Mike dresses up in a space of 30 seconds just like a soldier man who is late for the morning parade. He checks his pocket to see if he had taken everything he brought on him as he came to Julia’s end, and when he was convinced that he had everything on him, he left the room. He leaves the door slightly opened as he left the door because he wasn’t sure if Julia took with her the door card, and when he got to the corridor, he was left at a crossroad as to whether to use the elevator or the stairs.
He moved to the elevator finally and as he pressed on the regulatory bottom of the elevator, he realised it was engaged. All of a sudden, he started feeling a strangling on his neck which gave him the indication that trouble was just around the corner. He started looking around to check if someone was coming his way in the corridor. No one was on the corridor as he looked at both sides, and looking at the indication bar on the elevator, the lift was just two floors before it got to the floor he was. His instincts told him to boycott the use of the elevator and rather use the staircase, and immediately he took his first step on the staircase, the elevator door opened and Ginola and his guys came out of the elevator.
They walked straight to Julia’s suite and to their utmost surprise, the door was slightly opened, so they entered without any difficulty. They realised the TV was on, and when they checked the room, there was no one in the suite. After checking every part of the room and not seeing anyone in there, Ginola decided to check the balcony to see if possibly the person they were looking for is trying to catch the night breeze out there, but he was disappointed to see the place empty.
He threw his eyes down the compound of the hotel and to his greatest surprise, he saw Mike walking to the main gate of the hotel. He smiled and gnashed his teeth while he snapped his finger. Ginola walked back into the suite and told the guys to move out and make sure they don’t leave any trace of their intruding into that room. He told the guys as they entered into the elevator that they were late for their target because the person they were searching for was at the entrance of the hotel as they got into the suite.
Back at the Conference Room:
Boss:
Lady and Gentlemen, let me welcome you once again to this very important meeting, and with me here is Lady Julia. She…
Lady T:
Albert, cut the pleasantries because none of us is having that time. Young lady, let me throw this caution and advice to you. First, don’t you ever in your silly life keep me waiting for this long again because every second that passes, I lose thousands of dollars if am not doing anything productive with my time. Secondly, in life, if you wish to accomplish something, you must learn to be time-conscious and always learn to be punctual and precise. You can choose to take my advice or not…the choice is yours.
Black Angel:
Very well said Lady Terror, and to add to what she has said young lady, look at the faces sitting here carefully and you will realise that we are all qualified to be your father or mother. We couldn’t have gotten to where we are now if we took things for granted. One of the biggest risks in our line of business is to have a meeting such as what is ongoing. For us to accept to be under one roof at the same time is a life and death matter, so next time, if you are privileged to bring something to us, kindly be here at least 40 minutes before we get here. Do I make myself clear?
Julia:
(nods her head before answering) I hear you loud and clear.
Lady T:
The cheek of it…you equally have an attitude to display to us too. Albert kindly inform your partner in Las Vegas that, the next time he wants to do business with me, he shouldn’t send someone like ‘this thing’ to inform us or convey it down here. No girl of my daughter’s age can bluff me, after all, the consignment is not being given to me for free or on credit bases!
Karl Simpson:
Please I beg of you guys to ceasefire; we have been throwing words about and blaming ourselves for some time now which has not yielded any fruit. Over here is the conveyor of the product, so please let’s get down to business and accept the apology of the young lady because, every single minute that passes, our lives are very much at risk here and we are also losing money!
Boss:
So then, do I have the floor now and can I continue with my speech?
Lady T:
If you won’t continue you can stand there for us to watch you like a statue.
Karl Simpson:
That is a bit harsh Lady Terror, please Albert kindly continue and don’t take things personal here. You know the nature of our work when tempers go up, so take it as an occupational hazard.
Boss:
As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted by Lady Terror, with me here is Lady Julia and she is representing our partners from Las Vegas. She spearheaded the mission of bringing into this country the biggest consignment any carrier could smuggle into this country. Now I hand over the platform to her to take us through what she brought. Lady Julia over to you.
Julia:
Thanks very much Sir Albert. First of all, I want to apologise for my lateness to this meeting and also to let you know that, my coming here late wasn’t intentional. Actually, I wasn’t given the information early enough and secondly if I wasn’t time-conscious, my boss wouldn’t employ me to be here in the first place, so I would like everyone here to respect and accept my apology.
Lady T:
(gives a very big hiss) Mtcheeeeeeeew, as if I care! You are addressed by the way you are dressed. If you can’t impress me for the first time with your appearance, then nothing on earth that you do will be appealing to me.
Karl Simpson:
Lady Terror please keep calm, for it looks like you are overreacting now. Albert and the young lady herself have apologised for her lateness, so why are you dragging matters here? Please, time is not on our side, so let’s all co-operate and do this deal so that we go back to our respective houses. My dear please you have the floor so please continue.
Julia:
Before I was interrupted by Lady Terror, I was about to tell you of the highly amalgamated product we have brought into the system. With me here is the only product we have in Africa, and I am very proud to be the person to introduce and unveil it here this evening. You are going to be the sole agent and distributor of the product in Africa, so you can draw your distribution plan by yourself. I am done and the floor is opened for any further questions or interactions.
Black Angel:
What are the ingredients that you put together to come out with this new product?
Julia:
I am not obliged to talk about that Sir. You can place a call through to my boss and I believe he will gladly answer your question.
Lady T:
I said it, this girl has an attitudinal problem! You think we don’t know your boss is there when my colleague decided to ask you that simple question? I don’t like too known and bossy people at all.
Boss:
With this I will not be on the same side with you Lady Terror. I don’t think you peddlers and pushers have ever been told the active ingredients involved in producing your highly demanded products.
