Summary: Hawkeye must ask himself just how much he's willing to take to keep his secret safe.

Warning: this fanfiction contains slash, violence, and nonconsensual sex (i.e. rape). If you're too young to read this or if the subject makes you uncomfortable, now is a good time to hit the back button.
Per request, I was able to devise a system for anyone who would like to read this fic but would rather skip the rape scenes. Unfortunately the story formatting on this site makes it a bit tricky. If you're interested in reading the abridged version, you can find it at AO3 (Archive of Our Own) under the same title and username.

Story link: archive of our own · org / works / 6448756 (Remove spaces)

Author link: archive of our own · org / users / lastarael (Remove spaces)

Rating: M for language and sexual content.

Pairing: Hawkeye / male OC

Obligatory disclaimer: don't know, don't own, don't sue.

Set in Hawkeye's POV.


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The Coercion of Hawkeye Pierce


It all started with a soldier. A patient of mine. Quite possibly the most beautiful man I've ever seen. Brunette, chiseled jaw, finely sculpted muscles, extraordinary green eyes. Sergeant Ross Reynolds. A more fitting name would have been Adonis.

He had (fortunately for me) fallen into a foxhole and sprained an ankle. He was (even more fortunately for me) homosexual and interested. As a general rule I only had sex with women while in camp, and I'd never taken advantage of a patient before, but this sergeant was so stunningly handsome that a eunuch couldn't have passed him by. Really. I swear.

So I was shirtless and pinned against a shelf in the supply hut by this gorgeous infantryman. His tongue was teaching mine new tricks – astonishing, I know – as his hands made short work of my belt and pants. Meanwhile I delved below his clothing with one hand to map the smooth muscle of his back and side, the contour of his hip, and the curve of his ass, reveling in his sensuality as well as in the sheer size of the man. (I enjoyed feeling delicate every once in a while.) My other hand was beneath his shirt, pressed to the small of his back, both holding him close and providing support; he'd lost the crutches a couple of feet away and we hadn't yet made it to the cot. I didn't feel like breaking off the kiss long enough to point out that I couldn't walk there with my pants around my boots. The way his hands were dipping below the waist of my boxers made me think that those wouldn't be around my hips for much longer either. My free hand was working its way toward the fly of his trousers when I heard the door open.

You are so fucked, my mind informed me helpfully. And this was why I didn't have sex with men in camp. Some inconsiderate person fails to heed the hanger on the door and suddenly you find yourself on a plane home with a dishonorable discharge. Unfortunately the safer, more remote locales that I'd desired for our little tryst – the minefield, for example – weren't easily accessible on crutches in the dark. And we'd been impulsive. So here we were. Screwed.

I broke the kiss, panting for breath, and looked at the door to my left. Before Reynolds had a chance to yank his hands out of my boxers there was a flash of bright light and an odd clicking noise. I blinked frantically and when my vision cleared I saw Private Donner silhouetted in the doorway with a camera. And that answered the question of who would come to the supply hut at 3 a.m.

I locked eyes with Reynolds for a split second and we silently shared a mutual panic. Then he jerked away, abruptly untangling our limbs from each other's clothing, and hopped awkwardly over to the shelves I'd been pressed up against, his injured ankle carefully upraised in its brace. By putting space between us he inadvertently showcased the very obvious erections tenting our fatigues. I bent self-consciously to pull up my pants and retrieve his crutches, my mind going a mile a minute.

It absolutely horrified me that our futures were suddenly held in this kid's hands – or, more specifically, in the kid's camera. And I do mean 'kid' – despite his impressive height the blonde corpsman hardly looked 18.

"Donner," I greeted him with caution as I fastened my pants and belt. I was (I felt) exhibiting great restraint, holding my tongue until I could figure out how to best talk my way out of this fix.

"Hawkeye." His voice was smooth and completely devoid of warmth. "Good to see you."

"Well, I'd love to say the same," I told him with false cheer, "but you've caught me at a bad time." And so much for holding my tongue.

"Is that so?" he replied mockingly.

