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M*A*S*H "The Final Episode"

Summary:

When a show about war finally ends, it should rest in peace. This story was written while the series was still on the air.

Chapter 1: Chapter 1

Notes:

 

M*A*S*H "The Final Episode"

Based on the original novel by Richard Hooker

Adapted for television by Larry Gelbert

Date written: Summer 1981

Author's note:

My story is based on the CBS television series, M.A.S.H., which is based on a movie by the same title. I didn't like the movie. I never read the book. And I didn't particularly care for the first few episodes of the TV series.

But then something 'clicked'. I don't know who caused the 'click', whether it was the producer, the writers, or the actors themselves, but some unknown person or persons decided to shut the movie projector off, and just let the TV cameras and the actors roll along on their own. This 'declaration of independence' gave some very talented people the creative freedom to produce the M.A.S.H. which I consider a SMASH !

In the twinkling of an episode, I saw Radar transformed from an obnoxious, over-sexed little tough guy into a loveable, sensitive kid who claimed 'nuditity' made him 'breathe funny'. And, in the twinkling of an episode, the so-so sequel to the movie became a work of comedic and dramatic genius worthy of a few sequels of its own.

This same super-talented, dedicated group of people (subtract and add a few) has been grinding out Emmy quality episodes for ten years, now, and I've heard rumors that the 'well' may be running dry...that this season may be the season the 'Truce' is signed instead of CBS's contract with Twentieth Century Fox. (I just heard Alan Alda announce the date of the premiere episode for the 1982 season, so the 'well' of fresh ideas can't be bone dry...yet.)

I anguished over the passing of The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Star Trek, Cimarron Strip and Gunsmoke, and if and when M.A.S.H. is ever cancelled, I'm going to anguish some more. I've laughed and cried and grown up with the show's characters and when they're gone I'll miss them like others I've laughed and cried and grown up with.

In case they never make a final episode, I have taken the liberty of ending the Korean War for the M.A.S.H. characters. When a show about war finally dies, I believe it should rest in 'peace'.

A M.A.S.H. fan always,

Rosanne/Ross

P.S.

While M.A.S.H. is highly entertaining, I find it not very educational. I've watched it for ten years now, (not counting re-runs) and never did learn what started the Korean War and why U.S. troops were fighting in it. Then, as research for my story, I dug up some basic 'background info' which I have included in case other uneducated M.A.S.H. fans would care to possess a little deeper understanding of what all the fighting was about. (The school year ended before my U.S. History class got to the chapter on the Korean War.)

PROLOGUE

The Korean War began on June 25th 1950, with the invasion of South Korea by Communist North Koreans. The United Nations came to the aid of South Korea, sending a multi-national fighting force to support the South Koreans in the defense of their newly formed country.

U.S. troops made up a major part of this United Nations force and were in the thick of the fighting from the very beginning. Twenty-four thousand American Soldiers lost their lives during this cruel and bloody war. And the loss of life would've been even greater if it weren't for the heroic efforts of the doctors and nurses of the Army's Mobile Surgical Hospitals, or M.A.S.H. Units, as they were more often called.

The following story is about one of these Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals...M.A.S.H. Unit No. 4077 to be exact. The time is mid-Spring of 1953...just a couple of months before the signing of the Truce on July 27, 1953. The three bloody years of fighting came to an end within 12 hours of the signing of this long awaited for Truce.

Basic Background Info. gleaned from Funk and Wagnalls, Unicorn Publishers Inc., New York

Mobile Army Surgical Hospital: M.A.S.H.

M. The key to understanding the flimsy architectural structure of a M.A.S.H. Unit is the word MOBILE. Put a few hinges on some wooden frames, throw a few thousand feet of tent canvas and camouflage netting over the whole thing, add a portable generator and some trucks, and theoretically you have a highly mobile camp. In reality what you have is a depressing olive green circus set that is swelteringly hot in summer, frigidly cold in winter, and dismally dreary, drafty and leaky all the time in between.

