Disclaimer: Don't own.
FYI: The lines equal scene changes. :)
Not an exceptional writer, be lenient.
The clatter of surgical instruments and doctors ordering nurses filled the space around them. The sound of thunder echoed across the land and rain pattered on the metal roof.
"I've had it." Pierce said, throwing his gloves on the floor and running his hands threw his hair. The patient that he hadn't managed to save, was covered with a sheet and hauled away.
"Now Pierce! You have more customers in the waiting room. You can pray for the man when you get finished." Potter said softly, elbows deep in a kid's gut.
Pierce nodded and swiped an arm across his eyes, "Glove me."
Kellye gloved the doctor as a new casualty was carried in and placed on his table. BJ glanced worriedly at his swamp-mate before turning his attention back to the destroyed spleen in his hands.
Rain dripped in from the ceiling steadily between tables, the roof springing new leaks with each drop. Each doctor had to wheel their tables out from a leak at least once during the six hours they had been operating.
BJ slipped forward, grabbing the table for balance, the mixture of blood and water was making the cement floor incredibly slick. Potter looked at the floor, the water against his dirty shoes left mud footprints.
"Sweet Jesus. We need to do something about this floor," Potter looked frustratedly back at the kid in front of him. Making a few more stitches and announcing the patient ready for post-OP.
The rain seeped through cracks and down the wires and hooks holding the lights to the ceiling. The light bulb above Winchester's patient popped and crackled, sending Charles across the table and over his patient.
"Klinger!" The major shouted, from his position still over his patient.
"On it!" Klinger gave in curt response before scurrying out for a new bulb, pulling his jacket tighter against him as he headed out into the cold compound.
An explosion rocked the MASH unit. "Damn freezing temperatures and cold rain are setting our own mines off!" Potter shouted before calling for Radar.
"Radar! Get us i..." Potter said before Radar took over his sentence for him.
"...icorps! On it!" Radar finished, heading for his office.
"He has enough shrapnel in his abdomen to shame a junkyard!" Hawkeye shouted, retracting an organ enough to expose a bleeder.
Blood shot out of the kid like a geyser right into the dark-haired surgeon's face. Stunned and out of instinct, Pierce quickly jerked back. Time went in slow motion for the thin surgeon. His feet left their contact with the floor and he grabbed the surgical tray to catch himself; to no avail. He and the instruments clattered to the floor.
His back hit the ground and all the air was pushed from his lungs leaving him gasping and panting. The nurse who was assisting him looked panicky at him. Potter, BJ, and even Winchester looked shocked and concerned . "Pierce! You alright son?"
Hawkeye quickly got back to his feet and clamped a hand, the one that didn't hit the dirty floor, over the bleeder. Calling out for two more units of blood and a clamp.
"Fine, Fine. Just Dandy." Hawkeye rushed out, scurrying for a new glove. Mud covered his back and his pant legs, blood was splattered across his face, and his backside was sore as hell.
He looked like an ad for Jack the Ripper.
It was only when he was closing the patient did he feel the stinging in his arm. Looking and noticing, for the first time, a long cut down his arm. More than likely from the scalpel he dropped when he went down.
"Damn." Hawkeye hissed. Sending the patient to post-OP and wrapping a bandage quickly around the gash to keep from bleeding into the next patient. It was going to scar, Hawkeye thought absently.
Hawkeye leaned against the wall in the scrub room, post surgeries, with Potter, BJ and Winchester all shrugging out of their scrubs and into army-greens.
"Let me see your arm." BJ said, pushing Hawkeye's sleeve back and holding the arm out, exposing the bandages covering the cut on the outside side. Peeling back the bandages and grabbing and using the inside of his old scrubs to wipe away the dried blood.
"That's gonna leave a pretty little scar," Potter said, glancing over BJ's shoulder and at the six inch gash.
Hawkeye grimaces at the new reminder the war was going to give in as BJ left, only to return in a few seconds with alcohol and fresh bandages.
"How'd you cut your arm like that?" Winchester questioned, looking perturbed.
The look alone gave Hawkeye some hesitation, "I cut it on the scalpel I dropped while in surgery..." He trailed realizing the gravity of the situation. "His blood was on that scalpel."
Winchester nodded and BJ cleaned the gash, wincing as the dark-haired man hissed at the stinging.
"When he's done with re-bandaging, I'm going to take some blood samples." Potter announced heading off. Charles left too, getting the name of the kid Pierce operated on at the time and going to find his chart.
Winchester walked through the Post-OP ward scanning charts for Sgt. Fletcher Nelson. He found him on the furthest cot, a nurse sponging off his forehead.