"Yep. You see, tonight was just the rehearsal. The show doesn't open until tomorrow." In my peripheral vision I saw Reynolds' head snap to me. He was probably wondering what I thought I was doing. Hell if I knew. My mouth was on autopilot. "You wouldn't mind too terribly coming back then, would you?" I finished snidely. I waited a moment for Donner to respond to any of the words that had just tumbled out of my mouth, but he seemed content to stare at me with an inscrutable expression on his face. "Ah, I see that you're the strong, silent type. Like me." No reaction whatsoever from the kid. His intense gaze never wavered. "Why don't we cut to the chase," I finally suggested.

"If that's what you want," he said apathetically.

"You know, I'd like that, yeah."

"Fine." He pointed to Reynolds. "You – scram. I just want to deal with Hawkeye."

My Adonis shot me an apprehensive look. "How you wanna play this?" he asked quietly in his Southern drawl. "I can't exactly rush him, but I might could –"

"No," I interrupted him softly. "I'll talk to him. Head on back to Post-Op." I raised my voice to a normal level. "We're all adults here – I think –" I shot the fresh-faced Donner a dubious glance; Reynolds rapped me smartly on the boot with the tip of one crutch to remind me to behave. "There's no need for violence." These Army boys were always quick to come to blows. I gave my sergeant a tiny (fake) smile and jerked my head minutely toward the door.

"I can't say I'm overly fond of this talkin' notion," he objected apprehensively. "'Specially the part where I leave you high an' dry to deal with a problem that belongs to the both of us."

"Don't worry. I can handle this," I assured him. "My silver tongue can talk a nun out of her virginity in three seconds flat."

"That ain't a nun," he countered, jerking his head toward Donner.

"He wants to blackmail us; we have to be alive and fairly healthy to be able to pay," I reasoned.

"It's the 'fairly healthy' part that's got me worryin'."

"Relax. I'll work things out. I promise."

"You know this snake?"

"Kind of." Not really, I amended silently. I'd seen Donner around but our interactions were generally limited to him bearing patients to and from my operating table. Not a lot of time for idle chat then. I didn't even know his first name.

Reynolds apparently took my acquaintance with the boy as some sort of endorsement for his character. "Alright," he murmured with a frown and a shake of his head. "Good luck sweet talkin' him. Get up with me when you're done; let me know if I should start plannin' a career change." Adjusting his crutches, he visited upon me a soft look of concern and hopped out into the night. Well, the early morning.

As soon as the door closed behind him Donner fixed me with his full attention. He began to stalk forward with a grace that belied his rangy build. His body language – that smooth prowl and the tautness reminiscent of a cat about to spring – finally helped me decipher that peculiar expression on his face.

It was predatory lust. Alarm bells began sounding in my head.

"Did you know that the Army likes to give out dishonorable discharges to freaks like you?" he asked me impassively as he sauntered closer.

Why was he calling me a freak while looking at me like that? My mouth turned into a remarkably accurate imitation of the Sahara Desert.

"Let me guess. You're going to tell me what terms would cause you to come down with a case of selective amnesia," I predicted coolly.

Then he was within arm's reach. "Something like that," he said quietly, gently setting the camera down on a nearby shelf.

I was eyeing said camera speculatively and waiting to hear his terms when his fist slammed into my jaw. In short order the ground rushed up to hit me in the opposite jaw. I've always heard the phrase 'I saw stars' but I think that that may have been downplaying it, because I didn't get a few measly spots of light; I got a 4th of July fireworks celebration. Before my vision cleared Donner's hand had wrapped around my throat and started squeezing. I struck blindly up at the offending arm but it must have been approximately the length of a Sherman tank because I wasn't coming into contact with anything more sensitive, like a face near the end of the arm. It's pretty impressive when someone has arms longer than me, but I was feeling less than impressed all the same. (Perhaps that would come later.)

Some part of my consciousness that wasn't concerned with things like breathing supplied: this is not how this conversation is supposed to go.

Donner was squeezing tighter and my struggles were getting weaker when he suddenly released me. Go! Run! my mind ordered, but my body just lay there and wheezed. I heard him talking over the rush of blood in my ears.