A. About the only thing that can be said to be genuinely ARMY is the color of the tent canvas and ninety-nine percent of the clothing, army green. Ninety-nine percent of the people occupying the tents and wearing the clothing don't consider themselves army people, so it's not surprising to find the place lacking a hard-core army atmosphere. The only saluting done in the camp is by stray dogs as they trot past the tent stakes.

S. Colonel Sherman T. Potter, the camp's C.O., is an old Cavalry man. He is also the only doctor in the camp that is there by choice. The Colonel is an army lifer, a career officer who also happens to possess a certain SURGICAL prowess. It was because the Army had a shortage of Colonel Potters that it was forced to draft civilian doctors to staff its new Mobile Surgical Hospitals.

Benjamin Franklin Pierce, B.J. Hunnicutt and Charles Emerson Winchester III were all surgeons working in civilian hospitals when they were recruited into the Armed Forces. After just five weeks of only the basics of Basics, they were handed the uniforms of their new respective ranks and a one way plane ticket to Korea. Thus, in the sputtering of a plane's engine, these talented MD's found themselves skillfully trying to reconstruct the young men bent on self-destruction.

H. Webster's describes a HOSPITAL as an institution where the ill or injured may receive medical or surgical treatment, nursing, etc. Major Margaret Houlahan is in charge of the nursing etc. part of the 4077th's Mobile Hospital. She and her nurses stand elbow to elbow with the surgeons in the O.R. for long grueling hours, and then sit hand-in-hand with the recovering patients for countless more hours in the Post-Op Wards. It takes a special kind of person to keep functioning under such grim, stressful conditions, and these army nurses are very special people.

THE KOREAN SCENE IN THE SPRING OF 1953:

In mid-April, the United Nations and the North Korean Communists begin an exchange of sick and wounded prisoners.

Armistice talks resume after a lapse since Oct. 8th of 1952.

The UN and North Korean Communist delegations meet after final delivery of sick and wounded POWs.

UN and NK Communist delegates go into secret session at Panmunjom, then, after a week's recess, agree to a general prisoner exchange.

In mid-June, U.S. Army Intelligence reports a fighting force of about 60,000 Chinese Communists has crossed the border into North Korea. Fighting along the South Korean Central Front suddenly intensifies after a month long lull.

UN multinational forces suffer moderate casualties. Morale suffers an all-time low as hopes for an eventual cease-fire are dashed to pieces.

UN Troop Commanders find themselves holding their breath in anticipation of the Chinese Communists next moves.

Basic Background Info. gleaned from Funk and Wagnalls, Unicorn Publishers Inc., New York

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: The M*A*S*H characters do not belong to me.  They have been borrowed strictly for fun and not for fortune.

M*A*S*H  "The Final Episode"

By Ross

 

Chapter One

The spring of '53 arrived in Korea the way it arrives each year, on the moist, mild air currents of a prevailing wind called Kuroshio. Kuroshio blows steadily up from the South China Sea until long after it has freed the frozen Korean Peninsula from the icy shackles of winter.

What happens when these moist and mild air currents collide with this rather large, super-chilled chunk of landmass is elementary, actually. As the air warms the land, the land cools the air and causes all that moisture it's carrying to condense and fall in the form of rain...rain...and more rain! The rain prevails as long as the prevailing wind does—usually anywhere from four to six weeks.

But Kuroshio had been blowing and the rains had been prevailing for six and a half weeks now with hardly a let up. Which precipitated a problem. Before the ground could soak up one shower, another one had already begun, causing the country's 'barely negotiable', 'nothing more then glorified cow trails' roads to heave with frost and ooze with mud—and rendering them practically impassable to motorized vehicles such as troop transport trucks, jeeps and ambulances.

Anticipating that wounded allied personnel—involved in the current Police Action being taken by the UN's multinational peacekeeping forces stationed in South Korea—would be unable to get to the various Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals under such adverse conditions, the top brass at I-Corp advanced the various M.A.S.H. units a bit closer to the wounded...a bit too close, perhaps.

