Greg sat nervously at the henchmen’s meeting. Greg tried to remember the plan Christie set out to allow him to escape the world of being a bad guy henchman.
“Remember,” Christie told him before the meeting, quoting the book. “Henchmen are expendable. If you’ve secured them as a henchman, you can discard them at any point. If they were easy to seduce, they are harmless. If they’re a distraction, cut them loose.”
The main bad guy, who called himself the Snakeman and always traveled with a snake on his shoulders, entered the room.
“Good evening, class,” the Snakeman said.
“Good evening, boss,” the 12 assembled henchmen repeated back.
“Today, we’re going to talk about bread bowl constitution,” The Snakeman said. The group’s mission was to take down a Panera Bread franchise.
“Before we start,” Greg interrupted. “I want to invite you to my improv show next week.”
According to the book, bad guys hate improv. The Snakeman wanted to tell Greg to shut up, but luckily, henchman Bill interrupted, “What happens at an improv show?”
This was another piece of advice from the bad guy’s handbook. Henchmen are likely to ask questions about everything. You must ease them into thinking nothing is important, so they don’t ask questions.
“Oh, it’s cool,” Greg said, and now the whole henchmen class was focused on him. “You guys can help. What’s something that people think is really easy but is actually really difficult?”
“Making a bread bowl,” the Snakeman chimed in, but the rest of the class drowned him out. This was good. The handbook stated that you never want a henchman to have more control over the group than you.
“Getting your toddler to put his shoes on.”
“Explaining how the internet works.”
“Making the perfect chicken fingers.”
“Staying awake on a lifeguard shift.”
“Okay, great,” Greg said above the crowd’s yelling. “Now what you do in improv is…”
“Stop, stop, stop!” the Snakeman yelled. “Greg, you’re out of the heist. Get out of here before my snake bites you.”
Greg felt shocked as he slowly moved towards the door. The plan had worked. The Bad Guy’s handbook made it clear how terrible improv was because it allowed for anything to happen. Bad Guys only want very specific things to happen.
Greg also created dissent in the group and probably saved a Panera Bread Company franchise. A bread bowl sounded like a good way to celebrate getting out of a Bad Guy group. He called Christie to meet him at Panera.