[SM, School of Missions]

I woke up in a barren room, my hands handcuffed to a chair. The room has a stingy smell and it made me squirm. My head was still spinning from the chemicals I had inhaled, my eyes skating over the area to see what kind of situation I was in. I gritted my teeth—No wonder they wanted to save me. They wanted to kidnap me. Those ing bastards.

I scooted forward, dragging the chair against the floor just to see the marks on the ground. My eyes fell on a shelf on the other side of the room, the shelf looking like it would give way very soon. It was impossible to move like this, my arms pulled back and locked against the chair with not one, but two handcuffs.

I struggled to move, trying to stand up but the chair was heavy enough to make it a hurdle. I slowly tried to straighten my knees. Maybe if I had enough power, I would be able to swing the chair against the wall and break it. A part of me knew it was impossible but I tried anyway, trying to lift the chair up behind me.

Not going to happen. I gritted my teeth, there’s one thing I could try and it wasn’t going to be pretty.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

[Kyungsoo monitoring her]

In a room, Kyungsoo; the Director of Operations, sat with his eyes strained onto the screen. Johnny, his best Forger and also the head of the Forgery faction was beside him as they both watched Oh Dana struggle with the chair. She was Oh Sehun’s sister, the Ace. Oh Sehun was one of a kind, the best strategist they had who topped the charts with his success rate. What Kyungsoo wanted to know is if Oh Dana was anywhere near as brilliant as her brother.

“She’s struggling,” Johnny observed, the girl on the screen trying to stand up. “She doesn’t seem as flexible as any of our assassins.”

Kyungsoo didn’t say anything. Johnny was a character that was always quick to judge, but Kyungsoo knew better than to do that. He was in charge of recruiting and bringing in diamonds in the rough. He had seen enough people surprise him to know that time played a big part. Oh Dana tried to lift up the chair but it was too heavy even for her tall frame.

“What is she doing?” Johnny asked, leaning forward.

Oh Dana was doing something, dragging the chair over to the wall. She was out of breath and she was sweating through the hoodie Haechan had switched with her earlier. Her black hair stuck to her skin and Kyungsoo saw her move abruptly; slamming her body against the wall over and over again.

“What’s happening?” Johnny spoke more to himself than Kyungsoo, Kyungsoo seeing her grit her teeth. Her features hardened and she looked like she was on a rampage with her repetitive actions. She was slamming herself against the wall, her hands by the chair when Kyungsoo realized what she was doing.

“She’s breaking her thumbs to get out of the handcuffs,” Kyungsoo said softly and Johnny frowned. This was a first indeed. No one was that self-destructive. “How… interesting.”

Oh Dana had finally gotten out of her handcuffs, the flexibility of her fingers and her broken thumbs playing a part. Kyungsoo watched her rub her wrists, her face unreadable. She showed no sign of pain, Kyungsoo seeing her run towards the shelf. The shelf was out there for a reason. There were a majority of things that she could use.

Hackers would be able to put their skills to good use, if they were skilled enough and could build a proper computer from the scraps of old computer parts. There were crow bars, wires, and a button. The button was red and it would promise them an automatic fail.

Kyungsoo saw Oh Dana stop when she saw the button.

“For a person who has gotten kidnapped, she’s very calm,” Johnny told Kyungsoo who agreed.

Though most of the people they have brought in were pretty level-headed. Most of the people in SM were different than normal people, they reacted differently.

Chenle, for example, had found a way to hack into the school system. He had found out where he was, what he was put through in one single seating and sent out an automated voice signal to make everyone go into the auditorium. Kyungsoo had watched him gather everyone in one place and lock the school down, holding everyone hostage.

That was why his code name was called Crowd.

Oh Dana had grabbed a bunch of wires, staring at them when Kyungsoo decided that it was time to go to the second part of the test. He lifted the walkie-talkie onto his lips and spoke.

“Send the forger in.”

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I grabbed the wires, staring at them when I sensed movement. I was about to run back to the chair to pretend that I was still tied up when I saw who it was—my brother opening up the cell door. He was there, Sehun in front of me. He had his usual cold features and my voice cracked at the sight of him.

He was here.

“Sehun...” I breathed, scrambling to him just to grab his arm. It was him. His pale face, that hairstyle with his glasses perched on his nose. He smiled softly at me, a hand patting me on my head. “Sehun, you’re alive.”

“I’m not dead,” he replied and I slipped my hand into his. “I heard about mother and father.”

“They’re dead,” I told him; the pang of sadness was fleeting—leaving as fast as it arrived. “Where are we? What is this place?”

“You’re safe now, sister,” he reassured me and I nodded. If Sehun said I was safe, then I really was. “I missed you so much.”

“Where did you go? You disappeared.” I studied his eyes and he clicked his tongue, telling me that it had to be done. The moment he did that, my heart dropped and I blinked at him. Sehun never clicked his tongue. It was one of his pet peeves. It drove him crazy.

And then my mind was reminded of the mask that kid… Haechan? Fullsun? I don’t remember clearly. But he had dragged a mask over his face and looked exactly like me. I felt my teeth grind against each other. It was another one of those games.

“Let me hug you,” I said, reaching out to turn him and hug him from behind. I wrapped an arm around his waist and pressed my face against his back, the fake Sehun patting my arm when I lifted the wires that I was holding in the other hand.

This guy is dead meat.

With a swift movement, I wrapped the wire around his neck from behind and pulled with all my might, choking him.

Fake Sehun gasped and writhed, but I kept the wires there, tightening them around his neck to cut off his oxygen.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“She’s strangling him,” Johnny said to Kyungsoo who lifted up a walkie-talkie to his mouth, directing an order straight to the ear of the forger who was being choked by Dana.

