Cho Miran did not turn up at her new job for the first time expecting to be a celebrity before she’d even got there.

At first, it has just been heads turning as she passed through the enormous main hall of the headquarters of the Boreatic secret service, which had made her wonder if she was flouting the dress code in some obscure fashion, or the back of her skirt was tucked up into her tights or something.  Then it had been people openly gaping at her, and she’d panicked that her white blouse was see-through.  By the time she was at the reception desk, everybody seemed to know her name – she wasn’t sure if the lack of anonymity in an organisation of spies worried her or if it was good that they were able to get hold of information so easily – and she was sure she heard somebody murmuring “so, that must be Cho Miran, right?” and his friend replying, “yeah, that’s the new hotshot.”

It was also unclear whether they were referring to her looks – and Miran considered herself about average, but pretty with makeup – or whether they were already being judgemental, or whether she actually was considered a hotshot, which wasn’t really something she was prepared for.  It immediately made her feel like an imposter.

The receptionist introduced herself as Shin Gayoung, told her to ignore “the animals” with a sweeping gesture to everybody standing around and pretending they weren’t looking at Miran, and presented her with a pass for various doors and locks, a map, and an internal company phone.

“I heard the Chief of Operations himself was very impressed with your CV,” Gayoung added as she let herself out from behind the desk and gestured for Miran to follow her.  “I’m just going to make sure they have the right field equipment and then we’ll go find the COO.  I hear a good number of cells have been fighting over you being assigned to them.”

Miran raised her eyebrow in alarm.  “Why?” she demanded, running to keep up as Gayoung crossed the laminate floor, heels squeaking against it.  “I mean, I’m nothing special – I’ve only just graduated—”

“We’re at war,” Gayoung said simply.  “You graduated with the highest marks in your computer science and engineering course from the best university in Boreat, were personally recommended by our recruiting agent there, were involved in the student TA, have represented the country internationally on shooting squads since the age of fifteen, landed the lead role in numerous plays, and – the charmer – aged twelve, helped and led a group of school mates to survive when a camping trip went disastrously wrong.”

Miran almost came to a halt.  “That wasn’t on my CV.”

“We know everything about you, Cho Miran.  Getting information on people is kind of our job.”

Miran was disappointed that she wasn’t allowed to keep the gun Gayoung singled out for her as no weapons were allowed on the person unless in case of emergency, but she understood the reasoning behind it and followed the receptionist without complaint up towards the COO’s office.  They took the stairs rather than the lift so that Gayoung could single places out – first floor was the cafeteria; fourth was the gym; basement contained the shooting range – and explain the way that things worked.  She was a very keen proponent of what she called the Lattice Scheme.  Miran gathered what it basically boiled down to was everybody being accorded a cell division as well as a department.  There were field agents, “base” operators, handlers for the agents, technicians – and a whole bunch of other categories – for the departments, and people from different departments would be put into cells of between five and twenty, depending on whether they were high-operative or not (Miran understood “high operative” meant looking after agents in the field, though Gayoung wasn’t detailed on that front) and each cell had a division leader.

“So, where am I?” Miran asked, looking down at her employee card for any kind of indication.  Cell division and department had been left blank, though.

“That’s what they’re still debating over.  That room there is where the cell division heads have their weekly meeting – there are thirty of them in total,” Gayoung added, waving a hand quickly at a conference room just off the staircase.

“Still?  That’s really disorganised.  They told me they wanted me on the job a week ago and I was personally headhunted for it.”

“Two division leaders were absent when they were according cells and departments.  Kyuhyun returned two days ago; Hyorin only got back last night.  They insisted on opening up the discussion again, but Kyungsoo’s not very happy because you were assigned to him and he doesn’t want you moved.  This is the floor.”  Gayoung trotted happily off the staircase.  Tucking the employee card away, Miran followed her down the corridor and waited for her to scan her card and key in a code before she was able to push the door beyond the apparatus open.

The room they entered looked like the boardroom of any large corporation.  Tables were arranged in an elongated horseshoe down the centre of the room, and at one end was a lectern.  On the wall behind it was a projector screen, currently half rolled up, and on the tables nearest that end, about half a dozen adults were engaged in a heated debate.

They all snapped around when they realised they had company.

“Morning!” trilled Gayoung.  “I took Miran through the motions and brought her to meet you.  How many of you are still arguing over her?”

The oldest-looking of the adults stood up and came round to shake Miran’s hand.

“Pleasure to meet you at last,” he said.  “COO Shin Hyesung.  We spoke over the phone.”

