Standard Fanfic Disclaimer that wouldn't last ten seconds in a court of law: these aren't my characters (except for Rudi Köhler). I'm just borrowing them for um, er, uh, typing practice. Jawohl, that's it, typing practice. I'm not trying to steal copyrighted material from Bing Crosby Productions, CBS, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney Studios, Marvel Comic Books, or anyone else. Just borrowing: all characters will be returned unharmed, or at the very least, suitably bandaged. Originally published in the fanzine Our Favorite Things #29, from Elan Press.

The (Unscheduled) Liberation of Stalag 13

by Susan M. M.

Captain America: The First Avenger/Hogan's Heroes

for Jordre and Jake

The munitions factory was the tallest building in the sleepy town of Eichehahn.

Was.

When the munitions factory exploded, windows were blown out for three blocks. Debris flew, smashing through roofs and destroying both the belfry and the 17th century stained glass window at the church.

Captain America and the Howling Commandos ran. They enjoyed destroying Nazi resources; they were quite good at it. Munitions factories, bridges, armories, once a uniform warehouse - they'd laughed about that one later, at the thought of German soldiers fighting in their underwear.

Their principal targets were Hydra bases. Hydra had once been the top secret Deep Science Research Branch of the Nazi government, but its leader, Johann Schmidt, codenamed the Red Skull, had severed his loyalty to the Führer and now had his own plans for world domination. However, Captain America and the Howling Commandos also destroyed ordinary German military resources when the opportunity presented itself.

They ran, dodging in the shadows, until they reached the town's small hospital. Sgt. James "Bucky" Barnes hotwired an ambulance and they drove off. It was the perfect getaway vehicle. No one stopped an ambulance.

"What now, Cap?" asked the Hon. James Montgomery Falsworth, a gentleman ranker in His Majesty's Army. "Too early to call it a night."

"I say we find a hofbrau and some frauleins," Jacques Dernier, driving the ambulance, called back. The Frenchman's suggestion was only half in jest.

"Gimme the map," the super-soldier code-named Captain America ordered. The others wore the uniforms of their respective armies. He wore red, white, and blue: blue pants, a blue shirt with red and white stripes on his belly and a white star on his chest, red gloves and boots, and a blue hood with a white letter A over his forehead.

Jim Morita dug into his pockets and pulled out the map. The Nisei soldier handed it to Captain America. He studied the map a moment.

"There's a POW camp in the Bad Kissingen Woods," Captain America announced. "If we freed them, that would give Uncle Sam a few hundred more men to fight Hitler. You guys up to it?"

"Sure thing," agreed Gabe Jones. Jones was always ready to spit in Hitler's eye, either metaphorically (or someday, he hoped) literally. As a Negro, he found Hitler's views on racial superiority personally offensive.

"Mais oui."

"You betcha, Steve." Bucky Barnes was the only one who called Captain America by his given name. He and Steve Rogers had grown up together in Brooklyn, and had been friends long before the experiment that gave the former ninety-pound weakling his superhuman strength, agility, speed, and endurance.

"What's the plan, Cap?" Timothy "Dum Dum" Dugan asked. He was the oldest of the Howling Commandoes; he wore a bowler hat instead of a helmet.

Captain America began to think. He didn't have a plan yet, but by the time they reached Luftstalag 13, he would have one. His brain, as well as his body, had been improved by the super-soldier serum. Since Dr. Erskine's experiment's, he had read Sun Tzu, von Clausewitz, Thucydides, Caesar, and every book on military history, strategy, and tactics that he could get his hands on.

#####################################################################################

Dernier drove the ambulance past the POW camp. He stopped in the woods. Captain America and Barnes got out.

"Give us five minutes, then come to the Luftstalag, sirens at full blast," Captain America ordered.

"Oui, mon capitaine."

The pair snuck through the woods until they reached the barbed wire fence surrounding the prison camp. They were surprised to see that the trees grew almost up to the fence. Most prison camps cleared the trees and shrubs away from the fence, to deny cover to escaping prisoners. They weren't about to complain about their good luck, though. Captain America checked his watched, then pulled his shield off his back. It was a good two feet in diameter, and striped red, white, red, and then a blue center, with a white star in the middle. It wasn't inconspicuous, but it was deadly.

