radio transmission [June Catch-All]

[theydrewfirstblood]

Who: John Rambo (theydrewfirstblood), Sally Boyle (sunshinesally) & Arthur Morgan (mistermorgan), John Rambo & YOU!
What: June catch-all for John Rambo, plus John finally gets together with the neighbors to socialize.
When:Throughout June
Where: Baker Ranch & all around Da Hollow
Warning(s): Canon typical warnings for the FIRST BLOOD/RAMBO franchise: action movie violence, mentions & possible remembered depictions of torture, death, PTSD, flashbacks, police brutality, incarceration, & outdated offensive language--will add more if they come up.

Covey Leader Calling Raven, Come In Raven! (Dinner Party, closed to Arthur and Sally)

John's tried to get to know his neighbors a little--at least he knows Sally, and received a heartening greeting when he dropped by one day to let her know he had the parcel next door. It's good to see her occasionally, and Gwen, too. Makes him miss Lou a little less.

She, of course, tells him they should all get together sometime--and when the bank approves his request for an expansion, he drops by to invite the pair over to celebrate.

They say yes, so he offers to host--nothing fancy, either, Morgan just doesn't seem the type. Plus he told them it was okay to bring Gwen, so he takes a few days to find what he needs after telling them it's a casual setup...and when they come over, he's set up a makeshift barbecue pit he's just getting some venison steaks going on, while Co is a couple yards away trying to peck at Sam the rooster, who just avoids her nonsense and patiently tries to preen her feathers into place..

When he spots them, he waves with a smile and crosses over to greet them.

"Back in my time 'n locale, nothin' beats a good ol' fashioned backyard barbecue." he explains. "We can eat inside where it's more comfortable, or hang around out here, but while things're cookin' I thought I could show you a few things happening around here if you want."

Company Leader To Identify Baker Team (Ranch, OTA)

Once John gets his ducks in a row, the upgrades for the ranch start pretty fast: namely, the acquisition of land.

He's happy to do the work himself, but some parts need more than one set of hands, and knows it'll go a little faster with help. There's no official call, but he hits up a few people and mentions to the servers at the Oak & Iron he's befriended that he's willing to feed and water anyone interested in helping out.

So there's no official work party, but if you hear that Baker Ranch is upgrading? The offer stands: drop by, put in an hour or two, and you'll go home with a full belly and maybe a few little gifts of jerky, pelts, or trinkets crafted from beads of wood and bone.

Lone Wolf To Wolf Den (Forest, OTA)

John does most of the border work solo--marking off the fence placement for his new land allotment, and doing some minor clearing to keep his game safe in the little preserve he's creating. In doing so, he snags a couple hares to add to his growing menagerie, and looks into the necessary approval to remove a tree just a bit past the buffer he's been approved to clear. The branches breach his property boundary, and he doesn't want to risk any larger birds hassling his rabbits and hares.

He does his usual hunting as well...and he keeps an eye out for the wolf he met a while ago.

It's not his dog. Never will be, wolves can't be tamed, but this one is so different--already half domesticated. He was a good hunting buddy, and he had such great temperament...

Yeah, John kind of wants to keep him. He takes his breaks during construction near the new boundary, a bowl of broth-soaked meat nearby to hopefully draw him out. He spends his evenings out there as well, considering maybe a little shrine to Serranai while scanning the brush every time there's a single sound.

He works, he waits...and he maybe sends a little prayer to Serranai, and occasionally Kora (she did say Korra would be available if John needed her), in hopes of seeing the wolf again.

Talk To Me, Johnny (Wildcard)

Choose Your Own Rambo!

Comments

[incomingchoppers]

Phew. Bullet dodged. (So to speak.)

"Where're you from?" he asks. "Me and Hawkeye and Father Mulcahy -- I dunno if you met them yet, but they're real swell guys, Hawkeye's one of the doctors and the Father's, uh, a Father -- anyway we were all in Korea but I'm from Ottumwa, Iowa before that. It's over in America if you don't know anything about Earth."

...not that that would clarify anything if Edgar wasn't from Earth, but Radar's remembering his first conversation with Tayrey where he had to sketch out a map of the United States.

[hate_gettin_older]

"Yeah, I ... I know a little about Earth," he says, and rubs the back of his neck. "I'm sort of from Earth, 's just, uh. Different from a lot of Earths."

Worse, he doesn't say out loud. It feels oddly like it would be mean, to tell him just how much worse.

[incomingchoppers]

"Oh," says Radar, more subdued; more sympathetic, too. "Yeah, I heard some of the Earths people're from are real bad. I mean it's bad enough being in just one war, but I tell you, I hear about people whose whole planet was fighting a whole buncha wars at once, and I don't mean like World War II, I mean like it's as bad as things were over in Europe and Japan and now Korea except it's everywhere -- "

He gives the post one more thwack with his hammer and moves on to pick up the next one.