“We did,” Miran agreed, recognising his voice and shaking his hand.  “And I recognise Hyuna from my interview.”

A woman with dyed blonde hair and vibrant red lipstick waved at her before returning to bickering with the dark-skinned beauty beside her.

Introductions went quickly.  The woman sitting next to Hyuna was apparently the Hyorin that Gayoung had mentioned before.  Do Kyungsoo was the sullen, dark-haired, wide-eyed man who was grumpily sitting back in his chair with his arms folded and refusing to relinquish Miran to anyone.  Cho Kyuhyun was the most talkative of the men, apparently undaunted by Do Kyungsoo’s monosyllabic responses and regular interjections of “no, Kyuhyun, I don’t agree at all”.  Shim Changmin, the last of the six, was also trying to talk Kyungsoo into letting Miran go.

“Honestly,” Miran heard him insist as he leaned forward across the table, elbows resting on the surface as he gesticulated with both hands, “I have word that Oh Sehun himself is personally on the move from my field agents, and I need an extra person we can drop in—”

“Changmin, you can’t send in a new recruit straight off the bat, no matter how experienced,” Hyuna told him with a sigh.  “On the other hand, I know my cypher breakers could do with an extra brain and pair of eyes—”

“They’re already getting there with cracking the codes,” interrupted Hyorin.  “We need to get somebody on the ground in the enemy army or in the government who isn’t going to be picked off because they’re suspicious this time round.  A disillusioned, rebellious university girl who spoke out against things she was unhappy about in her home country might be just the kind of person they’d want.  If it got out that Miran had deserted her country due to the disillusion she was always citing when she was involved in student politics, then they’ll probably see it as a way of getting other young defectors—”

Do Kyungsoo managed to shut them all up just with a sigh and closing his eyes.  “Cho Miran was assigned to my division.  I’m missing a base operator and senior handler for my field agents since the last one was taken out.  Please stop.”

“But—” Kyuhyun immediately objected.

The COO decided it was time to step in.  “Since Cho Miran’s actually here, why don’t you ask her where she’d prefer to go rather than all fighting over her like a piece of meat?  That’s why I asked for her to be brought up.  I can’t deal with you all arguing anymore.”

Miran looked around at the expectant faces.  Kyuhyun took a moment to smarten himself up before putting on a winning smile.

Hyuna wanted her cracking codes.  Do Kyungsoo wanted her as a handler.  Hyorin and Changmin both wanted her out in the field, which – she had to agree with Hyuna – probably wasn’t the best place for her to start as a new recruit, not without proper training, and the way Hyuna had phrased it made it sound like Changmin’s at least would be sending her in possibly without that.  Kyuhyun seemed to want her as a hacker of some kind.  It sounded pretty similar to cracking codes, and really, Miran had had enough of that kind of stuff during her degree.  It was fun in free time, but not what she wanted to spend all day every day doing for her job, at least without some kind of break.

She turned to Hyesung.  “Will I have the option of moving around?”

“If needed,” he replied.  “You are one of the most versatile people we’ve taken on recently.  It was why you were recommended to us.”

Miran shrugged.  “Then I might as well start where I’m assigned.  I’m going to need training to go out into the field, so isn’t it best if I just train for that alongside being a field agent handler, where I’ll get to see how things work from the other side?”

To her absolute astonishment, a grin cracked across the sullen Kyungsoo’s face and he winked, giving her a thumbs up.  Hyuna and Kyuhyun immediately voiced objections that neither of their jobs required special safety training before going, but Miran tuned them out, trying not to gaze too openly at her division leader.  Grin wide enough to display straight, white teeth, he stretched and was now leaning victoriously back on his chair.

“Shush,” he told Kyuhyun and Hyuna with amusement.  “She wants to be in my cell.  Let her.  She’s probably had enough to do with codes and computers from her degree – who can blame her if she wants a break?”

“Then you’re loaning her to us if we need her,” Kyuhyun stated with a bossy finger in Kyungsoo’s direction.

“Her prerogative, Cho.”

Miran jumped, but then remembered that she and Kyuhyun shared the same last name.

“Mr Do’s right,” she said.  “I do need a bit of a break from coding and all that kind of stuff.”

Kyuhyun gave a disappointed sigh.  “I don’t suppose there’s any chance you’ll consider moving cells  when you get over that?”

Do Kyungsoo was a pretty quiet man.  Once Miran’s division had been sorted out and he’d had her employee card updated accordingly, he took her down to level three, where most of their cell worked.  Unlike Gayoung, he didn’t speak a word until they actually arrived at her desk.

“You’re taking over from Yoo