"Alright, Hawkeye," he said casually, as if he hadn't just been choking me. He crouched in front of me to give me his conditions and I was reminded of a playground bully forcing his vanquished foe to eat sand. "Here's what you're going to do: You're going to stay put. You're going to be a good pervert and you're not going to fight me. If you do I'll make you regret it, you understand, and I'll still get what I want out of you. And, you're not going to breathe a word of this to anyone or I'll blow the whistle on the depravity I just caught on film."

Part of me was surprised that the kid knew the word 'depravity,' part of me was indignant that he was applying the word to me after his behavior thus far, but most of me was a little terrified of what 'what I want out of you' entailed if the starter was a bruised trachea. Unfortunately I couldn't disagree or negotiate better terms as breathing seemed to be the most I was capable of at the moment.

Donner efficiently rolled me onto my back and started loosening my belt. I felt like I'd just had an ice water transfusion.

This is not happening, my brain insisted.

I put my hands on his and prepared to put up a struggle when the thought of a dishonorable discharge and its ramifications on my future stopped me. It would get me out of Korea, sure, but it would also hound me throughout my civilian life; I wouldn't be able to practice medicine anywhere. Hell, both Reynolds and I could be thrown in prison if Donner decided to claim that we'd had sex. I'd heard of men getting five years at Leavenworth for sodomy based on a lot less than the proof Donner possessed now (never mind that we hadn't gotten that far). I was stung by the unfairness of the situation: the Army pulled me away from my life back home, dropped me in a hell surpassing my worst nightmares, and would be happy to ruin said life over sex that wasn't hurting anyone and wasn't any of their damned business in the first place.

Internally cursing the circumstance I'd gotten myself into, I dropped my hands to the floor. Donner roughly jerked my pants and boxers to my feet, then pried my boots off to strip me bare. With a powerful tug he flipped me over onto my stomach. He crouched on his knees beside me, trailing his hands over my skin as if I was his, until he was ready. I shuddered but kept myself from trying to resist, gazing at the far wall of the hut with a thousand-yard stare. I bit my lower lip until it bled and tried to focus on only the pain that I was inflicting on myself instead of what was being done to my body; it made me feel like I was in control of something and helped me hold it together.

Not happening.

He took me, then, on the wooden floor of the supply hut. His fingers gripped my hips and sides like a vise, holding me in place. I let out a low whimper and immediately regretted it; Donner groaned loudly in response. I sank my teeth into my lip again, refusing to release another sound. I'd never been very good at suffering in silence, but I was not going to give the bastard the pleasure of hearing me cry out again.

Not happening.

This wasn't exactly my first rodeo, but it had never hurt this much before. Not even the very first time. Then again, I'd never had a man enter me so abruptly, fully, and violently with no real lubrication to speak of. That probably had something to do with it.

Not happening.

I screwed my eyes shut in mortification and tried to focus on how cool and soothing the supply hut floor felt against my throbbing jaw. I was predictably unsuccessful in that venture.

Not happening.

The most disturbing part, I thought, was the series of inappropriate bursts of pleasure that shook me when he hit my prostate. I wondered if I'd ever be able to experience that sensation again without thinking of Donner.

Not happening.

After a veritable ice age had passed he finished, stiffening before collapsing over my back with a groan, chest heaving and dripping sweat. Relief washed over me. It was over. I'd made it through.

He slid out of me, stood, and wiped himself off on my shirt, the fink. I shakily snared my boxers and pants and slipped into them but lacked the will to lift myself off the dirty floor. I'd honestly have preferred to sink into the scarred wood if that had been possible.

Donner crouched by me and took my aching jaw in a bruising grip. "There," he said. "You got that fuck you were after from a real man. Not that pansy who walked out on you."

A real man, I scoffed silently at the teenager. That was laughable. For once in my life I wisely kept my mouth shut.

He slapped my face under the pretense of a friendly pat, grabbed his thrice-damned camera off the shelf, and turned to leave. "That was fun," he said as he strolled to the door. "Maybe we'll do this again sometime." The door closed behind him.

No. Hell no.

I remained there for a long time. Slowly my impotent anger and shame subsided and an alien numbness took over. My legs curled up toward my chest of their own accord, my arms crossed themselves across my torso, and I hugged myself rigidly. I lay on my side, cheek resting on the floor, and watched my exhales carve a path through the dust covering the wood. My jaw throbbed. My throat ached. My rectum burned. My body trembled. My brain set sail for more peaceful waters.

