Colonel Sherman T. Potter was a man who appreciated the simple things in life: a good horse, a stiff drink, and a camp that ran with a minimum of screaming. Major Richard Horn was currently interfering with all three.

Potter sat behind his desk, carefully dabbing a brush into a palette of oil paints. He was working on a portrait of his horse, Sophie. He found that painting kept him from strangling difficult officers.

Standing before the desk was Major Horn, looking like a man who had just swallowed a lemon whole. Leaning against the doorframe, nursing a mug of coffee that smelled suspiciously like gin, was Hawkeye Pierce. And standing dutifully beside the Colonel was Corporal Radar O’Reilly.

“Colonel, this is an outrage!” Horn exploded, unable to contain himself any longer. “I gave a Priority One telegram to this… this child, and he failed to transmit it! I demand he be brought up on charges of intercepting military communications!”

Potter didn’t look up from his canvas. “Radar?”

“Well, sir,” Radar squeaked, adjusting his glasses. “I was going to send it, but the machine got a little jammed up. You know, Korean dust in the gears. And then I accidentally spilled some grape Nehi on the envelope, and it sort of… unsealed itself. And my eyes just happened to fall upon the words ‘court-martial’ and ‘Pierce.’ So I thought you should see it, sir.”

“You read my private report to General Clayton!” Horn shrieked.

Potter put down his brush and sighed. He picked up the crumpled telegram from his desk and put on his reading glasses. “Major Horn, according to this, you’re accusing Captain Pierce of medical malpractice, gross insubordination, and treason. You state that his unorthodox methods are a danger to the troops.”

“They are!” Horn insisted. “He ignores the manual! He mocks the very institution that protects this country! The man is an anti-American agitator masquerading as a doctor. My book—my report—will expose the decay in the medical corps caused by these liberal drafted doctors who have no respect for the uniform!”

Hawkeye took a slow sip from his mug. “Tell me, Major. In your book, are you going to include the part where you froze over a dying kid?”

Horn whipped around, his face turning an apoplectic purple. “I did not freeze! I was assessing the situation methodically!”

“You panicked, Horn,” Hawkeye said quietly, all the humor gone from his voice. “You realized that all your patriotic speeches and your crisp salutes don’t mean a damn thing when a boy’s blood is covering your hands. You couldn’t handle the reality of the war you love to write about. So you’re trying to burn me to cover up your own cowardice.”

“That is a lie!” Horn sputtered. “Colonel, I demand Pierce be arrested!”

“Horse hockey,” Potter said firmly, tossing the telegram into his wastebasket.

Horn gasped. “Colonel! You can’t do that!”

“I just did, Major,” Potter said, leaning forward, resting his hands on the desk. His voice was calm, but it carried the weight of thirty years of military command. “I read your report. It’s a work of fiction. Fiction might sell books, Major, but it doesn’t fly in my camp. Captain Pierce is the finest meatball surgeon in Korea. He saved a boy’s leg yesterday using a procedure you couldn’t even conceptualize, let alone perform under fire.”

“He broke the rules!”

“He saved a life!” Potter barked, slamming his hand on the desk. “Out here, that’s the only rule that matters. You came here looking for John Wayne, Major. But this isn’t a movie. It’s a butcher shop. Pierce and Hunnicutt might be insubordinate, smart-aleck, skirt-chasing lunatics, but they put these kids back together. And as long as I command the 4077th, no typewriter jockey from Tokyo is going to threaten my doctors.”

Horn drew himself up, his chest puffing out. “You are protecting him, Colonel. You’re part of the problem. Fine. I don’t need this telegram. I will fly back to Tokyo tomorrow, and I will hand-deliver my report to General Clayton myself. I will see this entire camp investigated!”

Potter sighed heavily. “I was afraid you’d say that. Radar?”

“Yes, sir,” Radar said. He pulled a second piece of paper from his clipboard. “I took the liberty of typing up a different telegram, sir. To General Clayton. From Colonel Potter.”

Potter nodded. “Read it, son.”

Radar cleared his throat. “‘To General Clayton. Regarding the visit of Major Richard Horn. Stop. Regret to inform you that Major Horn proved unfit for front-line conditions. Stop. Major Horn suffered a severe panic attack during routine triage, endangering the life of a wounded soldier. Stop. Required Captain Pierce to intervene and save patient. Stop. Strongly recommend Major Horn be reassigned to desk duty stateside, as he lacks the fortitude for combat medicine. Stop. Signed, Colonel Sherman T. Potter.'”

The color drained entirely from Major Horn’s face. He looked at Radar, then at Potter, then at Hawkeye, who was now grinning broadly.

“You wouldn’t,” Horn whispered. “That… that would destroy my career. My reputation as a military writer…”

“It would certainly ruin the book tour,” Hawkeye chimed in.

“The choice is yours, Major,” Potter said reasonably, picking up his paintbrush again. “You can get on that chopper tomorrow, go back to Tokyo, and write a nice, glowing article about the brave boys at the 4077th. You don’t have to mention Pierce. You can write ten pages about Major Burns’ perfectly aligned latrines for all I care. Or, you can file your grievance, and I will file mine. And I guarantee you, General Clayton will listen to a thirty-year combat veteran before he listens to a journalist with clean fingernails.”

Horn stood paralyzed. His pristine, black-and-white world of military glory had just collided with the muddy, gray reality of survival. He had been outmaneuvered not by regulations, but by a cunning, unified family of misfits.

Slowly, the stiffness left his shoulders. The rigid military posture slumped. He looked defeated.

“Fine,” Horn rasped, his voice trembling with humiliated rage. “I will withdraw my report. You people… you are sick. You make a mockery of this war.”

“No, Major,” Hawkeye said softly, stepping aside to let Horn pass. “The war makes a mockery of itself. We’re just the punchline.”

Major Horn stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind him. The camp would never see him again. When his article finally ran in the Stars and Stripes two months later, it heavily featured the heroic, unflinching discipline of Major Frank Burns. The rest of the 4077th was not mentioned.

Back in the office, Potter inspected his painting. “Well. That takes care of that. Radar, destroy that telegram.”

“Already done, sir,” Radar smiled, tearing the paper into tiny pieces.

Hawkeye raised his coffee mug in a salute to Potter. “Colonel, you are a gentleman, a scholar, and a ruthless blackmailer. I’ve never been prouder to serve under you.”

“Get out of here, Pierce,” Potter grumbled, hiding a smile. “And if I catch you distilling gin in my camp again, I’ll have you shot.”

“Yes, sir,” Hawkeye grinned. He walked out of the office, stepping back into the mud of Uijeongbu. The war was still raging, the choppers would inevitably return, and the madness would continue. But for today, the author had been written out of the story, and Hawkeye Pierce was heading back to the Swamp to pour himself a very well-deserved, very illegal martini.