"Makes me glad they ended up here where it's better, too."

[hate_gettin_older]

For a moment he frowns -- did he say 'worse' out loud? Or is he just that obvious?

"Yeah," he says, "been a few places since then, all different. This one's nicer than some." A pause. "You were in a war?"

[incomingchoppers]

"Uh-huh. That's why me and the other guys were over in Korea, we're all at a MASH near the front. -- That means 'mobile army surgical hospital,'" he thinks to clarify. "I was company clerk. Guess I still am, I'm just on a real long R&R until the barrier's down and we can all go home."

[hate_gettin_older]

Korea. He doesn't know much about Korea, any more than any other place that existed before the train; all he's got is a vague notion that 'Korean' was the name of the language Namgoong spoke.

"Hospital," he echoes, "so like ... doctors, you said. To fix people who get hurt during the war?"

(Hard to imagine a war taking that long, for there to be enough time to take care of the injured.)

[incomingchoppers]

"Yeah," says Radar. "If they gotta get people into surgery quick, they send 'em to us or the 8063rd, otherwise they go over to Tokyo."

He frowns. Something about the way Edgar said that...

Tentative: "You got hospitals where you're from, right?"

[hate_gettin_older]

"Sort of." Absently, he scratches the back of his neck. "Not really. I mean, we had a nurse, for a while. She din't have a lot to work with, she said that a lot."

He was a kid when Evie died, but he remembers her pretty well.

[incomingchoppers]

Radar's mouth falls open with dismay -- but, crucially, not disbelief. "One nurse? That's it?"

As rough as things are at the 4077th, Radar's got a good idea of how lucky they are, in some ways. They have a bunch of doctors, a whole lot of nurses, and enough connections (thanks to his clerking) to get most of what they need when they need it. He's seen how things go in the villages where they barely have any of that.

"Jeez," he says quietly. "She must've been a heck of a nurse, if it was just her taking care of all of you."

[hate_gettin_older]

"Yeah." Not much louder. "Yeah, she was pretty great."

Even when she couldn't do much, even when she got mad about how little she could do. She made sure other people in the Tail knew how to check for a fever, how to bandage a wound and keep it clean, so they weren't completely at a loss after she was gone.

[incomingchoppers]

They wrangle the next post into place; Radar smacks it with the hammer a couple times, then props his elbow on top.

(He has to raise his arm up a ways to manage it. The post almost comes up to his eye level.)

"You know, some of the doctors we got can be real jerks about the nurses," he says. "Either 'cause they're girls, or 'cause they don't think they're as smart. Or both I guess. But you know, I seen the nurses work twice as hard as the doctors sometimes doing things those same doctors wouldn't do if you paid 'em a thousand bucks. Nothing'd get done without 'em."

Radar might have a soft spot for staff who do the grunt work without any of the glory. Just a tad.

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar chews on that for a moment. "Do other people do that too? Think nurses aren't worth as much as doctors?"

[incomingchoppers]

"Yeah, sometimes the patients'll get mean about it and ask for a doctor if a nurse tries to help, or they'll flirt the whole time and won't take 'em seriously. But they're scared and they're hurt, y'know? They're only there a week or two. It's different if you're working with the nurses the whole time and know how good they are. Anyway if the soldiers get too mean Major Houlihan'll set them straight."

He lowers his voice, as if Major Houlihan's standing right behind him, about to jump out of the woods and holler at Radar to get back to work.

"She's kinda scary sometimes."

[hate_gettin_older]

What he's thinking, and doesn't see the point of saying aloud, is that maybe that's why Evie was left in the Tail and not made to go to the Front to work for them there -- because she was a nurse, and not a doctor, and they didn't think a nurse was worth taking.

"Scary's good to have on your side, though." Edgar hoists his end of the last fencepost, and tips his head in the direction they need to carry it.

[incomingchoppers]

Radar makes a face, already starting to head where Edgar directs before the other guy indicates it. "I dunno if she's on my side," he says. "She's on the side of getting everybody patched up, though, that's the more important side."

Besides, if she starts kicking up a fuss, Radar can just do what he always does: nod, smile, say yessir -- uh, ma'am, and go do what he was already planning to do anyway.

The last post thumps into place. "Whew!" he exclaims, and beams at Edgar. Pulling off his hat, he uses it to wipe some of the sweat from his forehead; his hair's damp and half-stuck to his head, but it pretty clearly has a couple bald patches that don't fit with how young he looks. "You wanna take a break and get some water before we get the planks in?"

Maybe some food, too. Radar's starving.

[hate_gettin_older]

The bald patches don't particularly strike Edgar as noteworthy; some people have thinning hair, is all. (Especially when they're living without enough food or sunlight, but when that's true of everyone you know growing up, you tend to think of its results as normal.)

"Yeah, let's," he agrees. "And a snack, maybe? There's stuff in the icebox."