I didn't move. I think that in the back of my mind I was afraid that if I rejoined reality it wouldn't be as easy as whatever this escape was. The fact that anyone could come in at any time and find me like that never registered in my stunned brain.

I remained there shivering in a slack fetal position for an eternity before the sound of choppers broke through my shock.

"Incoming wounded," the P.A. system announced. "Come get today's greatest hits."

Of all the possible times for there to be wounded...

I tried to lift my head, to uncurl my body and get up, but it seemed that the signal shorted out somewhere in my brain. Part of me was shamefully content to lie there in the relative comfort of this detachment, and that part apparently had the majority vote.

I checked in with my body. I felt the blood pulsing through my jugular and dazedly imagined that it beat in time with the sound of the choppers. My chest felt weighted down and every breath was an effort. My head swam and time drifted away without me again.

"Captain Pierce, please report to the O.R.," the P.A. system demanded some indefinite time later.

Pierce. That was me. They were paging me.

I tried once again to get myself moving and finally made it upright. My muscles, stiff from disuse, protested the action. The sitting position brought the stinging sensation in my rectum back to the front of my mind and I tried unsuccessfully to find an angle that was less tender. Upon failing that I reasoned that I was trying to get off the floor anyway and I might as well just go ahead and do that. With a grunt I transitioned from sitting to kneeling to pull on my boots, then levered myself into a standing position. The pain in my rectum alternated between stinging and burning but never faded completely no matter what I did.

I ran my fingers through my hair shakily. I remembered to buckle my belt and grab the shirt that I was never wearing again (it didn't do to leave evidence lying around, after all) and was proud of myself for having a more level head in the face of... whatever this was.

I took a few deep breaths and opened the door, blinking at the light of a new day. I'd entered with Reynolds in the wee hours of the morning. The choppers must have come at dawn.

I left the supply hut behind and headed to the hospital, hoping not to see anyone on the way. I was in luck. Everyone must have already been in surgery; the compound and scrub room were empty. I tossed my soiled shirt into the laundry hamper and donned white scrubs and a mask.

As I scrubbed my hands I still couldn't shake the tremors. I hoped no one would notice. Hell, I hoped it wouldn't interfere with my operations. Finally, with my sterile hands dried and held high, I backed into the O.R.

"Gloves please," I said quietly – and hoarsely – to the nearest nurse. Wow. Speaking felt like rubbing steel wool around in my throat.

I'd been trying to make a subtle entrance. (I know – me? Subtle? Shocking.) Unfortunately for me, Colonel Potter spotted me from his table.

"Pierce! Where in tarnation have you been?! (Retraction there, Gage.) See me when we're finished here. And it'd better be good," he said ominously.

And suddenly everyone was staring at me as Nurse Shari pulled on my gown and gloves. At least I had a while to figure out my excuse.

"Yessir, O Captain! My Captain!" I trumpeted facetiously. It felt like the words were clawing their way up through my trachea.

"That's colonel to you, buster, and I advise you to stuff it!" he barked back at me.

I meekly shut my trap. Never let it be said that I don't know when to shut up. I might not do it but I do know. Usually. Sometimes. Well, maybe once in a blue moon.

"Are you sick?" Margaret asked as she came closer.

"Fit as a fiddle," I rasped.

That didn't stop her from coming up and feeling the temperature of my forehead. Apparently I passed the test because she stepped away to oversee some other poor schmuck.

I positioned myself in front of a gurney and was presented with an injured soldier.

"Scalpel," I said quietly. Shari slapped one into my hand. I tried unsuccessfully to place the blade in the right location. Oh yeah, the tremors were definitely going to be a problem.

"Doctor, you're shaking," Shari said. Loudly. Just in case I hadn't noticed.

Let's just notify the entire O.R., I thought bitterly. As if on cue all of the surgeons and most of the nurses turned their eyes to me.

"Close for me please, Bigelow," I heard BJ say.

"Yes, doctor."

BJ came over to my table. "What's up, Hawk?" he asked in an undertone.

"Nothing's up," I said brightly. "Except the ceiling. The sky. The choppers –" that were bringing in more wounded that I couldn't keep my damn hands still enough to save.

