“There’s no two ways about it,” said his lawyer. “You’re gonna have to settle.”

Charlie sunk his head into his hands and groaned. Here he was, barely three days into the job, and he’d been faced with four class-action lawsuits and a severe drop in stock value.

“Have you heard from the former CEO?” the lawyer asked.

“No,” sighed Charlie. “It’s like he just vanished.”

“Well with him at large, as CEO you are responsible for his actions.”

Charlie dropped his head full force onto his desk. He hadn’t considered this when he’d taken the job. Of course he hadn’t. He was only ten. But the reality of the situation had begun to sink in. This company, the one he now ran, was responsible for physical and psychological torture of four innocent children, in some cases horribly disfiguring them. He himself had witnessed these incidents. What had he been thinking?

Meanwhile, atop the tallest tower of the building in a now disused elevator shaft, the purple-suit clad body of the former CEO swung gently in the breeze.