Disclaimer: I don't own MASH. If I did, I'd probably be doing something other than writing fan fiction about it.

Author's Note: I'd originally planned on not posting anything in the MASH fandom until a few days before Christmas, with a rather lengthy, fluffy, Christmassy one-shot I've completed over the past few weeks. However, this story came to me out of the blue and I couldn't resist posting it.

I usually don't write such shamefully angst-ridden melodramas, but once I had begun getting this down on paper I couldn't seem to stop myself. It was as if I was actually in MASH 4077, witnessing these events first hand. It was as if their situations had become my own, their feelings, actions, and voices quite plain to me, the mere observer.

Perfect Storm

Prologue – Lightning Struck:

Lightning clattered in the sky, claps of thunder completely obstructed by the constant piercing shriek and roar of dropping bombs. The ground shook beneath Hawkeye's feet and he tottered while reaching for a pressure bandage to clamp to the bleeding abdomen of the corporal lying in front of him.

"Alright," he shouted over the exploding bombs and pattering artillery directly outside the walls of the small shack Battalion Aid had set up in. "He's ready to be moved. Get me another one, stat!"

"There's no time, sir!" Sergeant Bunn's voice came out in a rush, water dripping down the sides of his face. "Our forces aren't holding. I've got orders to get everyone out of here right now!"

"Let me get to one more," Hawkeye said, already moving to another stretcher bound soldier. "I've got to get a tourniquet on his leg –"

"There isn't time, Captain," the sergeant insisted. He grabbed for Hawkeye's arm but Hawkeye moved out of the way, running up to the soldier whose leg had was torn apart by shrapnel, a mess of red and white bone and shining metal.

"Sergeant!" Private McKinnon appeared in the open doorway of the shack, eyes large, rifle held in his shaking hands, drenched with mud and rain. "We've got to get out of here, they said! The Chinese are right around the corner!"

There was a shuddering explosion, shaking dust from the ceiling, upheaving the ground so that Hawkeye lost his balance and crashed to his knees on the dirt floor. He threw his arms over his head to protect him from falling rafters and cursed when he thought of the soldier with the wounded leg, lying above him completely unprotected.

"Captain, come on!" roared Sergeant Bunn, fingers closing around Hawkeye's wrist. Hawkeye suddenly knew that there was no way the sergeant was going to leave without him and he struggled back to his feet.

"Alright!" he bellowed, cursing the Chinese, cursing the war, cursing himself for being so helpless. He tore himself out of Sergeant Bunn's grip and lunged for now dust covered soldier lying on the stretcher. He grabbed hold of one end of the stretcher and the sergeant grabbed the other.

They followed Private McKinnon into the downpour of rain and shrapnel outside. Hawkeye stowed the soldier on the back of a jeep. "Get in, Captain!" Sergeant Bunn yelled, and turned to Private McKinnon, who was holding his rifle toward the murky, rippling trees and undergrowth that might hold any number of shadowed enemies, "come on, Billy!"

Hawkeye leapt toward the front seat of the jeep. He heard a flurry of sharp cracks and a scream. He whirled around, mind automatically clicking into motion, looking to see what was happened, who was hurt, what he could do –

Private McKinnon was lying on his back in the mud. Hawkeye darted forward. Sergeant Bunn was yelling behind him.

He heard the familiar piercing shriek in the back of his mind, hardly recognizing what it meant. He saw in front of him the sudden tearing apart of the earth. There wasn't time to react. There wasn't time to take cover, to think of taking cover.

The impact tremor hit him like a thousand ton of bricks. His feet left the ground.

Time stopped.

The air around him filled with flying rocks, dirt, and dust. The continuous patter of rain, the angry screaming of the explosion, the clatter of guns all at once disappeared, becoming a muffled drone in his ears. Hawkeye knew, somehow, that he was waiting for something, something large, something significant, something terrible. He was conscious of a strange, insistent pain in his stomach.

The ground rose up to meet his back at a frightening speed. He crashed against the ground like a ragdoll thrown against a paved driveway. He tumbled. He heard something crack, something break, felt something snap. Something was screaming inside of his head, something that was aware that he had lost all control. He was being moved by a brutally strong, frightening force completely outside of himself.

He felt pulsing, uncontrollable fear blanket itself around his mind, stopping the air from coming up his throat.

He skidded to a stop. The dust settled.

Like the volume had suddenly been dialed all the way back to maximum on a speaker, sound leapt back to life, tearing into his ears, screaming, screaming, screaming.

He couldn't breathe.

My God, he couldn't breathe.

He couldn't see anything. All around him was light, drifting particulars of light, blinding, flickering –

He couldn't breathe. He couldn't move.

He became aware of something hard and smooth below his right palm. He focused on the feeling until he could detect individual particles of dirt beneath the beds of his fingers. He dug into the ground, curling his fingers into the dirt, trying to hold onto something, grasp something, some small, solid piece of reality.

He blinked. The blinding light retreated to the corners of his eyes. He was staring at dusty, cloudy sky, reaching branches of trees. Rain dripped onto his face, falling into his open lips. He could taste blood in his mouth.

He couldn't move. He couldn't feel anything. He focused on the dirt and small pebbles grasped within his fist.

Breath seeped achingly through his teeth in a wheeze. His chest rose and fell. The sensation of pain tickled the corner of his brain, feeling like a detached aching, spidery pain webbing across his chest and left shoulder, as if it was someone else's pain, someone else's….

Something moved out of the corner of his eye. With difficulty Hawkeye turned his head. It was…someone's foot.

Private McKinnon! The thought sliced through Hawkeye's stomach like a knife. My God… beside the foot was Private McKinnon's other leg, a ragged, bleeding stump.

Had to stop the bleeding. Hawkeye had to stop the bleeding. He lifted his right hand unconsciously, reaching toward Private McKinnon, touching the toe of his one remaining boot. Water was soaking hotly through the front of Hawkeye's uniform.

He put his hand to his chest. The finger's came away red.

Hawkeye couldn't…he couldn't breathe. Darkness grew in the corner of his mind. He felt something painfully gripping his shoulders, digging into the bone, pulling him away.

A strange sense of lightlessness overtook him, filling him up as with air. He was…floating…darkness was spreading across his vision. He could feel his own hot blood pulsing out of his chest and soaking through his shirt.

His right hand slipped away from his chest. He searched for the ground again with his fingers but there wasn't anything there. His wrist rubbed against the smooth lip of the side of a stretcher and he knew no more.