Ch.62Episode 4 – Why Are You Only Picking On Me

“Have you heard the news?”

My colleague’s question. I was opening a packet of Maxim White Gold coffee mix when I asked him back.

“What news?”

“About Senior Kim who was discharged a few years ago. Our executive director just came back from headquarters and said he met him there.”

“Captain Kim? What was he doing there after he’d already left the service?”

My colleague leaned in slightly with a mischievous smile.

“He changed jobs.”

“Changed jobs?”

“Yeah. I asked a senior officer there, and he said he’s doing well in London.”

“Wasn’t he originally in charge of Eurasia? But he’s in London now?”

“Yep. The executive director said he’s got something going on with the youngest member of that team. What was her name again… Something like Sejin, I think.”

It was summer, with hot sunlight beating down. At the smoking area behind the barracks, I tapped cigarette ash into the ashtray while my colleague tried to recall the name.

“Don’t worry about it. He’s not one of us anymore anyway.”

“Hey. He was still our military senior and workplace colleague once. What kind of reaction is that?”

“That’s not what I’m talking about, you idiot. Let’s just talk about games like usual. Why are you gossiping about other people? Don’t you remember how exhausting it gets when we get involved with them?”

“Anyway, you thick-headed bastard…”

My colleague chuckled as he tilted his paper cup. Suddenly, a window in the hallway slid open.

The executive director’s stern voice hit my ears.

“Hey, gentlemen. If you’re done with your coffee, why don’t you come inside and sit down? And why are you walking around without your caps? Forgotten the regulations? Want me to remind you?”

“Sorry, sir!”

“We’ll correct it right away!”

My colleague tossed his cigarette into the paper cup and threw it in the ashtray. Then he hurriedly adjusted his beret and rushed into the building.

Seeing this, the executive director turned to me and said:

“You should head in too. Director Jung is looking for you.”

“Yes, sir.”

I adjusted the angle of my beret and entered the building. My vision gradually blurred. The hallway. The stairs. Everything flipped rapidly.

Then, darkness.

It was darkness.

Episode 4 – Why Are You Picking On Me

Just as I was about to fall asleep in the duty room, I received a request to accompany staff members from the Royal Intelligence Service who had come looking for me.

I wasn’t particularly curious about why a competing agency was looking for me.

Experience had taught me that getting entangled with people from other intelligence agencies always led to exhausting situations. Whether it was joint operations or information sharing, nothing good ever came from getting involved with competitors. This truth, like a mathematical formula, was easily explained by my slightly over ten years of experience.

And since I was sufficiently tired then, am tired now, and planned to be tired in the future, I politely declined the Royal Intelligence Service’s request to accompany them.

But the Royal Intelligence Service staff were more persistent and tenacious than I had anticipated, and they entered the duty room, continuously trying to persuade me to go somewhere with them.

The reason. The purpose. The destination.

They told me nothing. They wouldn’t answer when I asked. What followed was an endless drain of emotions disguised as conversation, and eventually, I followed them after receiving a promise that it would be over within an hour.

And now, that promised hour has passed.

“You said an hour would be enough. Why are you still dragging me along? Huh?”

“We’re not dragging you, we’re escorting you.”

I’d been duped. The promise to finish within an hour was, of course, a lie.

I had expected it, but actually experiencing it made me feel sick to my stomach.

The convoy of heavily tinted black cars maintained their speed and distance as they quickly navigated the winding road.

I was now on an unknown mountain road. I could tell we were moving east by looking at the stars, but that was all I knew. No map, no signs. It was even my first time in this area. So I had no way of knowing where I was.

The only certainties were that we were heading east, and that the driving skills of those behind the wheel were far from ordinary.

“Where are we going?”

I asked the Royal Intelligence Service person sitting in the passenger seat. The suit who had handed me his business card.

“……”

“Not going to answer?”

But the suit didn’t respond to my question, maintaining his silence without taking any particular action. These were truly the most disagreeable bastards I’d ever met. Even the arrogant Naegok-dong necktie crowd wasn’t this disrespectful to industry colleagues.

“…Sigh.”

I knew that getting angry here would only exhaust me further.

So I sighed deeply and leaned back against the seat. I couldn’t exactly jump out of a moving car, so I might as well try to get some rest.

As a form of silent protest, I remained quiet for a while.

As I dozed off in the back seat, I occasionally caught fragments of radio communications from the passenger seat.

“…three minutes to arrival. Open the main gate.”

On a dark night with the moonlight obscured by clouds, the convoy crossed the mountain path and arrived at its destination.

The Royal Intelligence Service headquarters.

*

Unlike the Military Intelligence Agency headquarters, the Royal Intelligence Service headquarters is located far from the city center, in the outskirts.

