Dream Treatment (4)
A lavish penthouse overlooking Central Park.
Inside, as opulent as New York's murderous property prices, Michael lay sprawled across the sofa, utterly hammered.
For a man who'd lived his entire life coasting from one success to another, this kind of crisis was a first.
Amid the scattered bottles of top-shelf cognac littering the floor, an ominous buzzing went off without pause.
"Ugh... my head."
Half-passed out and marinated in booze, he pried his eyes open at the vibration and grabbed his phone with shaking hands. The caller was his Wall Street broker who managed his assets.
"Mr. VP! Why the hell are you only picking up now?!"
"What's so urgent you're screaming at this hour..."
His voice came out rough, still groggy from just waking up, and the broker yelled back at him.
"Pfizer stock has crashed! The margin call just hit on the loans you took out using your own shares as collateral! If you don't wire fifty million dollars before the open tomorrow, even this penthouse you're living in is going to the bank!"
Hearing the broker's words jolted him wide awake. He frantically flipped open his laptop and checked the stock price. The chart, which had been in a vertical freefall at a terrifying speed, had frozen. A red message read: Trading Halted.
"Wh-what the hell..."
Stunned, unable to process reality for a moment, Michael hung up in a panic and tried to access a secret offshore account he had hidden away. Even if Pfizer was crumbling, as long as the money in that secret account was intact, he could cover the margin call and still dream of a comeback.
[This account has been frozen at the request of the United States Federal Prosecution Service.]
"AAAAARGH!"
Michael let out a primal scream of sheer stress and rage, tearing at his hair. As he lifted his head mid-scream, all that greeted him was scattered liquor bottles, half-eaten pizza slices, and the screen showing his frozen account.
Just as he was about to hurl his phone in uncontrollable rage, a pounding came from the door.
THUD—! THUD—! THUD—!
Early in the morning. And who would possibly come visit him when things were looking this grim? A dark, ominous feeling crept up his spine, but he forced himself to ignore it. As he stared at the door, a heavy CRASH—! rang out and the door was forced open.
"FBI! Hands up! Get on the ground!"
[Vice President Michael Townley was arrested by the FBI this morning, local time.]
"...Michael? Who the hell is Michael?"
[The Vice President of Pfizer. One of the people who led the import ban initiative.]
Hearing Athena's explanation, the memory from a few days ago came flooding back.
"Oh, that guy. His name was Michael?"
Athena had explained it all, but the name had just slipped out of my head.
[Yes, the margin call on his stock-backed loans is about to hit, and the slush fund he'd hidden overseas is also being frozen and seized by the federal government.]
Hearing that even the slush fund he'd painstakingly stashed away over a lifetime of hard work was frozen — that must sting like hell.
"I bet he can't even hire a lawyer."
[They'll probably leave him enough from his remaining assets to cover a lawyer's retainer, so he can still get one. But he absolutely cannot avoid prison time.]
Listening to Athena, one question popped into my head.
"Don't they have plea deals in the US? Couldn't he trade information for a reduced sentence?"
[The whistleblower-style evidence I submitted contains pretty much everything relevant. The rest can all be obtained through independent investigation. There's no reason for the prosecution to offer a plea deal.]
If he can't even make a deal for leniency, it's going to be damn hard for him to recover his career, no matter how early he gets out.
[Also... a proposal came in from China.]
I was chowing down on some late-night fried chicken and tteokbokki I'd ordered because I was hungry, and suddenly that bombshell drops.
"China? What kind of proposal?"
[It's about importing the hair loss ampoule. They said they'd help us clear Chinese regulations so we could do business inside China.]
"Hm... Any conditions attached?"
I had no intention of accepting, but I wanted to at least hear what they had to say.
[You'll get angry if you hear it...]
"Just tell me. You saying that makes me even more curious."
I was in a pretty good mood, enjoying my late-night snack, so I was willing to listen to whatever bullshit they came up with.
[There are three conditions. First, submit the core formula confidentially for safety verification. Second, establish a joint venture with a Chinese state-owned company for sales within China and hand over 51% of the equity. Last, explicitly state that the ampoule's origins are rooted in Traditional Chinese Medicine. Those are the main ones; the rest are minor details.]
It was definitely Korean. She explained it in that same comfortable, pleasant voice as always, but my brain refused to process it.
"Say that again. Say it again. I don't think I heard you right."
[You heard correctly...]
My appetite vanished instantly.
"Haah..."
I didn't even have the energy to respond. Just a sigh escaped me.
"Are they out of their fucking minds?"
Out of the conditions they proposed, the only one even worth considering was the second one — the joint venture. And even that would require extensive negotiation, given they wanted us to hand over 51% of the equity.
"Wait, why the hell do they want us to claim it originated from TCM? Are they trying to claim this as their history too?"
[I don't understand either. I cannot deduce what intention they had in making this proposal.]
"Send them a polite reply that they can go fuck themselves. Tell them we'll consider releasing it in China if they declare Taiwan an independent nation. And while we're at it, tell them we'll give it serious consideration if they liberate Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia too."
