Marcus luttrell

We just want to be with you.
Outside the door of the main house, the front yard was like a parking lot. By midnight there were 
seventy-five people in attendance, including Eric and Aaron Rooney, from the family that owns 
one of the big East Texas construction corporations; David and Michael Thornberry, local land, 
cattle, and oil people, with their father, Jonathon; Slim, Kevin, Kyle, and Wade Albright, my 
boyhood friends, a lot of them Aggies. 
There was Joe Lord; Andy Magee; Cheeser; Big Roon; my brother Opie and our buddy Sean; 
Tray Baker; Larry Firmin; Richard Tanner; Benny Wiley; the strength coach at Texas Tech in 
Lubbock. Those big tough guys were all in grade school with me. 
Another of our local construction moguls, Scott Whitehead, showed up. He never even knew us, 
but he wanted to be there. He turned out to be a tower of strength for my mom, still calls her 
every day. Master Sergeant Daniel, highly decorated U.S. Army, showed up in full uniform, 
knocked on the front door, and told my dad he wanted to help in any way he could. He still 
shows up nearly every day, just to make sure Mom’s okay. 
And of course there was my twin brother, Morgan, making all speed to the ranch, refusing point-
blank to accept the broadcaster’s “fact” that I was dead. My other brother Scottie got there first, 

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but not being an identical twin brother to me, he could only know what he was told, not what the 
telepathic wavelengths told him. He was almost as devastated as Mom. 
My dad hit the Internet to check if there was further news or any official announcement from the 
SEAL HQ in Hawaii, my home base. All he found was confirmation of the MH-47 crash and 
four other SEALs missing in action. However, one of the Hawaiian newspapers was reporting 
the death of all four of us. At which moment I guess he believed it was true. 
Shortly after 2:00 a.m. in Texas, the SEALs began to arrive at the ranch from Coronado. 
Lieutenant John Jones (JJ) in company with Chief Chris Gothro flew in, with Bosun’s Mate Teg 
Gill, one of the strongest men I know. Lieutenant David Duf-field arrived from Coronado right 
afterward, with John Owens and Jeremy Franklin. Lieutenant Josh Wynn and Lieutenant Nathan 
Shoemaker came in from Virginia Beach. Gunner’s Mate First Class Justin Pitman made the 
journey from Florida. I should stress that none of this was planned or orchestrated. They just 
came, strangers mingling with friends, united, I suppose, in grief for a lost brother. 
And there to greet them all with my mom and dad was the mighty figure of Billy Shelton. No 
one had ever seen him in tears before. It’s often that way with the toughest of men. 
Chief Gothro immediately told my parents he did not give a damn what the media said. There 
was no confirmation that any of the original four-man SEAL team was dead, although it was 
highly likely they had not all survived. He knew about Mikey’s last call: 
My guys are dying out 
here.
But there was no certainty about any of it. He told Mom to have faith, told her no SEAL 
was dead until there was a body. 
And then Morgan arrived and told them all straight-out I was alive, and that was an end to it. He 
said he’d been in contact with me, had felt my presence. He thought I may have been injured, but 
I was not dead. “Goddamn it, I know he’s not dead,” he said. “If he was, I’d know.” 
By now there were 150 people in the front yard, and the local sheriffs had somehow cordoned off 
the entire ranch. No one could enter the property without passing through these guardians. There 
were police cruisers parked along the wide dirt road which leads to the house. Some of the 
officers were inside the perimeter fences, praying, at short services conducted by two naval 
chaplains who had arrived from Coronado in the small hours. Just in case, I guess. 
Some time before 0500 my mom answered the front door to see SEAL lieutenant Andy Haffele, 
with his wife, Kristina, standing there. “We wanted to help, any way we could,” said Andy. “We 
just got here from Hawaii.” 
“Hawaii!” said Mom. “That’s halfway around the world.” 
“Marcus once saved my life,” said Andy. “I had to be here. I know there’s still hope.” 
I can’t explain what all this meant to Mom. She hovered somewhere between hope and total 
despair. But she’s always said she’ll never forget Andy and the long journey he and Kristina 
made to be with our family. 

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It began, I suppose, just as neighborly visits, interspersed with more professional arrivals from 
SPECWARCOM. But it would turn into a vigil. No one went home, they just stayed, day after 
day, night after night, all night, praying to God that I was still alive. 
When I think about it, these many months later, I’m kind of overwhelmed: that much love, that 
much caring, that much kindness to my parents. And I think about it, all of it, every day, and I 
still have no idea how to express my gratitude, except to say I know the door of our home is open 
to each and every one of them, no matter the hour or the circumstance, for all the days of my life. 
Meantime, back up the goddamned mountain, unaware of the mighty gathering still building at 
home, I was listening to the distant flow of water. Hanging on to the tree, leaning out, wondering 
how to get down there without killing myself in the process. That’s when the Taliban sniper shot 
me. 
I felt the sting of the bullet ripping into the flesh high up at the back of my left thigh. Christ, that 
hurt. Really hurt. And the impact of the AK bullet spun me around, knocked me into a complete 
backflip clean off the fucking mountain. When I hit, I hit hard, but facedown, which I guess 
didn’t do my busted nose a lot of good and opened up the gash on my forehead. 
Then I started rolling, sliding very fast down the steep gradient, unable to get a grip, which may 
have been just as well. Because these Taliban bastards really opened up on me. There were 
bullets flying everywhere, pinging and zinging into the ground all around me, ricocheting off the 
rocks, slamming into the tree trunks. Jesus Christ, this was Murphy’s Ridge all over again. 
But it’s a lot harder to hit a moving target than you might think, especially one traveling as quick 
as I was, out of control, racing between rocks and trees. And they kept missing. Finally I came to 
a stop in a flatter area, and of course my pursuers had not made the downward journey nearly as 
fast as I had. I had had a decent start on them, and to my amazement I had come to little harm. I 
guess I missed all the obstacles, and the earth beneath me was softish and loose packed. Also, I 
still had my rifle, which to my mind was a bigger miracle than Our Lady of Lourdes. 
I began to crawl, going for cover behind a tree and trying to assess the enemy positions. I could 
see one guy, the nearest of them, just standing and pointing at me, yelling at two others, who 
were out to the right. Before I could make any kind of a decision, they both opened fire on me 
again. I did not have much of a shot at them, because they were still maybe a hundred yards up 
the cliff face and the trees were shielding them. 
Trouble was, I could not stand properly, and aiming the rifle was a problem, so I decided to 
make a break for it, on my hands and knees, and wait for a better spot to take them out. I 
crawled, not fast but steady, over terrible terrain, full of little hills and dipping gullies. It could 
hardly have been better country for a fugitive, which I now was, except I could not walk down 
the gullies, and I sure as hell couldn’t get down those steep slopes on all fours, not having been 
born a freakin’ snow leopard. 
So every time I reached one of those small precipices, I just threw myself straight off and hoped 
for a reasonable landing. I did a lot of rolling, and it was a long, bumpy, and painful ride. But it 

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beat the hell out of getting shot up the ass again. 
I kept it up for about forty-five minutes, crawling, rolling, and falling, staying out in front of my 
pursuers, gaining ground on the downward falls, losing it again as they ran up on me. And 
nowhere on that snaking route down the hills did I find a decent spot to get rid of the gunmen 
who were hunting me down. The bullets kept flying, and I kept moving. But finally I hit some 
flatter ground and all around me were big rocks. I decided this would be Marcus’s last stand. Or 
theirs. One way or another. Although I did not know exactly how many of them there were. 
I remember thinking,