"Then why are you shaking?" His tone made it clear that he didn't believe a word I'd said. BJ's no dupe.

"I don't know," I lied with the best innocent expression I could conjure up at the moment. Maybe I should take a break (take a break? You haven't even started yet!) and dose myself with a very mild sedative. That could work. Then again, there was always the possibility that it would work too well, and I wouldn't be able to operate. Of course, I already couldn't operate. It wasn't like it could get any worse.

With a decisive nod I handed the scalpel back to Shari. "Beej, can you take over here? I'll be back in a little while," I told them. "Don't wait up!"

"Pierce!" Potter bellowed. "Where in Sam Hill do you think you're going?"

"Fear not!" I called out, ignoring the pain in my throat. "I shall return!"

I made my escape before he could order me to stay. Granted, I might not have obeyed an order either, but ignoring it would have gotten me into even more hot water than I was already in. Which was a considerable amount, certainly.

Cutting through the office I made my way to Post-Op, startling Nurse Able.

"Hawkeye! What are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be in surgery?"

"I'm just stopping by. Don't mind me." I headed to the drug cabinet at the other end of the long ward.

Able was clearly taken aback but apparently trusted me to be doing whatever I was supposed to, the dear girl.

Reynolds sat up when he heard my name and I gave him a smile that was almost heartfelt as I passed. Then I remembered that I had a mask on and sent him a little wave instead. I needed to check in on him later to make sure Donner wasn't fucking with him. Figuratively or literally. Though I expected that he'd be pretty safe in Post-Op.

When I reached the cabinet I started rummaging around and quickly found what I was looking for: Phenobarbital. Grabbing a syringe, I pulled out 5mL, the equivalent of 20mg – a small dose. I put the bottle away before Able thought to look at what I was taking.

Syringe in hand, I headed to the Swamp, where I dropped my pants and injected my thigh with the Phenobarbital. Setting the syringe carefully by the still, I pulled my pants back up and tried not to think about when I'd done the same thing early that morning. My skin crawled as I remembered how his hands felt roaming my body.

Why are you taking this so hard? I asked myself bitterly. It's not like you didn't allow it to happen. And it's your own fault you were in that position in the first place. If you could have just kept it in your pants...

I had a seat on my cot to wait for the drug to take effect. The pain in my rectum flared and I quickly decided that it might be prudent to lie on my side instead. It seemed that sitting was not going to be incredibly fun anytime in the near future.

In less than a minute the sedative kicked in and not only did the tremors subside but an anxiety that I didn't even realize was present dissipated. I felt much better. I felt like the weight of the world was lifted off my shoulders. I could breathe. And I knew I could perform surgery.

I rolled off the cot and headed back to the scrub room to wash up again. I slunk into the O.R. as stealthily as possible but the old man was a sharp one.

"Pierce! You are so deep in manure I don't think a Saint Bernard rescue dog could dig you out!"

"I knew I should have brought my shovel today," I said flippantly.

"You dig yourself any deeper and I'll have you digging latrines for the rest of the war!" he threatened.

"Shutting up, sir."

I let Margaret change my gown and pull on new gloves, then followed her to an empty table. BJ was at my original table with Shari assisting.

Another wounded soldier was placed in front of me and I got to work. My hands were sure and I was back to operating like nothing had happened. Until a few hours later, that is, when Donner became one of the litter bearers. That threw me for a loop. The first time I saw him I dropped the instrument I was holding into my patient's mess of intestines and just barely stopped myself from bolting. Margaret immediately fished it out and, oddly enough, her stern reprimand helped keep me grounded. Still, the trembling was back (though not quite as noticeable) and I was feeling lightheaded (that can happen when you forget to breathe) and generally unnerved (that can happen when your violent assailant is three feet from you). The butterflies in my stomach underwent mitosis; half stayed in my stomach while the new half migrated to my chest. If I hadn't taken that sedative I'm not sure what kind of state I would have been in. I certainly wouldn't have been fit to operate.

