War's Wounded Find Guidance in Aftermath

"Man, are you trying to set the record for days at Walter Reed?" Gutting teased.

Reffner has been at Walter Reed since July 2006, when a improvised explosive device in Baghdad blew apart the front of his truck -- and his left leg. He suffered a broken tibia and fibula below his knee, and extensive burns, muscle and nerve damage. Five inches of his tibia were missing.

After the blast, doctors began talking amputation. He begged them to save his leg. After 23 surgeries, including a stem cell bone grafting, Reffner still has his leg. And he still has his faith.

"Every time I prayed, it got answered somehow," said Reffner, a member of the Assembly of God church.

Farther down the hall, Gutting found his buddy Sgt. Brent Hendrix in an empty weight room. The 23-year-old North Carolinian sat in his wheelchair looking tired and pensive. When Gutting swung open the door and shouted his name, Hendrix turned around and chuckled. He stood up slowly, carefully balancing his weight on his prosthetic right leg.

"He's a tall drink of water, isn't he?" Gutting said, looking up at the 6-foot-6 Hendrix, grinning broadly.

With a resigned voice, Hendrix explained that he used to be 6-foot-8 and that the doctors are going to re-break his leg to give him back those two inches.

That is just one more step in a long, trying journey for Hendrix. He was an infantryman on a raid in Iraq in June 2006 when his vehicle rolled over two buried roadside bombs. He woke up in Walter Reed with tubes coming out of his nose.

Hendrix has died twice, he said -- once for 58 seconds and a second time for two minutes. He has had close to 70 surgeries since the blast. He was told he would never walk again.

He's walking now and can bench-press 275 pounds, an impressive feat by any standard.

"God still wants me around for some reason," Hendrix said. "So I'm just waiting to see what he's got in store for me."

And for a moment, Gutting looked somber.

"We get through this together," Gutting said, slowly and deliberately, "because not one of us is as good, or as strong, as all of us."