[...I'll convey your refusal.]
That's the most ridiculous proposal I've ever heard in my life.
"Even if they wanted to buy it with no strings attached, I'd still be on the fence about selling. And they come at me with bullshit conditions like that and expect me to say yes? Like I've said a million times — if they want it so bad, they can come and buy it. Who's stopping them?"
I've scrapped any plans for an official release in other countries. I'll only handle bulk orders from people or companies who really need it. Of course, there won't be any discounts for bulk orders either.
"Tch. I was gonna eat and go to sleep, but now I'm so pissed I can't even sleep."
I figured I'd walk a lap around the apartment complex to help digest, then shower and sleep, but I was so heated the food wouldn't even go down.
[Calm down. Your blood pressure is spiking rapidly.]
I roughly shoved the leftovers into the fridge and did a lap around the complex. I felt a bit calmer afterward.
"Where did the proposal come from, exactly?"
[The proposal itself came from a state-owned pharmaceutical company. Their management consists of people from China's National Medical Products Administration — either former officials or current ones — basically the Chinese equivalent of Korea's Ministry of Food and Drug Safety.]
"So because they're from that background, they said they'd help us clear regulations?"
[Yes. And the proposing side probably doesn't expect us to accept either. It seems like a probing move — testing the waters.]
In Beijing, China, in the chairman's office of a state-owned pharmaceutical company, a man sat leisurely savoring an expensive cup of pu'er tea.
"Mn... Steeped just right."
Sipping his tea and enjoying the deep aroma of the pu'er, he reflected on the order he'd given a few days ago to send that proposal.
"It is practically impossible for a single company from a backwater nation to penetrate China's health certification system. They should be grateful we're offering them a 51% joint venture proposal. They'll fly straight to Beijing, so deliver the message as is."
Not just some tiny company from a backwater nation — even the giants of America and Europe bowed their heads before China's market. How could a company from a tiny peninsula defy the will of a great power? Humming a tune as he savored the aroma with a satisfied expression, his chief of staff knocked and entered his office.
"Director, we've received a response from Cheonmun."
He'd expected good news, but his face was pale as a sheet. Thinking something was off, he checked the official document.
The official correspondence, beginning with a standard introduction, did not contain the words Director Wang Weilun had expected — that they would fly to Beijing immediately. Instead, it carried a polite refusal.
"..."
Silence. An icy stillness settled over the lavish director's office.
The chief of staff didn't even dare to breathe, his head bowed, staring only at the floor.
Each individual word, taken separately, was a cascade of the most respectful honorifics, practically deifying the recipients. But the moment you read the context, the meaning did a complete 180-degree turn. An elegant mask over what was essentially mockery — that was the official document now being reported to Wang Weilun, a man steeped in Sinocentrism.
"Th-this... how dare those insignificant bastards from a peninsula!!"
CRASH—!
The Ming dynasty-style teacup, worth tens of millions of won, shattered against the wall, bursting into countless pieces.
"How dare some measly company from a tiny peninsula nation kick away a market of 1.4 billion people?! We were giving them an opportunity — have they lost their minds?!"
His face blood-red, the director let out a roar of a lion before ordering his chief of staff to retaliate against Cheonmun immediately.
"Slap regulations on every single business they're running inside China! Effective immediately!"
His chief of staff, watching his boss rage with steam practically coming out of his ears, answered in a voice so small it was practically crawling.
"Well... Director. That company has no business operations inside China."
Hearing his chief of staff's shrinking voice, Wang Weilun only grew angrier.
"What?! Not a single business operation?!"
Wang Weilun's eyes bulged in disbelief.
"Y-yes... The Cheonmun Group has absolutely no business presence in China..."
At the chief of staff's answer, Wang Weilun clutched the back of his neck. He'd tried to use the massive market of 1.4 billion as a weapon to grab them by the throat and shake them.
"These arrogant bastards... Let's see how long they can keep their heads held so high."
Still fuming, he ground the broken glass scattered on the floor under his heel and gave an order in a deeply lowered voice.
"If official imports won't work, then bring them in unofficially."
"...Sir? Unofficially, you mean..."
"Smuggle them if you have to. Bribe brokers or international students in Korea — I don't care about the means or methods. I said sweep up that ampoule in bulk!"
The chief of staff swallowed hard and pulled out his notebook.
"Send the ampoules we obtain straight to the National Number 1 Research Institute. Put the entire analysis team on it and have them replicate it exactly, down to the last detail. It's just some chemical concoction made by ignorant people from a small nation — with China's technological prowess, we can copy it perfectly in less than a week. Understood?"
The chief of staff, seeing his eyes gleam with greed, was silently praying to his ancestors that this moment would pass quickly.
"We'll create a perfect replica first and flood the global market with it as a TCM ampoule passed down through the imperial court. When the time comes, those bastards will be on their knees begging with bloody tears — and I'll teach them a lesson they'll never forget: that it's far too late."