Inspirational quote: You can't change what's going on around you until you change what's going on within you.

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Kieran stared at Dr Kozak in disbelief, not believing anything that he had currently heard.

He nearly dropped his ice cream on the floor, making a large O shape with his mouth.

There was a vending machine on the way to the toilet, which Kieran saw so therefore decided to use. He had a bit of money on him from his suitcase so therefore he brought ice cream because it was the cheapest item there and only God knew the last time he ate.

"I'm... I'm a spy?" He repeated to Dr Kozak, pointing to himself, Dr Kozak just standing there looking at him.

Dr Kozak nodded, smiling at him.

"Yes you are. Congrats Kieran. You should be really proud of yourself."

Kieran still couldn't believe anything he was hearing or seeing. This was way too unlikely and unorthodox to be true.

"I thought you had to pass all three tests to become a spy," Kieran remembered, blinking continuously.

"I know. And you did, Kieran," Dr Kozak told him, then looked at the food on the floor. "You gonna pick that ice cream up?"

Kieran was confused until he looked down at it and knew what he was talking about. Not taking the smile off of his face, Kieran headed over to the bin and back again, Dr Kozak a bit flummoxed on how he could keep his smile going on for so long.

"How did I ace all three tests?" Kieran whispered, very jubilant looking.

Bringing out his iPad from his lab coat, Dr Kozak went on it and clicked something, presumably Kieran's name, and showed him how he aced all the tests, explaining everything to him as well.

"Test one. Even though you did the wrong one, you still made it out alive, which was exactly how and why you passed the test. If you had died which you kinda nearly did, or had gotten disqualified, you would have failed instantaneously."

Kieran smiled.

"What about the test of justice?"

Dr Kozak flashed a very massive smile towards Kieran's direction.

"Believe it or not, you actually did really well."

Kieran wasn't convinced, so his smile dropped even though he did really well.

"You're probably just saying that to flatter me. I probably got like ten percent."

Dr Kozak shook his head.

"No actually. You got the opposite. You got ninety percent. You beat 94% of people that took the test. Someone got a hundred once. Somehow. I bet they cheated. The test is really hard."

Kieran was about to faint but didn't once he remembered that Dr Kozak was in front of him and not behind.

"How did I get ninety? You're probably just lying."

"Nope. I've got your test with me Kieran, I have proof. Look at it."

Dr Kozak gave Kieran's test back to him, and he couldn't stop staring at the score it said.

"You got 324 out of 360. That's ninety percent, Kieran. Well technically you got 314 because we mark you based on how neat your work is, out of ten, ten being the neatest." Dr Kozak explained. "And uhm, your handwriting is beautiful. So beautiful that when I was marking it, I got really jealous. So I gave you ten."

Kieran was utterly astonished. This was one of the best things that had ever happened to him in his life, so unexpectedly he hugged Dr Kozak.

"Where did I lose marks?" He wanted to know.

"Well... Your drawing of a rhombicosidodecahedron was very inaccurate, no offence. And well, some of your answers kind of made me laugh, like in the history section when I asked you 'why did Henry VIII have six wives?' you put 'because he has a problem with women' when the answer I was looking for was 'because none of them gave birth to a son, which Henry wanted'. Or something alone those lines, you don't exactly have to copy the mark scheme."

Dr Kozak burst out laughing remembering some of the other answers that Kieran had guessed for his test, but didn't say any of them out loud in case it had offended Kieran.

"So how did I pass the last test if Lauriel told me that there's no pass fail?" Kieran asked, handing Dr Kozak back his test of justice.

"Truth be told, everyone passes. Ever since I first made the test back 15 years ago, there hasn't been anyone that hasn't freaked out. So yeah, everyone passes. Well done."

Kieran had to hug Dr Kozak again because he was just so freaking triumphant at the moment.

He yelled 'I'm a spy!' about a billion times, walking out of the room. In the meantime, forgetting that he had to tell Kieran something, Dr Kozak froze and brought Kieran back by holding onto his arm.

"What was that for?" Kieran howled in pain.

