Brothers in arms reunited

FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. — Ten months after a roadside bomb cut short his deployment to Iraq, Army Spc. Steven Moore sat alone in his car and finally let himself cry.

He had come to terms with his injury — blindness in the left eye caused by shrapnel from the explosion. It had been harder to swallow the separation from his adopted family, the 463rd Military Police Company’s 1st Platoon.

“The one good thing about the military is that it gives you a sense of family,” says Spc. Moore, 19, who is from Gretna, Va. “And then if you can’t be with your family at all times, you don’t feel like you’re part of anything at all.”

First Platoon — nicknamed the Raiders — deployed to Iraq in June 2004, attached to the Army’s 10th Mountain Division, 2nd Brigade. Spc. Moore last saw his MP buddies Aug. 22, when, bloodied and bandaged, he was rushed to a field hospital in Baghdad.

Now, more than 10 months later, Spc. Moore’s nerves get the best of him as he stands at the airport in Topeka, Kan., preparing for a reunion. He exhales sharply, trying to expel the tension. He tells himself not to cry.

“This is going to be the longest 20 minutes of my life,” he says.

On the flight from Kuwait, Spc. Moore’s 36 friends and brothers in arms are thinking about him. When they land, they’ll scoop up wives, kiss their babies and let their mothers hold them for longer than usual.

But for now, Spc. Moore comes first, and the 33 men and three women talk about the soldier whose sacrifice on a Baghdad road had made them better soldiers.

“Moore’s gonna be there,” Staff Sgt. Allen Ward, 30, announces. “Hell, yeah.”

At the airport, Spc. Moore clears a path toward the gate.

“I can’t wait any longer,” he says.

Each arriving Raider gets a hug, sun-baked uniforms crackling as Spc. Moore pats shoulders. Pfc. Jarrett Brown, his best friend, is first. The 20-year-old from Mishawaka, Ind., hands Spc. Moore a M-249 light machine gun, the same type of weapon he had carried in Iraq. It feels good in his hands.

Then comes Pfc. Jesus Castro, 21, Spc. Moore’s old roommate and the soldier at the wheel of the Humvee when two roadside bombs exploded. Next, Sgt. Ward, who bandaged his wounds, squeezes Spc. Moore in a tight embrace.

Spc. Moore spots Spc. Brian Woods, 21, the medic from Shreveport, La., who had stayed by his side in the hours after the explosion.

“Woods!” calls out 1st Sgt. Bill Hutchings. “You kept him alive. I like you.”

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