Captain America threw the shield. It tore through the barbed wire and stuck there. He and Barnes ran up to the fence. Barnes grabbed the shield and held it steady while Captain America took hold of the barbed wire and pulled. First, he tore a big enough hole to free his shield. Then he continued tearing - as effortlessly as tearing a piece of paper in half - and tore the barbed wire fence until there was a safe gap for a man to step through.

Barnes handed him back the shield. "Here comes Dernier, right on time."

They watched as the ambulance pulled up to the front gate, sirens howling, lights blazing. The guards opened the gate and waved it through. Who stops an ambulance?

#####################################################################################

Sgt. Hans Schultz, a rotund, middle-aged sergeant, was trying to shoo the prisoners back into their barracks. "It is nearly curfew. Into the barracks."

"Ah, c'mon, Schultz, what's your bloody 'urry?" complained Corporal Peter Newkirk, RAF.

"Yeah, Schultzie, it's a nice night," added Technical Sergeant Andrew Carter of the U. S. Army Air Corps. "Why not let us stay out a bit?"

"If it were up to me, I would not care," Schultz confessed. "But the Iron Eagle, he says it is curfew, so it is curfew."

The 'Iron Eagle' himself, Oberst Wilhelm Klink, stepped out of the Kommandtur. Iron Eagle was a self-bestowed nickname; most of the prisoners (and some of his own men) called him the Bald Eagle behind his back. "Schultz, why are the prisoners not in their barracks yet?"

"They are going now, mein Kommandant," Schultz reported.

Col. Robert Hogan, the Senior POW, nodded discreetly to his men. Once they saw his signal, they began to head back to the barracks without any further complaint. Just then an ambulance drove through the front gates. Hogan frowned. He didn't know of anyone sick or injured enough to require an ambulance. Nothing like that should have occurred at his POW camp without his knowledge.

The prisoners stopped in their tracks, startled by the ambulance.

"Wer ist krank?" Klink asked. He didn't know of anyone sick or injured enough to require an ambulance. Nothing like that should have occurred at his POW camp without his knowledge. At least, in the commandant's opinion. In truth, a great deal happened at Stalag 13 that he knew nothing about.

"Qui est malade?" Cpl. Louis LeBeau echoed the commandant's question in his own language.

The back doors of the ambulance were flung open. Three men - one Asian, one Negro, one white - jumped out of the back, rifles in their hands. The driver opened his door, and joined his comrades. He, too, had a rifle in his hands. He fired a shot in the air to get everyone's attention.

"Okay, everybody out," Captain America ordered as he and Barnes came through the hole in the fence. "Jailbreak time."

"Say auf wiedersehen to the Krauts. You guys are going home," Barnes hollered. He let out a burst of bullets over their heads.

No prisoners ran to the fence. None cheered for their liberators. Instead, they looked to Col. Hogan, waiting for him to give instructions.

Klink ducked, hiding from the gunshots.

"You know the rules." Hogan didn't yell, but he raised his voice so all his men could hear him. "No escapes unless they've been approved by the Escape Committee."

Klink, noticing how his guards outnumbered the would-be liberators, began to regain his courage. He stood. "There has never been a successful escape from Stalag 13. Guards, seize those men!"

"But, Herr Kommandant," Obergefreiter Karl Langenscheidt protested, "that is Hauptmann Amerika!"

"Nonsense, Langenscheidt, Hauptmann Amerika is not a real person, just Allied propaganda."

Staff Sgt. James Ivan Kinchloe's widened. He'd heard of Captain America and the Howling Commandoes, and he knew they weren't just propaganda. The Negro sergeant was Hogan's chief radio operator, and more up to date on military gossip than his campmates. He stared at Gabe Jones. He hadn't known there was a Negro in the Howling Commandoes.

"C'mon, let's go," Captain America urged.

"Schultz, arrest that man!" Klink yelled.

Schultz gave the commandant a 'who, me?' look. Sighing, he started to take a step forward. Morita and Falsworth pointed their rifles at him. Schultz stopped short. Hogan and Newkirk stepped in front of him, shielding him with their own bodies.

"Nobody's shooting anybody here," Hogan said.

