Tobame's Struggle – Chapter Three
The first thing Tobame noticed about the head of Apricot was how young she was. It was stupid of him really – after the last ten years of his life had been spent running around under the command of various bosses in their early twenties, why was he surprised that this person was about the same age? Still, it was at least uncommon for a person barely out of university to hold top spot in such a large company. The second thing he noticed about Mrs L was how pretty she was – her long dark hair hanging down, sleek and shiny to her back. A few strands of hair hung loose around her ears, rather adding to the effect – but of course, she was married already. Tobame quickly removed the impure thoughts from his mind, and focused on what he had come here to do. Right now, the goddamn security guard was coming up behind him, talking in his walkie-talkie. Not good.
Mrs. L was staring at him now, one eyebrow raised. Tobame checked his watch, and found that it was probably the lunch hour. It might have been an oversight on his part – arriving during a time where she would probably be busy or out – but it appeared that the bad decision had given him a lifeline. Flipping his document to the relevant page, Tobame started to talk – and he cut straight to the chase. The elaborate preliminaries that he had prepared were lost, as any delay would result in him being handcuffed by security before he could even begin to make his point.
"I'm a former employee of Silph Corporation. I have classified information here that proves that Silph is planning a surprise takeover of Apricot Incorporated." So saying, Tobame handed one of the documents over, showing clearly the share percentage owned by the major shareholders. A few of these names were highlighted, indicating the successful persuasion – or coercion – of these people to sell their shares to Silph. A quick mathematical count showed that Silph had already persuaded 39% of the shareholders to sell. Once Silph owned 51% of Apricot, they could move into formal takeover demands. Under Kanto law, whenever one single party owned a simple majority in a company, they could legally force the remaining shareholders to sell by paying 1.5 times the amount the shares were worth to the shareholders. Which meant that obviously Silph had a real possibility of taking full control – or if not, at least getting a sizeable foothold in their rivals. 39% meant that Silph would be already the biggest shareholder in the company – which meant that the rest would be under major pressure to sell, regardless of whether Silph did get the remaining 11% required to obtain a simple majority.
The document had the expected effect on the head of Apricot, as she signalled to the security guard to stop whatever he was doing, which was trying to give Tobame a knock on the head. Her eyes scanning the document, she came to the conclusion that the contents were only too real. Motioning for Tobame to follow, Mrs. L turned back to the lifts, cutting short her lunch break before it had even began. Tobame, following behind, gave a little smirk – his plan had succeeded so far, admittedly due to luck, but it had succeeded. The stupid security guard was now looking dumbfounded at the turn of events, having not overheard what Tobame had said. The stupid piece of crap. I'm going up to earn more than what he's earned in his entire life.
Tobame was waiting for some conversation in the lift, but the woman at the other side of the glass box remained tight-lipped throughout. Tobame assumed that she was waiting for them to get into the office, where they had more privacy to discuss these confidential matters, and so relaxed, thinking of where he had seen her before. She certainly looked very familiar, but Tobame was sure that he hadn't known her personally – he would certainly remember. Someone famous – but if she was still famous, he would again have remember who she was, and if she was once famous, how could she be so young?
As he was still racking his brains in a bid to find out the answer, the lift doors slid open at the highest floor. Tobame had never even had a glimpse of the highest floor at Silph – unlike the janitorial head – and was now feeling thoroughly excited at this turn of events. The top floor was even more exquisite than the lobby had been, with wooden sculptures – rather than mass-produced paintings – adorning the walls. The paintings that WERE present could be easily seen to be one-of-a-kinds, and were artfully making the place much more high-class. After all, the top level was where the real money-makers did their work. Only the top directors and board members were granted offices here – and obviously, the woman Tobame was following now was the top board member.
The office was a similar story. It was the rough size of Tobame's entire house, and was rather more comfortable. The room seemed to be divided into two halves – one half for work, the other half for leisure. The "work" end of the room contained an ornate teak desk, with the typical odds and ends one would find at an office workspace; several bookshelves, with books of all colours and sizes arranged neatly and in order; and a television broadcasting a major news channel. Tobame was still taking in the 23-inch widescreen LCD monitor and impressive-looking CPU at the desk, as well as the 42-inch plasma TV, when he noticed the other half of the room. Its main purpose, apparently, was to give the occupant of the room a certain space to relax, to relieve stress, whatever. Passing over the several comfortable couches of different colours, Tobame saw another television – this one hooked up to Apricot's latest game console – as well as a pool table. One wall was made up entirely of glass, allowing people looking out to see one entire side of Saffron.
A little awed by the situation, Tobame was momentarily frozen at the view outside, before slowly dragging his feet to the desk, where he sat down. Mrs. L was already on the other side, and was now examining his document presented earlier in more detail. The examination confirmed her earlier analysis to be accurate – Silph had, if the official document was to be believed, indeed bought over 39% of the company's shareholders. There was a distinct possibility that more shares could be procured, until Silph could launch a formal takeover bid. Apricot knew very well that they had managed to hold a sizeable advantage over Silph in their niche areas – computers and gaming consoles. They had captured 74% of the gaming market last year, with the rival Silph console only getting 52% of the market. As for computers… Silph's foray into that department had led to an epic failure. The lack of publicity compared with lower user-friendliness had led to the vast majority of consumers preferring the Apricot model.