For the past several, soggy weeks now, M.A.S.H. 4077 had been occupying a sopping-wet clearing in a water-logged little strip of woods on the top of a rain-drenched ridge on a super-saturated hill less then two miles from the front lines.

There were three constants in the camp: Everybody was miserable. Every day it rained. And, everywhere there was mud.

The main compound bore a striking resemblance to a pigsty, and so they called their soggy little gully 'Wallow Hollow' Korea.

Tents were continuously collapsing because the stakes were too short to hold up in the mud...which was too deep.

Captain Pierce commented to his bunkies that their Swamp was really living up to its name now.

They had a network of boardwalks laid out for awhile, but the boards were slipperier then the mud—when wet—and they were always wet. And so, after some spectacularly embarrassing spills—which prompted Captain Hunnicutt to describe Korea as a 'Wash & Wear' country, ("The rain washes it...and we wear it!") the planks were pried up out of the mud and used for a sort of floor in the Mess Tent—which was also really living up to its name.

Add to all this a severe shortage of supplies and fresh drinking water, outbreaks of fever, foot fungus, stomach flu, missed mail calls and dysentery—and it was easy to see why morale wasn't just low in camp—it was practically non-existent! The rain had dampened everything in the camp—including their spirits.

That was what was in the back—and front—of Colonel Potter's mind, as he stood over the bleeding body of a badly wounded Turkish soldier in the 4077th's makeshift O.R..

The inner sanctum of the 4077th's surgical ward was a fairly large, open room containing several tall, rectangular-shaped tables. Following close encounters of the peacekeeping kind, these tables were occupied by two groups of soldiers: those being operated on, and those who were about to be operated on.

Army doctors and nurses in once white surgical garb worked feverishly to repair what the other side had just worked so feverishly to destroy.

Still, other nurses and orderlies moved quickly and efficiently about their business as the rumbling of heavy artillery sounded in the not too distant distance.

The strictly medical chatter of doctors requesting various surgical instruments and nurses reading vital signs was often interrupted by outbursts such as this:

"What's the holdup out there? Where the hell is this guy's x-ray?"

"Would someone plea-ease be so kind as to get me a drink of water?"

"I do not have to read the little numbers to know that this is the wrong x-ray, Lieutenant. This patient no longer has a left leg."

(Rumbling of distant artillery fire.)

"Davis, go find me this guy's x-ray, will you?"

"All right, who needs a picture of a right leg wound?"

"Over here!"

"Goldman! Where the hell have you been?"

"Here you go, Major. Sorry Captain, but we had a little accident in the dark room. Somebody knocked the stacks over and some of the trays got mixed up. What d'yah got, Doc?"

"If I knew that, Goldman, I wouldn't need the x-ray!"

"Ease up, Hunnicutt, accidents happen."

"I'm aware of that, Colonel. It's just that this poor kid has had enough accidents for one day."

"Where is my water?"

"Hey, Goldman, you got any hip shots?"

"One?...or both?"

"Just one...the left one."

"Left?"

"Right."

"You got it!"

"I don't believe this! Okay, I'll take the closest thing you've got to a belly wound."

"Upper? or lower?"

(frustrated gasp) "Upper right quadrant."

"Here you go, sir!"

"Thank you, Goldman."

"I'll see your upper right quadrant and raise you one left hip."

"Okay, I call. What d'yah got?"

"Just a strait hairline pelvic fracture..."

"Mortar fragments...looks like a full house."

"Uh...you lose."

"Just so long as he doesn't."

(disgusted grunt) "Colonel Potter will you—?"

"Yes, Winchester, I will. Cut the gab, you two!"

"All right, everybody quiet down. Charles can't hear the boom-booms."

(two loud explosions)

"Oh...I get it. William Tell's Overture in G-Major right, Winchester?"

"Dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-da..."

(boom...boom)

"I have no desire whatsoever to listen to either you or the roar of the war. However, if I must choose between the two, I should prefer the boom-booms to your off-key shouting, any day."

"Off-key? Well, how 'bout C-Major? Dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-dant-da..."

(boom...boom).

