Title: Cultural Differences
Author: MicroChips
Disclaimer: See chapter 1
Notes: I'm so sorry for being so long with this chapter, my comp crashed and then I broke my foot. Some severe swearing in this chapter… I'm just glad that I don't have to change the rating… well hopefully.
Chapter 4:Threats and Swamp Monsters
It had to be about four am and Alex had not yet slept a wink. She lay on her back in her tent, softly humming a song to herself, staring at the drab olive ceiling. She was used to this. She had suffered from mild insomnia since she was five, and it had become a lot worse when she had come over to Korea.
She yawned and rolled over to stare blankly at the wall. Inside her mind she ran over the events of the previous day. She felt so tense and could not figure out why. She should feel safer not being out in the field, yet this sensation of impending doom crept over her. With a snort, she stood up and stalked outside. She needed to do something to take her mind off this feeling.
Without a sound, she lay down in front of her door and looked up at the sky, calmly staring at the stars. As a child she remembered her father and brother had stared for hours at the skies, whether through telescopes or just with their eyes just to see what they could. Alex's eyes swam slightly as she thought of those days. They were long gone and no longer needed.
She sniffed sharply and stood up before walking around the compound. Insomnia was not a new experience. She had suffered from it since she was a child. Ever since her father…
No, that was not what happened, you have no idea what happened, you weren't there! She chided herself viciously. She shook her head and continued to walk. After about half an hour of wandering around the camp, an announcement over the PA woke her from her thoughts.
"Rise and shine! It's five in the am and we got customers!"
She threw her head back and stretched slightly. Well, it was a good way to kill time before dawn.
(Attempted Break)
Meg crept up on her a good while later and demanded to know where she had gone the previous evening.
"Away," Alex replied simply, angry at Meg's interruption. She was playing a very dangerous game of tag with a bullet in a Corporals chest. Meg frowned slightly at the dark circles under Alex's eyes.
"Did you get any sleep?"
"What's that?" Alex asked, blinking slightly. She grinned as she finally got a good grip on the bullet and pulled it out. "I need some 3-0 silk."
"3-0 silk," the nurse who was assisting her said, handing her the threaded needle. Alex blinked and began the slightly tedious task of stitching the Corporal up.
"Alex, you need to see someone about your sleeping problems," Meg said in a worried voice. Alex sighed sharply and almost dropped a stitch.
"I don't need to do anything. You on the other hand need to mind your own bees-wax," she snapped sharply. Meg blinked for a moment at Alex's viciousness. She very rarely yelled at anything, well anything important to her.
"Okay, I'll leave you alone then," she said before stalking off.
"Good, you got the point…" Alex grumbled, finishing her grisly sewing. "Corpsman, get this guy to post op." She stretched for a moment while blinking ever so slightly. She had been ignoring the banter from the other doctors for the majority of the time she had been in the OR. Hawkeye had just called Frank some sort of rodent and the Major was busy arguing the finer points of general etiquette between officers.
"You show no respect to people of higher rank to you Pierce!" Frank snapped with a small whine.
"I do show respect to people of higher rank. I just have to plug my nose before I do it," Hawkeye replied, receiving a few chuckles from the staff. Alex grinned to herself as another solider was placed on the table in front of her. Her smile faded quickly as she saw the damage that was done to him. She turned to the corpsmen who brought him in.
"Did they bring a leg with them?" she asked as calmly as she could. The corpsmen shook their heads and quietly walked off. Alex gulped sharply and looked over at the nurse across from her.
"Saline solution," Alex ordered, her voice wavering slightly behind the commanding tone. As the nurse passed her the bottle, Alex couldn't stop her hand from trembling slightly. She forced herself to stop trembling quickly, but not before the nurse had picked it up.
"Are you okay Major?" she asked quietly.
"Yes… I'm-" Alex managed to say before Meg stalked up again.
"Thank you Lieutenant, I'll assist the Major with this one," she ordered sharply. As the lieutenant left, she shot a glance at Alex's pale face, not knowing what to do or say.
"Thanks…" Alex whispered weakly as Meg pried the saline from her hand.
