Fiver O'Neil

What do I say about my past? That's a very good question. What do I say about my past?
I'm Fiver O'Neil. Well, my name is actually Peter Paul, but the only person allowed to call me that is my mom. I'm seventeen, although I look older. Twenty-two or twenty-three, depending on who you ask. What else? Hmm. I'm two-hundred and eight cems tall, with sort of a permanent tan due to some Tierra Nueva blood a few generations back. My hair is a light red--my mother calls it strawberry-blond--with a white streak running back from my right temple. What am I leaving out? Oh, my eyes are brown.
Of course I'm evading the question. Very well. But remember, I did warn you. My mom is an operative. My dad is the head of Medical. I'm one of Hell's Belles, born and raised to it. No, the organization isn't all-female, and hasn't been for more than two-hundred years. Nor are we the immoral spies and thieves and such that Odrin Brendan would have you believe we are. We're private contractors, yes, but . . . oh hell, how can I explain. People are so very important. Hell's Belles are there to protect them. If all else fails, we put ourselves between them and harm.
I am operative, as are my sister Trina and my brother Timmy. I've never wanted to be anything else. None of us have. MJ did a few years on standard duty--keeping a non-custodial parent from doing a snatch and grab on their kid, for example--but she was never as sure about it as the rest of us were, and she ended up in medical. That's just the way it works sometimes. Then again, she's the only one who didn't get our mom's photographic memory. I took my first assignment when I was six, and I've never regretted a moment of my chosen service. Ever. Even . . .
When I was twelve, I picked up my nickname because I knew I was going on an assignment that would get me raped, to put it very bluntly. I didn't want to go into it a virgin. So I didn't. The assignment was . . . well, you'll need background. Hell's Belles are not well-liked, due to our public image. A certain Continental Councilman was gunning to get at least a lot of strictures on us, and if possible destroy the organization altogether. And he was popular enough he might have been able to carry it out. We had to take him down. No, not kill him, that would defeat the purpose. We had to discredit him. We hear things that no one else hears, and the Councilman was rumored to have a certain fondness for barely pubescing boys. We needed information against him. Mother asked me to go, and I agreed.
We got the information, and I got more than I bargained for. The Councilman liked to do more than anyone had expected with boys, some of it painful. He took a knife to me. I won't go into detail. His entire household knew, including my backup. It was time to blow cover. They came in after me. By that point I was bleeding badly, and the Councilman held me as a hostage. The stalemate ended when he blew his brains out. All over me, incidentally. I almost died, and when I came out of the depression that followed, I discovered a streak of my hair had gone white.
Maybe that explains better than I could have otherwise just what Hell's Belles are.
I was sixteen when I started bumping into the Room. I don't know how to explain it. It looks perfectly normal, just like our front lobby, and while you're there, time doesn't pass where you were. I know that doesn't make any sense. Deal with it. The first time I found myself there I was going out of my mind worrying that Mother was going to kill me for being gone without getting leave. That's how I discovered the time-thing, actually. After that, it became a place to relax because I didn't have to worry about getting back. I met a lot of interesting people there, from many different places and times, and even from times that never happened where I come from, times in which the Collapse never happened. Very strange, but rather fun.