(gasp of frustration) "Pie-ierce!"

"Oh boy! Here comes my favorite part...a solo from the wind section."

(snickers, chuckles...then complete silence.)

Such was the sort of dialogue usually heard in M.A.S.H. 4077's O.R., usually. But lately it's been just:

"More suction."

"Hemostat."

"Clamp."

"More light."

"Two units of plasma, Davis."

"Retractor."

"Get this guy into Post-Op and tell Mason to keep that drainage tube open."

"Yes, Doctor."

" We got an empty table here."

"Litter!"

This sudden lack of teasing, bantering and bickering amongst the troops, had Colonel Potter worried. He knew the silence meant his people were keeping their emotions all bottled up inside. If the pressure wasn't released from time-to-time, somebody could self-destruct.

Before him, the surgeon could see war's effects on the human body. The silence around him was a warning sign that the human spirit was also under attack. Since he was the camp's Commanding Officer, it was his responsibility to maintain the camp's morale. He decided it was about time he raised the lid on the kettle a little...to help it let off some steam.

While the O.R. was in operation, its windows remained closed and completely covered. As a result, no one was ever really sure what time of day it was. Whether it was the middle of the night, early morning or late afternoon outside, inside, the bright lamps suspended over the tables always gave the room the sunny glow of midday.

Cut off from the rest of the camp and the world as they were, people working inside might have had a tendency to lose all track of the passing of time...if it weren't for little annoying reminders like the growling of an empty stomach, or...

Captain Hunnicutt quickly finished tying off his last suture and turned to the nurse who'd been dozing beside him. "Margaret, I hate to have to wake you, but could you close for me?"

The startled nurse's eyes snapped open. "Close? Doctor, I can't close until you've finished."

Hunnicutt stared at the nurse in disbelief. "That's the proper order all right—unless they've changed the rules. Now, will you please close for me?" he repeated, a tone of desperation creeping into his voice. He offered the nurse his needle and thread.

Margaret aimed her amazed gaze down at the young man on the table. "But...that procedure usually takes you thirty minutes!"

"I guess I must work a lot faster when I'm under pressure..." he hinted.

The look in the nurse's tired eyes turned from one of amazement to amusement and she snatched the needle and thread from him.

The Captain gave her a look of undying gratitude and started to leave.

"Hold it, Hunnicutt!" Colonel Potter advised.

"I'm trying, Colonel. I'm trying," the surgeon assured him and continued to take his leave.

Potter left his table to step between the Captain and the exit. "Just where do you think you're going?"

"To the little boy's room," Hunnicutt impatiently explained, and tried sidestepping the Colonel.

Potter sidestepped too, and continued to block his path to the door. "Funny...I don't recall giving you permission to leave this room."

The Captain looked somewhat puzzled. "Funny...I don't recall ever needing your permission to leave this room."

Potter's eyes narrowed. "Well, you do!"

Hunnicutt's eyes momentarily flashed with rage and indignation. But then they softened again and his slumped shoulders sagged even more—in defeat. He raised his right arm and waved his hand. "Teacher, may I please be excused?"

Potter frowned behind his mask. The lid was obviously on a whole lot tighter than he'd originally thought. He turned to a passing nurse. "How many more are out there?"

"Five, sir, that can't wait," she replied without stopping.

Potter turned back to Hunnicutt. "If you go out there now, you're gonna have to scrub all over again, and you heard her. They can't wait. So you're gonna have to."

The Captain's eyes flashed with rage and indignation again. "I don't believe this!" he shouted to no one in particular. "Silly me. It's my own fault actually. I mean, I should've known better than to drink that cup of coffee for breakfast. And that glass of juice for lunch. I should've known it would eventually lead to this! Colonel, I'm not going to the little boy's room to powder my nose! I'm not standing here with my legs crossed like this for good luck! If I don't go out there right now, I'm gonna go in here. And I won't just have to scrub. I'll have to change and scrub! Now, how sterile does that sound?" he sarcastically demanded.