"You some kind of Nazi sympathizer?" Captain America asked. "Why are you protecting him?"

"Don't you dare call the colonel a bleedin' Nazi," Newkirk snapped.

Hogan frowned at the insult, but didn't reply to it ... yet. "He's our German. If anyone is going to shoot him, we will."

"Danke, Colonel Hogan," Schultz said. "I think."

"What kind of prisoners don't want to escape?" asked Dugan. "You lot gone over to the Germans?"

"Say that again and I'll knock your teeth out," Hogan threatened.

"Lâche." Dernier growled the insult. "If they will not run when they are given the chance, then they must be cowards."

"We could break out like that," Hogan snapped his fingers.

"Hogan!" protested Klink.

"But I can't get three hundred men across Germany back to Allied lines," he continued. "As Senior POW, I'm responsible for the safety of these men. If one of my men came to the Escape Committee with a half-baked escape plan - no food, no civilian clothes, no forged documents - I'd kick him out on his rear. Do you think we stay here because we enjoy Nazi hospitality? If we try to escape and get caught, if we're lucky we'll be returned to this camp and thrown in the cooler. Or maybe we'll be sent to another, tougher stalag. This place is no summer camp, but at least the Kommandant tries to follow the Geneva Convention. If we're not sent to a camp, then the best we can hope for is to be shot as escaping prisoners. If we're unlucky, the Gestapo will get us. I won't risk my men to that fate."

Captain America yelled out, "Just because you're a coward doesn't mean your men want to spend the rest of the war in a nice, safe cage." He addressed the men, "You're ready and raring to kick some Nazi butt, aren't you?"

Some cheered, but more looked uneasily at Colonel Hogan. The colonel was fuming.

" 'Ere, now, you can't talk to the colonel like that," Newkirk protested.

LeBeau yelled in rapid French, too fast for most of the men around him to follow, but the other French POWs, as well as Langenscheidt and Kinch, winced at his vocabulary. So did Gabe Jones and Jacques Dernier.

Kinch put his hand on the colonel's shoulder to hold him back. He caught Gabe's eye. "Back in a minute, sir."

Kinch walked forward. Gabe left the Howling Commandos and came to meet him.

"Your guy in that cockamamie suit on the level?"

Gabe nodded. "Cap only looks like a clown. When it comes to fighting, ain't none better."

"One better, and that's the colonel." Kinch took a deep breath. "You get yours calmed down, I'll get mine calmed down, then we can get this settled like grown men instead of boys on the playground."

Kinch returned to Hogan's side. "We've been at this quite a while, sir. We've come closer to getting caught or killed more times than I care to think about. Maybe it's time to pack up and go home."

"And what's London going to say?" Hogan asked. "An idiot in a costume said go and we packed up the best sabotage/espionage ring in Germany?"

Sgt. Richard Baker came out of Barracks 2. He looked around, confused. He hurried over to Hogan and Kinch. "Just heard from the Underground. The munitions plant in Eichehain was destroyed. Hochstetter was having dinner with the Burgomeister, and he's on his way here. The Burgomeister's maid is one of us; she said Hochstetter started raving about you and that he finally had you. She stalled him as long as she could, but he'll be here soon."

Hogan bit his thumb. "That's a horse of a different color." He thought quickly. Klink would believe that they'd refuse to escape, even with Hauptmann Amerika's help. Hochstetter would not. He turned back to Captain America. "Looks like we will be leaving, but not because you're ordering it. Gotta give the boys a few minutes to grab their toothbrushes and their pin-up pictures of Betty Grable." He announced loudly, "Operation Egypt. I repeat, Operation Egypt." Hogan looked at his watch. "It's twenty-hundred oh five. Five past eight. I want everybody out the door in half an hour."

Kinch came to attention. He called out, "Operation Egypt: Pharaoh's Army. Barracks 3, 7, 11, and 19, Pharaoh's Army."

The men assigned to those barracks went inside without a word. They came back a minute or two later, armed.

"Sgt. Moeller, I need you and your men over there," Hogan pointed.

"But – " Feldwabel Moeller started to protest.

"That's an order, Herr Feldwabel." Three men from Barracks 3 advanced, their rifles pointing at Moeller.

"Jawohl, Herr Oberst." Moeller obeyed, and waved to his men to do likewise.

