Chapter One: Best Care Anywhere

Uijeongbu, South Korea. 1952.

Korea's winters were brutal. Made the warfare that much more unbearable. It was only November, but with the peace talks in a virtual standstill it looked like another Christmas would be go by with no end to the war in sight. Another Korean Holiday around the corner, with a soldier in every foxhole and a shambled tree in every mess tent. Hell of a buzz kill for a police action.

The clunky olive drab army vehicle soared widely across the Korean countryside blanketed white by the snow. The engine roared, the motor hissed, and the metal hull whined as the ambulance hit a curve so sharp that the driver was sure that they were ridding on two wheels for a split second. He was a medic. Corporal Matthew 'Doc' Richardson. Everybody called him Doc cause he was good at patching people up nice and neat before the doctors at the M*A*S*H's got to 'em. His helmet sat on the dashboard, the red cross facing front as if the big one on the side of the wagon wasn't a good enough deterrent for some trigger happy sniper. His face was caked in mud. So were his hands. There were big wet clumps of it all over the wheel where he'd tried to smear it off of himself. His knuckles were white in the icy grip of cold air. His uniform was in tatters. The load he was carrying didn't look much better. Four of them all together, sprawled out on the nailed-up cots and across the floor of the cabin. Well, almost four. Part of one guy was still back in the mud hole where the ambush had started and where the stray grenade had torn him apart. Half of his chest was gone and both legs up to his thigh. He was still breathing, but Doc didn't think, think hell, he knew he wasn't going to make it. That didn't stop him from putting him inside.

Aside from him there was only one other GI. He had a serious head wounded. The blood was soaking through the bandage around his head. The other two weren't with the others' unit and as far as Doc knew weren't even in the service. He hadn't had a whole lot of time to ask questions what with being shot at and all. One had been hit pretty bad in the chest. Taken a bunch of shrapnel. He needed a doctor fast.

Up ahead he could see the welcome sign at their destination. "They'll take care of you guys at this place," he said, relieved to see the 4077th. "Best care anywhere."

M*A*S*H #4077

"Attention! Attention! Ambulance in the Compound!" The familiar voice had become a troublesome reminder of this whole pitiful situation.

The wagon was right in front of the O.R. where Doc's load of casualties would soon find themselves undergoing meatball surgery, as basic and crude as they come. It was nothing fancy, but not exactly ineffective, especially around those parts. The 4077 had a 97 percent efficiency rating. 97 out of 100 men that reached that M*A*S*H could live to tell their grandkids about it.

The first one to meet Doc at the ambulance doors was Hawkeye. He was in the middle of a yawn, scratching his salt and pepper head. He was bundled up tight in his winter coat and snowcap. If only the weather had been better he'd have shown up in his class A uniform: his robe, purple and lush. "I'm certainly glad I didn't have any other plans," he said. "There's so much to do in a war zone ya know."

"Hey, Hawk," Doc replied, obviously glad to see the sardonic doctor from Crabapple Cove, Maine. "Light load today. Four. Got a couple pretty bad off. I don't think one's gonna make it."

The doctor's less than pleasant sarcasm faded. "Terrific." It was no secret that the war was hitting Capt. Benjamin Franklin 'Hawkeye' Pierce harder these days. He'd looked like he'd aged about seven years in the two he'd been there. It came naturally when you had to put kids back together on an assembly line just for them to get shot again. "How bad?"

"Most of him is back where we came from."

"Terrific. What about the rest?"

"Got a head wound, another guy with some scratches, and a fella that took a lot of shrapnel in the chest." Everyone else in the compound started to show up, pulled from whatever they had been occupying themselves with in vain to escape thoughts of the war. They all had their hands stuffed in their pockets, waddling around the growing congregation like penguins in olive drab, nurses and all.

The doors were open now. The guy with the head wounded jumped out of the ambulance and nearly collapsed into Hawkeye's arms. He sat him down and was looking him over when a familiar pair of giant sized sneakers crossed his line of sight. "Need help, stranger?' It was Capt. BJ Hunnicutt from San Francisco.

"Howdy, Mister Wayne. Sorry, I don't need a cowboy with a funny walk. I need a doctor with a cheesy mustache."

"What's the damage Hawk?"

"Light load, see what you can do on the ambulance. I'll join you there in a second." BJ disappeared inside with a few core men. Hawk took his time. He wasn't sure he wanted to see the rag doll Doc warned him about. He was just a little too sober for it. Didn't need his uninhibited memory to allow the image of a mangled body to burn into the back of his head this early in the morning.

"Radar!"

"Yea, Hawkeye?" Radar had a way of popping up just went you needed him, clipboard in hand as always.

"Is Potter back from R&R yet?"

"No. He's not due for another six hours."

"Goodie. We'll be at King cue balls beck and call again in O.R."

"Hawkeye!" It was B.J. Again. "Come on! I need ya."

"Yeah, yeah!" Hawk checked the bandages around the head and got up. "Radar, take this guy into pre-op. Careful. He may have a subdermal hemotoma."