Potter's surgical mask hid the broad grin he was wearing. He'd like to have answered that it sounded like music to his ears. Instead, he avoided Hunnicutt's eyes and crossed back over to his patient. "Go ahead then," he grumpily allowed. "But make it snappy!"

"Oh, taxi!" The Captain hailed a passing empty stretcher and collapsed exhaustedly onto it.

"Where to, sir?" one of the stretcher-bearers inquired

"The nearest latrine...and you'd better step on it!"

The two orderlies glanced at each other and rolled their eyes before quickly carting the collapsed Captain from the OR..

Potter watched them leave. "Damn! Should a' never let him lie down. We'll never get him back on his feet again." 'One down,' he triumphantly told himself. He glanced up at the silent, moody surgeon standing directly across from him. "You awake over there, Pierce? I haven't heard a discouraging word out of you all day..."

"I'm awake," Pierce assured the Colonel, not even bothering to look up. "Clamp."

Potter gave Pierce a concerned stare. 'You can be last,' he determined, and refocused his attention. "What about you, Winchester?"

"What? Well...I must say, these surgical marathons can be quite challenging to one's physical and mental endurance, all right. But you may rest assured, Colonel that my mind remains alert and my fingers remain nimble. More suction."

Potter's frown returned. Major Winchester was usually good for five to ten minutes of complaining...usually. Oh, well, back to square one.

Captain Hunnicutt returned several silent minutes later—on his stretcher taxi—holding his freshly scrubbed arms up in the air. The surgeon's eyes were closed and he had one end of an IV tube stuck in his mouth, through a small slit in his surgical mask.

A nurse stood beside him holding an inverted glass plasma bottle to which was attached the other end of the IV tube. The bottle and tube contained a black murky substance bearing a strong resemblance to the camp's coffee.

The orderlies carried the stretcher over to a table. One of them lowered his end to the floor, and then stepped around to help his partner raise his. "You'd better lock your knees, sir..." they advised as the stretcher approached a near vertical position.

Hunnicutt did and they slid him off the stretcher and onto his feet.

A nurse slid a fresh pair of sterile, skintight surgical gloves onto his outstretched hands.

"Wake up, sir. You're home," his cab driver announced.

No response.

"The meter's running..." he added.

Hunnicutt's eyes snapped open. He glanced around the room, looking tremendously disappointed. "This is the wrong address," he grumbled, through clenched teeth. "This isn't 2102 East Leslie. This isn't Mill Valley."

"We told you, we're a local company. We have to be. We can't walk on water." The two orderlies picked their stretcher back up and started to leave.

The Captain's tired, bloodshot eyes followed them from the room, "Thanks for the lift, fellah's!" he called out as they disappeared.

"Any time!" their muffled voices chorused back.

"And thank you for the lift," Hunnicutt told Nurse Davis as she yanked the IV tube from his mouth and tied a fresh mask in place. "A little clearing of the kidneys...a few cc's of caffeine and I almost feel up to another 12 hours," he sarcastically stated.

"It's been twelve hours?" Margaret queried in disbelief. "Twelve hours without a break!" she added, and held an x-ray up to the light.

Hunnicutt studied it carefully. "What are you complaining about, Margaret? The choppers didn't start coming in till dawn. You got three hours of sleep—the same as the rest of us."

She gave the surgeon a look that showed she definitely appreciated his sarcasm. "You might've gotten three hours, but I didn't. There was a dog just outside my tent making such an awful racket that it kept me awake. Didn't you hear it?" She lowered the x-ray and placed a surgical instrument in the doctor's open hand.

"I'm gonna need a longer probe," he told her.

"Surely you must've heard it." She switched instruments. "You had to have heard it!"

"Okay. I heard it. Scalpel."

Margaret's eyes narrowed menacingly and she slapped the instrument into his hand. "Well, why didn't you get up and do something about it!"

"Suction. About what?"

She gasped in frustration, "The dog...last night."

"Clamp. That was a dog?"

"What did you think was making that awful racket!" she demanded.