“Collapse,” he told the male and on camera, they saw the forger collapse onto the floor. He was acting, of course, and he did it well. Forgers had a knack for performing in situations they needed to. Kyungsoo watched as she let her guard down, Oh Dana finally releasing the wires when she saw his limp body.

They watched her nudge his body with her foot, her eyes going to the open door when she leaned down to rip the mask off the forger. He was still acting, but his real face was shown now. Kyungsoo saw her scoff, throwing the mask to the side when her eyes skated over his body and stopped at the gun by his hip.

It was put there for a reason and Kyungsoo saw her grab the gun and pointed it at the man.

“Ruthless. He’s already down and yet she wants to shoot him?” Johnny shook his head.

“You’d do the same too, if you were kidnapped,” Kyungsoo told Johnny who fell silent, knowing it was true. They watched Oh Dana press her finger against the trigger when she paused and frowned.

It was a blank. Kyungsoo would never put a loaded gun in a test.

Dana’s eyes traveled to the door when she began to strip.

Johnny turned away from the screen, his face turning a certain shade of red. It wasn’t like he hasn’t seen women strip before. Johnny cleared his throat awkwardly, peeking a glance at Kyungsoo who was unaffected. Sometimes, he had his suspicions that Kyungsoo was celibate and was aual.

“She’s changing into the clothes of the forger,” Kyungsoo said, Johnny seeing her change outfits. The forger was left in his briefs on the floor when Dana looked around warily and pocketed the blank gun, slowly exiting the room. “Wait ‘till she is gone and send men after her. Let’s see how she reacts when she is cornered.”

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

“.” I breathed when suddenly an alarm rang and I could hear distant footsteps ringing throughout the building. Trying to think fast, I ran towards the end of the hall. I had no idea where I was and no idea where to go. It was a disadvantage, a very bad one.

Where were the stairs? The elevators?

Hastily making my way towards the other end of the hall, I ran forward and found the staircase.

Except there were people climbing them from below.

“Go! Go! Go!” a man chanted from below and I quickly ran up the staircase, my legs bringing me higher and higher when I reached the top. It was better than nothing, and I pushed a door open to find out that I was on a rooftop.

The air was salty and I could already tell that I was near the ocean. Where was I? I looked up to see sea birds, the white ones I would see every time I went to the beach. Rushing forward, I ran to the edge and looked down to see that I was very high up—the waves crashing against the rocks below.

“Halt!” a voice thundered and I turned to see men stand there, their guns pointed at me. They all wore uniforms and reminded me of a SWAT team.

“Where am I?!” I yelled, backing away against the wall as they edged closer. “What do you want? My money? My company?”

They didn’t speak and I fumed. If they were going to make such a mess and go through everything to kidnap me, the least they can do is give me some answers. I grabbed the blank gun from inside the suit that I had stolen from the fake Sehun before lifting it up to my head.

“I’m going to shoot myself!” I threatened when suddenly a voice spoke.

“We know it’s a blank.”

From behind the team emerged a male with thick-rimmed glasses and a checkered suit. He walked with his hands behind his back and behind him, I saw a familiar face. It was Johnny Suh, the guy who pretended to be my lawyer. He had a small pouch behind me, and was staring at me when my fists tightened into a ball.

I shouldn’t have trusted them.

“Oh Dana, welcome to SM—School of Missions. My name is Kyungsoo, or D.O. Director of Operations in SM.” Kyungsoo said and I shook my head. No, there was no way this was a school. What kind of school kidnaps people?

“Let me go. Let me go back to Seoul,” I told the man. “If you don’t let me go, I’m jumping off and you won’t be able to use me for my money!”

My parents were rich and I was given so much security growing up because of that. I just didn’t know that someone would one day actually kidnap me. Let alone a bunch of people.

“Jump,” Johnny spoke from behind the man. He seemed unbothered and I felt a fire of fury bubble, turning to look behind me. I looked down, dropping the gun over the edge, and closed my eyes to count.

1…

2…

3…

And it went on to seven when a splash could be heard.

Seven seconds. Goddamnit, it was high.

But it was water and I could swim. I my lips and made my decision. If I were to die, I would rather die trying to escape than them using me for ransom. And with that, I sat on the edge before I heard running and flung myself over, feeling myself drop.

The air pierced my skin and my stomach rolled at the motion. I closed my eyes, bracing myself to feel the touch of water when hands grabbed my body from behind, and right at that moment, I could feel my body float.

“You’re a ing idiot!” the voice yelled from behind me. I opened my eyes. Someone’s arms were around my body, a parachute above our heads. The arms tightened around me and I didn’t have to turn to know that it was Johnny. “You could have died!”

“No, I can swim!” I screeched, slamming my fists against his hands that were holding me as we began to drop lower. “Let me go!”

“With that height, your neck would have snapped!” he snapped at me.

Well, I certainly did not know that.

Once we dropped down on the ground, I saw the man who claimed to be called the Director of Operations already standing there with a very satisfied look on his face.

“Amazing!” he gushed, motioning to me. I thrashed against Johnny who let me go and I turned to smack his arm when my hand was caught by his hand. He held me in place and before I knew it, he had ordered the uniformed men to take me away.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I was sitting in a meeting room alone, pacing back and forth when the door opened and Kyungsoo walked in. He hummed to himself, a phone in hand. I was about to demand him to release me but he beat me to it, handing me the phone. Glaring at him, I looked at it.

“Your brother,” he said and my eyes widened, lifting the phon