I Saw the Team Leader's Secret Account

The sleeve of my dress shirt was crumpled beyond recognition, beaten into submission by Subway Line 2. I rolled it up as I pushed open the office door.

Keyboard clatter and the mechanical drone of scripted phone greetings tangled together inside the 12th Floor Planning Team Office.

"Junhyuk, since you're in, fill the ice in the pantry first, and check the printer paper."

A cold voice hit me the instant I set my bag down. Kim Ahyoung — the colleague who'd joined all of three months before me and used that as a license to dump ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠every menial chore on my head.

"Yes, understood."

I gave a perfunctory nod, returned to my desk, and sat. Pretending to organize my bag, I pressed the power button on the ten-year-old piece of junk they called a computer.

A nauseating whir of the fan, and a crude bluish glow washed across the monitor. In one corner of the desktop, a black icon sat planted as if it owned the place.

I remembered yesterday's mandatory security-update popup. The moment I hit the blue update button, the fan had spun itself into a frenzy and error windows had flooded the screen. The relic's wretched processing speed had choked, and the IT team's internal test-server data had overwritten itself onto my PC.

Those incompetent IT bastards. This is what happens when you do your job like garbage.

Full administrative privileges for a surveillance module that only the IT director or the CEO should have held. A weapon of enormous power, sitting on a ten-year-old office fossil.

I'd tested the remote access from home last night. I was certain. With this program, I could set the entire 12th-floor Planning Team in the palm of my hand and look down on all of them.

A simple test had confirmed the essentials.

That was about the shape of it. For certain functions I could move a mouse pointer, click through to programs running in the background — that sort of thing.

I gently took the mouse and double-clicked the icon.

A cascade. The moment the window opened, some thirty monitor screens from the 12th-floor office unfurled in a grid of thumbnails. Above each one, employee numbers, names, and currently active programs updated in real time.

Someone browsing clothes on a shopping site. Someone who'd minimized a stock-trading window. Someone tearing into their boss over the company messenger.

The ugly, lazy underbelly hidden behind the office's noble, professional daily life. The instant the monitor's blue light caught in my pupils, a shiver ran up from the base of my spine, accompanied by a strange, intoxicating sense of superiority.

Five minutes ago I had been a crumpled intern, jostled in a Line 2 subway packed like a can of sardines. The moment I clocked in, I'd been told to fill the pantry ice. But now — in this moment, in this space — I was the only one looking down on the truth of it all.

Let's see what the rest of these people are up to this morning.

I twisted the corner of my mouth and slowly scrolled the mouse wheel. The first thing that caught my eye was Assistant Manager Park's monitor — the guy with a reputation for being good at his job.

On one of his dual monitors an Excel window sat open, the cursor darting busily across the cells. Hidden behind it: a cryptocurrency exchange. Red lights and blue lights flashing in a chaotic dance, and Assistant Manager Park's seed money sitting at minus forty-two percent.

"Heh... Assistant Manager Park, getting your soul wrung out first thing in the morning. Stocks and crypto — a total bloodbath."

I glanced at the next desk. Park Cheolmin was sighing, gulping down an iced americano. The fact that I alone knew the reason for that ashen expression — I couldn't help a little snort of laughter.

Next: Manager Jeong from HR, infamous around the company for being a stickler.

The woman who enforced company policy like a blade and even monitored the interns' clock-in times. But in one corner of her monitor, a shopping-cart window sat open without a shred of shame. She was adding and removing luxury designer bags from an overseas site, each one running close to a thousand dollars. Manager Jeong's fingers weren't executing company regulations. They were trembling over the checkout button.

All that talk of rules and principles on the outside, and inside she's just a woman stuffed with vanity.

This time I clicked on Assistant Manager Choi's PC — the guy who played the cheerful, approachable senior around the interns.

He was chatting with another employee over company messenger.

The filthy gossip and sexual remarks of workplace superiors who played the gentleman in person poured endlessly across my junk computer's monitor. Who was trash-talking whom. Who was digging into whose past. Whose stocks were getting demolished. Every secret on this 12th-floor office was being laid bare under a single finger of mine.