While the Military Intelligence Agency stubbornly ignored the sharp criticism from the Ministry of Land, the Ministry of Finance, construction conglomerates, and the National Assembly—who all insisted on redevelopment due to rising land values and population concentration in the capital—the Royal Intelligence Service quietly sold their property and relocated to a larger, more pleasant site.

Despite the outcry from numerous suits living in the capital about accessibility issues, they too were civil servants and couldn’t go against government policy. In the end, the suits either became “goose dads” or endured long commutes to headquarters…

…or so I’d heard when I was an aide to the Military Intelligence Agency’s Counterintelligence Director.

And now, visiting the Royal Intelligence Service for the first time in my life, I discovered that rumor was true.

“Please come in.”

The Royal Intelligence Service staff guided me into the building.

I deposited my belongings at the desk, passed through security screening, underwent a simple identity verification process, and only then was granted entry permission.

Following the suit down a straight corridor, I asked:

“So why am I here? I think it’s about time you told me.”

“We don’t know either. We’re just following orders.”

They claim they don’t know why they brought me here. Whether they truly didn’t know or were hiding something from me was unclear, but it was certain that these suits were acting on orders from above.

The staff member leading the way walked silently, and I too maintained silence as I followed. We continued like this for a while.

Suddenly, he spoke to me:

“Do you know what this place is?”

“I heard it’s where they pull out fingernails.”

I didn’t say this because I genuinely didn’t know.

The Royal Intelligence Service is a national intelligence agency. In South Korean terms, it would be the National Intelligence Service, and in American terms, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Considering that the Royal Intelligence Service itself is both a national intelligence agency and a foreign intelligence agency, its functions and status are closer to the CIA than the NIS.

The fingernail comment was half a joke. But given the circumstances, I couldn’t speak politely.

However, if you think about it differently, saying something is half a joke means the other half is serious.

“You know well.”

The Royal Intelligence Service staff member deflected my joke with what might have been self-deprecating laughter.

With that, the conversation thread broke, and an uncomfortable silence returned. We hastened our steps in this uncomfortable silence, and before long, we arrived at our destination. The Royal Intelligence Service staff member held the door open with a rather formal gesture, pointing inside with a businesslike motion.

“Please enter.”

I nodded to him and went inside.

It was a conference room.

*

The Royal Intelligence Service conference room was more modest than I expected. If the Military Intelligence Agency Director’s small conference room felt like a military command situation room or an underground bunker, the Royal Intelligence Service conference room resembled something you might see in a government department or private company.

It had a more relaxed atmosphere, in other words.

But the national flag and the emblems of the Royal Intelligence Service and Military Intelligence Agency displayed behind the head seat indicated this was a government facility, and the participants dressed in formal attire and military uniforms proved this was no ordinary place.

I stood at the entrance of the conference room, scanning the faces of those seated.

“……”

First, the head seat was empty.

To the left of the head seat, closer to the entrance, sat military personnel. All familiar faces, so I didn’t need to identify who was who.

They were the Military Intelligence Agency commanders.

The suits sitting on the opposite side must be from the Royal Intelligence Service.

“…Why are you here?”

“Why was this fellow called here?”

All the key figures of the Military Intelligence Agency, including the Director and Chief of Staff, were gathered in the Royal Intelligence Service conference room. Even Clavins, who hadn’t answered my calls, was there.

I had a rough idea. Everyone seemed to be attending a joint meeting between related agencies. Given that department heads, who were working-level officials, were present, this was clearly an operational meeting rather than a policy meeting.

It was strange that even the domestic division (security, intelligence, counterintelligence) commanders were gathered, but anyway.

I saluted the Military Intelligence Agency commanders.

“Thank you for your hard work this late at night.”

The Director received the salute on behalf of all the commanders, and Clavins, representing all the Military Intelligence Agency policymakers, asked me:

As a brigadier general candidate and a strong contender for the next Director, he could do this.

“Frederick. Why are you coming out from there?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

I couldn’t say I was dragged here by Royal Intelligence Service staff in front of their key personnel, so I gave a vague answer.

In truth, I didn’t know the reason either, so I had nothing to say. What could I say when I was dragged out of bed?

Clavins asked what I meant, but the answer came from the opposite side.

“Ah, our staff brought him here.”

An unknown Royal Intelligence Service official answered. Then he gestured to a chair at the back of the conference room.

“Please sit. You must be tired after coming all this way so late.”

If you knew that, you shouldn’t have dragged me here.

Of course, I couldn’t speak rudely to someone old enough to be my father, so I kept my mouth shut.

And I couldn’t sit down either.

“By what authority does the Royal Intelligence Service summon our staff?”

“Our staff simply requested his company.”

“Voluntary accompaniment? Why is the Royal Intelligence Service, which has no investigative authority, exercising powers not granted by law?”