"What's wrong with him?" He questioned worriedly.
"Hemorrhagic Fever." The nurse answered nonchalantly, hanging a sign that said, 'No Fluids' on the end of the bunk.
Charles, still not very familiar with the disease, asked "Is it spread by blood to blood contact?"
The nurse looked thoughtful, "I think so. I'm not too sure."
Charles rubbed his forehead before heading to the X-Ray room where Pierce was getting blood drawn. Considering the OR was being cleaned from the water that had, since then, stopped falling from the sky.
Winchester walked in slowly, dreading the news he was going to have to give. He saw Pierce laying on a gurney, his injured arm thrown over his eyes as his right arm was being prodded by Potter. Hawk was still wearing his dirty scrubs, splattered with blood and mud.
BJ was standing off to the side, leaning against the wall, casually watching Pierce and Potter, glancing at Charles when he walked in.
"Um. Colonel. I found Sgt. Nelson's chart." Charles swallowed, an almost tangible air of impending bad news.
"What did it say?" Potter, now looking exceedingly worried at Charles's expression.
Hawkeye moved his arm to lay flat against the table, turning his head to look up at Charles still in the doorway. "He has Hemorrhagic Fever." Charles said weakly.
Potter gave a defeated sigh before placing a hand on Hawkeye's upper-arm. "If you caught it son the next few weeks are going to be rough. We won't know you caught if for sure till the results come back from Seoul. You can carry on like normal till the results get back. Hemorrhagic Fever al least doesn't spread through the air."
Hawkeye nodded and looked grimly at the ceiling; waiting for his CO to fill the last vial before heading off to the swamp, BJ and Charles walking back with him.
It was two days after the accident when Hawkeye started showing symptoms. They were in the Swamp and it was 7 am. The boys had just woken up, no incoming wounded or other obligations, making them wake up any earlier.
BJ was pulling on his converse and Charles was gathering a his shower items. Hawkeye was laying on his cot, wiping the sleep from his eyes when the headache started. He pressed his index and thumb on either side of his nose and groaned.
"Hawk? You okay?" BJ asked, pausing mid shoe-tie to look over at the bunkmate.
"Headache," was all Hawkeye said; squinting at BJ who finished tying his shoe to stand and walk over to his cot. BJ pressed his palm against the man's forehead, Charles standing in the doorway watching the interaction with genuine interest.
"You have a fever Hawk." BJ sighed and bent over to pull Hawkeye up. "Time to take a bunk in Post-OP." BJ deadpanned.
Hawkey pulled his lips tight and let himself be pulled up; slipping on his boots and shrugging on his red robe. Winchester looked awkwardly between the two before nodding at Pierce and slipping out of the swamp, heading to the showers.
Hawkeye reached out and grabbed BJ's arm. Reeling as a wave a dizziness washed over him and threatened to drag him off his feet. His head spun and he felt the urge to vomit all over the dirt floor.
"Hawkeye? Hawkeye?" BJ shouted at the man. Hawkeye's head was lowered and BJ was practically holding him.
Hawkeye shook his head, clearing the fog that muddled his brain. BJ's voice drifted through the fog like a lifeline and pulled him to the surface. He forced his eyes to BJ's.
"Hawk? You with me now?" BJ's voice softened.
"Yeah, I just got really nauseous." BJ looked concerned again and led Hawkeye to post-OP, arm wrapped under Hawkeye's shoulders just in case he got dizzy again.
Potter was sitting at the little desk in post-OP. He was on duty for Winchester after losing a bet. Sherman glanced through papers scattered around the desk when the door thumped open and BJ walked in practically carrying Hawkeye.
"What is going on?" Potter exclaimed, jogging over and supporting the other side of the sick surgeon. They laid him out on an empty cot and shouted at a nurse to grab a change of clothes and a few pillows.
Soon, Hawkeye was changed into pale blue hospital clothes and comfortably tucked in the olive drab blanket. A sign was posted on the end of his cot, 'no fluids', and BJ was sitting next to Potter on the cot right of Hawkeye's.
"I don't feel all that terrible," Hawkeye confessed, "Just incredibly thirsty."
"You know no water." BJ warned.
"I know," the lanky man said sadly.
"Hang in there, son. We will be with you the whole way." the colonel said, smiling reassuringly at him and running a hand through his black-gray hair.
Hawkeye smiled and Potter left to attend to some official paperwork that kept the 4077th in operation. BJ sat on the edge of the cot his friends was lying on. He grabbed a towel from the table beside the cot and wiping the sweat from Hawk's forehead.