Hunnicutt removed a jagged piece of metal from his patient's abdomen and dropped it into the basin on the stand beside him. "More suction. I'm gonna need about six inches. Well, since it was coming from over by your tent, I just naturally assumed it was you...barking out orders."

Several moans and groans sounded from the people standing within earshot.

Margaret cut off a section of surgical thread and slapped it very forcefully into the Captain's open palm. "You're as disgusting as your puns!"

"Hold that there for me," he requested, slipping her a retractor. "I'll forgive you for that, Margaret, because I know you had a ruff night."

More moans and groans sounded.

Margaret winced. "Ugh! I won't forgive you for that!"

"Colonel Potter! Colonel Potter!" company clerk, Sergeant Klinger shouted as he suddenly came barging into the room.

Potter glanced up from his work and spotted the man's grin. "Klinger, what's gotten into you? You, of all people, should know better than to come in here without a mask on!"

"Sorry, sir. I got carried away—with excitement!" he explained as a nurse tied a mask over his nose and mouth. "The mail's found us, sir! And you'll never guess what was in it!"

"Don't tell me," Potter replied. "You got a letter from Toledo, Ohio. Your family's won the Lebanese Lottery."

Klinger's eyes sparkled with excitement. "Something even better than that, sir!" He held up an airmail envelope. "It's postmarked Otumwa, Iowa, and it's addressed to the entire camp!"

All eyes in the room suddenly riveted on the Sergeant and his raised right hand. "Radar!" their voices all chorused at once.

Potter's eyes lit up. "Don't just stand there! Read it!"

The people in the room voiced their unanimous approval of the idea.

Potter saw them all standing still in anticipation. "And while you're reading, we'll all be working!"

They took the hint and returned to work.

Klinger opened the envelope, slid several sheets of paper out and unfolded them. "The mail service must be getting better. It only took three weeks to get here," he looked up and saw several people giving him annoyed, impatient glances. He cleared his throat and held up the letter, "My Dear Friends at MASH 4077, the best MASH in all Korea. It's been nearly four months now since I said goodbye to you guys. It seems more like four lifetimes.

I can't really explain why I haven't written sooner. It just seems like my mind wants me to forget the war and to forget I ever was in Korea. But I can't. There isn't a day goes by that I don't think of you guys and all the good times we shared together at the 4077.

There also isn't a day goes by that I don't hope and pray you'll all be coming home soon so that you's can start forgetting, too." Klinger's vision blurred. He blinked and continued, "I talked to Mr. Arthur Coleman at the feed store yesterday. Mr. Coleman is a retired college professor. He and his wife, Alice, bought the old Miller farm, which is just up the road from us. So now they're our closest neighbors. They seem like real nice people, too.

Mr. Coleman let my mom use his prize Duroc boar to breed our prize Berkshire sow, Daphne. Gee, I sort a' got off the track a little. I was going to tell you what Mr. Coleman told me at the feed store yesterday.

Mr. Coleman used to teach Political Science at I.S.U., and he seems real smart about these things and he told me he thinks a truce will be signed within a month—or two, at the most! He said the North Koreans and the Chinese have a centuries-old hatred and deep resentment for one another and that they're sure to make very bitter allies. He thinks the NKs will do anything, even sign an armistice agreement, if it will get the Chinese Communists out of their country.

I told him I sure hope he's right! He also said that while there may be a written truce agreement, he can see no real end to the fighting. In fact, he says he can already see another Korea developing in Indochina. I told him I sure hope he's wrong!"

Klinger managed a solemn pause, then continued, "On the brighter side, Daphne had 14 piglets this morning and she only got to eat four this time, cuz I was there to take them away," Klinger's mask hid his grin. "Gee, I guess that side isn't so bright after all," he read, and was momentarily too amused to continue.

"My mom, Mr. Coleman, just about everybody I talk to around here, seems to think I should go to College on the GI Bill and further my education. I keep telling them I think my education was furthered enough in Korea to last me awhile.

