Finding The 4077th

Knowing The People

Sitting on his cot, Chris was doing school work, like actual books and everything. He was crazy excited when they came in the mail. He gave Hawkeye a big grin.

He wanted to learn more English, and when Hawkeye told him that his new grandfather from Crabapple Cove would send him clothes but also books to learn, he was thrilled. Apparently, Hawkeye sent a telegram to his father who knew the local school teacher, and got a used set of books to learn English.

And of course, he started at the very beginning, but Chris was finally learning to write and speak English. Chris was very eager to learn how to communicate, so he took his books everywhere. He asked questions by pointing to the words, and he always listens carefully.

The army only approved his temporary stay at the 4077th because of Sidney's interference and with the Dutch embassy behind him they had no choice but to accept.

He's been on the 4077th for weeks now and he slowly started to feel safe around here. Sometimes he even went alone to the latrine or alone to the swamp and back to the O.R.
Hawkeye seemed proud of him, he kept telling him that he is, and it made Chris extremely happy.

The people of the 4077th made him feel at home. He even became friends with Radar who gave him comic books and hours of stories about his life back home.

And he did a crossword puzzle with Francis, who insisted that he needed help from the smartest boy around. Chris doesn't know about being the smartest but he loves the feeling of the man thinking he was smart. It made him proud.

Hawkeye and Trapper were lounging around.
“Fix you a martini?” Hawkeye said to Trapper while raising his glass.

Chris looked up, did Trapper want a drink? He didn't notice.

“Haven't you got anything better to do when you're off duty than to lie around swill gin?“ Frank stated with disapproval.

”Swill gin?“
Hawkeye stood up insulted.

Standing tall he said.
”Sir, I have sipped, lapped, and taken gin intravenously, but I never swilled!“

Walking over to the still, he got a martini for Trapper. Handing it over to the man, he started a speech about martini and gin.

”Twaddle“ Burns replied

”Watch your language, Frank, or I'll wash your mouth out with soap.“ Hawkeye jokes.

”That's not a threat I thought I would hear anytime soon,” Trapper laughed.

“By the way, did you know ”soap“ was a four-letter word?” Hawkeye added to Frank who looked irritated at being treated as a child.

Hawkeye did that a lot these days, he explained everything. Sometimes he would explain simple things disguised as jokes. Chris knew Hawkeye did that for him and he was glad for it, it really seems to help. He also could show any word to the man and he got a complete explanation about it.

He felt a rush of affection for the man every time he did that.
The other personnel also helped a lot. Now they knew Chris was learning English, so they all wanted to help. He could show them anything and most of them explained a lot, but not Frank, Chris had become friendly with some people in this unit, but not all of them.

Hawkeye also noticed that aside from Hawkeye, Chris also started to follow around his new friends from the 4077th.

Like now, Hawkeye noticed that Chris didn't follow him into the O.R, looking around a bit in shock he saw the boy standing with Kellye who was talking to him. She was showing him her family pictures.

Getting a big smile on his face he walked inside. The boy made him proud, he was already getting comfortable around here and was even brave enough to walk alone for a while. It amazed Hawkeye how he even could be happy with multiple wounded waiting to be operated on, but this minute he was. Between all this blood and dirt he could still feel somewhat normal.