My sister Ezra and I grew up poor. We never knew our father and mother never talked about him.

Ezzy and I were 8 at the time when the men came. Ezra had hid me in the upstairs closet and told me not to come put unless she or mother told me it was OK. I could hear everything from in there, it's almost as if the sounds were amplified in that tiny closet. I could hear my mother begging the men not to hurt us, that they could do what they wanted with her but to leave us alone. The sound of glass shattering was quickly followed by the loud pops of a gun.

I remember covering my ears and squeezing my eyes shut, trying to block everything out. I don't entirely know what happened next but what I do know is that I found myself in the back of an ambulance, wrapped in a blanket, red and blue flashing all around me. I stared into the concerned face of a fireman, his mouth moving but no sound came out. Sweat dripped down his charred face as he continued to try for my attention. Passed him laid nothing but a black, hollow, shell of what used to be my home. White smoke billowed from every window as the other firemen continued to spray water into the window of what used to be my bedroom.

I still remember the smell of the air that night, the way a light breeze graced my tear-streaked face as they told me my mother and sister were gone. To this day, I don't know what happened after Ezra hid me in that closet or how the fire started. Every day since then I had to fend for myself, Ezra was no longer there to hide behind.

When I was 12 I got into my first fight. The older girl had been bullying me since I started 7th grade and I'd had enough. What pushed me over the edge wasn't the food in my hair or the spit balls that would land in my lunch or even my soaking wet shoes from being dunked in the toilet at gym. It was the comment about my family-how could anyone love me? After all, my mother and sister set fire to our home just to get away from me.

I lost it. I screeched as loud as I could as I stood from my desk and ran at her. In a flurry of arms and legs, I ripped hair, bit skin and hit at everything I could. I gripped her hair at the scalp and jerked my arm down as hard as I could, slamming her head into the desk a couple of times before she threw herself forward, toppling us to the ground in a tangled mess. At some point I bit her arm hard enough that I almost gagged on her blood. She furiously scratched and clawed at me as I rolled myself on top of her. I ripped her hands from my own hair and managed to pin them beneath my knees while I straddled her. Balling up my fists, I only managed two solid hits before the teacher grabbed me by my collar and tossed me off of the girl. It was that day that I realized I liked fighting, the adrenaline rush that comes from pulverizing your opponent is unlike anything I've ever felt. Needless to say, that girl never even breathed in my direction again.

I got myself kicked out of many schools, pushing my foster mom over the edge. On my 16th birthday, Bette, my foster mother, tossed me out. She told me to never step foot in her home again as long as she lived. That was second time I lost my family and home, except this time it was my fault. I remember walking away from the house with a pit in my stomach when I realized what I'd done. I somehow managed to survive, bouncing house to house, couch to couch. I eventually found myself at rock bottom with a needle in my arm.

The poison I'd injected myself with flooded my senses with euphoria as I flew through the sky. It was only the second time I'd done heroin, and thank god it was my last. My friend at the time- and I use that term loosely- had hooked me up with enough to last me a couple of days but failed to mention the part where his dealer fronted him the drugs promising me as payment. When said dealer came to collect, I was already out of my mind and on another planet. The grungy, dirty man picked me up and took me behind the house we were in and used me violently. I was bruised and beaten half to death and only realized how bad it was when I couldn't even lift my self from the dirt.

A man walking his dog found me lying there half naked and nearly dead. As it turns out, this man was a detective for the NYPD. Instead of ringing me through the system like he could have, he took me in and gave me a place to call home. As long as I helped around the house and did basic upkeep I was aloud to stay. That Christmas, Bobby gave me a box with papers for me to sign to make him my legal guardian. By the time I turned 17 I had already finished high school and was looking to get into college. Bobby taught me to work with my hands with cars, computers, house renovations, everything. My personal favorite was when I would tinker with electronics, learning what made them tick and tock.

College taught me actual computer work, the true innards of it all. I typed my way to the top of my class and by 20 I was building firewalls for fortune 500 companies.

At 21, I now have a career with BlackStoneTech as the head of the cyber division. My job was a breeze, everything came to me naturally when I would stare at the screen of a monitor. It was the one thing that made me feel like I had control over what I did and how I did it.

However, as nice as my life was currently treating me, some days I felt like I was missing something. I had a small house that I had decorated myself entirely. I painted the walls myself and even put in my own carpet, there was not a single thing about the house that I didn't do myself, aside from the occasional plumbing issues.

I don't really go out much besides to get takeout only to find myself in front of an old movie at home. Looking back on it all, I feel a sense of pride when I think of how far I've truly come. I survived absolute hell and came out on top.

It's Friday night and I can finally relax and let go of the stressful week I've had with fast approaching deadlines and a hacker that is testing my abilities. For the last week or so, someone had managed to break through three of my firewalls and began to weasel his or her way into the company's sensitive financial information. I've sealed off and moved all of the critical parts to a separate, self sustaining system that's completely separate from the main servers. I've tried everything I could think of to back trace the signal and end the cyber attack but nothing was working. I quickly tossed the thoughts aside; it's my weekend and I don't need to be thinking about work at the moment.

I glanced over to the stove clock and saw that it read 9:47pm. God, what am I doing, I need to get out of the house and away from the threat of being consumed by thoughts of work. A hard knock at the door startled me.

I looked at the clock again: 9:49pm. Someone had better be dead or I swear to anything out there, someone will be dead. Who the hell shows up at someone's home this late at night?

I shuffled my way over to the door, first check the top drawer of the stand next to it to make sure my 9mm was in there with the clip in. Peaking through the peep-hole, I saw three men standing there, the one in the front is in a black suit with a stern look on his face. The two behind him were dressed in military clothes, both standing very still. I opened the door slightly, not removing the chain on the door.

"Can I help you?" I asked, gauging their reactions.

"Tesla East?" The man in black asked?

"Yes." I said slowly.

"I'm General Stone of the United States army and I need to speak with you about an urgent matter."

"Can I see some ID, please?" I narrowed my gaze at him as he reached behind him and pulled out a small folded badge.

"A careful woman, just what we are looking for." He gave a small smile as he flashed his badge at me, pausing to let me read it.

"What can I do for you?" I asked a little more relaxed.

"May we come in?" It sounded like a question but his tone told me I shouldn't refuse. I nodded and, unlatching the chain from the door and stepping back, giving the three men entry into my home.

After they settled themselves on to my couches and I sat across from them in a recliner he began.

"As you know, BlackStoneTech has been under cyber attack for about a week now," there goes my work free weekend.

"I am very aware, tracking the attackers has proven to be challenging." I nodded.

He smirked, "That's because it is us. We are your 'hackers' as it were."

"Excuse me?" I stared at him, what the hell is going on?

"Yes, your company provides the military with cyber security for certain sectors of the Army. You Miss East, have been battling our top people and you have proven yourself as someone we would like to use."

"You've been messing with me? Is there a reason you couldn't have talked about this with me at work and not on my weekend?" Who the hell does he think he is? Do I look like someone who appreciates being stressed out for the sake of playing games?

"We had originally planned to discuss this with you Monday morning but the situation has become increasingly urgent."

"I'm sorry, why don't you use your own people?" My tone let slip my irritation.

"You beat them. All of them. We need someone from the outside to take a look at the situation and assess it from a different perspective."

"So that means what exactly, I trump around your base staring at your equipment?"

"Not exactly. You'll be on a base, just not here. You'll be in Iraq."