Chapter 1: A Crowded Cafeteria

(CLEVELAND CHIROPRACTIC COLLEGE - LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, 1996)

The cafeteria at the Chiropractic College was packed with students from all kinds of backgrounds. The energy was electric, with whispers turning to laughter as the hours ticked by.

I stood on the makeshift stage, looking out at the sea of faces, and felt a rush of excitement. The event was mine to lead, and the crowd seemed to be loving every moment.

I leaned over, helping Anne and Kate, two scantily-clad students, onto the stage. With a confident smile, I walked toward the karaoke machine and flipped the switch. “Hey! Dr. Charles, here,” I called out to the crowd.

“As unlikely as it seems, on this day, my destiny came calling in the form of an out-of-control karaoke party.”

The room erupted into cheers, and someone in the crowd hooted, “Yay, Charles!”

I nodded, feeling the rush of adrenaline but also the hesitation creeping in. I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep talking, so I stepped off the stage and let the party continue.

A couple of hours later, the karaoke party had reached its peak. I had swapped out my party clothes for my usual white lab coat, trying to regain some semblance of professionalism—if that was even possible at this point.

The music was still blaring, and I found myself telling some of my colleagues about my past. “Believe it or not,” I said, my voice trying to rise above the noise, “just three years ago, I was on a fast track to greatness as a research scientist at the USC School of Medicine. My ten-year plan was to get a Nobel Prize, or at least something close to it.”

My colleagues listened as I rambled on, and with every shot of whiskey, the excitement in my eyes grew wilder.

I was loosening up more than I had in a long time. Another attractive girl walked in, dumping a bag full of prescription 

drugs on the table beside me. I barely registered her as I kept talking.

“USC was wild—sex, drugs, rock and roll. It was stimulating, to say the least.” I laughed, the alcohol making me more candid than I should’ve been. “But eventually, I realized working for someone else wasn’t gonna cut it for me. So, I jumped off the tenure track and ended up here at Cleveland Chiropractic College. It was supposed to be a smooth transition until I started my own biotech company.”

The whiskey blurred the lines between what was appropriate and what wasn’t. I no longer cared about the chaos erupting around me.

The students were going nuts—Anne and Kate had started making out, and the crowd was eating it up.

At some point, Anne grabbed the mic and locked eyes with me. “This is for the Doc,” she said in a sultry voice, licking the microphone seductively, sending the crowd into a frenzy.

I knew I should’ve stepped in and told them to stop, but I just smiled at Anne and Kate as they continued their provocative show.

I thought to myself, What’s the harm? The crowd was loving it, and who was I to kill the vibe?

“Get down tonight, get down tonight,” everyone chanted. The energy was spiraling out of control.

That’s when I saw her—Dr. Kahn, standing near the back, arms crossed, glaring at me. The stern, mid-forties dean of the college was anything but impressed.

She shook her head, clearly disgusted by what she was seeing. Anne, not missing a beat, shot me a mischievous look before turning her attention to Dr. Kahn.

“Come on, Dr. Kahn, let’s see how you shake it,” she taunted, the crowd chanting Dr. Kahn’s name in unison.

Dr. Kahn didn’t move, and her fury was evident in every inch of her posture. She stood frozen as the chaos continued around her, the students cheering and hollering, egging her on.

But when the song finally ended, the crowd quieted down. I grabbed the microphone, trying to take back control. “Okay, everybody! Thanks for coming. Do you want to do it again next week?” I called out.

“Let’s do it again!” Anne screamed, and with that, the crowd began to disperse as the stage lights dimmed one by one.

Chapter 1: (LONG BEACH, CALIFORNIA, 2003)

After my initial success with ZICAM, I decided to set up my own biopharmaceutical company.   I chose the ARCO building in downtown Long Beach as PRB Pharmaceuticals’ head quarters.  The building was an architectural marvel and from an aerial point of view, one could see that the imposing high rise had a very unique four-leaf clover design.

The double doors of my office entrance led directly into a large open area where Cathy, Masami, Sylvia and Christine had their desks.  Cathy, my personal secretary, had been with me since the Zicam days. She was a petite, attractive, Taiwanese/American girl and even though she had a tendency towards casualness towards me, she was extremely protective of me.

