The walk from the OR to the latrines had never felt so perilous. Usually, the greatest danger in this sector of the 4077th was whatever Swamp recipe Hawkeye and BJ had concocted the night before, or the haunting possibility of running into Frank Burns in a bathrobe. Today, however, the threat was quite literal, metallic, and currently humming a silent, deadly tune in the mud.

Hawkeye, still in his green surgical scrubs and rubber boots, marched alongside Colonel Potter. “Colonel, tell me I’m hallucinating. Tell me the gin finally rotted my optic nerve and I’m just dreaming this.”

“I wish I could, Pierce. But unfortunately, the United States Army in its infinite wisdom has provided us with a living, breathing paradox,” Potter grumbled, chewing unlit cigar.

They arrived at the perimeter. A piece of red twine had been strung between two tent pegs, cordoning off a five-foot radius around a rusted, deeply ominous-looking North Korean mortar shell. Standing guard outside the twine was Major Larson, his boots shining so brightly they practically reflected the overcast sky. Next to him stood Frank Burns, practically vibrating with bureaucratic ecstasy.

“Halt!” Frank barked, raising a hand. “You are entering a restricted Police Action zone! Show your passes!”

“Frank, if you don’t lower that hand, I’m going to use it to unscrew the fuse on that bomb,” Hawkeye said cheerfully.

Potter stepped forward, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. “Major Larson. I understand you’ve turned away the Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit.”

Larson adjusted his cap. “Colonel Potter. I am simply enforcing the standards of the United States Military. This is a Police Action. We are a stabilizing force. If we allow mud-caked, non-regulation vehicles to parade through a medical facility, we are no better than the anarchists we are fighting.”

“It’s a bomb squad truck!” Hawkeye shouted, throwing his arms up. “It’s supposed to be dirty! They blow things up for a living! They don’t drive a florist’s delivery van!”

“Rules are rules, Captain,” Larson replied coldly. “They will return when their vehicle meets the sanitation requirements. Until then, the perimeter is secure.”

“Secure?” Potter’s mustache twitched. “Major, that shell has a hair-trigger fuse. If a particularly heavy rain cloud decides to weep on it, it’s going to turn the officers’ latrine, the mess hall, and half of post-op into a crater!”

“The statistics of an unexploded ordnance spontaneously detonating without kinetic friction are quite low,” Frank chimed in helpfully, reading from a small manual.

Hawkeye stared at Frank. “Frank, did you read that in an army manual or on the back of a cereal box? Because if that thing goes off, your ‘Police Action’ is going to require a lot of zip-lock bags for the paperwork.”

A loud rumble echoed in the distance. Artillery. The ground beneath their feet trembled slightly. The mortar shell in the mud shifted, sinking a quarter of an inch deeper.

Everyone froze. Even Larson looked slightly pale.

“Right,” Hawkeye clapped his hands together. “Well, since the car wash in Uijeongbu is probably closed on Sundays, and our illustrious police chief here is waiting for a shiny truck, I guess I’ll do it.”

“Do what, Pierce?” Potter asked.

Hawkeye reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver martini olive pick. “I’m going to defuse it. I read a book once. Or maybe it was a comic book. Either way, it involves cutting a wire. Red or blue, usually.”

“Captain, you are not authorized!” Larson yelled, stepping forward. “I am ordering you to stand down!”

“Or what? You’ll arrest me?” Hawkeye ducked under the red twine, his boots squelching in the mud. He knelt beside the rusted shell. Up close, it smelled of cordite and wet earth. It was terrifying. He was terrified. But the thought of three tents full of post-op patients getting blown to bits because a bureaucrat wanted a clean truck was far more terrifying.

“Pierce, get back here!” Potter barked. “That’s an order!”

“Sorry, Colonel. Can’t hear you. My ears are clogged with regulation paperwork.” Hawkeye leaned closer to the shell. The fuse mechanism was bent, jammed with dirt. He used the olive pick to delicately scrape the mud away from the firing pin.

“He’s destroying evidence!” Frank gasped. “That ordnance is property of the opposing forces, currently impounded under jurisdiction of—”

“Frank, shut up,” Margaret’s voice cut through the air. She had arrived, standing behind Potter, her arms crossed. “For once in your miserable life, just shut up.”

Hawkeye took a deep breath. His hands, which had just flawlessly repaired a torn femoral artery, were perfectly steady. He wedged the olive pick between the firing pin and the striker plate. If it slipped, he’d be nothing but a memory and a stain on Major Larson’s shiny boots.

With a soft, metallic click, he pried the arming mechanism backward. He then unscrewed the top of the fuse, pulling out the detonator cap and tossing it casually over his shoulder. It landed in a puddle with a plop.

Hawkeye stood up, wiping his muddy hands on his scrubs. He walked back to the red twine, stepped over it, and walked right up to Major Larson.

“There,” Hawkeye said, his voice deadly quiet. “Your jurisdiction is safe. The bomb is castrated. The camp is safe. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have actual bleeding human beings waiting for me. Because out here, Major, it’s not a Police Action. It’s an abattoir. And your parking tickets don’t stop the bleeding.”

Larson stared at him, speechless.

Potter stepped in. “Major Larson. You will pack your bags. You will take your Military Police. And you will leave my camp. If you ever return and interfere with the medical operations of the 4077th, I will personally see to it that you are reassigned to a weather station in Alaska. Do I make myself clear?”

Larson swallowed hard. “I will be filing a report, Colonel.”

“Make it in triplicate,” Potter snapped. “And use two-ply paper, so we can put it to good use in the latrine. Dismissed!”

As Larson and a bewildered Frank Burns scampered away, Hawkeye turned to Potter.

“Nice work, Colonel. Though I think you went a little easy on him.”

Potter clapped Hawkeye on the shoulder. “Good job with the olive pick, Pierce. Where’d you actually learn to do that?”

Hawkeye grinned, pulling a silver flask from his pocket. “I didn’t, Colonel. I was aiming for the red wire, but I slipped. Let’s go get a drink. I think my heart just restarted.”

The war continued to rage outside the perimeter, loud and bloody. But inside the 4077th, for at least one more day, the only action that mattered was keeping people alive. And maybe making a really, really dry martini.