I just want to take it easy now. Maybe I'll build the farm and livestock up and maybe plant a few crops and maybe settle down and maybe get married and maybe raise some kids. Oh yeah, I guess I should tell you's. Me and Miss Patricia Ann Haven have been going steady for the past four months. Patty's a swell person. I know you'd like her. We met in the airport in Tokyo when I was on my way back from R&R. Patty was an Army nurse and she was leaving for the States. We got to talking and found out we grew up only a hundred miles from each other. Patty lives over in Griswold, now.

My Uncle Ed's old Studebaker didn't turn out to be a very reliable courtin' car. It was always breaking down and leaving us stranded in the middle of nowheres," Klinger looked up at Pierce and Hunnicutt. "Gone four months and he's already forgotten everything we taught him!"

Their eyes sparkled with amusement.

Klinger's attention returned to the letter. "I know what you guys are thinking, but Patty isn't that kind a' girl...and besides, she trusts me," he was forced to stop again as the sound of hearty laughter filled the room.

The laughter died down and he attempted to continue, "I don't trust me like she does. So I took some of my savings and put a down payment on a new Ford convertible. She's a real beauty! (The car—not Patty.)" Klinger cracked up.

Everyone cracked up again.

Klinger regained his composure. "I mean Patty's a real beauty, too. But I meant the convertible. Anyways, with my new car, I can make it over to Patty's house in 27 minutes flat now. That means, I can spend 66 more minutes with her and still make it home by eleven.

My mom doesn't set down the rules for me anymore. She says, I'm a man now and I can come and go as I please. But, I know it makes her feel better when I go after supper and come home by eleven. My mom hasn't changed.

She says I sure have though. She says, it's like I'm a whole different person. I feel like I am two different persons. Or at least was. It's like the person named Radar stayed in Korea with you guys and the person named Walter came home to his mother. But the person named Walter can remember everything Radar ever thought or felt.

I miss all of you very much. I miss the way you used to call me Radar. Nobody calls me Radar around here and I don't want them to either. Radar is something special between you guys and me and nobody else. Living and working together brought us together like a family. I still think of Colonel Potter as a father. The rest of you are still like brothers and sisters.

I made it through 27 months in Korea with most of you guys. We made it together. We each had our own unique method of coping with the horrors.

I remember Hawkeye's was to resist them with every bit of his body and soul.

B.J.'s was to try and find some speck of good in them, and if nothing good, at least something humorous.

Charles tried to pretend the horrors weren't so horrible after all, by bringing a touch of civility to such uncivilized surroundings.

Major Houlahan (I still can't bring myself to call you Margaret) used to convince everyone she was immune to the horrors, and if they believed it, it helped her to believe it.

Klinger's secret was to rally behind a worthwhile cause and then never forsake it.

My method of coping was to hug my Teddy bear and watch the rest of you guys coping.

Everyday that we endured, I felt more and more obliged to you guys. I would've never made it if it weren't for you's and your abilities to cope with the things I could never cope with alone. I owe you all so much, I could never repay you. And I love you all so much, I could never really leave you.

I guess that must be why I feel the part of me that was Radar is still with you in Korea.

And, if the part of me that is Walter is changed, it's because he took a little bit of each one of you home with him to Iowa.

I think I've changed for the better. And I can't wait till the rest of you's get here! So take care of yourselves, and keep on coping! You've made it this far—you can make it the rest of the way! I just know you can! (Remember, you didn't give me the name Radar for nothing).

All my love, your friend, Radar Walter O'Reilly..." Klinger paused to blink his blurred vision clear. Then, he sniffled and continued, "P.S. I'd appreciate it if someone would go over to the orphanage some day and check up on my animals. I miss them, too. P.P.S. Klinger, if I know anything about how the Army operates, which, after 27 months as a MASH company clerk, I think I do, I figure my replacement will probably arrive the day the truce is signed." Klinger smiled sadly behind his mask and slowly lowered the letter.

There was a long, solemn silence, interrupted only by an occasional sniffle.