"Hogan, what do you think you're doing?" Klink demanded.

"That's what I want to know," Morita muttered.

"I'm sorry, Herr Kommandant. We're leaving," Hogan glanced at his watch "in twenty-seven minutes."

"There has never been a successful escape from Stalag 13!"

Dugan pointed his rifle at Klink. The commandant cringed.

"Sorry, Kommandant. That record's about to be broken." Hogan called out to his men: "Don't have much time to pack, guys."

Kinch called out, "Operation Egypt: Royal Robes."

Some POWs held guards at bay with rifles - German rifles. Others went into their barracks, and return a few minutes later dressed in German uniforms or civilian clothes. As they came out, they took over watching the guards so the men from Pharaoh's Army could get changed themselves.

"Where did these weapons come from?" Klink demanded.

Under his breath, Schultz muttered, "I know nothing, nothing."

"They'll be considered spies rather than enemy prisoners if they're caught dressed like that," Captain America realized.

Hogan retorted, "Then they'd better not be caught."

The POWs began disarming the guards. There were far more prisoners than guards, and most of the guards were either veterans of the First World War, like Schultz, or boys too young to shave. Most cooperated.

"Nein," declared Soldat Rudolf Köhler. "I am a loyal soldier of der Vaterland and der Führer. I will not surrender to a pack of Untermensch prisoners."

Barnes raised his rifle, intending to get rid of the problem in the simplest way.

"Put that rifle down, sergeant," Hogan ordered. He stepped in front of Barnes. "Can't you see he's nothing but a scared kid?"

"He's a Kraut." After a pause long enough to be insolent, Barnes added, "sir."

"He's a kid who lied about his age to join the army. A kid who's been brainwashed by too many Hitler Youth meetings." Hogan turned his back on Barnes. He nodded at Schultz, who began moving slowly toward the boy. "Rudi. No one will hurt you. But it's time to put down the rifle and be sensible."

"Nein. I am a German soldier. I am -" Köhler suddenly felt someone grab his rifle from behind.

"You are up past your bedtime, Knabe." Schultz wrested the weapon away from him. "Did you think you had fooled us? Everyone knows you are sixteen, even the Iron Eagle."

Köhler looked up, wide-eyed. Hogan, Schultz, Kinch, LeBeau, even the Kommandant, nodded.

"Rudi, Fräulein Hilda checked you out the minute we saw how young you are. The only reason we let you stay is because we figured you were safer here than at the orphanage. If you'd had a real home to go back to, Col. Klink would have sent you back months ago," Hogan told him gently. "We wanted to keep you out of combat. Allied troops don't shoot children." He turned and gave Barnes a dirty look. "At least, they're not supposed to."

Schultz put one hand on Köhler's shoulder and held the rifle in the other. He pushed the boy forward. "Col. Hogan saved your life. It would be polite to say danke." He handed the rifle to Hogan. "Here, Herr Oberst."

Hogan accepted the weapon without a word, merely nodding to the sergeant.

"Schultz, how many times have I told you not to give weapons to the prisoners," Klink moaned.

Dernier and Falsworth exchanged bewildered glances. That was not something they'd ever expected to hear a German colonel say.

Falsworth muttered, "What the bloody hell?"

"Merde, what kind of prison camp is this?" Dernier asked.

"Langenscheidt, take care of Köhler," Hogan ordered.

"Jawohl, Herr Oberst." The tall, lanky German corporal trotted up and relieved Sgt. Schultz of the boy. "Komm' mit, Rudi."

Newkirk, dressed in a Luftwaffe sergeant's uniform, came up to Hogan, carrying two uniforms on hangers. "Begging the colonel's pardon, but it's time you got changed, sir. Heer or Gestapo?"

Hogan looked at the feldgrau army uniform and the black Gestapo uniform. Both had officer's rank tabs. He took the black. No one dared mess with the Geheime Staatspolizei, the Secret State Police. "Excuse me a minute. Captain, I'll thank you to wait for me. We're not through with our discussion."

Hogan went inside to change. He came out a minute and a half later a Gestapo Kriminaldirektor.

