The flight to Amazon Headquarters was gut-wrenching as Gregson clutched his barf bag with sweaty fingers. The helicopter was like a blender churning the clouds into a whirlwind and when they landed, Gregson was ready to fight anything besides the weather. Bezos was there to greet them. “I have your package here, on time; happy hunting.” It looked like a vacuum cleaner ready to hurl fire and Gregson couldn’t wait to test it out. “To the shopping mall and Suits and Blooms!”

Jesepi drove them in his Maserati until they reached the mall and Gregson surveyed the mannequins, wondering if he detected worry on their faces.

“We’ll need to burn one-at-a-time in the dumpster out back.” And when Gregson said this, he swore 50 eyes darted towards him. Let’s start with the dandies in the men’s section.” But before he reached the mannequin, it jumped off its pedestal and ran. Gregson let the fire rip out of the vacuum cleaner and the wooden man incinerated. When this happened, all the mannequin men and women rushed for the exit and Gregson didn’t have time to throw fire.

“Where do you suppose their headed?”

“Into the crowd. And telling them apart from regular folks, will be impossible. They’ll be well-dressed and too polite. Shoppers were exiting the mall like bees buzzing out of a hive. And all those fake people were entering society.

“What should we do?” Jesepi asked.

“There’s nothing we can do. Let’s just hope your mannequins want to be responsible. If they pay their taxes, the government won’t care.”

Epilogue

And that’s why there are so many fake people in society. Of course, the butler did it, but Gregson couldn’t prove it. Hopefully, mannequins can’t reproduce, but lately I’m starting to think they do.