David huffed the black case up the last set of stairs and onto the roof, panting hard.

Behind him came two other men, one a national guardsman and the other wearing jeans, a black t-shirt, and a light jacket.

"All right, Dave, start setting the rifle up over there," the guardsman said, pointing to the edge of the roof.

"Yea, I'm going, dammit," the aging David muttered as he jogged over and set down the enormous black case and opened it. Inside was a giant rifle, two halves separated.

As he started putting it together the third man came up and put his backpack on the ground, proceeding to unzip it and dump out four giant magazines for the rifle, as well as a military can that had more loose rounds.

The guardsman's radio squawked as someone called in, yelling that, "We can't hold them back any longer! We've lost two of our trucks and we're pulling back across the bridge! We need the mortars ready to lay down fire, and those rifles need to be ready to fire NOW!"

David inserted the final pin into the rifle, making it ready to fire, and then deployed the bi-pod, laying it on the edge of the roof.

Seventy feet below guardsmen, wounded and not, were running as quickly as possible across the bridge.

The building shook as an artillery round smashed into the city behind them, and it seemed that the gunfire coming from across the river increased in intensity.

As the last guardsmen made their way across the bridge the gunfire seemed to stop, and the air suddenly became quite still.

Then a whirring sound could be heard coming from far away, and a few moments after that two black shapes appeared from behind of the city scape before them.

"Give me one of the armor piercing magazines, NOW," David ordered the other civilian, Jeffery, as he eyed the two Mi-28's coming towards them.

"Here you go!" panted Jeffery, handing him one of the book-sized magazines.

David inserted it into the magazine well and pulled back the monstrous bolt, loading one of the fifty caliber armor piercing rounds into the chamber.

The two helicopters nosed up and then stayed four hundred yards away, hovering above the suburbs.

Then a sound like a rip saw rent the air, and the building next to the sniper team's was chewed into by nearly one hundred explosive thirty millimeter rounds.

David's heart beat in his throat as he looked through the scope and sighted in on one of the attack helicopters.

He steadied his trigger finger, breathed deeply, and then fired. He recovered from the shot and fired again a second later, and then again, and then again.

At first nothing appeared to happen, but then the helicopter pitched forwards and to the left and then crashed into the ground below.

The whole thing took nearly fifteen seconds, and that was it.

David tried to move in on the second helicopter, but it was too late. He could only watch as it flew up and away.

David pulled the magazine out from the rifle and pulled the bolt back, ejecting the round, and then peered across the river to see if there was any activity.

"...All mortar teams, we have a lock on enemy forces, grid location seventeen degrees north, eighteen degrees east. Fire four round barrages now."

Behind them there came a slight whooshing as the mortars fired, and fifteen seconds later the first of the cracking explosions sounded over the barren urban land scape.

As David watched the fireworks put on by the mortars he felt his ancient cell phone vibrate once in his pocket. After turning onto his side he was able to fish it out and open it to read a text message that said, "Dad, we're all out. Last civilians on the way to Anchorage."

The guardsman walked over and asked, "Well?"

"Yea, everyone's out but us," David replied.

"All right, Nappster, this is the Watchtower. We've received confirmation that all civilians are out of the city and general area. It's just us now."

David tuned out the ensuing conversation, watching the landscape before him through his binoculars.

There, he saw something!

Zooming in his suspicions were confirmed - there was a Russian marksman moving around in a store across the street. He was staying back so as to be less noticeable, but David had been watching at just the right moment.

"Jeffery, normals, now," he muttered, taking the magazine that was offered to him a moment later and inserting it into the rifle, pulling the bolt back again.

Zooming in on the Russian who was looking elsewhere with his rifle David breathed deeply again, pulled back slowly...

The gun belched flame and roared, and the Russian's lungs and heart were spread out onto the floor behind him.

Jeffery watched this through his own pair of binoculars and then took out a knife and marked a sixth notch above the left lens.

Twenty minutes passed, David and Jeffery both scanning the urban environment below them for any sign of hostile forces.

Twenty more minutes passed.

Occasionally the whoosh of a mortar could be heard, and a small while after that the thud of a distant explosion.

After an hour Jeffery exclaimed excitedly that he had something moving down Illinois Street, it looked like an armored division.

"Confirmed," a guardsman reported over the radio. "It looks like we've got about twenty vehicles, including six T-90's. They've come to a stop for the moment, though, but I can see infantry moving up. It looks like they're getting ready to push."