Masami, our procurement officer, was an extremely attractive, young woman from Tokyo.  She had answered an advertisement I had posted at Monster.com and when I first interviewed her, I was hesitant to hire her because of what I perceived to be a party girl atmosphere.  However, I changed my mind when it because apparent that she was an extremely intelligent, hard working individual.  Ironically, her good looks and charm became an asset to the company, as she was able to break through a lot of impenetrable business barriers for us.

Sylvia, my CFO, was an accountant from Hong Kong.  Her former boss was the CFO of one of my previous companies and I was always impressed with her organizational skills, diligence and work ethic.  Even though she was the same age as Cathy and Masami, Sylvia was much more reserved and conservative.

Christine, also from Hong Kong, was our database management and IT person.  She was the wife of one of my close friends and having known that she had previously been with Cisco Systems, I hired her to create and manage the company’s databases.

The conference room, which was separated from the main floor by a glass wall and double doors, was situated on one of the clover leafs which allowed for a spectacular 180-degree view of the Long Beach harbor and the Queen Mary.  It was in this conference room where I spent the bulk of my time.  Being able to spread out all my “stuff” on the grey marble conference table while being engulfed in natural light and beautiful views made it the perfect environment for me to work.  In addition, since I had visual contact with “the girls” and yet had a barrier to sound, I was able to keep my finger on the pulse of the company while still attending to “my stuff”.

Aside from meetings, Ernesto Barron, my business partner was the only other person allowed to work at the conference table.  Ernie was a dedicated husband and father with a strong sense of family, which he always attributed to Hispanic background.  I had known Ernie since my days as a graduate student at The University of Southern California and had always had the utmost respect for him as both a scientist and a person.

Ernie was the first person I contacted when I came up with the idea of using strategic use of combinations of natural substance to inactive viruses.  As soon as I explained my concept and told him of my plans to develop a new series of technologies to fight viruses, he offered to join the fray.  Of course, I was pleased and was quick to accept his offer.

On this particular day, we were working on a botanical cocktail that was designed to have a broad antiviral effect.  It had always been my contention that strategic combinations of natural substances, with known antiviral properties was the best approach to combat emerging viruses.

Over the past year, we had developed some technologies targeting specific viruses but those were not nearly as complex and challenging as the one we were working on that day.  As the challenge was just about to do us in, we decided it was time for a much needed break.  Our daily ritual was to leave the office at 3:00 pm and walk down Ocean Ave. towards a coffee shop over looking the oceanfront. We had just walked out of the building when Cathy chased us down.

“Charlie, Benjamin Li is on the phone from Hong Kong.  He says it’s urgent that he speak with you.”

Benjamin Li, a brilliant scientist and physician was a long time friend of mine and head of Lees Pharmaceuticals.  I 

should have known that if he was calling from Hong Kong, it had to be something important.

“OK.  Tell him I will call him back in an hour.”

Cathy just stood there with her hand on her hips.  “Says he is leaving for Shenzhen in a few minutes and he must speak with you now.”

Reluctantly, Ernie and I made an about face and headed back up to the office. “This had better be important,” I muttered under my breath. “ I am so tired I can’t even think straight.”

When we got back to the office, I plopped down on the cozy conference room chair and motioned for Cathy to patch him in.

“Hello.  Is this Benjamin?’” 

Obviously, Benjamin had me on the speakerphone as I could hear him talking to someone else.  Finally he turned his attention to me. “Charles.  Real quick.  I am leaving for Shenzhen in a bit.  Seems as though there is a big problem over there and you may be able to help.”

I took a deep breath and asked the million-dollar question.  “Sure, what’s going on and how can I help?” Benjamin was one of the few people in the world who knew that we had been working on a new approach to combat viral disease and our new prototype anti-viral formula.

“Well, there is a new kind of bug going around in China and it is killing a lot of people.  Do you think that formula that you have been working on could help?  I know some doctors that are treating some patients and I would like to see if we could try it out.” I could hear the urgency and desperation in his voice.

“Sorry Benjamin. In the first place, the formula isn’t even finished and in the second place we don’t even know what the pathogen is.” After a period of silence, Benjamin thanked me and I hung up the phone.  I thought to myself that it was a strange call with that I shrugged and went back out to get my coffee.  That call from Hong Kong set in motion a set of events that would ultimately turn my world upside down.