In a bustling metropolis adorned with glittering skyscrapers and punctuated by honking cabs—a city so vivacious that it practically pulsated with a kind of caffeinated exuberance—lived Bartholomew "Bartleby" Mims, a vegan entrepreneur. Distinguished by a mustache that could only be described as an overgrown caterpillar undergoing an identity crisis, Bartleby had but one dream: to revolutionize the culinary landscape with a venture that would make the Impossible Burger look like mere child's play.

"Bartleby," his friend Veronica, a performance artist specializing in interpretive dance based on baroque music, quizzed him one fine day. "How can you make people swap their love for good ol' steak and sausage?"

"Ah, my dear Watson—ahem, I mean Veronica. What if I told you that it is not the cow or the chicken people love, but the idea of exoticism? The rare, the dangerous, the powerful! Imagine, eating a lion without actually eating a lion!"

"Ah, Bartholomew, you've been sniffing too many essential oils again," she chuckled, but Bartleby was unfazed.

Thus, our intrepid entrepreneur established "Primeval Plates," a laboratory where meat was not born but rather concocted. Ah yes, the scents wafting from Primeval Plates were a curious blend of sterile science and culinary zeal. Here, tiger steaks and zebra sausages were sculpted, not from actual animals, mind you, but from cultured cells, harvested with the glee of a mad scientist on a sugar rush.

"Ah, the fruits of modern sorcery," Bartleby mused as he stared at a petri dish filled with what would soon be a gourmet lion steak. "This will certainly win over the carnivorous connoisseurs and the reluctant vegans alike. I can already taste success—figuratively, of course."

News of Primeval Plates spread like gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, soy-free, flavor-free wildfire. Journalists clamored for interviews, and social media influencers displayed their cultured-meat feasts with flamboyant hashtags. However, not everyone was pleased.

"Sir, do you not think this will instigate an unquenchable appetite for the *actual* forbidden flesh?" asked Percival, a devoted animal rights activist whose passion for ethical living was rivaled only by his passion for bow ties.

"Poppycock! My meat is as real as your convictions, Percival! Why would they crave the original when the duplicate is not only ethical but also customizable? We can make lion meat taste like bacon-wrapped cheesecake if we wanted!"

"And what of the endangered species? The mere whisper of such exoticism could drive the black market into a frenzy!"

"Nonsense, my dear boy. As if someone would traverse the jungles and risk life and limb, when they can just stroll into a chic eatery and enjoy an ethical tiger steak seasoned with Himalayan pink salt!"

The plot thickened like an overcooked stew as Primeval Plates started making waves, not just in culinary journals but also in scientific forums and even philosophical debates. Critics argued that while Bartleby was playing gastronomic god, he was unwittingly opening a Pandora’s Box of epicurean ethics.

The climax arrived unannounced, as climaxes are wont to do. During a gala event, where the pièce de résistance was a cultured mammoth meatball, a sudden revelation hit Bartleby. As he watched guests nibble on extinct fauna, he pondered, "What if Percival is right? What if this instigates a vile craving for the genuine article?"

His epiphany was as startling as finding out your pet goldfish was secretly authoring a memoir. He realized that he had never questioned the ethical ramifications of his culinary escapade. In his quest to provide an alternative, had he inadvertently made the forbidden more desirable?

Drawing upon this newfound wisdom, Bartleby shifted his course. Primeval Plates began a new line of ‘Chimera Meats’—a fusion of cells from multiple animals, thereby making it impossible to trace back to a single species. It was a culinary quilt of genetic artistry, a Frankenstein’s monster of flavor, if you will.

The public adored it, the critics were mollified, and perhaps most importantly, it distanced the cultured meats from their real-life counterparts, thus thwarting the potential endangerment of rare species.

As for Bartleby, he became not just a businessman but also a harbinger of change, albeit one still sporting an increasingly absurd mustache.

So, dear reader, as we saunter down this convoluted corridor of culinary ethics, let us feast on this morsel of wisdom: When life gives you lemons, perhaps it’s time to question not just the lemonade but the very notion of citrus itself. After all, in a world teeming with choices, sometimes the most exotic option is to question the menu.

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