A funeral service is being held for a Bremerton soldier killed in Iraq. PFC Charles Hester was part of the 3rd Stryker brigade that saw four more of its soldiers die in one attack.

A soldier who served with all four is paying tribute to each. Former Army Specialist Patrick DeBarge came to pay tribute to the four Stryker soldiers killed this week. All were his friends.

"This is unbelievable," said DeBarge as he walked through the Tahoma National Cemetery in Kent. It is a place soldiers don't normally visit until they have to. They are brought there by the realities of war, the deaths of fellow soldiers, their friends.

"A lot of grief," said DeBarge, "just having to deal with the friends I just lost recently is not an easy thing to go by. I can just imagine how the families are feeling right now."

DeBarge served with all four on their first tour of Iraq in the 1st of the 37th Field Artillery with the 3rd Stryker Brigade.

Gone is Staff Sgt. Greg Gagarin. "He cared about his soldiers a lot. Always put his soldiers in front of himself," DeBarge said.

Sgt. Robert Surber. "He was a good friend of mine. We were roommates for roughly eight months," DeBarge said.

Sgt. Tyler Kritz. "I mean he was a great guy. He always did what he was told and was a pretty squared-away soldier as well," DeBarge said.

Sgt. James Akin. "I felt like it couldn't be true. I didn't expect any of the guys that I deployed with to go through something like that," DeBarge said.

All four killed last Sunday when a roadside bomb hit their Humvee.

"It's devastating, it's devastating," DeBarge said.

One of the brigade's top commanders said soldiers just pick themselves up and keep going.

"You go through a period of being angry, you go through a period of mourning," said Maj. Kyle Marsh of the 3rd Stryker brigade. "But ultimately as a soldier you know your mission is to get right back out there and get at it."

All four will be remembered at a joint ceremony at Fort Lewis Thursday.

"It broke my heart and all I could think about was their families and the rest of the guys that are over there still," said DeBarge.