That nightmare operating theater lasted 18 hours. I only really spoke to ask for instruments. My heart wasn't in it, and it hurt my throat to talk anyway. Every time Donner entered the O.R. my pulse would skyrocket and I was in danger of dropping whatever I might have been holding at the time. I think I beat Frank in number of dropped implements that session. Thankfully Donner was pulled off after several hours and replaced by a fresh corpsman.

Toward the end when Nurse Baker untied my mask to give me some orange juice she paused and said loudly, "Hawkeye! What happened to your face?"

I realized then that my jaw must have been bruised up. It was the first time I'd had my mask down in hours.

"And your throat!" she added in horror.

Wonderful. I'd apparently smuggled the bruising on my neck safely across the border until one nosy nurse saw my jaw. And suddenly everyone was looking. Why couldn't nurses keep their big mouths shut?

"Thanks for that," I snapped. "But you might want to repeat it a little bit louder. I don't think the North Koreans heard you."

Baker looked hurt. "Sorry, doctor," she said in a subdued tone. I would have felt bad if I hadn't been so angry.

"Forget the juice. Bring me another patient." I wanted her to get that mask back on my face pronto before everyone else had a chance to gawk. If there was anyone left who hadn't seen it.

"Yes, doctor," she said sullenly. Yep. She was mad at me. Well, she'd have to get in line.

We continued operating for a while longer and I could just feel the concerned looks BJ was sending to my back. And I could see the incensed looks Potter was sending to my front.

As we were finishing up the last patients the colonel gave me a reminder: "Pierce. My office."

"Your wish is my command! Margaret, it's closing time. Take care of this last customer for me, will you?"

I reluctantly joined Potter in the scrub room. We washed up in an uncomfortable silence – well, I was uncomfortable anyway – as he took stock of my face. I knew he was waiting to get me alone in his office for the chat. I personally wasn't feeling particularly talkative. In fact, I felt how I imagined people lined up to be hanged felt in ye olden days.

BJ entered as I was stripping down to my boxers. I reached for my shirt and pants and only found my pants. Oh yeah. I was about to pull the white scrub shirt back over my head when a hand touched my shoulder. I couldn't help it; I flinched, hard.

"Hawk!" BJ said, pained. "What's – What's all this?" He gestured to my torso.

I looked down and was impressed by all of the little fingerprint-shaped bruises scattered over my sides. It looked like someone had dipped the pads of each finger in paint – reds, blues, and every shade of purple in between – and gone to town on my body.

Except... that was bad. I raised my eyes and found both BJ and Potter staring at my contusions. Both the bruises on my sides and those apparently on my jaw and throat.

Colonel Potter leaned in, his eyes following the path of the fingerprints on my sides down to below my waistline. "I wanted to wring your neck," he told me sternly, "but it looks like someone beat me to it." He looked up at me before taking a finger and lowering my boxers down to my hips to see the bruises there.

At his touch I jerked so violently that I almost fell over. For a moment all I could feel was Donner peeling off my pants and boxers on the floor of that damned supply hut. I tried to focus on breathing once my burning lungs clued me in to the fact that I'd stopped. Potter met my widened eyes with an enigmatic expression, then lowered the other side to find more bruises. I twitched at his touch, but managed to restrain my reaction to just that.

Finally he concluded his impromptu examination. "Do you have any more injuries?" he asked me.

Rectal trauma flashed through my mind and I thanked my lucky stars that it didn't pop out of my mouth. I sometimes – occasionally – quite rarely, really – have trouble with keeping my mouth shut.

"Isn't this enough?" I joked weakly with a shake of my head.

"Get dressed and come to my office."

I felt like every time he said that the circumstances deteriorated further. "I'll be there with bells on," I replied with a fake smile and a wriggling-fingered wave.

Colonel Potter exited with a final scowl and for a brief moment it was just me and BJ. He opened his mouth to ask one of the thousand questions I'm sure he had when Frank came through the doors from the O.R.

I pulled on a clean white shirt and my green pants hurriedly, but Frank was in his own little world and probably wouldn't have noticed if I'd painted myself neon orange.

"You think you're so special, don't you Pier – oh. Golly! What happened to you?"

I could be wrong. Those bruises must be something.

