“He’s probably dead.” Lorne Montgomery smiled without showing his teeth, which made it look like a grimace. He sat back, tenting his hands, pressing them against his lips. The board of Texitron stared at him.
“Jesus, Lorne, that’s horrible of you,” said James Pierce, one of the other members. He sipped coffee from a Starbucks cup, not trusting any of the corporate-made fare in the room. Since Reynard’s illness, he attributed it to bad food from the corporate cafeteria.
Lorne then grinned, perfectly white and straight teeth showing like headlights from his tanned face. “If he’s dead, I get first dibs on his shares, and then I can be leader of this Board, instead of defacto leader.”
“I don’t think so,” said another member, Phillip Lafferty, one of the few members who actually lived in Millennium City. “You might have the most shares but you still have to be elected.”
“Phil. Don’t’ tell me you’d vote against me.”
“I’d vote to kick you out in a hot second, especially when you decided to ‘help’ with the company.”
Said one of the millionaires on the board, William Habernas, “You let go of too many people. In the middle of a recession.”
Lorne shrugged. He had let go all of Reynard’s staff, known as the “goons and geeks.” He also moved into Reynard’s penthouse office. Out of the eight member Board, three of them were totally against Lorne. The other five had voted for him to take over the company as a sort of regent. Instead Lorne took over everything. Habernas had been on his side. Now it was going to be four?
The door opened. Everyone turned to look at who entered.
It was Reynard. Not in a wheelchair. Not bald. Not shuffling. Not coughing. Not sick. Healed. With all his hair. Tall, broad, green eyes bright, walking straight and tall.
“Reynard,” said Habernas, “You look good.”
“Finally found a good doctor,” he said, and sat down at the head of the table. He looked at Lorne and smiled. “Gentlemen,” he said, looking at each one of them around the room. He returned to Lorne. “Do you like my office?”
Lorne swallowed. “Reynard. We thought you were going to die.”
“If someone took your place, wouldn’t you be a little bit pissed off?” He settled back. “I read the minutes of the last couple of months. You strong-armed your way through this Board. You were one of the original investors, Lorne. I hate to inform you that I’m kicking you off the Board.”
“You can’t do that!” Lorne sat up and slammed his manicured hands on the table.
Reynard looked around the table. “I believe that it says in our Board charter that if I see something that’s wrong with the company, I can excise it. You, Lorne, are wrong with this company. You got rid of my researchers.”
“We don’t need research, we need production.”
“You don’t know magic.” He looked at Phillip. “Phil, if you would.”
Phillip got up. “Come on, Lorne. Don’t make me use magic on you.”
“I’m not leaving,” said Lorne.
“A shame,” said Reynard.
Phillip whispered something, and Lorne’s head exploded, sending brains and skull and blood everywhere. The rest of the Board gasped and William screamed like a little girl as bits of skull and blood hit him.
“Been wanting to do that for weeks,” said Phillip, sitting down.
Blood oozed from the body into the chair. Reynard wiped off the blood from his cheek. “Anyone else have an issue with my coming back?”
The rest of the Board, terrified, shook their heads.
“You know what to do, Phil.”
“Yes, sir,” said Phillip, getting up again. He picked up the chair and the body, carrying them to the edge of the room. He took out a piece of chalk and put a circle around the body and the chair. Reynard said, “Gentlemen,” getting everyone’s attention again. “I will split his shares evenly among you, after I take half. You can also cherry-pick from his staff, otherwise I will be firing them and rehiring my people.”
He pressed a button. A screen came down. The Board stared at him – before, the screen would come down on its own. Reynard inserted a thumb drive into the projector and a Powerpoint presentation appeared after a few taps on a keyboard. “I noticed the following research was discontinued…”