"What are cousins for?" Meg asked with a consoling grin. She proceeded to irrigate the wound for Alex, letting her cousin prepare herself for what had to be done next. Franks eyes narrowed as he caught this exchange. Oh where could he take this one?
(Another Attempted Break)
As they all walked out of the OR like zombies, Meg and Alex headed straight for the mess tent. They were both extremely tired and did not notice that Frank and Hawkeye were tailing them closely. They stood in line, Alex not really wanting to eat but being forced by Meg to do just that. Alex looked extremely ill, and deeply pale under her red hair. Meg had to force a bowl of oatmeal into her hands and steer her to a vacant table before she would respond. As Meg forced her to sit down, Alex grimaced at the food.
"What is this?" she asked, pulling a spoonful of grey gunk out of the bowl and letting it flop back in.
"It's a bad imitation of oatmeal…" Meg grumbled, sniffing her spoonful before wincing.
"This is oatmeal? Looks like dead skin…" Alex said, raising her voice slightly.
"Probably is… I bet they cooked it in really dirty socks…" Meg grinned at her and also raised her voice.
"Kill two birds with one stone?" Alex asked, putting theatrical emotion into her voice.
"Wouldn't put it past them. Army cooking is pretty bad," she lowered her voice and looked conspiratorially at Alex. "I think we should stop. They have all paled significantly." Alex just grinned and took a small mouthful of the goop.
"Fine. Ruin my fun why don't you?" she flared her nostrils as the taste took hold of her and made a small gacking noise. She slowly pushed the bowl away as someone sat down next to her. She slowly turned her head and glared at Hawkeye, who had a consoling smile on his face. Alex sighed and rolled her eyes.
"You saw didn't you?"
"Yes I did. Do you want to-"
"Talk about it? Hell no," Alex snapped angrily, brushing a strand of hair angrily off her face. "What happened is my business and mine alone." She viciously pushed the oatmeal substitute around the bowl before sighing angrily and standing.
"I think I'll go back to bed," she declared sullenly before turning and walking off. She suddenly looked very tired. Meg nodded solemnly as Hawkeye dropped his jaw.
"What was that all about?" he asked, a dumbfounded expression on his face. Meg shook her head and followed Alex's retreating form with her eyes.
"Reasons best known to Alex and me for now," she hissed darkly through her teeth before adding, "I'll tell you later." She shot up off of the bench and stalked quickly over to where Alex had just been cornered by Frank.
"I do hope you have an explanation for your actions today Major," He said smarmily. Alex flashed him an all too cheesy smile.
"An explanation? For what?" she raised her eyebrows and cocked her head to one side as she asked the question, not too dissimilar than an inquisitive child.
"For that stunt you pulled in the OR. Letting a nurse do most of an operation. If I didn't know any better I'd say you had no skills," Frank stated slightly louder than needed. A crowd had begun to pay attention to what was going on. Alex blinked and her smile turned cold.
"I do suggest that you take that back, Major Burns, or I shall be forced to make you."
"Are you making a threat to an officer?" Frank raised his eyebrows and flared his nostrils. He did not notice Alex's hands were white from being clenched so tightly.
"No, I'm threatening an inferior human being," she hissed coldly. Meg finally managed to force her way through the crowd and gripped Alex's shoulder tightly.
"Majors, is there a problem here?" she asked, her voice not giving away what she was feeling.
"No I don't believe there is." Alex said sharply before spinning on her heel and attempting to force her way through the crowd. Frank scoffed.
"Obviously you can't prove that you are a superior surgeon, Major Lexington. How did you get that rank anyway? Your family buy it for you?" Frank barely had time to finish his gloating before Alex had turned around and tackled him to the floor. She landed at least two punches on him before various people pulled her off of him.
"You goddamned yank!" she screeched as the people holding onto her received bites kicks and scratches. "You good for nothing ass hole! You couldn't see anything if it wasn't taped to the end of your shitty nose! You fucking spineless, yellow bellied, tit whore!" she continued as people dragged her out of the mess tent. They let her go halfway across the camp, and she was still reeling off various objectionable phrases in at least three different languages.
