Lone Survivor_ The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 ( PDFDrive )

When that grenade blew me over the cliff, it probably should have killed me,
but the only new injury I had sustained was a broken nose, which I got when I
hit the deck semiconscious. To be honest, it hurt like hell, along with my back,
and I was bleeding all over my gear. However, I had not been seriously shot, as
two of my team had.
Axe was holding the tribesmen off, leaning calmly on a rock, firing up the
hill, the very picture of an elite warrior in combat. No panic, rock steady, firing
accurately, conserving his ammunition, missing nothing. I was close to him in a
similar stance, and we were both hitting them pretty good. One guy suddenly
jumped up from nowhere a little above us, and I shot him dead, about thirty
yards range.
But we were trapped again. There were still around eighty of these maniacs
coming down at us, and that’s a heck of a lot of enemies. I’m not sure what their
casualty rate was, because both Mikey and I estimated Sharmak had thrown 140
men minimum into this fight. Whatever, they were still there, and I was not sure
how long Danny could keep going.
Mikey worked his way alongside me and said with vintage Murphy humor,
“Man, this really sucks.”
I turned to face him and told him, “We’re gonna fucking die out here — if
we’re not careful.”
“I know,” he replied.
And the battle raged on. The massed, wild gunfire of a very determined
enemy against our more accurate, better-trained response, superior
concentration, and war-fighting know-how. Once more, hundreds of bullets were
ricocheting around our rocky surroundings. And once more, the Taliban went to
the grenades, blasting the terrain around us to pieces. Jammed between rocks, we
kept firing, but Danny was in all kinds of trouble, and I was afraid he might lose
consciousness.
That was when they shot him again, right at the base of the neck. I watched
in horror as Danny went down, this beautiful guy, husband of Patsy, a friend of
mine for four years, a guy who had always been last away while we retreated, a
guy who had provided our covering fire until he couldn’t stand anymore.
And now he lay on the ground, blood pouring from his five wounds. And I
was supposed to be a fucking SEAL medic, and I could not do a damn thing for
him without getting us all killed. I dropped my rifle and climbed over the rock,
running across open ground to get to him. All right. All right. No hero bullshit. I
was crying like a baby.