After basic training Alice had been sent to the Texas wall. Half the time she worked as a sniper from the armored turrets, the other half was spent in the wilderness tracking down insurgents. Out there she had taken point duty more than any other Marine. Her sergeant even joked about it, said she was a telepath or some high-tech cyborg. It wasn’t that. She’d spent years in the abattoir of New York City, honing her survival instincts to a keen edge, and had learned to trust her feelings. Now they were telling her something was off, she just didn’t know what.