Free Soldier On: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse by Shawn Chesser

shit hit the fan on the weekend,” added Durant.
    “The Center for Disease Control is one of the best funded operations in the United States. Outside of Plum Island in New Jersey and a few smaller facilities...this is where the dangerous shit is kept. Don’t let the absence of a few cars fool you. I shit you not, the place had to have had people working to sort out Omega around the clock,” Desantos didn’t want to take the wind out of the co-pilots sails, but he was a realist. “Lock and load fellas.”
    Ari Silver finished the aerial recon of the grounds, noting the large amount of shambling dead. “General, we’re going to have to take a chance with the aerials and put your team on the roof. It’s way too hot to put her down on the grass, we’d be overrun the second the wheels hit the ground.”
    Avoiding the antennas on the approach to the LZ was front and center on the pilots mind. Chief Warrant Officer Ari Silver had flown down Mogadishu alleys in a little bird, dropped SEAL Team Six operators on top of terrorist strongholds while under heavy fire and navigated the tight confines of dry wadis flying nap of the earth in both of the hot wars the United States had been embroiled in. It made no difference where he was flying; home was at the controls of a rotor wing aircraft. He deftly side slipped the big Pave Hawk around the array of antennas that bristled from the top of the modern multi-story steel and glass structure. Sergeant Hicks poked his head out of the door and called out the distance to the roof. Durant did the same from his seat. The antenna array was used to send and receive communications but it hadn’t been utilized since the first days of the Omega outbreak.
    Ari picked a path between two of the communication antennas, flared the Pave Hawk and gently put her down, being careful to avoid the air scrubbers and HVAC equipment scattered atop the roof.
    Normally after an insertion the SOAR pilots orbited the target area in case the operators needed an emergency exfil. Desantos ordered Dooley and Rooks to remain behind and guard the Pave Hawk and her aircrew.
    Even though the helicopter held enough fuel to transport them to the predetermined emergency refuel point, Ari made the difficult decision to remain on the roof with the engine powered down. Another aerial refueling couldn’t be guaranteed, making the contingency plan necessary. Ari held no reservations that his flying days might be numbered since aviation fuel was not a finite resource and the people proficient at refining it were probably dead. Ari sat in the pilot’s seat while the mission unfolded in the building below.

Chapter 12
    Outbreak Day 5
    Schriever AFB
    Colorado Springs, Colorado
     
    Dirt and sand swirled in the air, kicked up violently by the dual cyclones from the aircrafts massive twin rotors. The flat black CV-22 Osprey settled lightly on the oft used maintenance pad, the twin nacelles tilted into the full upright position before the pilot throttled back power.
    Schriever AFB had been secure since the outbreak, things here remained under control. Compared to the rest of Colorado Springs a few miles away, the sprawling base was a welcome sanctuary. Air force PJs with silenced automatic rifles were positioned at numerous locations around Marine One. Colonel Shrill thought it prudent to include the shooters as an added precaution.
    The eight man Secret Service detail exited the hulking Osprey and fanned out in a full circle with their weapons at the ready.
    The Commander of Schriever AFB greeted the new President warmly. President Valerie Clay was a tough as nails politician, all wrapped up in a petite package. Standing barely five feet tall she was not what one would expect based on her reputation. The former Senator from Washington State knew how to gut a trout could skin a deer by herself and had the gift of disarming friend and foe alike with one glance of her hazel eyes. Clay’s detail quickly hustled the two of them into