Series 1

In Westminster there stands a drab building, peopled by ambitious men wielding great power in total secrecy, Among its staff are Neil Burnside and Willis Caine, for whom the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) is not just a way of life, but life itself. Neil Burnside, the Director of Operations SIS, objects to sending his best agents, the Sandbaggers, on a mission into Russia for Norway's Secret Service.

When Sir Donald Hopkins, a top government advisor, is unexpectedly seen in Vienna, it is suspected that he intends to defect. The Sandbaggers are sent to Vienna to keep tabs on him. Meanwhile, an East African dictator has been executing British citizens, and SIS has put together a proposal for his assassination.

Alan Denson threatens to quit the Sandbaggers after a rough, unauthorized assassination mission near the Soviet border, so Burnside applies pressure to Denson's fiancee.

There has never been a woman in SIS's Special Operations Section, but with only one Sandbagger left to him, Burnside faces a crisis. The Training School can offer no one... except the enigmatic Laura Dickens. Sandbagger One Willie Caine goes to Gibraltar to investigate the murder of an SIS agent, and the new potential Sandbagger Laura Dickens goes to Morocco to get more clues in the case.

Laura Dickens is assigned to find out where an Arab sheik's sympathies lie, while Burnside clashes with Deputy Chief Matthew Peele and the Ministry of Defence over a covert scuba-diving operation.

Caine and an agent fresh out of field school, go to Cyprus on the trail of some missing rocket scientists, while Neil lets his romantic guard down at home.

Laura Dickens is the most qualified agent for a risky mission in East Berlin and Burnside has to double-deal to make sure her presence there won't pose other security risks as well.