Alice shouldered her riot gun and toggled to wide disperse; the centrifuge spun up with a faint whine. The front cartridge held aluminum pellets, lethal close up, but their limited range wouldn’t reach the building rooftops. Still, it might slow a casual attacker enough to give her cover. She breathed in, ignored the pain in her ribs, and sprinted along the southern wall, minimizing her silhouette. Her footsteps crunched, the month-old layers of snow cracking like cheap wood to ghost her progress.