I'm just going to dedicate the whole story to all of my great supporters out there! Couldn't have done this without you. If any of you are wondering, all reviews will be answered at the posting of the next chapter. I know that this chapter is short, and I promised to get it out yesterday; but my parents decided to take my siblings and me on a surprise vacation for the next three days. I have been packing and trying to get everything together, so I really didn't have time to write. :-( I promise that you will all get a nice long chapter when I return! Until then, enjoy!
Mel didn't want to leave the comforting darkness that presently surrounded her. Here, she could remember who she was and what she stood for. Here, she was still blissfully ignorant about the world as a whole. There was no blood, no terror, no death. She had the fantasy of a normal life, and somehow she knew that this wasn't the way it should be. Some little voice in the back of her mind urged her to wake and face the problems that now lie in her way; but every time that little voice spoke up she seemed to settle further into the darkness.
Foreign voices often intruded on her while she remained hovering in that non-descript place. The voices said things that would have scared her long ago. Now, she had no feeling, no opinion. She liked this. Mel could hear the voices trying to urge her, to coax her out of the darkness. They seemed desperate to lure her from this strange paralysis that now gripped both body and mind. The voices called it hysterical paralysis. They said that her only way out of the darkness was for her mind to come to terms with what went on in that aid station. Mel did want to wake up, but only to the semi-normal life she once had before this senseless war had torn it all apart. She just wanted to open her eyes and find that she had been living in a horrific nightmare for the past six months of her life. The little voice of reason in the back of her mind continued to insist that this would never be possible.
Hawkeye Pierce was puzzled by the state of his new patient. Never had he seen a condition like this that frustrated him like the one at hand. It had been a week since he pulled the girl from the wreckage of the bombed Jeep, and still she showed no signs of response. If he didn't know any better, he would say that she had given up on life. He truly didn't blame the girl for not wanting to emerge from her apparently peaceful state of rest and into this hellhole. He didn't know what she had been doing here in the first place. They had searched her medical bag and had found no personal information whatsoever that would give them a clue as to who she was. She no longer seemed to care about who she was as long as she remained far away from the war. It was a heavy price to pay.
While on rounds one afternoon, Hawkeye paused to look at the girl's chart. Her vitals were normal in every respect, save for the fact that she had yet to show any signs of consciousness. Something inside of him wanted this frail beauty to wake, to show that even in war there was such thing as a miracle. She had been the only one from the aid station to survive the horrible shelling. When the 8063rd arrived at the station, they found it in shambles. Inside, there were the bodies of no less than fifteen men lying dead on the dirt floor. None of them had even the slightest chance of living.
Sighing heavily, he replaced the girl's chart on the hook at the end of the bed and sat down slowly on the edge of it. Gently brushing a few stray strands of hair from her face, he contemplated her situation. She was obviously alone in this terrifying war zone with no family to speak of. She had incredible strength to be out in the midst of battle doing what she did, but it was still not her place. Hawkeye wished he could understand her motives for doing what she had done. His hand caught hers in a gesture of comfort. He wished he had been there to help this girl. Something inside of him wanted to protect her. He could not take this feeling lightly.
"Listen," he began, staring at her still features. He did not know if she could here him or not, but he continued on nevertheless. "I know you probably can't here me, but incase you can, I need to tell you something important. You need to wake up now. You need to prove to all of us that there's some light in the middle of all the smoky haze of the gun shells. The aid station you came from had no survivors left. You're the only one. I can tell that you're strong, but you're unsure," his soft tone broke as tears began collecting in his eyes. "You've made it this far. You're safe now, and I promise that you won't have to go back out there again. Please wake up. You have a whole group of people here who want to help you, so let them."
Hawkeye took a deep breath, collecting himself. He rarely got so emotional over a single patient. All of the non-stop surgery he had been doing lately must really have been getting to him. He considered calling Sidney Freedman for himself as well as the girl who lie in front of him. Hawkeye moved to get up, giving the girl's hand a light squeeze before moving to his next patient. If he didn't know any better, he would have said that she squeezed back.