Chapter Text
Red.
Red everywhere.
Coating his hands, rooting its way underneath his fingernails, staining the olive drab a solemn dark maroon.
Hawkeye was too late, just one minute too late. This was the busiest influx of wounded the 4077th M*A*S*H unit had experienced in a while. There was a long dry spell for two weeks before this; well, as dry as it could be in a warzone.
BJ and Hawkeye had perfected a brew of moonshine in the still, indulging too much than they reasonably should have. They had somehow managed to flavour it with hibiscus flowers that had started growing out back of Rosie’s bar.
Now the fun was gone from that drinking, Hawkeye was only thinking about how he would use it as a temporary amnesia from the dead kid in front of him.
Fuck, he was just a kid. He could barely have been nineteen years old, a baby really, compared to how old Hawkeye felt after the eternity spent here.
The boy had come in on a stretcher from one of the ambulances crowding the unit. He couldn't even make it to the operating theater, they were just that busy. There was nothing Hawkeye or anyone else could do apart from just be with him for the last few moments. Nevertheless, Hawkeye felt an immeasurable amount of guilt drop down onto his shoulders. The surgeon, whose hands were normally steady, were trembling. The stress was really getting to him.
The kid was now lying there, limbs splayed out, eyes glassy and unmoving. He probably didn't even know what hit him. Hawkeye slid his fingers over the boy's eyes to close them, to make it look like he was just sleeping. No one could be just sleeping with that much blood dripping from their chest and stomach. His fingers brushed against the boy's small mustache. Most likely to make him look older than he actually was. So many of them do that to look more like their commanding officers. They thought it made them seem so much more mature.
Hawkeye knew maturity didn't come with a mustache, his best friend was the prime example of this. The boy in front of him did look a little bit like BJ. Hawkeye shook that thought out of his head, better to not dwell on similarities of these soldiers and friends.
Speaking of: BJ rushed out of the operating rooms' double doors and called for Hawkeye to come inside.
‘There's a real bad case in here Hawk. We need your help.’ BJ glanced down at the boy on the ground and wandered over to him. His firm hand rested on Hawkeye's shoulder, giving a comforting squeeze. ‘There's nothing you could have done, c’mon, lets get inside.’
With that remark, Hawkeye took one last look at the corpse, blinking hard at him. The blinking comforted him slightly, it was like he was taking a picture of them with his mind's eye. He wanted them to be remembered somewhere, even if Hawkeye would forget them in the blur of how many there were, his subconscious might remember. They would still exist in his mind.
The two doctors headed into the operating room together, hurriedly scrubbing in and getting back to work.
Hawkeye lost count of how many blinks he got in that stretch of night into early afternoon when he finally emerged from the stark lighting of the OR. The natural lighting was a shock to his system and he scrunched his eyes shut.
‘Fuck. How long has it been Beej?’ he looked at BJ standing next to him who was stretching his arms wide and squinting in the same manner. ‘It feels like I've been in there for days.’
‘Only a mere twelve hours, my dear friend.’ BJ joked. ‘You really need to get some sleep. Looks like you've got two black eyes.’
‘Yeah. I guess so.’ Hawkeye barely had the energy to reply.
Silent agreement swept between the two and they headed towards The Swamp, back to their uncomfortable beds. When they got there, Charles was away, most likely onto his shift in the OR to replace one of them.
BJ went straight to his own cot, while Hawkeye went to the still.
‘Want a drink?’ he offered his friend.
‘No thanks Hawk, got a big day tomorrow.’ Hawkeye merely hummed in acknowledgement while taking a sip of the sour liquor, too tired to do anything else. He shook his head at the bitter taste, then downed the whole glass with a grimace.
‘Woah, slow down there tiger.’ BJ chuckled and looked over from folding a pile of his shirts and pants.
Hawkeye waved him off, setting the glass down and slipping under his blanket, only bothering to take off his boots. ‘Night Beej, see you tomorrow.’
BJ chuckled again. At what, Hawkeye couldn't tell. He didn't have time to question it before falling to the sleep that quickly overcame him as soon as his head touched the pillow.
When Hawkeye next opened his eyes he felt like he hadn't slept a wink. He was still in The Swamp, but he was no longer in bed. The light outside was blinding white, and he couldn't see anything past the mesh walls of the tent. Everything he saw looked clean. Too clean.
Hawkeye brought his hand up to his face to rub the sleep out of his eyes, to clear the haze he was in. When he brought his hand back down, it was clasped around a manila envelope. The address was his full name and nothing else.
He slid the flap of the envelope open and pulled out a letter inside. One page, yellow paper, folded perfectly into thirds.
Hawkeye unfolded the page and was met with it being completely blank apart from three sentences.
Captain BJ Hunnicutt. Killed in a plane crash just out of Uijeongbu, South Korea. Friday 1st February 1952.
The words hit him like a bullet to the heart. An ice cold bolt of terror shot through him.
No. Not BJ, not his best friend, his Beej.
He racked his brain for how this could have happened. The feeling that he got was the same now as it was when Radar delivered the news of Colonel Blake's death. How could two people closest to him go down in the same way? It wasn't possible. How could it be possible?
He rushed over to BJ’s cot, feeling like he was moving in slow motion. Once he got across the room, he reached out to grab at BJ’s sheets, to check if he was there, if he was just sleeping and this was all some cruel practical joke.
As soon as his hands touched the sheets, he was flung backwards without warning, flying through space until he landed hard on a solid metal seat.
His surroundings had changed completely. He was on a plane now. BJ’s plane. He didn't know how he knew that exactly, but it was a clear fact in his mind.