BJ felt small shivers run through the body next to him. He wished he could do something besides sit and wait for Hawkeye to get worse before he got better. A nurse came by and gave BJ the things he needed to set up an IV saline solution, BJ wanted to do it himself after all.
BJ grabbed Hawkeye's arm, Hawk's eyes following BJ's movements deftly. He tied the tourniquet and inserted the needle in Hawkeye's wrist, attached the line, and hanging the bottle. Hawkeye yawned and fell deeper into the pillows.
"I'll let you get some sleep. And don't worry, I'll visit you a couple hundred times." BJ smiled and headed to the mess tent for tasteless army breakfast.
BJ went in and grabbed a tray and pancakes, sitting at the table occupied by Potter, Winchester, Margaret, and Radar.
"How's Pierce?" Margaret asked, taking a bite of something that appeared to be eggs.
"He's doing okay. I'm going to bring him a tray with a lot of food on it for him before he starts to lose his appetite. At this rate he will be in phase two by tomorrow." BJ muttered sadly, poking at his pancake with his fork.
"Damn. This is going to be rough. Pierce doesn't have a whole lot of weight he can lose." The colonel agreed.
Winchester interjected, "What does phase two consist of exactly?"
BJ answered, "That's when the kidneys start to go down hill. He won't be able to remove fluids or receive any. Then phase three. He can get back on a bit of water, but his saline has to be cut off drastically. He will be putting out tons of fluids though. He will lose enough sodium as it is so we will start him on an isotonic saline solution. That's also the phase he could slip into a coma, delirium, go into shock, and he still will have virtually no appetite."
"Is there anything we can do besides that?" Charles asked, sounding more than a little angry.
"No. We just have to keep watch and try to combat it anyway we can." Potter answered dismally.
"I just wish we could do something. I mean if it was anything else you guys could fix it in OR." Margaret supplied.
All the men couldn't help but agree.
BJ walked into post-OP that night, carrying a two trays: one a normal meal, the other full of starchy foods. Hoping it will give Hawk enough calories to last a few days.
"That's the third tray you've bought me today. If I didn't know any better I would say you were trying to fatten me up. Do you own a candy house in the woods?" Hawkeye joked sitting up and allowing BJ to set the try in his lap.
"Yes Gretel, how'd you know." BJ joked back, extending a fork for Hawkeye.
"This food is horrible. Even if I didn't feel terrible I wouldn't eat this much." Hawkeye griped accepting the fork.
"We need to get food into your body before the loss of appetite and the kidney problems." BJ argued.
"I know. It's just this food is going to help me heal. If anything it will make me sicker," Hawkeye grumbled, sliding the food around on his tray. "Plus, I don't even know what this is!"
BJ laughed, "Mashed potatoes, corn, rye, and a brown thing that just lies there..."
Hawkeye scoffed and shoved a bite of mashed potatos in his mouth, grimacing as it slid down his throat.
BJ grabbed his own tray and ate with Hawkeye, joking about the new nurse assigned to the unit for a few days.
Bj was staring at the top of the tent listening to the sounds of crickets and Charles' light snoring. The air was a little chilly and Bj pulled the blanket to his shoulders. His mind kept drifting to Hawkeye. Their earlier conversation was cut short when Hawkeye had become drowsy and had fallen asleep.
He just couldn't shake how pale he had gotten. He was as white as the pillows his head was resting on! Hawkeye was also so weak. He had attempted to shove BJ playfully and Hawkeye himself was surprised by how weak he had gotten. This virus was hitting him hard.
BJ rolled over, having given up on sleep, and grabbed the letter from Peg hopping it would take his mind off of things. He was just about halfway through the letter for the fifth time when nurse Kellye walked in.
"BJ...BJ," she whispered.
BJ rolled over, "What happened?"
The nurse looked a little nervous, "Hawkeye just entered phase two."
BJ climbed out of bed and threw on his shoes, not bothering to get dressed, he just threw on his robe and ran to post-OP.
He opened the door to post-OP and saw Margaret sitting near Hawkeye's cot.
BJ rushed over, "How's he doing?"
Margaret sighed, "As well as expected. Temperature is up, he isn't releasing any fluids. He keeps complaining about muscle aches and he can't sleep. Plus, look..."
BJ moved closer and Margaret put her hands to Hawkeye's face. Hawkeye smiled mischievously at her but didn't say anything. She pulled Hawkeye's eyelids wider gently, to expose his sclera, the white of his eye, which was now a pale shade of yellow.