"The cook tried to wring my neck and add me to today's menu," I told him hoarsely. "I told him that you'd be less gamey and probably wouldn't have such an objection to being served next to WWII surplus green beans, so I'd recommend being cautious for a while. At least until he finds a new entrée du jour."

"It's beyond me how the Army in all its infinite wisdom selected such an undisciplined clown for service," Frank carped as he washed his hands.

"You know, I completely agree. I'm right there with you," I commiserated before making a show of perking up. "Well, as fun as this chat is – and let me tell you, I'm having a blast – I have a prior engagement." I flashed a winning smile and exited stage left.

Still in his bloody scrubs, BJ followed me the short distance to Potter's office.

"Are you coming to watch the execution?" I asked him.

"I'll try to prevent the execution, but keep in mind there are very few golden opportunities to make a clean getaway. Everything else is riding out in a blaze of glory, so pick your battles."

I grinned at him before we swept into Potter's office.

"You summoned, good sir?" I said when I walked through the door.

"Have a seat Pierce," Potter ordered.

I sat down painfully and ended up barely perching on the edge of the chair to keep the discomfort in my rectum to a minimum. BJ parked himself in the chair beside me.

The colonel's eyes flicked to him. "Hunnicutt, you have Post-Op duty. Go do it."

"I'm just across the hall," BJ protested. "If they have a problem they can come grab me."

"Skedaddle!"

BJ sent me a helpless look, then what might have been a silent 'good luck.' I heard his sigh of frustration as he left the office.

"Okay son, spill."

I pursed my lips as I debated what to tell him. Nothing I had come up with was both believable and safe. Finally, since he was staring at me so expectantly, I decided to pretend he was an idiot. "I fell down," I lied, not even trying to meet his eyes.

"Let me get this straight," he said flatly. "The ground punched you in both sides of your jaw, choked you, and wrapped a bunch of fingers around you all at the same time? Really, Hawkeye, I expected more creativity than that from you." He did sound quite disappointed and I found myself wishing I'd been a little more ostentatious.

"I fell up?"

Crickets.

Potter didn't appear to be amused. "Look son, if you're afraid of him – him? or them? – I can guarantee you they'll be court marshaled in a heartbeat, I'll send them away, and you'll never have to see them again."

Damn straight, I was afraid of him. And didn't I wish it was that simple? "I fell down," I reiterated obstinately.

Potter threatened grudgingly, "I could order you to tell me."

"You could," I admitted with a challenging quirk of one eyebrow. But we both know that won't make a damn bit of difference, I didn't say.

He seemed to reach the same conclusion and tried a different tactic. "I'd say you got more than beat up."

My heart stopped. "What do you mean?" I asked carefully. He couldn't have guessed anything from just bruises. There was no way.

"Those bruises on your torso make me think you were held in place."

Shit. "Yeah, well, I didn't exactly feel like sticking around at the time." That wasn't a lie.

He didn't look convinced. "And that's all there is to it?"

"Of course. What else could there have been?" I really meant to say it in an innocent and/or ignorant manner but it came out more as a challenge.

"Did one attacker hold you still for the other to hit on?" he conjectured.

A swing and a miss, I noted with great relief and slight amusement. "I fell down," I said inexorably, carefully keeping my face blank. If he wanted to go off on this 'two attacker' theory I wasn't about to stop him. It was a hell of a lot safer than the alternative.

Colonel Potter frowned at me with narrowed eyes but changed the subject. "And this attack is why you were late to O.R.?"

Kind of. "Yes."

"Okay. Now, I want to know why you felt you had to leave the O.R. with a wounded man in front of you."

I scowled. "I couldn't hold a scalpel steady to save my life. Or his."

"And where did you go when you left?"

"To the Swamp. To calm down."

"Just to the Swamp."

He sounded like he was testing me. I debated the benefits of lying over the possibility of being caught in the lie.

"Just to the Swamp," I lied.

"I have a very reliable nurse who told me that you went through Post-Op and grabbed something in a syringe out of the medicine cabinet."

Damn that Able. "Oh yeah," I said with extremely faked dawning recollection. "Yeah, I did go through Post-Op."

"What did you get out of that cabinet?"

