it's the season of grace coming out of the void[givingstide]
Radar's been happily deputized as one of Santa-Hawkeye's... okay, not elves, since there's actual elves around here, but one of his partners in gift-giving crime. So along with him and Mulcahy, Radar spends nearly all of the gathering scampering around, handing out toys, explaining who Santa is to the littler kids, and keeping up the kayfabe by insisting -- with the same straight-faced, wide-eyed earnestness that's fooled three-star generals before -- that yeah, that really is Santa! He flew his sleigh in this morning! We got people taking care of his reindeer out on the farms! One of 'em's even got a glowing red nose and everything!
It's really nice. Since he got here, Radar's spent so much time with other stuff around town that he hasn't gotten much chance to help out at Autumn Leaves. He's missed playing with kids like this; like he would with the kids from the village or the orphanage in Korea.
Which means he's a bit out of practice and looking a little ragged by the time the festivities start winding down. Cheerful as ever, beaming with the pride of a job well done, but kinda ragged all the same. Once the last kid's out the door, he grabs a plate and a cup of cider (with just a tiiiiny bit of brandy in it) before flopping into the nearest chair with a loud, "Phew."
and knowing we are not alone in fear[mourner's night]
He joins the procession, silent as the rest.
The weight in the back of Radar's head has gotten heavier and heavier the longer he stays here. Death is so light on this island. It loses meaning when it's no worse than being knocked out for twenty-four hours. It becomes an inconvenience, a joke, even a reassurance: nobody stays dead here for long. And every time he patches his heart up and tries to take on the weight of what death ought to be, well --
It matters when people die, he cried to a near-stranger once, and it always has and when people here start acting like it don't, how's that any better than being back home, huh?
Here, for one night, it matters again. And it's kinda weird how the weight of so much collective grief makes Radar feel a little lighter.
At the cemetery, he sticks close to Dahlia for a while, slipping his hand into hers. Elsewhere, on a patch of open space between the headstones, he sits in the snow. Writes HENRY BLAKE with one fingertip; the closest his CO's gonna get to a grave when he's buried in an ocean a world away. There's more he wants to add, but it'd be whole sentences worth, not names. Everybody Dahlia's killed, even if some of them were only temporary. All the people in Korea who didn't ask to be pulled into some dumb police action war. The soldiers who left their homes and won't ever go back.
Radar guesses he's one of those soldiers for now, until the barrier comes down. He just hopes the world hasn't kept turning too long while he's away. He doesn't wanna think of his mom and Uncle Ed getting a letter from Colonel Potter in the mail -- and who'd be taking down the letter, anyway, if Radar's not around as clerk anymore?
He wipes his eyes. But when the singing begins, his voice stays steady.
Radar O'Reilly | M*A*S*H | OTA
Radar's been happily deputized as one of Santa-Hawkeye's... okay, not elves, since there's actual elves around here, but one of his partners in gift-giving crime. So along with him and Mulcahy, Radar spends nearly all of the gathering scampering around, handing out toys, explaining who Santa is to the littler kids, and keeping up the kayfabe by insisting -- with the same straight-faced, wide-eyed earnestness that's fooled three-star generals before -- that yeah, that really is Santa! He flew his sleigh in this morning! We got people taking care of his reindeer out on the farms! One of 'em's even got a glowing red nose and everything!
It's really nice. Since he got here, Radar's spent so much time with other stuff around town that he hasn't gotten much chance to help out at Autumn Leaves. He's missed playing with kids like this; like he would with the kids from the village or the orphanage in Korea.
Which means he's a bit out of practice and looking a little ragged by the time the festivities start winding down. Cheerful as ever, beaming with the pride of a job well done, but kinda ragged all the same. Once the last kid's out the door, he grabs a plate and a cup of cider (with just a tiiiiny bit of brandy in it) before flopping into the nearest chair with a loud, "Phew."
and knowing we are not alone in fear [mourner's night]
He joins the procession, silent as the rest.
The weight in the back of Radar's head has gotten heavier and heavier the longer he stays here. Death is so light on this island. It loses meaning when it's no worse than being knocked out for twenty-four hours. It becomes an inconvenience, a joke, even a reassurance: nobody stays dead here for long. And every time he patches his heart up and tries to take on the weight of what death ought to be, well --
It matters when people die, he cried to a near-stranger once, and it always has and when people here start acting like it don't, how's that any better than being back home, huh?
Here, for one night, it matters again. And it's kinda weird how the weight of so much collective grief makes Radar feel a little lighter.
At the cemetery, he sticks close to Dahlia for a while, slipping his hand into hers. Elsewhere, on a patch of open space between the headstones, he sits in the snow. Writes HENRY BLAKE with one fingertip; the closest his CO's gonna get to a grave when he's buried in an ocean a world away. There's more he wants to add, but it'd be whole sentences worth, not names. Everybody Dahlia's killed, even if some of them were only temporary. All the people in Korea who didn't ask to be pulled into some dumb police action war. The soldiers who left their homes and won't ever go back.
Radar guesses he's one of those soldiers for now, until the barrier comes down. He just hopes the world hasn't kept turning too long while he's away. He doesn't wanna think of his mom and Uncle Ed getting a letter from Colonel Potter in the mail -- and who'd be taking down the letter, anyway, if Radar's not around as clerk anymore?
He wipes his eyes. But when the singing begins, his voice stays steady.