The bathroom tiles were cool against my hand

[notinflictthem]

CHARACTERS: Hawkeye and you! Yes, you!
DATE: November
LOCATION: Hawkeye’s Clinic
SITUATION: Settling in, making waves, shaking hands, making friends
WARNINGS: Blanket warning that war and injury may come up

Press my corpse against the wall

Hawkeye wakes up to sunlight instead of Radar yelling for helicopters. He has his coffee unhurried, plans out his day. No Frank to yell at him for not shaving, but no Trap to chew the fat with, either. Nobody to complain with about breakfast. It’s too quiet. If he doesn’t see a human person in the next hour, he’s going to start gnawing his own limbs off.

So from about 8am-6pm, the clinic is staffed. The sign out the front reads ‘Hawkeye’s Clinic, happy hour 6-7pm’, and underneath that, more recently, a smaller sign reads ‘100% satisfaction rate; just ask the survivors!’
Inside, Hawkeye is either cleaning, running his tabletop still for alcohol to disinfect with (or drink), or organising his small array of client notes.

I told the band to leave without me

If you actually visit during the signposted happy hour, the table in the middle of the clinic has a tablecloth draped over it, and Hawkeye stands there polishing the couple of glasses he owns. Someone should get him some decent barware. There’s a couple of stools, and he grins as you enter. He’s playing bartender. Indulge him?

I'll get the next flight

After happy hour, the ‘bar’ gets packed up and the clinic gets scrubbed down. If you’ve got a standing invitation for cards, a date, or just want to check in on him off-hours, this is the time to do it. Find him out on his front doorstep with his nose in a book, leaning out the window with a martini in hand and watching the street, or doing something upstairs, the sound of a pleasant baritone muddling through something jazzy.

And if I make it to the mornin' (wildcard)

(Hit me!)

Comments

[300kgbackpack]

"Oh sure, she'll be a great assistant," he replies easily, a hand curling around the top of the sling that he carries her in. Huge green eyes regard Hawkeye with clear fascination.

When he stands back up straight, Sam reaches back to unsling his too-large pack and ease it onto the floor, first pulling out a bound folder of copied over documents and handing them straight over, then picking a few cases to stack on the counter.

"Supplies, doc. Don't worry, I'm not gonna make you sign anything."

[notinflictthem]

"I'm sure she'll be better than some of my coworkers. Here-"

Hawkeye helps where he can, taking the folder (with a quick peek into it) and one of the cases. He's helpful without being unobtrusive; he might hate the army, but damnit if it doesn't teach you how to work efficiently with others.

"Thanks a bunch, I think I left my pen back in my pants that are still in Korea. Seriously- really decent of you, thanks for this. You're...?" nope, can't even make a guess, nobody warned him about the amazing human camel.

[300kgbackpack]

"She's a pretty good lookout, if nothin' else." He kind of misses the clicking of the odradek on his shoulder, but at least in the time he's been here, there hasn't really been any necessity for that kind of early warning system.

Usually Sam doesn't have anyone actively helping him do this. He has to stop himself waving Hawkeye off; just because he's not accustomed to it doesn't mean that it isn't nice. Considering that this was probably what people did anyway when he'd dropped things through their delivery terminals anyway, the only thing that's actually any different is that it's happening right in front of him.

"Korea? Lemme guess, ex-army?" Only reason he could think for someone to be out there when for all intents and purposes the guy looks and sounds like someone he would have expected to see back in DC. "Uh. Sam. Sam Porter." Notable lack of handshake as he gets the last of it in order.

[notinflictthem]

"Ah, she's in intelligence," he gives Lou a little mock salute, "keeping an eye out, good to know."

Once everything's sorted, he answers-

"More and more ex by the day, thank goodness. Nice to meet you Sam," it's fine, handshakes aren't necessary, manners are kind of the first thing out the window back at the mash unit, anyway.

"Who's the kid?"

[300kgbackpack]

"Good paranormal investigator, too," he jokes.

As soon as it looks like everything is well in hand, Sam straightens up to cinch his pack snug to his body once more, and makes sure that the sling is secure after the jostling. "'s Lou. Watch out, she's a little spitfire."

[notinflictthem]

"Better watch she doesn't commit any crimes. Then she'd be a small medium at large."