"Jaundice?" BJ announced, more as a rhetorical question.
Hawkeye smiled weakly, "My kidneys."
Bj nodded, a look of uselessness overcoming his features.
"You're not too jaundiced yet. Your kidneys aren't too far gone Hawk. You'll be fine." BJ encouraged, he could tell Hawkeye saw through his facade but didn't point it out. Choosing to agree with BJ, Hawk just nodded.
"Get some sleep Hawk. I'll stay right here." Hawkeye smiled and took BJ's hand. It amazed BJ how limp his grasp was but he didn't focus on it, relieved when Hawkeye's breathing slowed and he fell into a decent sleep.
BJ felt like he had been sitting in the little fold out chair for hours. Which he had been. He pressed his stethoscope to Hawkeye's chest for the fourth time in that hour. Content that no fluid was in his lungs.
BJ glanced up when he heard the door creak open, watching as a tired colonel walked in and stopped at the foot of Hawkeye's bed.
"Couldn't sleep?" BJ asked, glancing at the clock that read 4:27 am.
"Not a wink. How's he holding up?" Potter asked sitting carefully on the cot Hawkeye was resting on.
"He entered phase two about three hours ago. He is jaundiced." BJ whispered, afraid to wake him.
"His kidneys are doing better than expected right now, " Potter said in an equally quiet voice, taking in the shade of yellow that had covered the surgeon's sclera. "He still looks terrible." Potter admonished truthfully.
BJ agreed, taking in his friends parlor and temperature which had leveled out at 101.6. BJ smoothed back Hawk's sweat soaked hair and watched as Hawkeye stirred a little, not rousing from sleep completely.
"Go to sleep Hunnicut. I'll watch him." Potter said, resting a hand on Hawkeye's ankle.
"Why do you think I'm in here. I couldn't sleep." Bj confessed. Potter gave him a knowing look, both men resigning to stay at Hawk's side and keep each other company.
A few hours later and Hawkeye roused from the clutches of sleep. He smiled at the two men there with him. BJ was asleep in a fold-out chair, head against the wall, and the colonel was asleep on the cot that put BJ in the middle.
Hawkeye laughed but it quickly turned to coughing. The cough ripped through his dry throat and he grimaced, waking BJ and Potter, who both shot up startled.
"Sorry." Hawkeye said, looking between the two trying his hardest not to laugh.
"Bj waved him off and Potter looked him over, "Wanna try and eat something?"
Hawkeye cringed at the thought of food. "Oh God no."
Potter and Bj seemed to expect the answer, and honestly, so did Hawkeye weirdly enough. Hawkeye was about to say something about himself eating enough to gain 30 pounds when he felt something warm trickle down his upper lip.
Hawkeye swiped a hand across his face and pulled it back in his line of vision. Blood was slicked across the side of Hawkeye's palm. BJ noticed just after that.
"Bleeding is normal. Nothing to worry about." BJ said, glancing over his shoulder and grabbing a cotton ball from the basic supplies table. Hawkeye took them and held it to his left notril to staunch the bleeding.
"You don't get the Hemorrhage in Hemorrhagic fever without blood!" Hawkeye exclaimed with false joy.
It took nearly an hour and sixteen cotton balls later before his nose stopped bleeding. And Hawkeye was overcome with another wave of fatigue. He was incredibly thirsty and the thirst kept him from falling easily to sleep. It was a lose lose situation.
BJ sensing this, left to allow Hawkeye to at least try and sleep and probably get some for himself too. Potter, following suite, headed off in the direction of the latrines. It was a day and half later before Hawkeye's condition changed any.
BJ was eating lunch with Winchester and Potter when Margaret ran in, frantic. "Guys. Pierce just entered phase three. He's losing sodium faster than we thought he would. He's going into shock!"
All three doctors stood, abandoning their trays and sprinting towards post-OP.
Once at Hawkeye bedside; Winchester changed the IV that was just giving small amounts of vitamins and 5% saline, to one that gave less than 1% saline and no vitamins. BJ had his stethoscope pressed firmly against Hawkeye's chest and Potter was checking Hawkeye's pupils.
Hawkeye was now unconscious and losing fluids rapidly. His sweating was worse and his urine bag was changed more often than they would've liked. Hawkeye looked like death warmed over.
"His eyes are looking better, the yellow is fading. Once his kidneys are fully back we can start adding fluids to his body to compensate for the loss." Potter asserted, finishing his inspection of Pierce's eyes.
"His lungs are clear." BJ sighed in relief.