"Tete du merde! Tu putain ta mere!" she finally ended, out of breath and throat feeling like it had been rubbed with sandpaper. She drew in a breath through her teeth that sounded like a large hiss. Without looking at the people who had pulled her out of the tent, she turned and stormed of and locked herself in the VIP tent. Meg sighed as she stormed off and seriously considered screaming into her hands. She balled her fists and stormed back to the mess tent. Frank was whining on one of the benches, Margaret coddling him like an infant.
"And then she hit me! Why does everyone want to hit me?" Frank whined pathetically.
"Because you provoke them to an extent of which it's the only course of action!" Meg snarled at him, advancing viciously. Frank paled considerably as she spoke while Margaret stood up and glared at her.
"How did he provoke her?" she demanded. Meg looked back at her with almost double the intensity.
"Alex's family is a very touchy subject," she said coldly, "and do remember that you are speaking to a superior officer, Major…" She pushed past Margaret and stopped in front of Frank.
"Be happy, Major Burns, that you are not a member of the Canadian Army," she said simply before turning and leaving the mess tent. As soon as she was gone from hearing range, Frank let out a quiet whimper of fear and passed out.
(Yet another time/ place break)
Alex lay on her cot and fumed. Her fists clenching and unclenching, occasionally tight enough to almost cut her skin with her extremely short fingernails. She was muttering under her breath, about the army, majors, and various other subjects of what those two things should go and do, normally involving shoving heads up each other and so on. She didn't even notice a quiet knocking at the door until the knock became much more insistent.
"What do you want?" she snapped at the door. It opened cautiously, and Hawkeye came in wearing a bucket on his head and carrying a mop like a sword.
"It's safe, there appears to be no hostile activity," he waved his hand and continued to stalk into the tent. Meg followed him with a very flustered expression on her face, and she was followed by BJ, who was also decked out in the same ensemble as Hawkeye.
"What the hell are you two up to?" Alex asked, swinging her legs off of the cot so she was in a sitting position. BJ let out a loud and very comical shriek, while jabbing the stick end of the mop at Alex.
"Look out! They've sent out the great and terrible swamp monster!" he exclaimed, while Hawkeye swung around and made the same stabbing motion with the broom he held. Alex's glare could have melted steel, and if it hadn't the tone of her voice that followed would surely rip its atoms apart.
"Get out…" she snarled angrily. All the intruders felt a shiver run up their spine.
"I um… think that…" Meg said quietly before trotting quickly out the door. Both Hawkeye and BJ followed her and did not give Alex a reason for lobbing a boot at them. She collapsed back onto her cot and proceeded to cry herself to sleep.
(Yet another one…)
"What's up with her?" Hawkeye asked Meg as they crossed the compound. Meg looked at him dejectedly then looked around them to see who was there.
"Stuff I can't tell you in public, though it would probably be best if someone around here knew…" Meg mumbled quietly. She wrung her hands nervously and shuffled from foot to foot. "She may need it if she does what get us sent down here in the first place."
A/N: I do apologize for not posting in a while. Please, no rotten fruit, it's a killer.
Bluesparkle123: Once again, glad you liked it. If I told you my plans for Alex, wouldn't that mean that you know more than everyone else? Laughs I'm not promising anything. But maybe.
Akahana: Thank you, I feel loved.
Evila-elf: When I read the fist part fo your review I thought, oh god my first flame, but then I read further. Thank you, and I'm glad you liked it. About the nationality thingy, I was emphasizing that there was a lot of prejudice in that war but yeah; it was a bit too harsh…
Oliver: I'm glad that you liked it. Megumi is a very Japanese name but I did my research on this one. Meg and Alex are from British Columbia, to be more precise, Vancouver. During the time between the First and Second World War, a lot of Japanese people settled in Vancouver. During WW2 they were persecuted quite badly. They were sent to prison camps and had all their property taken from them (wow in Canada?!?!?!). A large amount of them stayed in BC after the war, and a majority of them still live in BC today. Yes, it sounds a bit funny, but believe me, its possible.
Well thanks to all my reviewers. I think that I will give you all a Krispy Kreme doughnut. Tim Hortons invades the states, Krispy Kreme invades ehre.