The difference between master and servant, superior and subordinate, the class gap between people — none of it meant a thing in front of this surveillance module. The people who'd walked past me like I was an insect were, in truth, nothing but ugly humans steeped in hypocrisy and desire.

What a circus. They're all wearing their masks of pretense and having a grand old time.

My fingertips trembled slightly as I moved the cursor.

So then. Who should I cook first?

The first thumbnail that caught my eye was my neighboring colleague, Kim Ahyoung. I clicked her PC screen and enlarged it. An Excel window open, pretending to be busy at the keyboard — but tucked in the corner, a secret company-messenger conversation.

The real face of the woman who'd been playing the kind senior to my face. While I was at it, I dug into her secondary Instagram account. Under photos of luxury bags, conversations setting up weekend dates with three different men.

Not even two-timing. Three-timing.

I snorted and saved Kim Ahyoung's screen to a capture folder. But this was just small-time gossip. I scrolled further down.

The head of the Planning Team. The untouchable Ice Goddess. The married Team Leader, Han Yujin. A body and face so perfect you wouldn't believe she was in her mid-thirties. A husband who was a researcher at a major corporation. The woman who normally walked past an intern like me as if I were a bug.

I clicked. In one corner of the screen, a minimized private web browser. A secret transgression community she'd joined behind her husband's back.

The moment I clicked the attached photo, my ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠breath caught in my throat. A shameful pose, the skirt of her expensive office look hiked up just slightly. And beneath it, the damp, lewd comments of strange men. Her personal storage folder was packed with explicit selfies she'd taken behind her husband's back.

"Team Leader, if you could review this quarter's proposal."

Someone held out a document, and Han Yujin instantly put on that cold, cutting gaze and delivered a harsh critique. On the surface, the perfect female superior. Behind it, a married woman starving for filthy transgression. The hair-raising gap of it sent a violent shiver down my spine.

So this is it.

A few mouse clicks, and the honor, the family, the pride she'd spent a lifetime building would shatter in an instant. I captured every secret post and every photo without missing a single one, and dropped them into a dedicated folder.

5:50 p.m.

As a hush settled over the office, I opened the company's anonymous messenger.

I attached the most explicit capture and hit send.

A moment later, Han Yujin at the team leader's desk went rigid as a statue. That proud face turned ashen in an instant, her trembling hand clutching the mouse. A cursor lurching in panic. She tried to close the window, hit a notification instead, fumbled the cable — frantic, unsteady movements. A single anonymous message and one photograph, and she was coming completely undone.

Love watching the reaction in real time.

I smirked and played with my fingers.

The reply came at the speed of light. I could practically see her fingers shaking like mad. A woman who'd spent her whole life standing over other people's heads, about to be demolished by a few mouse clicks. The sense of dominion at my fingertips swelled beyond control.

The police? I let out a low, grinding laugh.

The pleading text arrived, and Han Yujin rose from her seat with a deathly pale face. A faintly trembling phone. Shallow breaths through a neat blouse. The way she scanned the entire office with eyes full of terror and suspicion was almost pitiful.

Yes. That's the expression. Trembling like a little rat suits you perfectly, Team Leader.

From my corner desk, bathed in the blue light of the junk computer, Intern Lee Junhyuk was the last person she would ever suspect. She clutched her bag and hurried toward Meeting Room 2.

But I didn't get up right away. The one ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠who holds the initiative does not rush. Leave her alone in a dark conference room, and let the terror bleed her dry, minute by minute. I looked at the clock at my leisure. One minute. Two minutes. Three...

"Ahyoung, I'm going to the restroom for a bit."

"Oh, and while you're at it, move some A4 paper into the pantry. For a man, you've got zero sense."

Kim Ahyoung, still treating me like a servant, smiling as she said it.

Oh, sure, Ahyoung. You're next after the Team Leader, so look forward to it.

I swallowed a pleasant laugh and stood up. The promised ten minutes were almost up.

"Yes, Senior Ahyoung. I'll take care of it as soon as I'm back."

I put on the harmless, clumsy smile of an intern. And with calm, unhurried steps, I walked toward the dark, sealed Meeting Room 2.

Toward the woman waiting for me there — the once-perfect female superior I was going to break in and make entirely mine.