Things had moved too quickly.
That was the thought that lingered as Darian sat alone in his office, the city outside already dimming into evening. In less than a day, the board was gone, ownership consolidated, mandates issued, and the machinery of Synder Enterprises redirected by a single hand.
His hand.
Darian shifted his gaze back to the report left behind by the former board. The thick evaluation sat open on his desk, its pages covered in interlocking red lines and floating margin notes that hovered just beyond the paper itself.
It was phantasmical.
Numbers connected to footnotes that led to charts, charts branching into alternate assumptions, margins revealing ranges and inefficiencies that no ordinary eye should be able to see. It felt less like reading a document and more like staring into a living system, one that reacted to his attention.
He studied it the way one might study a lover in sleep. Quietly. Intimately. With an almost reverent focus.
A soft knock interrupted him.
Before he could answer, the door opened and Ethel stepped in, holding a cold bottle of water. She moved carefully, as if entering a room where something fragile was happening.
"Sir," she said gently. "I thought you might need this."
Darian looked up, momentarily surprised, then nodded.
"Thank you, Ethel."
He took the bottle and drank deeply, only then realizing how dry his throat had become.
She hesitated near the door. "Is there anything else you need before I head out?"
"Yes," Darian said, recapping the bottle. "Tomorrow's executive meeting. Everyone confirmed?"
"Yes, sir. All executive level employees. Twenty one in total."
Darian nodded once. "Good."
He paused, then added, "Please book me a room at the Meridian Hotel nearby. And after that, go home. Get some rest."
Ethel frowned slightly. "Sir, it's already late. Are you sure you should not go home as well?"
Darian glanced back at the report, the red lines still waiting patiently for him.
"I will," he said. "Eventually."
Ethel did not press. She nodded, gave him a small, worried smile, and quietly left the office.
Darian returned his attention to the pages, leaning closer as if proximity alone would reveal more. The margins seemed almost eager now, revealing paths and possibilities he had never been taught to see.
He did not look away again until morning.
.............................................
At exactly 8:30 a.m., the doors to the main conference room opened.
Twenty one executives sat around the long table, conversations cutting off mid sentence as Darian Synder stepped inside. He looked tired. Dark circles framed his eyes, his tie slightly loose, his hair not quite as neat as usual.
Instead of diminishing him, it made him look dangerous in a quiet way. Focused. Unfiltered.
He did not rush. He walked to the head of the table and took the seat that had once belonged to the board chair, as if it had always been his.
Silence settled over the room.
Darian rested his hands on the table and let his gaze move slowly from face to face. He recognized all of them. Real estate. Milling. Banking. Asset management. Logistics. Energy. Each one represented a piece of the empire he now fully owned.
"I will not waste your time," Darian said calmly. "So I ask that you do not waste mine."
A few people straightened instinctively.
"As of yesterday, Synder Enterprises is no longer governed by a board of directors," he continued. "There are no external shareholders. No proxy votes. No competing interests."
He paused, letting that sink in.
"I bought them out. All of them."
A ripple of restrained reaction passed through the room. Surprise. Apprehension. Calculation.
"This company is sick," Darian went on. "Not because of any single decision, but because of years of compromise, extraction, and fear of short term discomfort."
He leaned forward slightly.
"That ends now."
Darian outlined his plan methodically. Consolidation under a single holding structure. Shared services. Full financial transparency. A cultural reset that would reward competence over loyalty and results over politics.
"You will be asked to justify every cost," he said. "Every headcount. Every assumption. If something exists simply because it always has, that will no longer be enough."
He let his eyes linger on a few faces longer than others.
"There will be change," Darian concluded. "Some of it will be uncomfortable. But I promise you this. If you are honest, capable, and willing to adapt, there is no safer place to be than here."
The room was utterly still.
Darian sat back, his voice steady.
"We begin immediately."
For the first time since taking the seat of honor, Darian felt the weight of motion settle into something solid.
Darian let the silence stretch.
Then he turned slightly to his left.
