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

Jeff Bender, Admiral Maguire’s public relations officer and a fantastic
encouragement to everyone. Navy SEAL chaplain Trey Vaughn from Coronado
was a spiritual pillar of strength. Everyone wanted to talk to him, and he dealt
with it all with optimism and hope. When the mood was becoming morbid and
there were too many people in tears, he would urge them to be positive. “Stop
that crying right now...we need you...we need your prayers...and Marcus needs
your prayers. But most of all we need your energy. No giving up, hear me?” No
one will ever forget Trey Vaughn.
There were also two naval chaplains from the local command who just
showed up out of nowhere. Chief Bruce Misex, the navy recruiter boss from
Houston, who’d known me a long time, turned up and never left. As the days
had worn on, shipments of seafood started to arrive from the gulf ports to the
south: fresh shrimp, catfish, and other white fish. One lady brought an enormous
consignment of sushi every day. And families who had spent generations in the
South stuck hard by that old southern tradition of bringing covered dishes
containing pots of chicken and dumplings to a funeral.
Dad thought that was a bit premature, but there were a lot of people to feed,
and he assumed a loose command of the cooking. Everyone was grateful for
everything. He says it was strange but there was never any question of anyone
going home. They were just going to stay there, for better or for worse.
Meanwhile, back in the freakin’ thunderstorm, more than thirty pounds lighter
than when I first set off on this mission, I was sleeping like a child. Gulab said at
0300 it had been raining for nearly six hours without ever slowing up. I was out
to the world, the first time I had slept soundly for a week, oblivious to the
weather, oblivious to the Taliban.
I slept right through the night and woke up in broad daylight after the rain. I
checked my watch and rounded on Gulab. I was supposed to be in Monagee, for
chris’sakes, why the hell hadn’t he made sure I was? What kind of a guide was
he, allowing me to oversleep?
Gulab was sanguine. And since we were growing very efficient at
communicating, he was able to tell me he knew it was the first time I had been
able to sleep for a long time, and he thought it would be better to leave me.
Anyway, he said, we could not possibly have gone out in that weather because it
was too dangerous. The overnight walk to Monagee had been out of the
question.
One way and another, I took all this pretty badly. I actually stormed out of