“We politely invited him for tea. What’s this about voluntary accompaniment…”

The Military Intelligence Agency and Royal Intelligence Service personnel began a power struggle.

“So I asked, what is the reason?”

“Does one need a reason to have a cup of tea?”

“This person is…”

“Come now, let’s calm down. A young colleague has joined us, what kind of disgraceful behavior is this?”

“Is this the time for jokes? Who’s the one acting inappropriately for their age?”

The atmosphere was unusual. The exchange of words was so friendly that it felt like they had already had a round of arguments before I arrived.

I quietly tried to push the door open to return the way I came, but seeing Royal Intelligence Service staff waiting outside, I closed it again.

The air in the conference room was like cold fire, showing no signs of calming down.

Finally, someone needed to step in like a superhero on a white horse to resolve this situation. And that superhero emerged from the seat closest to the head position.

From the Royal Intelligence Service.

“That’s enough.”

An elderly man with graying hair intervened. His voice wasn’t particularly commanding, but it was enough to calm the heated atmosphere.

The old man surveyed the now quiet audience, then narrowed his wrinkled eyes and continued:

“I called for the Major.”

A grandfather I didn’t even know claimed to have called for me.

There was no need to question who this gentleman was. He sat closest to the head seat, directly opposite the Military Intelligence Agency Director.

Only one person was qualified to sit in such a position.

The Director of the Royal Intelligence Service.

He addressed me:

“You must be tired after coming such a long way. Please sit down.”

The Royal Intelligence Service Director offered me a seat with a kindly smile.

“……”

However, I didn’t sit down and instead looked at the Military Intelligence Agency commanders. My affiliation was with the Military Intelligence Agency, not the Royal Intelligence Service.

In the end, I was only able to sit in a folding chair placed at the back of the table after receiving a signal from the Director. As a soldier, this was only natural.

But this displeased the Royal Intelligence Service people (the Director of the Royal Intelligence Service is their leader), and the atmosphere in the conference room plummeted like the price of Bitcoin after a regulatory hit.

“……”

“……”

“……”

“……”

The Royal Intelligence Service and Military Intelligence Agency. Dozens of personnel stared at each other without making even a breath of sound, and then:

“Ho ho!”

The Royal Intelligence Service Director burst into laughter characteristic of an elderly person and said:

“Watching the Major reminds me exactly of when I first met our Department Head. Isn’t that right, Department Head Leoni?”

To this, a middle-aged woman sitting on the Royal Intelligence Service side responded:

“Was I like that?”

The middle-aged woman looked toward the Director and then slowly turned her gaze to look at me. Only then did I notice what she looked like.

Long bob hair that wasn’t so much grown out as simply not cut.

A small, skinny frame compared to others.

Sunken eye sockets and hollow cheeks. Prominent cheekbones.

But piercing eyes filled with intensity that made one forget all her flaws.

“Yes, identical. Do they teach that at Kelsir too?”

“I’m not sure. Anyway, I’ll take that as a compliment, Director.”

Kelsir Royal Military Academy, Class 145, Valedictorian.

The first female intelligence officer in military history.

The youngest Military Intelligence Agency intelligence agent.

The first female operative to pass the selection process.

An elite among elites who served as the Military Intelligence Agency’s Foreign Operations Department Chief for the Kiyen Empire and Branch Chief for the Lushan Federation.

A seasoned handler who controlled hundreds of operatives from the frontlines of the most intense espionage warfare.

A giant in the world of espionage who succeeded in countless covert operations while evading tight surveillance networks and killing numerous counterintelligence agents.

A living legend.

A true 007.

And…

“It’s been a while, Squad Leader.”

My former superior.

“No, now that you’re a Major, I should say Team Leader, not Squad Leader?”

“……”

“It’s truly delightful to see you after so long.”

A reunion with my former boss.

*

The character “Department Head Leoni” who appears at the end is inspired by the real-life figure Gina Haspel, the first female Director in CIA history.

Gina Haspel was an elite of elites who worked as a key figure in Africa and the Middle East, rising through important positions to become Director of the CIA’s National Clandestine Service, Deputy Director of the CIA, and finally Director of the CIA.

The National Clandestine Service was established in the late 1990s when the CIA’s HUMINT (Human Intelligence) activities were reduced, and it directs all of the CIA’s HUMINT (intelligence collection) activities and covert operations (political, economic, propaganda, deception, subversion, terrorism, and coup operations).

The human aspects and private areas are purely my creation as the author, while her capabilities served as inspiration.

Gina Haspel is the real-life inspiration for the character “Maya” in the film “Zero Dark Thirty.”

For reference, “Maya” from “Zero Dark Thirty” is a fictional character who inspired the analyst “Pippin” in this novel.