Closest to him sat the five Senior Vice Presidents of Synder Enterprises' primary business lines. They had arranged themselves there instinctively, years ago, when proximity to power still mattered.
Richard Hale, Senior VP of Real Estate, broad shouldered and perpetually confident, had once dismissed Darian's cost reduction proposal with a smile that bordered on mockery.
Thomas Kline, head of Milling Operations, gray haired and entrenched, had openly questioned whether Darian had "earned the right" to restructure legacy assets.
Victor Lang, overseeing Asset Management, sharp dressed and sharper tongued, had treated Darian's early reform efforts as an inconvenience rather than a mandate.
Samuel Reed, Senior VP of Banking Services, had never hidden his disdain, responding to Darian's initiatives with procedural delays and passive obstruction.
And Elaine Foster, the only woman among them, Senior VP of Logistics and Infrastructure, had been quieter than the others, but no less dismissive, choosing silence and inaction when support mattered most.
Darian remembered all of it.
The sideways glances. The polite smiles that never reached their eyes. The meetings where his words had fallen flat against practiced indifference.
At the time, he had mistaken it for growing pains.
Now he recognized it for what it was.
An expectation that he would fail.
Darian stood.
The sound of his chair sliding back seemed unnaturally loud in the room.
"I want to be very clear," he said calmly. "This company will not change unless examples are made."
He turned fully toward the five executives.
"For years, each of you resisted reform. Not because it was wrong, but because it threatened your comfort. You treated urgency as inexperience and accountability as insult."
Richard Hale opened his mouth slightly, as if to speak.
Darian raised a hand. He did not raise his voice.
"Do not."
The room froze.
"Effective immediately," Darian continued, "your employment with Synder Enterprises is terminated."
Shock rippled across their faces, some masked better than others.
"Your severance will be handled according to contract," Darian said. "Security will escort you to collect personal belongings. Your roles will remain vacant for now."
He paused, then added quietly, "They will serve as motivation."
None of the five spoke as they were led out. Pride curdled into disbelief. Disbelief into something colder.
The doors closed behind them.
Darian turned back to the room.
"The next month will bring movement," he said. "And change. Those who are capable will rise quickly. Those who are mediocre will find themselves examined closely. And those who are subpar will follow the same path you just witnessed."
His gaze swept the table.
"This is my company. For far too long, it has been allowed to rot under compromise and inertia. That ends now."
He let the words settle.
"It is up to you whether you move forward with my vision," Darian said evenly, "or whether you are run over by it."
Silence gripped the room.
Darian saw it clearly now. Fear, sharp and immediate. Ambition, simmering just beneath. And in a few eyes, something darker. Greed. Opportunity.
He nodded once.
"This meeting is adjourned."
As the executives slowly stood and filed out, Darian remained where he was, watching their faces as they passed him.
As the last of them left the room, Darian remained seated, the echo of footsteps fading into the hall.
Only then did the tension ease from his shoulders.
He exhaled slowly and pressed his fingers against the table, grounding himself. There was a part of him that recognized what he had just done. It had been necessary, but it had also been sharp. Public. Deliberate.
Perhaps too authoritarian.
He had held back for too long. Years of restraint, compromise, and being spoken over had built pressure he no longer knew how to contain. What he had needed in that moment was release. Vindication. Proof that the company was finally moving.
Movement required force.
Still, he knew this was not the Synder way. It was not how his grandfather had led, nor how Micah had carried the family burden in silence. The Synder family did not rule through spectacle or fear.
They endured.
Their sigil came unbidden to his mind. A hardwood tree, half carved. Stoic at its core, yet always changing shape under time and weather. Never rigid. Never broken.
What he had shown them today was not cruelty. It was frustration, long contained and poorly expressed.
He would need to temper it.
Authority without control of oneself was simply another kind of weakness.
Darian rose from the table and straightened his jacket, the weight of the moment settling into something quieter.
The company was his now.
And how it grew from here would depend on whether he remembered who he was meant to be, not just what he had become in the heat of reclaiming it.