"Operation Egypt: Carter, Newkirk, Pharaoh's Tomb. LeBeau, Royal Banner." The three men went into Barracks 2. Kinch didn't bother changing clothes. There was no way he could pass as a German soldier.

"Schultz, move your men closer to the fence."

"Colonel Hogan, have you forgotten you are our prisoners?" Klink asked.

Hogan ignored the commandant. "It's not safe where they're standing, Schultz. Move' em."

Schultz knew which of the two colonels really ran the camp. He waved the men to the edges of fence. He looked over at Barracks 2, and saw Carter, Newkirk, and LeBeau exit the building. All were in German uniforms. LeBeau was carrying something. Alas, it was not Apfelstreudel. Worse, it was not Bier. He could use a beer right now.

LeBeau went to the flagpole. He took down the Nazi swastika flag. In its place he put up the French, British, and American flags. POWs cheered, as did the Howling Commandos. Several of the men pulled themselves to attention and saluted.

Klink began, "Hogan, what do you think you - "

Then the bombs went off.

"Was is los?"

Half of the camp collapsed. The implosion created giant sinkholes, as Stalag 13 fell down.

Klink cringed. "What was that?"

Ignoring him, Hogan checked his watch. "Five minutes ahead of schedule."

"Shed-yool," Newkirk corrected him under his breath.

"Very good, men. You have your assigned groups. We won't all fit on the sub at once, so make your way back as best you can. Don't rush; safety first. I'll meet you in London at the Saracen's Head Pub," Hogan promised. "Last one there buys the beer."

The men laughed.

Captain America and the Howling Commandoes were confused. Very confused.

"Operation Egypt: Pharaoh's Chariots." At Kinch's signal, nearly twenty men went to the motor pool, to fetch every vehicle in the camp.

Kinch turned to Hogan. He looked at Klink. "Once Hochstetter gets done with him, there won't be anything left of him to ship to the Russian front."

Hogan said nothing.

Kinch insisted, "We have to take him with us, sir. You know he won't last two weeks at the Russian front."

"Uncle Walt got it wrong. He should have given that cricket sergeant's stripes instead of a top hat," Hogan groused.

Kinch chuckled softly. "Just doing my job, sir."

"Sorry, Kommandant, but you'll be coming with us," Hogan announced.

"What? Never!" Klink declared.

"We can't leave you behind for Hochstetter. Schultz, you too."

Klink cringed.

"Colonel, are you forgetting I have a wife and five children, of whom I am the sole support?"

"Not forgetting. Just want to make sure you're alive at the end of the war to come back to them," Hogan told Schultz.

"But, but -" Schultz tried to protest.

"There has never been a successful escape from Stalag 13. If you think by abducting Schultz and me that you will get away safely," Klink warned, "well, you're wrong. You cannot possibly - " He stopped and looked around the shambles of his camp: the guards huddled along the fence, held at gunpoint by the prisoners, the giant, gaping sinkholes between the barracks (and in one case, the sinkhole had swallowed Barracks 4), his prisoners in German uniform. "Well, perhaps you can."

"Mein Kommandant," Hogan addressed him in a more respectful tone than was his usual wont, "you have followed the Geneva Convention and done the best by us you could, wartime conditions being what they are. It would be poor courtesy to return the favor by letting you be shipped to the Russian front."

"The Russian front?" Klink repeated. In a small voice, he asked, "What do you want me to do?"

"Newkirk!" Hogan raised his voice.

" 'Ere, sir," the Englishman looked out from the driver's seat of a troop truck.

"Phone lines cut?"

"Yes, sir."

"Schultzie and the Kommandant are coming with us. Help them in the truck." Hogan looked around. "Langenscheidt, Moeller, front and center!"

Langenscheidt handed Rudi Köhler off to another guard before hurrying up to the colonel. Moeller worked his way carefully across the camp, not wanting to stumble into one of the sinkholes.

"We're leaving in just a minute. Go open the front gate for us. I came in the front door, and I plan to leave the same way," Hogan declared. "Hochstetter will be here in about half an hour, maybe less. It would be best for your sakes if you convinced him that you didn't know what was going on."

"That won't be hard," Langenscheidt muttered.

"Probably wouldn't hurt if when he got here, if we'd gone west to escape, and you went east to search for us, or at least were too dazed by the explosions to be able to answer questions," Hogan suggested.

