TheBakersfieldCalifornian.com

The bullets from the AK-47s made a strange snapping sound as they sprayed the rocky hillside around Staff Sgt. Robert Fortner.

The 33-year-old Army medic from Bakersfield had already used his forceps to dig a bullet out of his bloodied shoulder. After packing the wound with gauze, Fortner went back into the line of fire several times to provide aid to his wounded comrades.

"To say all hell broke loose that day is really an understatement," Fortner said Monday from his Army base in Schweinfurt, Germany.

The daylong firefight on July 27, 2007, near the village of Saret Koleh in Afghanistan would claim the lives of two Americans, including the commander of B Troop, Capt. Thomas Bostick, who was killed by a rocket-propelled grenade. Ten others -- nearly half of the American force -- were wounded.

Some of them would probably have died on that steep hillside were it not for Fortner's "extraordinary heroism under intense fire" that "saved the lives of his comrades," according to the military citation that accompanied the Silver Star awarded to Fortner last year.

"Sergeant Fortner rendered medical aid under fire and then positioned them in a more secure location so they could continue the fight," the citation reads. "Sgt. Fortner's courage, commitment to mission, and devotion to duty are in keeping with the finest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, B Troop, Task Force Saber, the Combined Task Force Bayonet, Combined Joint Task Force-82, and the United States Army."

Medals and memories

Fortner's mom, Ann Fortner, remembers her son, a 1993 North High School graduate, as a teenager who developed a strong sense of right and wrong early in his life.

She characterized her motherly fear for Robert's safety and her great pride in his accomplishments as "a mixed blessing."

"I did not realize until recently just how long the battle lasted," she said.

Some details had been withheld by Robert, she said, to allay her fears. Details such as bullet holes in her son's uniform and shrapnel skipping off the sole of his boot in the heat of battle.

"I just thank the Lord for bringing my son home," she said.

The beginning

Troop B's mission that day was part of a much larger operation to secure a region of Afghanistan. Fortner said Taliban-backed forces, believing propaganda that American forces were there to wage a modern-day version of the Crusades, put up sporadic but consistent resistance.

The river valley was made up of steep slopes rising up from the river and the nearby road. The small contingent of about two dozen Americans and 16 members of the ANA, the Afghanistan National Army, were in the village of Saret Koleh to assess the local feelings about the Allied presence and to determine whether anyone in the village could be a threat.

Typical village assessments take hours and often include a meal shared by the Americans and the village elders. But something unsettling was in the air in Saret Koleh, Fortner recalled.

"There was a hostile atmosphere," he remembered. The meeting with elders lasted less than one hour and as they were leaving, Fortner was told to "be ready."

'All hell'

The soldiers were tasked with securing three bridges east of the village. But before they were very far from the village, the Afghan soldiers went across a small foot bridge to check out a building.

Suddenly a smattering of small arms fire was directed at the Afghans from the high ground.

"It was light at first," Fortner said. "Then it was like a full-on combat scene in a movie."

Habiballah, Fortner's favorite of the Afghans, was hit in the leg. As he limped back across the bridge, Fortner pulled him toward some cover and went to work on him.

From that point on, the insurgents fired everything they had -- from superior position with superior numbers, Fortner said.

Throughout the day, Fortner would work on a wide variety of wounds, from RPG shrapnel to the face and neck to massive injuries to bones and arteries. When he was hit in the right elbow by what he believes was a ricochet, he said it felt like being hit with a baseball bat.

And when a bullet lodged in his right shoulder, he simply yanked it out with his own medical equipment, patched it up and continued working to save lives.

At one point, he was called down to the road to leave with a group of others being evacuated. Fortner refused.

"I wasn't leaving -- not until we got all our wounded out," he said.

Silver Star

Fortner is appreciative of the award, but he keeps it in perspective.

"The Silver Star is a great honor. I cherish it," he said. "But the biggest source of pride for me is the appreciation of the guys I treated out there.

"When they told me I did a good job, that meant more to me than anything."

Fortner said that day on the battlefield he learned the meaning of the term "the fog of war." With bullets humming past his ears and the blood of his comrades on his clothes, Fortner said he went into a zone where he was aware of the danger but was able to work on the wounded with a kind of single-mindedness he'd never before experienced.

Living proof

Robert's sister Trace Fortner said her brother came back from battle a changed man.

"My brother has always been, for lack of a better word, a hard-ass," she said. "He came back a very different person, more focused on family."

There's nothing like a near-death experience to give a man perspective -- though the firefight at Saret Koleh was not his first battle.

In 2006, months before he was deployed, Fortner was diagnosed with testicular cancer. He underwent months of treatment and came out on the other side cancer-free.

Beating cancer in 2006 and beating death again in 2007 -- yes, he's a changed man, Fortner said. Changed for the better.

"No matter what you go through, no matter how dire," he advised, "just keep putting one foot in front of the other and good things will happen.

"I'm pretty much living proof."