'Good old Radar is still living up to his name,' Potter thought to himself. His letter was just the boost in the arm their slumping morale needed. He blinked his own watering eyes, and then drew his shoulders back. "That's my boy!" he announced with all the gusto of a proud father. He saw Hawkeye staring off into space.

"Dear...sweet...innocent...lovable old Radar," Pierce muttered finally, "is still just as dear and sweet and innocent and lovable as ever. God I miss him! I think maybe we oughtta call him when we finish up here and tell him thanks for the news from home, or something."

The rest of the people in the room all voiced their unanimous approval of the idea.

Pierce glanced up at Potter. "How 'bout it, Colonel?"

Potter gazed fondly into the two dozen sets of eyes that suddenly riveted on his. "I get to talk first," he determined.

The eyes looked delighted and focused their attention back on their work.

"Ah nah," Captain Pierce protested. "It was my idea. I should get to go first."

Once again, Potter's mask hid his grin. "I go first and I don't wanna hear any more arguments about it. It's all settled," he added, halting Hawkeye's further complaints. "I'm the C.O.. I pay the phone bills around here, so to speak. So I get to do the first speaking!"

Pierce's eyes flashed with mock contempt. "Tyrant!"

Major Winchester finished with his patient and started to leave that table for another. He found he couldn't move. "Quick! Someone find me a chair!" he pleaded.

"No sitting down on the job, Charles!" Hawkeye reminded him.

"My legs have fallen asleep! I cannot move them!" Winchester saw no attempt was being made to find him a chair. He grimaced and let out a pitiful groan. "Will someone at least place a few blankets and pillows down around me so that when my knees buckle and I drop to the floor I might at least have a softer landing?"

Major Houlahan drew in a deep breath and let out a long exhausted sigh before stepping over to the troubled doctor and flinging his right arm around her neck. "C'mon, Charles, the best way to get the circulation going is to get going. A little walk around the room, they'll be as good as new."

Hunnicutt finished working on his latest patient and looked up just in time to see the two Majors go strolling by, locked in each other's arms. He decided to pass up this prime opportunity for humor. Choosing, instead, to dish out some sound advice. "Margaret's right. You gotta keep moving. The trick is to keep shifting your weight from foot to foot. That way, only one leg dies at a time."

Pierce glanced back up, spotted the odd couple and smiled beneath his mask. "I envy you, Charles. A voluptuous woman, no longer able to contain her seething emotions, wraps her arms around you and carts you off. Ooh, I'll bet you must be on pins and needles over there."

Winchester stopped groaning just long enough to give the good Captain a disgusted glare.

Klinger started to leave, but then suddenly remembered something and turned back to Potter. "Oh, Colonel, with all the excitement over Radar's letter, I almost forgot. The guy that just delivered the mail also delivered a hot rumor." Klinger paused, seeing he had everyone's undivided attention once again. "Unofficial word is, sir, that we should be prepared for an immediate bug-out."

Klinger's audience managed amused snorts and returned to their duties.

Potter looked thoughtful. "Did this guy happen to mention the source of this rumor?"

Klinger nodded. "The 8063rd."

B.J. glanced up. "It's becoming impossible to distinguish between the honest and for true bug-out rumors and the just plain bug-us rumors. What is this? The fourth or fifth rumor this week?"

Klinger glanced solemnly around the room. "The guy that delivered this rumor was in such a rush to head south, he wouldn't even stay for supper."

Pierce glanced up again. "That's easily explained. He's obviously eaten here before."

The nurses and orderlies snickered.

Colonel Potter couldn't seem to stop smiling behind his mask. "Just to be on the safe side, you'd better set the bug-out wheel in motion, Sergeant."

Klinger appeared pleased. "Yes, sir!" he acknowledged snappily. The Sergeant then spun on his heels and disappeared out the door.

Major Houlahan ushered Winchester back up to an operating table, "How are the legs?"

"Fine. Thank you, Margaret," he answered, then grimaced and slowly slid his right arm from around her neck. "Now my arm has gone to sleep!" he announced pitifully.

Margaret let out a pitiful groan of her own.

End of Chapter One