Chapter 3

As soon as Howard started the livestream, hundreds of viewers poured in.

He pointed his phone camera straight at me. "Guys, this is the heartless boss. He landed a multi-million-dollar order and tried to make us work over Memorial Day weekend for free. When we refused, he put on this whole act just to intimidate us."

Larry squeezed into the frame and did his best to look pitiful. "You can all judge for yourselves. Working stiffs like us have it hard enough already."

Then a horn blared outside. A heavy truck backed through the main gate with two forklifts rumbling in behind it.

Liam Walker, owner of the plant in the neighboring industrial park, jumped down from the passenger side.

He was a heavyset guy in his 50s, his face slick with sweat as he clutched a thick stack of papers.

"Ryan!" he shouted. "I brought a truck to pick up the raw materials! I went over the Verdanian blueprints overnight. No problem at all. I spent three million dollars on a brand-new imported CNC machine last month, and your order is the perfect job to break it in."

The entire floor went dead silent.

The workers who'd been acting so arrogant just moments ago went still and turned to stare blankly at the massive truck.

Liam strode up to me, papers in hand. "The deposit already came through. Don't worry, Ryan. I'll have the whole order finished and back to you the day after Memorial Day."

Then he turned and waved toward the gate. "Guys! Get in there and load all the raw materials from Ryan's warehouse onto the truck!"

More than a dozen workers from the plant next door, all in matching uniforms, poured into our warehouse. The forklift operators quickly moved pallet after pallet of raw materials onto the truck. They worked with smooth efficiency, not wasting a second.

The cigarette butt slipped from Larry's hand and fell to the floor. Embers burned the top of his foot, but he didn't even react. His lips trembled as he rushed over to Liam.

"Mr. Walker, you really took over our order? Can those junk machines of yours even handle this?"

Liam shoved him aside impatiently. "Who the hell are you? My brand-new CNC machine imported from Verdania is more advanced than anything on your floor. Ryan was generous. He gave me the entire 400,000-dollar budget. You think I'm not gonna bust my ass for that?"

Larry completely fell apart. He slumped to the floor, his head in his hands. "Mr. Hale really outsourced it. The nearly 15,000 dollars I would've made in overtime… It's all gone…"

A woman in the crowd burst into tears. "Howard! Didn't you say Mr. Hale was just bluffing? You owe me that money! Five days of overtime would've covered a whole year of my kid's tutoring!"

All 50 of them panicked at once, turning on one another as the factory floor descended into chaos.

Howard stood there with the stream still running, his face going from red to pale. He gritted his teeth, stubbornly refusing to admit he was wrong.

He turned and glared at me.

"Don't panic, everyone! Show some backbone! So what if he outsourced it? We're full-time employees here. We've got contracts!"

He shoved the camera right up into my face. "Mr. Hale, you think you won just because you handed off the order? Let me tell you something. Under employment law, as long as we're still employed here, you have to keep paying our base pay even if you don't give us any work."

Larry scrambled up off the concrete, seizing on Howard's words like a lifeline. "That's right!"

Howard continued with a smug grin. "Forget the five-times rate. You still have to pay us 4,000 dollars a month! And if you dare fire us, you'll owe us severance based on our years of service, plus one extra month's salary. For 50 people, that's over a million dollars!"

The more Howard talked, the more confident he got. He raised his voice, riling up the livestream audience.

"The whole internet's watching! Mr. Hale, you just handed your profit to somebody else. Let's see what you've got left to pay us with. We'll come in every day and sit around and play on our phones. If you short us a single dime, we'll keep filing complaints with the state labor board until you go bankrupt."