"Roger that," another guardsman replied on the same wave. "Everybody dig in. I'm initiating a tactical withdrawal soon, but not yet. We need to make them think that we're going to fight this out. Mortar section Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie, begin constant bombardment, location nineteen north, nineteen east. Rifle section Bravo, take up position in the Marriott."

The mortar rounds began to tear up the earth behind the old hospital, prompting screams and the occasional gunshot.

After two minutes another report came over the radios, this time it was confirmed - the Russians were moving forwards.

The first vehicle to come into view was a T-90 Main Battle Tank, the long barrel turning to find a target in the urban landscape. Behind it came two BMP-3's, and behind those two BTR-90's. Behind those came another T-90, and then another, and another. It seemed only half the column was advancing immediately.

When the vehicles were within one hundred and fifty feet a single word was broad casted over all radios: "Fire."

Immediately there came a whoosh as a Javelin missile was launched, arcing up into the air above the scene. Time seemed to stop as David, Jonathon, and every person who witnessed the launch of the rocket watched it come to the vertex of its flight and begin to rush down wards and -

There was a bright flash of light and an explosion as the missile impacted on the top of the lead T-90, instantly gutting the interior of the tank.

Moments later a second detonated behind the rear tank.

It only took five seconds for things to get really hairy - the barrels of Kalashnikovs began poking out the windows of the old hospital, and 7.62 millimeter rounds began breaking windows and chipping concrete on David's side of the bridge.

A second later and over one hundred rifles wielded by National Guardsmen and civilians who stayed behind alike returned fire. On each side men screamed out as they were shot, and then the crews in the vehicles came to their senses.

First the two BTRs fired, pounding thirty millimeter shots into buildings. Then the two BMPs fired their hundred millimeter main guns, and the sixth floor of the building below David was gutted.

Soon the fifty caliber machine guns on top of the T-90s were spraying lead into the buildings before them, and then the tanks themselves fired.

First the one in the rear, and then the other one, sent two high-explosive 125 millimeter rounds into the Marriott Hotel. Ten men died instantly, seven others were wounded.

By now David already had a magazine of armor piercing rounds in his rifle, with one in the chamber, and he was now sighting in on the right BTR.

He knew that a shot to the front of the vehicle would be useless, but at this range it would be easy to disable the thirty millimeter guns. First one shot, then a second left the two assault vehicles unable to fight. Not only that, but when the guns tried to fire they exploded in the gunners' faces.

David then focused his scope on the chest of the gunner on the front surviving tank behind the BTRs and fired once, and then did the same to the one behind him, sending their blood cascading into the cabins below.

At this point the driver of the right BTR started to turn his vehicle away to fall back. This was a mistake, as the moment that the side of his vehicle was exposed David was sighted in on it and firing, sending four rounds into the thinner side armor.

Though David had no idea where the driver sat in the vehicle he seemed to have hit him anyways, and the BTR suddenly revved and smashed into the small white church next to it.

By now the two tanks had their guns loaded again, and they fired into the hotel again.

For a moment the fight continued, but then it became apparent that something important had taken a bad hit, because the hotel started to lean over on one side. And then half of it fell in on itself.

"...All soldiers, this is Colonel Johansen. Pull back immediately. Remaining Bravo company soldiers, get out of the buildings now before they collapse on you. Mortars, continue firing until we've pulled out to your line. Repeat, we are falling back now. Friendly air strike is imminent."

David picked up his rifle, engaging the safety, and slung it onto his back. He grabbed the case and then began to run for the stairs, the other guardsman and Jeffery close behind them.

They would make it out alive.

As a pair of two thousand pounds gravity bombs fell onto the bridge, sending it the bottom of the river, new reporters all over the country were only then starting to send out emergency broadcasts about the Russian advance on Alaska.

The evacuation was the timeliest ever, with over a hundred thousand people evacuated in less than six hours.

In the first twenty-four hours of fighting between guardsmen and other military personnel in the state over two thousand brave American soldiers lost their lives. Beside them fought over a thousand volunteer civilians of whom only two hundred lived.

The Russians suffered heavy casualties, and it is thought that if the resistance put against them by the local forces hadn't been so tenacious the Red Tide may have actually made it to the American ABM system and started a nuclear war.

The monument that now stands in the middle of rebuilt down-town Alaska has the names of all those who died in the first twenty four hours, Russian and American alike. It continues to be an inspiration and a reminder of the horrors of war to those who live on today.

And yet, to others it remind only of horrible loss. The loss of fathers, of brothers, of daughters, of sons. The loss of husbands and wives, fiances and lovers.

-The New York Times, February seventeenth, 2015.