Finding The 4077th

Out Of Sight

It all started in the middle of a cold dark night, when a couple of nurses entered the Swamp. They woke up Hawkeye telling him their stove in their tent was down again and they needed him to fix it. The doctor invited them to stay warm in his bed but they didn't seem very interested, so he slowly got up.

Chris stirred and woke up, but Hawkeye told the boy to go back to sleep, quickly giving him a kiss on his forehead. Chris didn't want to stay, but he was tired and was slowly falling back to sleep before a loud bang awoke him for a second time.

Hawkeye's panicky screaming followed. Chris felt his inside freeze and panic skyrocketing at the loud screaming from his dad, he quickly jumped out of bed, followed by a very alarmed BJ.

The boy rushed outside and saw his dad surrounded by nurses and doctors alike. Hawkeye held his red burned face in his hands and was screaming in pain, it was a very scary sight. People were screaming and talking loudly over each other, so the boy couldn't understand a lot of what was going on and it made him terrified. His dad was badly hurt, and it was too crowded for him to even see his dad clearly.

Nobody was paying him any attention as the crying boy stood in the middle of all the screaming people. Chris wanted nothing more than to get closer but his dad was completely surrounded and got quickly herded towards Post-op. He didn't know what to do so he just followed them, waiting for a chance to get close. He needed to know his dad was okay.

Inside the post op, Hawkeye was guided to a chair and sat down. The other doctors inspected his face and eyes, the ophthalmologist was already called by Radar and was on his way.

The second Chris saw an opening between the people huddling around his dad so he quickly grabbed Hawkeye and attached himself around the man's arm. He buried his face close and sighed a ragged breath against the fabric of his dad's bathrobe. He was so scared that he couldn't stop crying or trembling. His dad got hurt when he only left Hawkeye for a second, and that was only because the man wanted that. And this was what happened, he should never leave the man alone again.

Hawkeye flinched a bit as his kid flew himself on him, not being able to see anything, he wasn't prepared for the boy. He was very glad his son was close and he didn't blame Chris, but he didn't know how to make this better. He was very scared himself, his face was burned and painful and he couldn't see anything and there was a good chance of him losing his eyesight permanently. Which would mean he couldn't continue with his doctors career, and that scared him more than he would like to admit.

He hugged the boy tight, which went a little awkward as Chris refused to let go of one of his arms. But he managed. It took almost over an hour for the boy to stop crying, even with Hawkeye telling him, he was fine.

The ophthalmologist arrived that morning, which was pretty fast by Army standards, thanks to Radar. The man quickly started checking out Hawkeye's eyes.

"How do you feel?" The man asked.

"Blind." Hawkeye replied, he felt Chris squeeze a little tighter around his arm. The child stopped crying but was still trembling like a leaf. He tried to talk to the boy, help him calm down but Chris simply refused to let go, refused talking, even Radar couldn't seem to distract him, the boy even refused to hold his bunny after Radar retrieved it from under the child pillow. Nothing seemed to calm him down, which worried Hawkeye even more.

Hawkeye's eyes were covered in bandages as he asked the ophthalmologist if he could keep his nickname but the man said he didn't know for sure and that only time will tell. For now he needed to keep the bandage on and give his eyes a couple of days of rest.

Hawkeye is furiated by the lack of certainty. He sighed and sadly said "Just wondering if I should rent or buy a seeing eye dog or buy one. "

The man clapped him on the shoulder telling him he will be back Friday.