Having just been awakened by explosions , we'd quickly taken up a defensive position behind mattresses and furniture. Bullets flew freely, breaking glass everywhere around us. We could hear great explosions a few blocks away, even over the racket surrounding our villa from the helicopter gunships that were in action overhead. We whispered loudly
with each other, as we tried to decide how to defend ourselves. We were pinned down in a small room on the second-floor, yet smoke and tear gas were filtering upstairs towards us.
Our only safe exit was to the rooftop, but when we arrived, we found ourselves surrounded by a hellish scene of fire and explosions, with great clouds of tear gas swirling all about us. The night sky was red with the glow of fires in all directions.
The battle that had just erupted raged all around us three floors below, yet little did we know that the enemy was making its way up the stairs towards our position...