Moeller looked around at the damage and destruction. "Ja, dazed by the explosions; we might have concussions from the shock waves."

"Captain Grüber is still on leave. We're taking Klink and Schultz with us, so you'll be the highest ranking ones left here." Hogan turned and glared at Captain America. "Tell him some clown in a flag-suit came in and took everyone. And make sure Rudi stays out of trouble."

"Jawohl, mein Oberst," Langenscheidt replied.

Carter was helping Klink into the back of the troop carrier. Schultz stood next to him. The rotund sergeant turned and called out, "Karl, take Rudi to my wife Greta. She already has five. What's one more?"

Langenscheidt looked to Hogan for approval. When the colonel nodded, he yelled back, "Jawohl, mein Feldwabel."

Carter helped Schultz into the back of the truck. LeBeau nimbly scrambled in after him, a rifle in one hand.

"Moeller, get the gate," Hogan ordered. Then he lowered his voice, "And if any of your guys want to desert, tell Hochstetter that Captain America kidnapped them. Him and his army of five hundred costumed übermensch."

Moeller grinned. "Yes, sir."

"Colonel, did you want to give the final order?" Kinch asked.

"Yes, yes, I believe I do." Hogan took a deep breath and bellowed: "Operation Egypt: Exodus!" In a normal voice, he addressed the Howling Commandoes. "Captain, it's a long drive to the coastline, and we'll have several hours to talk. Please have your men join mine in the truck. I want to have a word with you. Several words."

He stood there, glaring at them as only a colonel can glare, until the Howling Commandoes followed Kinch, Baker, and Carter into the truck. Olsen climbed up into the cab beside Newkirk. Hogan was last into the truck. "Head 'em up and move 'em out!"

Langenscheidt watched as the caravan of trucks, cars, motorcycles, and an ambulance went out the front gate. There weren't enough vehicles for three hundred prisoners, so many marched behind. "Viel Glück und auf Wiedersehen." Good luck and goodbye.

#####################################################################################

Three days later, Hogan was in General Butler's office in London, pacing in front of the general's desk and complaining.

Butler tried to console him. "Not much else you could have done under the circumstances. I can put an official reprimand in his file, but it won't do any good. He's the War Department's fair-haired darling. Got friends in high places. On a first name basis with Howard Stark, from what I hear. Besides, your operation lasted longer than we expected it to."

"I expected it to last till the end of the war."

Butler shook his head. "Hogan, we expected you to be shot a year ago. That your operation lasted as long as it did is a miracle. You helped a lot of prisoners and downed pilots escape. You gathered vital information for us. And your sabotage hindered the German war effort, probably helped shorten this filthy war."

Hogan took a deep breath. He knew Butler was right. He'd just expected to do more.

"Over two hundred of your men are back safe. And the names of the others haven't been reported to the Red Cross as having been taken prisoner, so we're assuming the rest are working their way back to Allied lines," Butler told him.

"There's a nasty little saying about assume." Hogan knew the Germans didn't bother reporting the names of men they shot. "I've requested commendations for all my men, and promotions for Newkirk and LeBeau. And I'm recommending Kinch for OCS."

"Commendations for you and all your men, certainly. No problem with promoting your corporals to sergeant; they would have had that long ago if they weren't in a POW camp. But officer training for Sgt. Kinchloe … I can't promise that," Butler admitted. "He's Negro."

"He deserves it."

"You know that. I know that," the general agreed. "Convincing the desk-jockeys at the Pentagon, that's another matter."

"He's better qualified than half the lieutenants who graduate from West Point," Hogan insisted.

"Maybe, but the paper-pushers in Washington would never approve it. And if you try to push it too hard, you'll hurt your career." Butler shook his head again. "You've got thirty days leave, Hogan, and you've earned it."

"Not to mention a helluva lot back pay," Hogan quipped.

"Take some R&R, then we'll talk about your next assignment. The 504th is fighting in the Pacific. How'd you like to rejoin them?" Butler asked.

"Be good to get back in the air," Hogan admitted," but if I'm shot down, I don't speak Japanese."

"Hogan, we don't expect you to try this again if you're shot down."

"Why not? It worked once."

das Ende