The interior of the plane blurred together as Hawkeye tried to look around hurriedly for his best friend. The walls began to shake and boxes flew past him as the plane tilted. His heart was beating so hard that it could burst out of his chest at any moment. He still couldn't find BJ.
Hawkeye tried calling out BJ’s name but he couldn't speak. He screamed at the top of his lungs but no sound would come out.
The plane tilted harshly downwards and Hawkeye slid out of his seat, falling through empty space once again. The light beaming at him from all directions grew brighter and began to close in on him. As he recognized he was falling rapidly to the ground, he saw BJ in front of him.
BJ was frozen in a silent scream of absolute terror. It hurt Hawkeye to look at his friend like this, especially because he knew what was coming, yet he couldn't bear to tear his eyes away. He needed to see as much of BJ as he could before the inevitable end that was encroaching.
Right before he was about to hit the ground and be killed, Hawkeye blinked his eyes shut in the all too familiar habit. He knew logically that he could never forget BJ, but he had to make sure. He had to.
Blinding white light overtook every one of his senses and he rushed to open his eyes.
He shot upright and hit his head on something. No. Someone.
‘Ow! Pierce calm down!’ He recognized that voice. As the world came into view he became aware of blonde hair and manicured hands waving in his face. Margaret. ‘Oh, you look terrible.’
She was cradling her forehead where his own had collided with hers. Finally, the pain registered and he winced at what was sure to become a bruise. Hawkeye's heart was still beating out of his chest and he felt uncomfortable in his clothes.
He readjusted his shirt, peeling it off of his skin where sweat had stuck it down. ‘Fuck. Sorry Margaret.’
She waved him off and examined the dark circles that were even more prominent now under his eyes. ‘Just breathe Pierce. It was a nightmare. You're fine now.’ Her words failed at comforting the sinking pit in his chest.
What had even happened? The memories were blurry, as was expected if that really was just a nightmare. It was just a nightmare. Nothing more. Right?
BJ. Where was BJ?
Margaret stared intently as Hawkeye went to the other side of the room. His head was spinning from getting up so fast.
‘Pierce calm down, what's wrong? Did something happen between you and BJ?’ Her words broke through the haze that was clouding Hawkeye's mind. A million questions flooded his mind.
Did she know where BJ went? Did she get the letter too? Was the nightmare real? Why did she think something happened between them? Did something happen? Was it all Hawkeye's fault?
Hawkeye couldn't voice any of these questions, too occupied with scrambling around through BJ’s belongings, trying to find any evidence of which version of reality was true. His breath was coming in faster and faster bursts, trying to escape his chest.
BJ’s bed was made, clean. Too clean, just like things were in the dream. It unsettles Hawkeye to see the area devoid of the usual messy piles of clothes and martini glasses. How could BJ just disappear like that without telling his best friend? Had Hawkeye done something wrong?
The pit in his stomach only grew deeper at these thoughts. He couldn't bear it if he had been the cause of BJ's departure and- and his death. Hawkeye sunk down into the floor and sat defeated, his long legs spread limp along the uneven ground and arms wrapped around himself.
‘BJ…BJ…BJ…’ Hawkeye's voice breaks with a pained sob as he repeats his friend's name like a mantra. He cant get out any other words.
Margaret walked over, gently coming to kneel in front of Hawkeye. She looked at him like he was a wounded animal, or like he was another patient come back from the front. ‘It was just a nightmare, Pierce.’
Hawkeye couldn't hold back every emotion that was building in his chest now. It wasn't just a nightmare! BJ was gone. Really gone. He had left Hawkeye here in this hellhole all alone. Anger swirled inside of him, as well as sadness, and every other stage of grief all at once.
‘I saw him die Margaret! He's fucking dead. I saw him go down in that plane. He left me here.’ The words came out harsher than he had intended. He couldn't think straight.
She looked somewhat shocked, most likely more so at the lack of sarcasm and jest in his tone.
‘He isn't dead, Hawkeye.’ She rested her hand on his leg softly, offering comfort. Hawkeye was her friend, despite how much they argued. ‘I’m sure he's just gone somewhere and forgot to tell you. I’ll check in with the Colonel after my next shift.’
‘No! No one else knows, but I saw it. I saw him die.’ his voice trailed off, unwilling to speak the truth into existence. ‘There was so much fire- and he was so- he was so scared.’ Hawkeye met Margaret's eyes now, revealing the tears that threatened to spill over.
Her lips parted and then closed again. She didn't know what to do with him in this state, he had never been like this in front of her before. Usually BJ would be the one to help Hawkeye if something like this happened. Finally she found her words. ‘I’ll get someone to take your post-op shift. I recommend that you get some more rest. I’ll get Klinger and the Colonel to find out where BJ is and report back to you. Just stay here.’
Hawkeye knew that they wouldn’t find anything on BJ’s whereabouts. Only Hawkeye knew the real truth. Only Hawkeye knew that BJ- or just his body- was somewhere over the Yellow Sea, drifting with the wreckage of the plane. Maybe he was with Henry there, their ghosts telling jokes together.
Hawkeye didn’t want to reply to Margaret, he could tell that she must think that he was going insane. All he did was nod in her direction, averting his gaze back to the empty cot next to him.
Margaret stood up and went for the door, giving one last glance back to Hawkeye’s helpless form before leaving.
As soon as the door was shut and Hawkeye was alone the tears began to spill down his cheeks. He tasted the salt and all it did was remind him of BJ’s resting place in the sea. He pulled his legs up to bury his head between his knees and let out an ocean of sadness.