"I take it you weren't interested in whatever poison they offered in the mess tent," BJ greeted Hawkeye as his best friend made his way into the Swamp.
"Oh, I thought about it, but the poison in here is far more tempting," Hawkeye answered, taking up a glass and pouring himself home-brewed alcohol. "This only burns going down- the questionable substance they stuff down our throats sets in your stomach and starts breeding."
"Nothing like little critters scampering around in your gut," BJ replied.
"I only like little critters running around in my gut when they are about to make an escape," Hawkeye joked raunchily. BJ laughed heartily beside him, raising a glass in salute.
"You two miscreants remind me why my family raised me with such poise and reverence for proper conduct," Charles Winchester entered the Swamp reading an old Boston Daily, disdain clear in his voice.
"Well excuse me, your majesty," Hawkeye prodded, standing and making a mock bow before nipping the old paper from Charles's hands and walking about with his chest puffed out. The offended man scuffed and ripped the paper back out of Hawkeye's hands.
"Perhaps you have no respect for another's property," he chastised, "but know that if you ever touch my papers again you will find yourself lacking an intact nose!"
"Watch out, Hawk, he might mean that," BJ warned with a laugh on his voice. Hawkeye raised his brows.
"Oh, I'm sure he means it, but is he mean enough to mean it?"
"Knowing Charles, I'm sure he is, but I doubt he has the means by which to mean it," BJ threw back. Charles snapped his paper as he sat upon his cot, glaring at them.
"Gentlemen, your insults are reaching an impossible low," he drawled. "Your attempts at pitiful comedy are dropping in a most pathetic way."
"All fine acts of comedy have their lows, Charles," BJ answered, lying width-wise across his messy cot. "If this is your high, then I'd hate to see your low."
All three paused in their tossing of insults, looking at their material roof. Hawkeye quickly downed the rest of his drink, BJ flopped backwards on the cot, and Charles allowed his paper to lilt in his hands.
"Attention all personnel. Incoming wounded, all to pre-op. This is a small group, but some bad hits, folks. Take 'em as they come, they're all day last."
"That's my low," Hawkeye said in a suddenly very tired voice as he stood. BJ and Charles stood as well, and they made their way grudgingly out the Swamp door. The sound of choppers in the distance hummed, a stressing sound as the 4077th got to business.
"They're sending Green back to the front," Hawkeye informed BJ as they made their way in a brisk walk.
"What?" BJ looked at him sharply.
"The boy that required an hour of fishing shells from his scalp?" Charles quipped, his voice surprised.
"Apparently our boys are recyclable," Hawkeye spat. "They give him a purple heart and a lollipop and send them back to the front. Like a piece of metal is supposed to make him better!"
"It was mass amounts of metal that landed in his skull that put him here," BJ growled.
"Yeah, but this time, it's a different color," Hawkeye sneered as they waited for a chopper to land in front of them. Before the chopper had completely touched the ground, the surgeon was clambering atop a wounded soldier who was continuing to bleed profusely from his side.
Hawkeye attempted to wipe the blood from the wound with the bandage the medic had placed over it, but the scarlet liquid continued to seep into Hawkeye's hands. The stench coming from the wound gave him two options: either the man was badly infected, or there was serious damage to the intestines. He pressed the already soaked bandage back to the wound, applying pressure with both arms.
"Margaret, I've got a bad belly wound. I need clamps now," he called out. The nurse looked up from another wounded patient that looked like a head injury.
"I can't leave this one! He's going into shock!" the Major objected, her blond hair blowing in the chopper-created wind.
"Damnit!" Hawkeye cursed and looked about, desperate to find free hands. Two men had come to carry his patient from the chopper, but he waved them to a stop. He thought desperately, wracking his brain for a way to halt the bleeding before the man lost too much blood to replenish. A thought flew into his head, but he hesitated at following through. He had no clue how extensive the injuries were, but at this point there was little more he could do to stop the bleeding. Cursing, he gripped both sides of the messy, gaping wound and strained the two ends together, hoping desperately that this would not create internal flooding. The soldier cried out, jerking pout of unconsciousness. "Alright, go, go!" Hawkeye ordered.
He followed the man, jogging alongside attempting to keep the large incision connected. Beside him, BJ and Charles ran alongside their chosen patients. One by one, the patients were brought into the OR, and Hawkeye looked about desperately.
"I need clamps, people!" he shouted over the hustle and bustle. Someone, he couldn't see who, shoved a cold pair of clamps into his hands, washing relief over him. He applied the instruments, and he snatched a nurse rushing past by the arm, swinging her about to his table. "Suction- now." The girl rustled off and reappeared a moment later, applying his request. He had not had time to scrub or prepare, but he went ahead with the operation, pushing the sanitation risks from his mind.
&.&
Two hours on the belly wound and an hour more treating other patients had Hawkeye all but dragging himself into his cot and out of the biting cold wind. His stomach complained for lack of food as his shoulder muscles whined of being sore from leaning over his patients for too many hours straight. He had not had twenty minutes between the first batch that day and this last one, and his body was reminding him he was only human. Not that he needed the reminding. He was all too aware of the fact that his body's immune system was quite penetrable as he felt a stiff headache looming in the back of his cranium.
BJ fell onto Hawkeye's cot beside him, too tired to make it to his own, using his best friend's abdomine as a pillow. Hawkeye had a mind to shove him off and tell him to get in his own, but words and conceptions of the action never made it out of his thoughts. Rather, BJ's warm body against the chill of the oncoming night was welcome, and Hawkeye was far too tired and cold to reject extra heat. He was still laying sideways across his bed, but simply did not have the energy to resituate himself and his buddy, who's eyes were closed, only his irregular breathing hinting that he had not already fallen into a deep sleep.
Charles slugged in shortly after them, bundled up in a parka his family had sent from home. Hawkeye would have glared at his warm friend if his head hadn't ached as fiercly as it did.
"Well, gentlemen, it was a joy working with two of the most unprofessional meatball surgeons for the majority of nearly twenty four hours," the man drawled, his voice strained. "But I am simply estatic to say I am going to escape this festering boiling pot of hell by sleeping as long as humanly possible."
"Don't count on that, Charles," BJ muttered half-mindedly.
"Why on earth wouldn't I?" Charles snapped, flopping upon his cot in an ungentlemanly fashion.
Even as his weight tipped onto the make-shift bed, it gave out from beneath him, his backend splashing into a bedpan full of cold rain water.
Through their fateuge, Hawkeye and BJ managed to laugh.