"Uh." My mind raced with possibilities. Finally the little angel on my shoulder won out over the devil on the other. Well, that and the fact that he'd seemed to be pretty well-informed thus far. (When did Able get a chance to snitch on me, anyway?) I elected to go ahead and get the chewing out over and done with. "Phenobarbital," I admitted quietly.

"Are you're telling me that you operated under the influence?!" Oh, he sounded pissed.

And that's why I lied. "I only gave myself 20 milligrams!" I said defensively.

"What made you think it was alright for you to dope yourself? Never mind operate while drugged!"

"I couldn't –" my throat closed and I swallowed convulsively before trying again. "I couldn't operate before I took it. And it helped! I... it helped."

"And you don't think being drugged affected your skill at all?"

"No, it just made me stop shaking. Mostly stop shaking."

"What about your sloppiness tonight? About all of the instruments you dropped?" he demanded. "You're supposed to be above Burns' level!"

"That wasn't the drug," I denied. How come I was getting bitched at for not operating above another surgeon's level? Never mind that it was Frank.

"And just how do you know that?"

Because I knew what caused my sloppiness. But if I said that he'd be so very interested in hearing what it really was and there was no way I could tell him that it was because my attacker was in the O.R. with me. If Donner got caught he would most certainly take me and Reynolds down with him.

"I just know," I told him defiantly.

"Well I don't 'just know.' I am appalled that you would take a drug to perform surgery! You're lucky you didn't kill someone!"

"So I was supposed to wait a few more hours to operate in the hopes that it would go away soon?! While you were all stuck in the O.R. with no relief?!"

"Yes!" he shouted. "That's exactly what you should have done! What kind of numskull thinks he can take a sedative to operate?!"

"How many of those kids that we operated on could have sat in the waiting room for a few more hours?! Or more!"

"I know I don't hear some young hot-shot surgeon telling me how to run my MASH when all I'm asking is for him to be sober!"

I took a breath and swallowed my pride. There was no way to come out on top in a shouting match with this C.O., no matter how reasonable I felt my actions were. Sherman Potter was not Henry Blake. "It – it won't happen again," I assured him quietly. "I screwed up. I'm sorry."

"It'd better not happen again!"

"It won't," I mumbled resentfully.

"Good! Now, go ice your jaw and get some rest."

"Right." I tried not to let my frustration, bitterness, and defeat show in my voice but I'm not sure how successful I was. Donner's gift just kept on giving. I rose quickly and hit the door at speed, escaping into the Korean night.

It was about 1 a.m. Or 0100. Whichever. After a miserable half hour spent tossing and turning in my cot, tormented by vivid memories that refused to let me rest, I gave up on sleep and decided to get so drunk that I could forget what had happened a little less than 22 hours prior.

So that's what I did. Or tried to do. Despite the fact that the liquor hitting my throat felt like swallowing fire (or what I imagined swallowing fire would feel like, as that was one life experience I'd had yet to enjoy) I made an admirable attempt at draining the still dry. But no matter what I did, no matter how much gin I poured into my body, that memory would not fade.


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Author's Notes:

If you are a Firefly fan you may notice some Firefly-related "Easter eggs" scattered throughout this story. I hope that someone out there is half as amused by them as I was when I slipped them in.


Updated 2018

While doing some research for another one of my MASH fics ("A Moth to a Flame") I came to realize that I had underestimated the consequences that Hawkeye could be facing. At that time men accused of sodomy could be convicted and sentenced to five years of "confinement" in a military prison (typically Leavenworth) with no concrete evidence presented at court martial. There are documented instances where the accused were even denied the right to call witnesses that could vindicate them from such unsubstantiated charges.

Extreme examples of the injustices faced by gays in the military in the last century are those that Hoover had imprisoned in Alcatraz from 1934-1957. There appear to be at least 8 confirmed ex-military convicts confined there by the the early 1950s solely on charges of sodomy, with no violent charges and little to no criminal history, including the very first prisoner incarcerated there when it opened as a federal penitentiary in 1934. However, none of these men were stationed in Korea, so I chose Leavenworth as the expected potential destination, as that seems to be where the majority of men convicted of sodomy during the Korean War were sent.

Aaaaand this history lesson has been brought to you by far too many hours of research and a sense of outrage for the victims of these practices.


Please read on, and enjoy!