhand right.

WeKool ducked the punches and stepped in, and instead of hitting him said, “Yo sure, nigga!”

Tupac fired another terrible combo.

WeKool ducked that and popped back up with his hands on Tupac’s shoulders, “You fo certain, nigga?”

Tupac fired another combo, which WeKool ducked, coming up under his arms and clinching up for a body lock.

Girlfriend stepped up behind WeCool, as more cars backed up.

BeKool then stepped out in the gutter and yelled, “No bitch-shit! No Bitch-shit bitch!”

Girlfriend backed off as Tupac unsuccessfully attempted to punch and was held in a plume clinch by WeKool, who was still trying to calm the twerp down, “You sure, nigga?”

Tupac then ingeniously contrived to throw WeCool, who spun him down into the gutter, cupped his head so that it wouldn’t crack on the curb, and got the mount. This did permit traffic to flow by. WeCool still refrained from striking Tupac, but rather cuffed him lightly, “You see how this be, nigga! You sure you wan’ dis?”

Girlfriend then began grabbing and hitting WeCool [who did not appear to feel it] from behind, and was rushed by BeKool, who screamed, “No bitch-shit!”, and chased ‘her dumbass’ up onto the sidewalk.

The cop was still around the corner writing a ticket. But Girlfriend was now on the phone. BeCool grabbed WeCool lightly and stepped off a pace with him, only to have his man swung on by Tupac again! WeCool grabbed ‘the fool’ and growled, “We cool, yo!”, and pushed the small punk away.

As WeCool and BeCool walked off to my side of the street and Tupac stepped back up onto the curb, all involved noticed a cop car coming around the corner slowly with its lights on. The car followed WeCool and his wingman back to the sidewalk, getting out for a short conversation, while another car cruised by heading east and stopped to speak with Tupac and Girlfriend. The first cop car and the cop questioning WeCool then headed down the street to compare notes with Tupac, Girlfriend and their fellow officer.

Meanwhile WeCool, with tears in his eyes, pleaded solidarity and respect with his three friends, “I didn’ start no shit did I, my nigga? You is my nigga—my good nigga? I didn’ mean no disrespect to da lille nigga. His bitch stepped ta me. I’m yo nigga. I’m his nigga. He my nigga. Yo my nigga—and you my brother be my nigga too! Where do dis shit come from?”

WeCool, seemed to be painfully wracking his well-intentioned but not very adept brain for a way out of an arrest. In my eyes he did much to postpone and limit the violence that Tupac craved, for whatever higher end he had in mind.

My bus then banked up to the curb and I was gone.

I hope WeCool is where he wants to be, and that Tupac picked a fight with the cops.

Tupac is the new violence marker among black American youth, the denatured suburban wannabe hip-hop designer gangswanger who wants the thrill and status of ‘breaking bad’ and ‘throwing down’. These are the types of teens who play ‘the knockout game’, ‘the knicker knocker game’ and swarm as ‘flash mobs’. That twerp and his aspirations reminded me of the worst movie of the year [Purge], a bizarre fantasy about an America kept in check by one annual night of cathartic mayhem. As bad as that movie was, I believe I saw an example of its inspiration last night: the retro-ghetto smart-phone equipped Afro-manchild, who might one day get his shaking hands on a weapon, or gather a mob of like-minded sub-humans to his flaccid banner of feigned angst.

May he and his ilk all meet a hideous and untimely end.