Finding The 4077th

Relief, Disbelief, and Devastation

It was a dull and gray day in Korea. It seemed like a normal day, but the day already had a rocky start, Chris woke up with a nightmare twice this night. The child had seemed to have more nightmares after Hawkeye's trip to the aid station. Instead of Chris having a nightmare two or one night a week, he had them four times already this week.

And that wasn't the only problem Hawkeye encountered with his son this week. Because apparently, if a lady screamed, Chris would go and hide. The child stood right next to him and was gone the next second.

Hawkeye searched the unit for almost an hour before he found his child, hidden underneath Francis's cot.

It took almost thirty minutes for Chris to calm down, and it took even longer for Hawkeye to get the child to talk about it. It took a lot of trying and he needed to put the short, small answers together, but he managed to find out that Chris learned to hide, when a lady screamed in the brothel he stayed in for a while.

The ladies didn't always encounter nice men, and if a man wasn't nice, they would scream and one of the bodyguards would handle it. But because that didn't always work out the way they wanted, they taught the boy to hide from the scream. Hawkeye was glad they taught him that, to keep him out of harm's way but that was difficult to unlearn.

Hawkeye called Sidney about it, and the psychiatrist called back later after he talked to some of his colleagues, and had some ideas to help.

Chris needed to sleep normal hours, and keep his bedtime routine short, easy, and happy. They could read stories about getting over fears. Or draw pictures of the nightmares and then tear them up and throw them away as a symbolic gesture.

Also, talk about the nightmares during the day, and try to explain them.

Hawkeye knew why Chris had these nightmares, his kid was so afraid of people leaving him, that he kept dreaming about being all alone, in a scary environment. The doctor tried to reassure him during the day and worked on the boy's confidence, but it stayed a struggle.

So the doctor had his child write down his nightmares so they could talk about them. Chris liked writing better than drawing, so the doctor hoped this would also work. 

After breakfast, casualties arrived and the personnel immediately got to work. After triage, the doctors started to scrub up and the nurses began preparing the injured for surgery.

While the doctors are in surgery, a giddy Radar comes into the OR, followed by Chris, who looks a bit confused. The boy held a mask in front of his face but Hawkeye could see a bit of sadness in those eyes. It worried him for a second, but he didn't have time to find out as he was working on a difficult bowel.

Radar however looked very happy as he spoke up.

“Colonel?”

“Yo,” Henry said as he didn't look up at the clerk, he was busy with both his hands inside a patient.

The happy clerk said.
“Do you know what I found in this morning's mail? You're going home!”

“I'm going home?” The confused colonel repeated, it didn't sink in yet.

Radar happily explained that the colonel was being discharged, he had all his points, and was going home!

Slowly the colonel seemed to understand what the clerk was saying and as his expression turned into relief and disbelief as he got very excited and told everyone in the O.R loudly that he was going home!

People cheered, whistled, and congratulated him, as the colonel tried his best to calm down and keep his focus on the patient he was working on.

Hawkeye immediately understood his son's expression, Chris was a bit sad and confused, so he knew he had to explain a bit, Chris didn't know about the points you have to earn before you get sent home. The doctor just hoped this wouldn't give the boy more nightmares. Chris wasn't very close with Henry but he was still a friend.