He started for the ambulance when he saw him by the pre op doors. His entire right side was crushed. Father Mulcahy was leaning over him. It was over. Damn it. What was worse Hawkeye had to see it. He turned back to the wagon and saw BJ walking out of it holding an end of a stretcher. Attached to the other end was a khaki clad chap. A run-down, mangy looking man. He was a lot older with hair as russet as his clothes, but starting to gray. Heavily. The same abundant trace of dusky hair whisked through a weighty beard. An unusual sight to be sure, he wore a leather jacket zipped up to the collar and a satchel. As Hawkeye got closer he got a better look at him. He had a whip hanging off his belt too and a holstered pistol on the other side. A slightly shocked smile crept onto his face. What a goofy looking guy. This fella he had to meet.

Hawkeye caught up as they set the stretcher down. The chest case. The guy on it was much younger and bigger around, but dressed similar. Sported a mustache that could give BJ's a run for its money. He was muttering something and struggling to breath. Part of the guy's coat had been torn up to make a bandage. He was holding it on his chest to apply pressure. The two doctors struggled for a minute to get though the layers of clothes.

"This looks like a job for our resident chest man," Hawkeye said, his hands sticky with fresh blood. "Where's Bozo?"

"When I left, he was still in the swamp."

"Nurse Able! Go get Winchester and tell him he's on in five! Can't start this show without him!"

"How is he?" The bearded man asked.

"He'll be okay," BJ quickly replied. "You injured?"

"Just a few bruises."

"Been taming lions?" Hawkeye cut in.

"Huh?"

"Never mind. Beej, you think you can handle this? I'll look this guy over."

"Sure. Zale, get over here! Help me with this."

Like scurrying rats everyone else disappeared into the O.R. leaving cold and chapped Hawkeye with the whip-wielding newcomer. Needless to say he wasn't exactly thrilled about feeling him up.

"Where are you hurt?"

"I'm fine. Thanks." He pulled away from Hawk when he tried to check for tenderness in his arm and jumped back onto the ambulance.

"Look fella," Hawkeye called, "I don't like going this far on a first date either, but give me a break. I'm a doctor…I think."

He reappeared half a second later standing in the wagon's entrance with a fedora in hand.

"Okay, first the pistol," Hawkeye addressed playfully, "Then the whip, now the hat. You look like something outta one of Colonel Potter's Zane Grey's. Who…or what are you and more importantly should I clear out before high noon?"

"Just see to Mac. I owe him. You gotta mess around here?"

"Yeah, but I don't think the compound's big enough for the both of ya. Trust me. Take one bite of the food around here and you'll be hitting the old dusty trail up to your face, partner." Hawkeye's attempt at a John Wayne impression was admirable, but the cowboy wasn't having any of it. He rolled his eyes and mashed his hat down hard on his head.

"I'll just find it myself," he said as he started to walk away.

"Hey, wait! I was just about to tell you where Jesse James is hiding!"

It was like the cold had lost its touch. All Hawkeye could think about was getting to know his new friend.He ran up behind him like an over anxious child, keeping up the pace no matter how fast the fellow walked.

"Come on, guy. You know how many interesting people we get around here? I mean besides the ones bleeding from every orifice. This is like some movie fantasy come true. I can just picture it. " He threw on his best announcer voice. "It was just your average run of the mill war until he strolled in, an ominous stranger who looked like he'd been run over by a country western store."

"Like hearing yourself talk, don't you?"

"All right, all right. I'll shut up." That promise didn't last long. "So you got a name or did it run away with your sense of humor."

"Buzz off."

"Okay, okay. It's a semi free country." Hawkeye was tired of trying. If the weirdo didn't want to talk, he didn't want to talk. What was the bid deal? Did the blood get to him? The whole bloody mess make him squeamish? Hawk had been around it for two years now. Hadn't gotten to him yet. Oh, sure, he cried into his pillow every now and again and sometimes he felt like getting a tank and taking a long drive off a short cliff. Careful, Ben, he thought. Before I know it I'll be babbling on one of Sidney's rubber couches. To be fair, using the guy for entertainment in a place desperate for some kind of escape was a tad…off, but that was the cost of war. Between all the gore and the death you had a flood of long periods of time where the dead flies in Radar's animal cages got more out of life than you did. Even worse, you had to put up with the same, moldy people you never liked every day in between counting the minutes until the war started again. Meeting somebody new was the difference between making it to tomorrow and splitting your head open with an axe just to break up the monotony.

O.R.

"Ah, Pierce," Winchester greeted dryly, "so munificent that when you're not needed in the slightest you'll still bestow upon us your colorful presence." Even through an operating mask Charles' annoyance was ever apparent in the venomous way in which he coolly needled the chief surgeon despite being up to his elbows in patient. Hawkeye was scrubbed and masked, gingerly observing the only two tables in function that session, bouncing between them from time to time to avoid stagnancy. Moving kept the cold from latching on. BJ was on the head case. Margaret was assisting. Ever determined to be useful, Father Mulcahy stood by the blood storage unit, ready to grab whatever the doctors asked for.

"A healthier disposition than being completely useless all the time," Hawkeye shot back. "How's that working out for ya?"

"Better than you ailing wit."

"Must be these cold nights interrupted by hot blood. I'll work on it, Chuckles."

"Now, now Hawk," BJ added, "I think you're confusing Major Winbag with old Ferret Face."

Charles let out a stiff laugh.

"Don't get excited Charles, there's only about a hair's difference between the two of you."

"Right," BJ said. "Frank still had some on his head when he left."

"Speaking of hair," Hawkeye mused, "Anyone see Old Man Clanton outside?"

Next Chapter: Stars and Stripes.