Aura Willet, Varsity Runner for Central High and accomplished procrastinator, found herself staggering out of practice once again. She was tired, and for the fiftieth time she questioned why she put herself through this. She was on the 9th and final mile of today's long run, and she was working hard to keep her form together and her body moving in the right direction. She emerged from the forest trail that she had chosen as her running path at a light run and saw her coach and two of the other runners on the team waiting. She reached them and immediately stopped, trying her very best to catch her breath as sweat rolled off her body.

Her coach dismissed her to stretch so thats what she did, concentrating on walking normally over to the nearby school parking lot. It took her 10 minutes to stretch herself out. After that, she bid goodbye to her teammates and walked over to her truck, unlocking it and climbing into the cab as she shut the door with a big slam. It was a Black 2000 Chevy Silverado, and she was particularly proud of her truck's good condition, or at least on the outside. On the inside, it was a cluttered mess just like Aura's room at her house, littered with school papers, running clothes and assorted other things.

It took her only five minutes to drive to her house in Santa Cruz, pulling into the driveway and shutting the door with a loud thud as she yanked her keys out and slide from the cab. She casually flicked the only other key on her keychain into her hand as she walked up to her front door. Locking her truck as she walked in, via the remote, she shouted "I'm home!" However, she was greeted with nothing more than silence and a note on the counter next to the door. Apparently her parents were going to be at work late, so she had to fend for herself for supper.

She groaned in dismay at yet another night of Hot Pockets supplemented with a bottle of water, but for now gathered a new set of clothes, athletic shorts and a comfortable T-shirt. After taking a long shower and changing, she set to cooking her own supper, or rather heating up her favorite Hot Pocket, and was done eating in 10 minutes. With a light groan of boredom, she walked into her room and slumped down into her computer chair, booting up the gaming computer that was her true pride and joy. As she waited for the boot process to finish, she thought to herself "I wish something cool would happen, every day has just been the same old same old for the last forever!"

Santa Cruz, a beautiful city on the coast of California and has its famous boardwalk with the Giant Dipper. Simon loved the beach and got a job at a surf shop in order to stay near the beach either known he has an apartment down the block for the surf shop. He got a day off from work because he hadn't had a day off and people were parked on the beach for fun, so he needed to have fun. The owner knew Simon that he had no day off so far and gave him one because he worked so hard, even joked about becoming the owner. It was 3:30 in the afternoon and the parking lot was full of cars and the local shops were packed to full, even the surfboards at the surf shop were almost empty. With one cup of water in one hand, he walked onto the sandy beach and couldn't help but smiled. The beach reminded him of the tales that his mother would tell other family members on Thanksgiving or on any holiday.

He walked towards the sea and saw tons of people either on the water or resting on the sand, he saw a group of kids building sand castles. He decided to walk back towards his home until he saw something within the sea's horizon, he didn't know what it was but it looked like a cruise ship. Then some people saw it as well and went on with their lives, ships normally pass this beach. Simon decided to keep walking back to his home, it was just a block away from the beach, and he looked up and saw a KTLA Five news helicopter above the beach. He went from the beach to the street, he saw the parking lot starting to be empty out and then seen people going to the boardwalk. He opened his door with the keys in his pocket and closed the door once he went inside; he went to the couch and turned the TV on. He went to channel five and wanted to know about the news, but it was on commercials about Carl's Jr. Simon waited as the commercial ended and the 4:00 news began.

Simon sat and heard through the news as they were talking about Russia's actions over at Europe and how the military has increased more than ever in Europe and the Middle East. He put his feet on the table and grabbed a cup of water that he left at the table early and looked at the weather, sunny for the week and high temperatures for the weekend. It was on a commercial about Samsung's Galaxy S5 until a breaking news blasted on the TV and Simon grabbed the remote as most breaking news are about pursuits that are in a different city. But something stopped him and dropped the remote to the table, he through that it wouldn't hurt to watch a pursuit. But the news anchor said, "We have breaking news, an unknown ship is on the horizon of Santa Cruz coastlines and the National Guard is on the way to look at the ship. It looks like it hasn't been activated or something else. We got Colonel Paul H. McGillicuddy from Beale Air Force Base in Marysville. Paul, could you tell us about the ship?". Using the power of Skype, Paul appeared and said, "We don't know anything about the ship but we'll sent the 9th Reconnaissance Wing in before we sent in the 'real guns'. But we'll keep yo-" the connection was interrupted by something and Paul's words couldn't make sense, "Hello- is th- worki-".

The news anchor looked to his right with an odd look and turned to the camera and said, "We have connection issues for some reason, but we'll keep on trying to raise him again.". Simon got his feet off of the table and with his shoes still on, he got outside and walked towards the beach once more, he wanted to know what’s going on. He saw people walking towards the beach or looking for their yards. Simon saw some people leaving the beach with a rush to get out there, but most stayed, either not knowing what is going on or want to see what happens next. Then out of the nowhere two F-Eighteens appeared and raced towards the ship as did a National Guard boat, and something happened as the ship launched something towards the sky. It went up at first, but rushed down towards the boat, destroying the boat and making a bang sound that shook the beach. The people were in horror as they saw what just happened and the KTLA news helicopter looked towards the ship now and the two F-Eighteens were met with two unknown jets. The jets met in the sea and they were now in a fight for their lives, one of the F-Eighteens were followed by the unknown jet and the jet launched rockets, which hit the F-Eighteen.