Lady T:
I haven’t told them because none of them has ever bothered to ask me what is involved in bringing the product out.
Karl Simpson:
Hey, so you mean if any of your distributors ask you, you will tell them how you managed to prepare your product? My dear that will be the end of us then, and don’t you know when they discover that no one will do business with us again?
Lady T:
HahahahaI I am surprised you people are saying this. Lemme tell you one thing, and that is, “cheap things sell but quality things last”. When you get to Abossey-Okai spare parts market, a lot of people sell over there, but by the close of the day, everyone gets what he or she deserves to take home. You people call yourselves businessmen, but you don’t know how to run business. See, we are dealing with black men and they are the greediest people I know on planet earth.
Black Angel:
Lady T, what are you trying to insinuate?
Lady T:
You guys should relax for me to teach you the rules of the game. See, the black man will always be greedy and always pretend to be fast, but we will always lose to the white man. Oh yes, I knew all of you will frown at my statement but when I am done, you will straighten your face up and start clapping for me. Now, take the canned drink you have in front of you, and read the side where they have listed the ingredients they used in preparing it.
Black Angel:
But what has a canned drink got to do with your explanation or the deal we are doing here?
Boss:
Blackie, please do as she has instructed you to do.
Black Angel:
Nutritional information for 330ml:
Energy 35,5kcal – 1.8%, Sugar 8,9g – 9.9%, Fats 0g – 0%, Proteins 0g – 0%, Salt 0,01g – 1%.
Ingredients:
Carbonated water, Sugar, Acidifier, Citric acid, Orange flavour, Preservative, Sweetener, Colourings, Sodium benzoate, Vitamins.
Lady T:
Are you done with the mineral composition or ingredients used in preparing the drink?
Black Angel:
Yes I am done, so what next?
Lady T:
If I get you the items or ingredients you just mentioned, can you prepare the same canned drink in front of you?
Black Angel:
Hell no! I didn’t study Biochemistry and that is not my job.
Lady T:
Then hold it right there, because you just stated the point I wanted to make. Even though the factory or company which produced the drink have stated the active ingredients that they used to prepare this drink, none of us have bothered to imitate the product because if we do, we will get it wrong, and we will not make any profit. And if God doesn’t intervene, we will be arrested for selling bad products to consumers.
Boss:
So, what are you trying to insinuate right now Lady T?
Lady T:
I mean to say the black man is wicked and greedy. When we try to open up a bit to the suppliers or peddlers, some will try to play smart and come out with their own products, but they will flop because they can’t come out with a quality product like what we have here. The greedy ones will go in for theirs since theirs might be cheaper than ours. With this, when they see the bad product they have purchased, they will come back running to us and with this, we will raise the price of our product because they want “quality and not quantity”. This is what I want all of us to know.
Karl Simpson:
(claps his hand for Lady T) Woooow, what a brilliant idea! This has never come to mind in our previous discussions. What a magnificent and great ideology! You are very right with the point you just brought on board, but how do we convey this news to them?
Lady T:
See, I don’t open my mouth just like that, and before I say anything, then it means I have done my underground and background checks and investigations properly. I know how to make everyone bow to me and do as I have instructed or commanded. I will brief you later since we don’t have much time here.
Boss:
That was a nice presentation Lady T, and I believe everyone here has enjoyed your brief lecture. Now Julia, tell us the way forward as to how we will go about things.
Julia:
Thank you Sir. What I have in my hand weights 1kg, and it is worth $1.1million. It is only the rich that can afford to buy it and use it raw, but for the rest, they have to buy the mixed one.
Black Angel:
Mixed one? What do you mean by that?
Julia:
Good question Black Angel. You see, the old product that has been there for years…you think it has no value, and this is the time to see its value. You will only add two teaspoons to 1kg of the old product, then you mix it together so you get a uniformed mixture. The old product that you were thinking it has expired or has lost its potency, is now three times stronger and more powerful than it was some years back. You can then repackage it into smaller containers or whatever things you have.
Boss:
Ah this is good news then. I know now why your boss told me that my face will beam with excitement as soon as this meeting is over. Indeed, this is the best news I have heard in the last two months. Scorpion, bring that junky here so he sniffs the product to give us a confirmation.
Scorpion leaves the conference room, and in a few minutes time, he walks in with someone whose face had been blindfolded. He leads him to the centre of the Conference Room, and then pours a little content of the product on a small board. He then comes back to the blindfolded person. He slaps him twice; takes the blindfold off, and then hands over the board to him.
Upon seeing the content on the board, the junky starts laughing, but Scorpion orders him to quickly sniff the product on the board, else he will take the board from him. Quickly, the junky sniffs the product into his head and in some few seconds, he falls down and starts acting strange, as his body vibrates like a Nokia 3310 on the floor.The Conference Room by now had been thrown into a quiet mood that, even if a feather falls down, you could hear the sound and know the direction it fell.
Everyone in the Conference Room had his eyes cast on this junky, as he fell down and his body kept vibrating. All of a sudden, the junky jumps on his feet and starts to laugh again, and as his mouth drools with saliva, everyone claps his hand as the junky’s performance proves to them that the product was a great stuff from a genuine site.
Back at Quincy’s End:
Quincy:
Ah Mike has kept long paaa ooo, and he didn’t tell me he was going to stay out that long. I am also not having airtime to call him to find out if he will sleep over or he will come back. Well, let me take advantage of his absence to observe closely the things Julia bought for him. (starts to inspect the cameras, then a heavy knock comes from the door. Fear creeps into him as he moves to check who is at the door)
Who do you think could be at the door?
Do you think Mike’s life could still be in danger?
