The OR had been a slaughterhouse. Fourteen straight hours of suturing, clamping, and desperately trying to put young men back together. By the time Hawkeye and B.J. stumbled into the mess tent, they were covered in blood and running on fumes.
They grabbed their trays of mystery meat and turned toward their usual table, only to freeze in their tracks.
Sitting near the window was a man they vaguely recognized. He was clean-shaven. He was wearing an impeccably ironed fatigue shirt. His boots were polished to a mirror shine. He was sitting with perfect posture, quietly reading a manual on quartermaster logistics.
“Dear God,” B.J. whispered, dropping his tray. “It’s happened. The war has finally broken him.”
Hawkeye cautiously approached the table, poking the man’s shoulder with a spoon. “Klinger? Is that you in there? Blink twice if the ghost of General MacArthur has possessed your body.”
Corporal Maxwell Q. Klinger looked up, offering a polite, subdued smile. “Good morning, Captain Pierce. Captain Hunnicutt. How was your shift in the operating theater? I’ve taken the liberty of organizing your supply requisitions for the next quarter.”
Hawkeye recoiled as if burned. “He’s talking like Frank! Someone get a medic! Wait, I am a medic. Someone get a priest!”
“I assure you, Captains, I am perfectly well,” Klinger said calmly, taking a sip of his black coffee. “In fact, I’ve never been better.”
The truth of Klinger’s terrifying transformation had roots in a late-night conversation with Colonel Potter. After the OR shift, Klinger had begged Potter for a way out of the infantry transfer. Potter, scouring the military rulebook, found one loophole.
If a soldier scheduled for frontline transfer is deemed psychologically unfit, they are remanded to a psychiatric ward stateside for evaluation and honorable discharge. However, because Major Frank Burns had officially logged a formal complaint accusing Klinger of “faking insanity to avoid duty” (malingering), a visiting psychiatrist from Seoul was en route to evaluate him. If Klinger acted crazy, the psychiatrist—warned by Frank—would rule it a fake, and Klinger would be sent to the front for insubordination.
The only way to beat the system, Klinger deduced, was to act so terrifyingly, aggressively normal that the psychiatrist would think he was a sociopath masking his true nature, or better yet, to prove he was a perfect clerk so Potter could fight to keep him.
Later that afternoon, Major Sidney Freedman, the brilliant but weary Army psychiatrist, arrived at the 4077th. He was briefed by Frank Burns, who spent twenty minutes complaining about Klinger’s wardrobe.
When Sidney finally sat down with Klinger in Potter’s office, he was expecting a man in a feather boa. Instead, he found Klinger standing at perfect attention, saluting sharply.
“At ease, Corporal,” Sidney said, leaning back and observing Klinger. “Major Burns tells me you have quite the collection of spring fashion.”
“I have no idea what the Major is referring to, sir,” Klinger said smoothly, his face a mask of military discipline. “I am a soldier in the United States Army. I live for the regulations. I dream of proper filing protocols. I find great comfort in the predictability of military hierarchy.”
Sidney raised an eyebrow. He spent an hour grilling Klinger. He asked about his childhood, his dreams, his fears. Klinger answered every question with the dullest, most aggressively sane responses imaginable. He talked about baseball statistics. He discussed the weather in Toledo. He expressed a deep, profound love for inventory management.
Hawkeye and B.J. watched through the window, sweating.
“He’s overdoing it,” Hawkeye whispered. “Nobody in this camp is that sane. It’s unnatural.”
Finally, Sidney Freedman emerged from the office. He looked at Potter, then at Frank, and then at Hawkeye.
“Well?” Frank demanded eagerly. “He’s a faker, right? Fit for the infantry!”
Sidney sighed, rubbing his temples. “Major Burns, I have evaluated thousands of men in this war. I’ve seen men who think they are birds, men who think they are radios. But I have never, in my entire career, met a man as devastatingly, flawlessly sane as Corporal Klinger.”
Frank’s face fell. Hawkeye and B.J. cheered silently.
“Therefore,” Sidney continued, pulling out a stamped document, “since he is in perfect mental health, and his temporary assignment here has long expired, he is fully cleared for his transfer.”
Hawkeye’s smile vanished. “Wait, what?”
“He’s a model soldier,” Sidney said, handing the paper to Potter. “I’ve officially cleared him for frontline combat duty with the 8th Infantry. He ships out at dawn. May God have mercy on his soul, because the North Koreans won’t.”
Through the window, they saw Klinger still sitting at the desk, his perfectly sane facade cracking as a single tear rolled down his freshly shaven cheek. He had played the game too well. He was going to the front.
[ Next Chapter ⏩ ]