The F-Eighteen was on fire as people were still in horror and it was coming down onto the beach and the people began to run as the jet crashed on the Giant Dipper, it destroyed the Dipper as the jet blew up. The sound of the explosion could be heard all over the city as people were running towards the boardwalk with one woman shouting that her kids were on it. Simon couldn't believe it as he stool still and people were running away from the beach, the Giant Dipper was gone and he was thankful that he wasn't on it. But the dogfight at the sea began to look bad for the F-Eighteen but he saw something worst at the sky. He saw white parachutes dotting the skies and he knew now what was going on, America was under attack.

The sound of an explosion pulled Aura from her game of X-COM abruptly, and she casually walked outside to see if she could see the source. What she saw, instead, was a host of cloth parachutes raining down, with soldiers attached to them. At first, she thought they might just be an Army unit doing some weird exercise or PR stunt, but on closer inspection saw the figures carrying AKs, and they wore different uniforms. Aura had been brought up by two soldiers, so she more than knew the difference between an M4 and an AK, and she also knew that no American soldier carried an AK, which left only one option. They were being attacked by foreign forces, and heaven only knew how friendly they'd be to civilians.

Her parents were nowhere near home at the moment, but in a way they'd already given her all she needed. They'd brought their rifles with them, and probably a good deal of the rest of the stuff in the house, but Aura knew there was still a pistol in her dad's desk. She ran up stairs and burst through the door, claiming the spare key hidden in an old boot in the corner and unlocked the desk drawer. Inside was a Colt 1911, loaded and safed, and a second clip. She grabbed the gun and clip then ran to her room, looking frantically for what she may need. She hurriedly grabbed a bag and stuffed a pair of running shorts and a camouflage shirt into it, then donned a thin, blue jacket that she shoved the pistol and clip into. She ran downstairs, opened her cabinet and shoved a few cans into it along with a pair of nearby water bottles before running outside and jumping into her truck.

As she started it, she could see the paratroopers nearing the ground, and she pulled out of her drive quickly. She knew her parents had actually been at a militia meeting in the general vicinity of the docks, so she headed there at top speed. Her truck barely dodged several cars, and in one case the car dodged her, before she arrived there just to find chaos. Here, the paratroopers had already touched down and were moving in to secure the city. She pulled the pistol into her hand and stopped her truck in some parking lot, getting out and beginning to move through alleys further down the strip. She already knew her parents were likely out of their workplace and looking for a weapon, so all she could do was wait. However, her hopes were shattered when she saw a group of civilians being gathered into an enemy APC. She could see her parents among them, but there were way too many for her to stop. It hurt her heart, but she hid and slowed her breathing, keeping it quiet and slow. After she heard the APC pull away, she carefully poked out to find herself next to a house.

With her parents, and therefore her objective, gone she had no idea what to do. She glanced at the bag on her back and reminded herself "[i]C'mon Aura, you can do this, you have the supplies and you have a gun. You can handle this, after all, what would mom or dad do in your situation? They'd hide in a building, take stock, probably try to get more stuff, then fight back, so thats what you should do.[i/]" With that done, she carefully opened the door to the house, pistol held out in front of her. However, she almost immediately saw a twenty-something guy watching the news. She held the pistol like her dad had showed her, keeping it ready but not aimed since this guy was clearly American, and asked "Hey...do you know whats going on?"

As the parachutes were getting bigger and bigger, Simon decided to run into his home and grab the car keys and drive out of the area. He hoped that other areas weren't affected by this, but his hope would dry up as soon as he came into his home. The TV was left on and the news anchor was reporting about the invasion in Los Angeles, San Diego, and few other important cities in California. They also showed clips by people that were shared all over Facebook, YouTube, and many other sites, either one showed the explosion at the boardwalk. He passed by the TV as the news anchor showed more clips and opened his door to his room, and saw his phone on the charger and grabbed it. The phone was a Samsung Galaxy S3 and was at sixty percent, he was walking away from his room as he heard yelling and screaming. He rushed towards the door as saw guys with guns, running towards the people, grabbing them, and then tying them up. He even saw a child getting shot as he rushed away from a man, as his mother told him to do so then she was taken away.

Simon made a rush towards his car, and getting out his keys from his pocket and turning the car on. As soon as he drove away from his home, the men pointed at the car and shouted in a foreign language and then fired. Simon ducked at the bullets his car, but he kept driving until he was away from the beach and safe. He couldn't help but feel sad as he lost his home and the feeling of safe, he looked up at the sky and saw tons of parachutes still coming down. He had to get out of his hometown and get somewhere safe, maybe a military base or something, but he realized that they could be captured already. Or he could just keep on driving east until he makes it to DC or somewhere safe and get an airplane out of this country. He didn't know what to choose other than drive until his car runs out of gas and hope for the best, but he could stop along the highway in order to get gas and food. He kept driving until he reached State Route 17 and saw other cars on the freeway; well other people have the same idea.