Therefore, Silph Co, not content with their monopoly of the Pokemon goods market, had planned a surprise takeover of Apricot – to remove the competition once and for all. Mrs. L was confident that Silph couldn't get an overall majority of the shares – she herself was the biggest single shareholder, holding 25% of the shares, while the next major shareholders were all loyal to Apricot. Silph had managed to get to this point through the smaller shareholders, all of which owned less than 8% of the total amount. However, Silph being the major shareholder once the transactions were complete was an enormous danger to the company. With most of the financial power in their hands, they could demand concessions from Apricot using this bargaining chip. Alternatively, they could offer their newly bought shares back to the company, in return for some promises – such as pulling out of the computer market, for example. It was a really horrible prospect, and Mrs. L had no intention of allowing that to happen.
Turning her attention to the man now sitting opposite her, a glazed expression on his face as he stared out of the windows and at the equipment around the office, Mrs. L realised that the arrival of this document presented new problems to the company. This person was obviously some disgruntled employee that had managed to get his hands on some confidential documents from Silph. This meant that he was engaging in illegal activity to hand Silph their biggest loss of their career. This also meant that he would be demanding a big payoff to firstly show her the remaining documents, and secondly to keep silent about the matter.
Mrs. L was not unduly worried about the payoff – the company would incur far greater losses if she allowed the takeover to go through – but she WAS worried that this idiot would just go and blab even after the payment. The fact that he was trying to make such a deal only showed what sort of person he was. Still, whether she turned him down or not, he might still spill the secret, and then their company would go under investigation for stock market fraud. Not a good end to a glorious ten-year history.
And so it was with a sense of resignation that the chairman of Apricot Incorporated started talking. The company was already halfway into the quagmire, and whether it folded because it was bought over or because it was shut down by the government was… immaterial… in the larger sense of things. "I'm Mrs. Lanaya, head of Apricot Incorporated. I understand that you are giving us some information that might well save our company. Before you make your demands, I have some questions for you.
"Firstly, I want to know your position in Silph that allows you to get this privileged information. And this leads me to the next point – if you are of such a position, why did you resign and come to us? You must be earning a lot – and if you were fired, it's surely an anomaly – from what I know, Silph usually doesn't fire their higher employees unless they did something really, really wrong."
Tobame almost laughed. Obviously, Apricot had a different way of doing things, having no equivalent for his position. This was bad news, in a way – it as good as ruled out any point of him asking for a job. Still, a one-time payoff would be decent. Tobame explained his previous position and situation, clarifying minor details on request of Lanaya. Once she was satisfied that in such a position, Tobame would have been able to obtain these documents, Lanaya continued.
"Very well, so I am guessing that you have volunteered this information to Apricot not because of the infinite goodness residing in your heart. You are here because you want something in return. How much are you asking for?" Lanaya cut straight to the chase. She suspected that the remaining documents probably contained more detailed information on each specific shareholder and how much Silph was paying them on top of the basic share price. It would also reveal possible future strategies on how to acquire Apricot – and this information would be invaluable to her. Thus she was willing to take the risk and turn to Tobame for help.
"Actually, what I would prefer is getting a stable job in your company. Apparently, you don't have a position that is similar to what I was doing over at Silph, and I don't have the qualifications to do something more advanced, but I would much rather prefer a constant salary rather than a one-time payment." Lanaya looked up, impressed. Apparently this person was not just a money-faced fickle-minded idiot, but rather someone really trying to salvage his career. She considered – he had brought his resume, of sorts, along – and she now looked through it more carefully. His qualifications were certainly nothing impressive, but if his testimonial about neatness and typing skill were to be taken as truth, Apricot could probably give him a desk job. He would probably want more pay than someone else working in the same position, but Lanaya had been prepared to pay much more as a one-time payment.
And so, after a certain amount of negotiations, much of which was dreary and mere formalities, Tobame found himself an employee of Apricot Incorporated. His job was quite different from what he was used to at Silph, as Apricot used tape recorders to record voice clips of meeting before the secretary listened to it and wrote the minutes at his leisure, but his skills would come in handy. He now had to go through inventories of goods, checking them off and then writing a report on the week's stock, including possible damages and losses incurred. It was a more hands-on job, which partially relieved the boredom, but what was more interesting to Tobame was the salary – he was now earning twice what his pay was at Silph.
As Tobame handed the remaining documents over, which indeed contained what Lanaya had suspected they would contain, shook hands with her, and walked back to the lift and down to the lobby, he still couldn't get her face out of his head. He most certainly hadn't heard of anyone named Lanaya before… but her face was still vivid in his mind. Brushing it aside, he headed for home, where he resolved to get a good rest before his first day of work tomorrow. As he walked, he started to daydream of his house looking like that office, and his dreams carried him the rest of the way home.
The gears of a big economic and political game were starting to turn.