Cantor closed his eyes to regain composure, pushing the word asshole out of mind in favor of an idyllic image of a bubbling brook and a school of lazy fish. He breathed in and out. The perfect future required a perfect start.
When he opened his eyes, he smoothed his rainbow-colored robe, stroked his mufti beard, and arched an eyebrow sprouting like wild seagrass on the crooked shoreline that was his forehead. His words began with the measured drawl of a Savannah accent, dripping like dew from Spanish moss.
“Welcome. Whatevah you believe, you must know two things about me. First, Ah am an artist, and my palette is the mind. Second, Ah am not c-r-a-a-z-y.” He spoke the last word in a resonant, hypnotic, radio-announcer voice, segueing the final “y” into a broad, beatific smile, like the Cheshire Cat.
Cantor made eye contact with each of the investors, most of them dressed in business casual, some swirling drinks purchased from the lobby bar, others fingering their netcards, like worry beads.
“You are all here because you believe as Ah do that men will rise again,” he said. “Our place of honor in society is eroding, to the detriment of the country. Are you ready to fight back?”
No one said anything, but he had their attention, with one exception. The man wearing the red polo shirt seemed to be lost in a newspaper called National Scandals. He looked vaguely familiar, but Cantor couldn’t remember inviting him.
Cantor wanted to evoke a reaction from the group—any reaction—so he lifted a foot onto the table and wiggled his sandal-thonged toes. Tilting his head back, he closed his eyes and painted a vision with the broad sweep of an open hand.
“Two tried-and-true ways to become rich in our society are to invent a breakthrough technology or lead a popular religious movement. Ah intend to do both simultaneously.”
The red-shirted man blew his nose with three loud honks.
Cantor was undeterred. “As my investors, you will make an obscene amount of money and restore respect for men. Let me show you how.”
He hit a button, and an ancient digital projector whirred to life. It lased the screen with colored charts promising wealth and high social status.
“The technology we’ve perfected is called”—he made air quotes— “life cloning. Yes, Ah know it’s against the law, but we’re exploiting a loophole—no, let me rephrase that. We are using an approach consistent with the International Compassionate Family Act. The religious crusade we’re perfecting will motivate people to buy our services and will generate immense profit.”
Breaths punctuated the silence as forebrains processed his words.
“The technology,” he continued, “was developed by my prior organization, Clonaid. Their initial successes were with families in North Africa and the Middle East—families with a little money and a lot of tragedy. Families who had seen their kids become martyrs. Families who could provide a bit of tissue, but not much more. They wanted their male children back—the same, only different. They paid a high price for cloning skills, and the company gave them new look-alike babies to replace the children who blew themselves to smithereens.”
The red-shirted man in the back of the room said, “Amen.”
Cantor continued. “The greater good was to provide comfort to those families who lost loved ones to tragedy. Ah believe everything happens for a reason. Ah am part of God’s plan to bring sanity to this crazy world.”
A man in the middle of the table, on Cantor’s left side, raised his hand. “How does this—”
“Great segue,” Cantor said, cutting him off. “The facts I just gave you speak to our expertise. Now Ah’m going to tell you about a breakthrough that will change your life and give you hope. We’ve created a vaccine to inoculate men against the effects of Testrial. But that’s not all. You can pass down that immunity to your heirs. We’ll never have to kowtow to women overlords again! This solution could be yours today by investing in shares of our privately held common stock. All you have to do is contribute a modest amount of funding, which we refer to as our ‘Bronze Level’ of participation. Simultaneously, because of a special relationship between my two companies, you become an emissary for the Cantor Tax-Exempt Spiritual Community, a not-for-profit company, which gives you special tax write-offs. The ‘Silver Level’ of participation gives you more stock in the for-profit and allows you to be a beta tester of our anti-Testrial vaccine. And at the ‘Gold Level,’ we’ll immunize your entire family at no additional cost, and provide a certificate naming you as a ‘Spiritual Guide’ in our not-for-profit, which has even more tax advantages.”
Thirteen uninterested faces, save one, were motionless. Cantor knew he was losing them.
“Don’t you get it? It’s really simple. Technology plus religion. Get rich; channel God’s narrative; control your genetic destiny; help take our country back.”
The mannequins stirred momentarily. Cantor wasn’t sure this group could envision an idea on such a grand scale.
He hooked a finger inside his cheek and made a pop that surprised everyone. He wanted to wake people up.
The attendees stood up, one after the other, waved their hands under their noses and departed.
“Oh, the progress we’ve made in the last three decades of the new millennium,” Marcy said. “Five years ago, men represented eighty percent of all homicide victims and committed ninety-five percent of all crimes. Just think how we’ve turned things around.”
A wave of applause rolled through the ballroom. She waited for it to subside.
“Epic levels of violence—in our schools, workplaces, and houses of worship—finally tipped the scales for action in this country. That violence sapped our nation’s productivity and challenged our morality. But it took a woman president, a sympathetic Congress, and a deal with the NRA that lifted all restrictions on gun sales, to chart a new course.”
A wave of chanting, “Marcy ... Marcy ... Marcy” erupted from the crowd.
Marcy raised her hands, eliciting silence. “Now the tide is turning. The monthly killings at schools recently hit a five-year low. The murder rate in our worst cities has fallen to unprecedented lows. And we did this without taking away any guns. We didn’t have to. The demand for them is vanishing. And companies that sell weapons are starting to lose money.”