"Kieran. I forgot to tell you something." Dr Kozak said nothing else, placing both of his hands on Kieran's shoulders and directly staring at him in the eyes.

"You can not tell anyone that you are a spy. Okay? This is very important. If you tell someone, people will most likely track me down and get me arrested, 'cause this whole thing's illegal. Okay?"

Kieran nodded, telling Dr Kozak that he understood. He was about to go again, until Dr Kozak held him back, placing one hand on each of Kieran's shoulders once again.

"Kieran. I mean it. Promise me you won't tell anyone. I am very paranoid about these type of things. I told someone that they shouldn't tell anyone and they did, and I was so mad at them I had to kill them. Please. I don't want to do the same thing to you. I really trust you."

Kieran grimaced complacently to himself.

"Chillax, Kozak. I promise. I'm very very good at keeping secrets. I promise that I won't tell anyone that I am a spy."

Dr Kozak didn't reply, and let go of Kieran's shoulders, walking away with him.

"No one out of KOZAHKISTAN HEADQUARTERS I mean," he added, Dr Kozak just staring at him.

"You can't anyway. I need to tell you something about this place Kieran. It doesn't actually exist."

Kieran was perplexed and stopped walking immediately once Dr Kozak had said that.

"What?" Kieran told him, poking Dr Kozak's face until he became so fully agitated he rolled his eyes. "So you're not a real person?"

"I am. And everyone else here is as well. It's just that this building... Kind of isn't."

Kieran shook his head.

"I don't understand."

Dr Kozak let out a stressed sigh before doing the same thing again in absolute frustration.

"This place is real, however simultaneously imaginary. It's kind of hard to explain without some sort of phone or computer. Do you have your phone on you, Kieran?"

Kieran nodded, bringing it out and handing it over to Dr Kozak.

"What happened to yours?"

"Died; charging in my room. Anyway..." He played around with Kieran's phone, making Kieran shocked because he didn't even ask for his password and it was honestly unlocked.

"How the heck do you know what my phone password is without even asking me?"

"Kid, I know everyone's phone password. Even if you changed it, I'd still know." Dr Kozak answered, half smirking in the process as he did so as well. "Anyway. Here's what I mean by the place being half real and half imaginary."

He handed Kieran's phone to him, where a photo of KOZAHKISTAN HEADQUARTERS on the outside appeared.

"Here's the front of this building from my point of view," Dr Kozak told him, both of them concurrently looking down at it.

"...and here's the building from somebody else's point of view," Dr Kozak muttered.

Kieran looked at it from Kozak's perspective and then from somebody else's.

"It's not there."

Dr Kozak nodded in agreement.

"Yeah. It's invisible."

Kieran didn't know about anyone else, but he honestly found that very cool.

"That's awesome. But how?"

"I get to choose who sees KOZAHKISTAN HEADQUARTERS and who doesn't," he explained. "So far, because there are 37,483 people here as of today, then that means 37,483 people can see the building. If you're not part of those 37K people then you can't. It's as simple as Astera trying to tell me I'm beautiful everyday."

This place was actually really awesome. Kieran liked it here. It beat staying at home anyway, with his dead stepfather and dead serial killer stepmother.

Kieran was actually a hundred percent sure he was going to like it here.

Despite the tests.

"Do you ever leave this place? Or have you stayed here since you made it a few years ago."

Dr Kozak cleared his throat quickly before saying anything else.

"Good question. I usually just stay here really. We have everything. Why do you think we have 50K rooms?"

Kieran didn't reply, just shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly. He guessed that it was a rhetorical question.

"So.. Am I a spy now? We've been walking for ages. Where are you taking me?"

Dr Kozak genuinely didn't say anything, for about a mere twenty seconds anyway as he was thinking of what to say, that was intelligent.

"Oh you are a spy..." He said, trailing off, looking back at Kieran. "Right after we sort out your costume first. Come on. Let's go."

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Moral of chapter: Sometimes you might be scared of getting a result back for something until it turns out that you actually did really well in it.