He sticks his tongue out at the kid mischievously, then turns his attention back to Sam-

"I owe you anything for this? I can't remember when postage started being paid in advance, don't know if it's happened here yet."

[300kgbackpack]

That's a laugh. A quiet little choke-snort-laugh but a laugh all the same.

"Nah man, it's all good. City pays the fees and I make sure shit keeps running on time. Pretty good system."

[notinflictthem]

"Now that's a system I can get behind."

Hawkeye taps beside the still on the countertop, "can I tempt you with a belt before you get to your next job? It's nice to have a visitor who isn't bleeding."

[300kgbackpack]

A moment to regard the still, then an internal shrug. Why not?

"What's your poison?" He can't tell by smell, and his pallet isn't exactly acclimated to anything but caffeine and dark beer. On that thought, he eyes the still again, then Hawkeye. "Actually, another question for you doc. You know anything about energy supplements?"

[notinflictthem]

"Gin. The finest vintage of a few hours ago," and Hawkeye nods, meandering to find his glasses.

"Energy supplements? What, like... batteries?"

[300kgbackpack]

"Sure, why not?" He can't remember the last time he actually had gin, but he'd try it and see how he feels after one. It's probably not the thing to shotgun three of and then go back out on the job, mind, but nothing ventured and all that.

"Energy drink. Think like coffee but tastes better, lasts longer, and has more to it in general. Kinda tastes like soda?" He doesn't know when energy drinks were invented but surely it can't be a bad idea to propose to a doctor for production, right?

[notinflictthem]

Oh. Oh now that- that's a good idea right there. Not that there's anything wrong with coffee, but better? Longer lasting? Now that's an idea. Hawkeye pours the gin for them both, offering the glass over to Sam.

"Haven't heard of it. But we could probably give it a shot- we'd need to extract caffeine somehow, and I don't know about you but I haven't looked at organic chemistry since college. We might need to ask our lovely pharmacist about it."

[300kgbackpack]

Sam is careful as he takes the glass, raising it then taking a tentative swallow. It's sharp, not particularly refined, stronger than what he's used to drinking, but he doesn't hate it. Now he's wondering if Hawkeye does moonshine.

"I know there's people working on trying to grow it here. Maybe if they figures it out, we can work with 'em on that. There's this kid too, real sciencey type, always hear 'im muttering about growin' stuff." He barely understood the majority of what the Torgal kid had told him when he was asking a pile of questions about the economy of the island, the supplies, and his plans for getting deliveries out to the farms only to learn that Sam actually lived pretty damn close to them, at least for the moment. There had been a moment when Sam had sort of tuned out while listening to the poor guy. The way he'd reacted, that kind of thing seemed to happen a lot.

Another swallow of his chin, and Sam shakes his head. "Can't do more than this but maybe I'll hit you up later. Already riskin' some kinda citation drinkin' on the job."

[notinflictthem]

No moonshine, just gin. Hawkeye's boring like that.

"Well hey, keep me in the loop if any of you manage to work it out. Can't complain about having something to drink, but your uh- your energy drinks sound nicer than the chicory stuff I've been having."

It might be an alternative, but it's not a good one.

"Happy hour's on the door. Would be nice to have you- and whoever your boss is, I didn't see or hear anything," and he zips his mouth shut.

[300kgbackpack]

"Yeah, heard about the chicory stuff. Not a fan," he replies easily, swigging down the last of his drink and handing the glass back over. "Yeah man, I'm sure you'll be seein' me a lot. Gotta keep you medical types supplied and up to date, right? Got an order box up too if you need the priority shit. You come up on a list of ingredients for whatever else you wanna do here, I can probably source whatever you need."

[notinflictthem]

"Sure sounds like it," Hawkeye agrees cheerily.

"Back home we had requisition officers and all to sort this out. Going to be weird having to run all of my own inventory."

Yes that was technically sometimes his duty but. Hawkeye didn't do it. Not often. What were they going to do, draft him again?

[300kgbackpack]

Sam shrugs. "Usually I'm just the guy movin' it point A to B but, y'know. Sometimes people want a little extra, n' they pay good for it, so why not?" What's one additional stop in his rounds, right? If he's already on his way out somewhere, it's not gonna hurt him any to knock on a door and ask after something for a customer.