"IV is in place as well." Charles said, "but, he's bruising easily is that a symptom or problem?" Winchester gestured at the wrist where the reinsertion of the IV had bruised the skin around it.
"No, it's okay. His blood vessels are a little weak due to lack of fluids and sodium. It'll be fine." BJ answered, trying to not notice how much the bruising contrasted against his friends pale skin or how long it would take for that bruise to fade.
"Can I do anything?" Margaret asked worriedly, tugging on her lab coat sleeve.
"Just keep monitoring his sodium levels. They should start normalizing." Margaret nodded and left to check on a patient that had just requested her.
"Incoming wounded at the helicopter pad. Not many this time, just two!" The comm boomed. BJ groaned and left to scrub up, following Potter as he did the same. Both men casting looks back at Hawk's cot.
A day later and BJ was sitting by Hawkeye's cot, of course, and checking for fluid in the lungs yet again. His sodium levels normalized a few hours previous and his kidneys were completely back online, and another IV was set up to compensate for the lack of food.
BJ was going over the man's chart again for the seventh time in twenty minutes. Glancing at his watch he read 5:55 am. Too early to be awake, too late to go back to sleep, BJ groaned rubbing tired eyes.
It felt like forever ago since his best friends sliced his arm on an infected scalpel. Sgt. Nelson was already further ahead in recovery, sitting wide awake and eating light meals. BJ's gaze shifted over to the bunk that occupied by the man in thought.
BJ was so absorbed in thought, he almost missed the weak 'Howdy' uttered by the man in the cot next to him. Almost. BJ grinned from ear to ear and looked down at Hawkeye; whose blue eyes were open to the world. BJ could've have hugged him.
Bj called over a nurse and told her to tell, Winchester, Potter, Margaret, Radar, and everyone else that Hawkeye was awake. "How ya feeling partner?"
Hawkeye cracked a tired smile, "Honestly, starving."
BJ laughed and laughed till tears sprung to his eyes. Hawkeye was going to be alright! Before BJ could jump to his next thought, Potter and everyone else he had mentioned came walking in. They looked happy enough to float on air!
"Glad to see you awake son!" -Potter
"Oh boy! Gee Hawkeye you scared me!" -Radar
"You look better than last time I saw you, though, you never looked great." Winchester joked.
"Good to see you awake, Captain." -Margaret.
Klinger brought in a tray of food, "Here ya go sir! Heard you were hungry! You'd have to be to eat this slop!"
Hawkeye smiled and accepted the offered tray, taking a hesitant sniff before taking a bite. BJ laughed and ruffled his hair. Hawkeye was going to be fine.
The next day, BJ helped Hawkeye into a wheelchair, grabbing the blue standard hospital robe and tying it tightly around Hawkeye's waist.
"So, you guys are throwing me a 'Glad You're Okay' party in the mess tent..." Hawkeye grinned, elbowing Beej lightly in the stomach.
"Of course. Everyone was worried Hawk. Except Winchester; he was waiting for a quiet Swamp..." BJ joked.
Hawkeye glared playfully as BJ wheeled him across the compound. BJ was watching his friend, more than happy that he was fine. All BJ could see was the thin man's head and his arms as the gestured madly at whatever joke he was telling.
BJ could still see plainly the bruises covering Hawk's arms and the bandage that covered the gash; but, he could also see the color rising to his cheeks and the energy the man couldn't give just yesterday.
Radar pulled open the door to the mess tent and BJ wheeled Hawkeye in. The tent erupted in 'glad you back's and 'how ya feeling's and warm smiles.
"As much as I am saddened by this fact, I missed you Pierce. The swamp wasn't the same without you." Charles said in a way that was humbling and so un-Charles.
"Thank you Charles." Hawkeye replied, in all seriousness.
Potter slapped Hawkeye's shoulder, "Glad you back, son. We were worried for a bit you know!"
"Don't do that to us again!" Margaret said, looking at the man in the wheelchair.
"Yes Mom." Hawkeye smirked.
BJ wheeled him over to get him a drink and BJ sat on a bench next to the wheelchair. Silently observing the good mood around the mess tent. He slung his arm around Hawkeye's shoulder as they watched everyone dance around, hopelessly drunk. Hawkeye leaned into the embrace and smiled. Everything was just as it should be, maybe better.
I'm not entirely pleased with this. I was honestly just going to trash it but I got to thinking about how long it took me to type this so, I just put it up on here. I know I'd probably enjoy reading a story someone else would've probably thrown away so, I put it up for all those bored people out there.
R&R Please! :D