Epilogue

And now it is the end. It's been a wild ride but all good things must come to an end eventually. My most gracious thanks go out to my long suffering beta TinySprite. Also, my thanks to the Twitter crew for encouragement and help, my friend River who listened to endless conversations about plot and all the Hogan's Heroes fandom and authors who assisted along the way.

And to all you readers, you're most appreciated. The ones who review, I cherish every time you shared your thoughts.

And now, the epilogue.

LeBeau had fretted for two days. Wilson had done an exam, rewrapped the Englishman's ribs and vehemently cursed anyone who would harm one of his patients. Hogan and Kinch had gotten everything in the camp running smoothly again and gotten all the POWs reassured that all was back to normal operations. Schultz had dropped in frequently, expressing his pleasure that all of his 'boys' were back in the stalag where they belonged and there was a distinct lack of monkey business going on. Even Klink had gotten smug and pleased as his prisoners had gone back to being tame and easily controlled. Carter spent most of his time hovering near his friend.

Newkirk slept. And slept and slept a bit more. He slept right through the first evening roll call, propped up on Carter's shoulder in the formation next to Hogan. He slept through mealtimes, only drinking down soup when LeBeau put the cup to his mouth and shouted insults at him to wake him enough to swallow. He'd fallen asleep standing for an evening roll call and managed to end up propped against Schultz's broad back so the guard didn't dare move until Klink dismissed them all. Carter had saved him from drowning in his tea twice when he fell asleep sitting at the barracks table. After that second near-fatal cup of tea, they stood him up for roll call and fed him his soup and left him to the bunk in between.

Wilson straightened up from listening to Newkirk's heartbeat and breathing. "He sounds okay. Just exhaustion, guys. His breathing is a lot stronger today and he should start staying awake longer. Just don't let him overdo it at first, okay?"

Hogan snorted. "Overdo it? He doesn't do anything at all."

"His body needs rest. It won't heal properly if he's still exhausted." Wilson's frown made even Hogan squirm just a little. "If you need him for some scheme, I'd suggest that you find someone else. He's not able to do anything strenuous."

Frowning back at the medic, Hogan protested. "I'm not pushing for him to do anything. We're just all worried, that's all."

"Well, stop worrying. He'll recover." Wilson snapped his medical bag shut and left, still acting grumpy over the whole situation.

Carter took his usual seat on the bench closest to his bunk, peering at his friend for a few seconds as if Wilson would have hurt him somehow. "Don't take it personally, sir. Sergeant Wilson doesn't mean all that. He's just mad that he couldn't make Major-General Hendrich leave Newkirk alone in the first place. He doesn't mean to say you'd do anything wrong. He was really mad when Hendrich took him away right after he'd just wrapped up his broken rib again. Boy, he cursed every German in the camp over it. I didn't even know he knew cursewords in German but he sure gave everyone a piece of his mind." Carter didn't even notice Hogan smiling at how he was rambling on. "He even yelled at Langenscheidt and you know, everyone kind of likes Langenscheidt. I mean, for a German, he's a pretty good guy. Not as good as if he weren't a German of course..."

There was a tired sounding grumble from the bunk. "Caaarter... shut up."

Carter jumped to his feet. "Newkirk? Are you awake?"

One hand pushed the blanket aside clumsily and Newkirk's face appeared, looking around blearily. "Who could bloody well sleep through your nattering away?" The hand weakly grasped at the corner post of the bunk as Newkirk made his first attempt to sit up.

Hogan reached to help him with an arm around his back. "Here, let me help you up, old bean." Instead of just sitting up, Newkirk managed to lever himself to his feet and staggered the one step to fall onto the bench at the table. "Coffee?" asked Hogan.

"Who made it?"

Hogan smiled as he poured the tin cup full. "LeBeau."

Newkirk grunted. "I'll take some anyway."

"You're welcome." Hogan handed over the cup and watched him drink down half of it in one gulp.

Newkirk started to tip over and Carter pushed him upright again. Newkirk glared in his direction vaguely. "Sod off."

"Sorry..." Carter stood up and wrung his hands, his joy at Newkirk waking up vanishing as he remembered his friend's orders to stay away from him. "I didn't think you'd still want... I mean, since you got back."

Newkirk blinked up at him standing there. "Where's me bloody cards?"

"What?" Carter stopped.

"Me cards... the deck of cards? Little bits of ruddy paper with numbers and 'earts and clubs on them? Where are they?" snapped Newkirk at the young American.

"Oh... I..." Carter turned and climbed half up onto Newkirk's usual bunk where he'd been sleeping himself. Fumbling about a moment, he brought down the deck of cards from a nitch in the wall. "Here... I put them away for you because I knew you'd want them when you got back."

Newkirk took them irritably and checked the deck briefly before shuffling them once. "Too bloody right I want them." He patted his pockets for a few seconds and turned a new glare on Carter.

Without even asking, Carter went back to the shelves to hand over a half-full pack of cigarettes and a lighter.

Newkirk grunted as he lit up a cigarette and blinked a bit, looking at the barracks. His bruises were half faded away by now and almost all of the swelling had disappeared.

Carter waited for a few seconds looking downcast. "Okay, well, I'll go... I know you don't want me around." He turned to leave.

Newkirk snorted loudly. "What? 'ow can I play gin if you're not 'ere to cheat me?" He turned a rather sallow glare on Carter who was staring back at him. "Come on, sit down and let's 'ave a go at a 'and of gin." He started dealing the cards out between them.

Carter wasted no time in flinging himself down on the opposite bench, smiling widely. "I really missed you a lot, Newkirk. I'm glad you're back."

Newkirk grunted again but his eyes fastened on Carter for just a few seconds longer than was strictly needed to convey his own thoughts. "Glad to be back, mate." His lips twitched upwards slightly. "Thanks, Andrew."

Hogan went to trigger the false bunk and climb down into the tunnels. He wanted to check for reports from London.

An hour later, Hogan came up from the tunnel looking pleased. "Well..." He stepped over to the table, making Carter look up with curiosity. "Just got confirmation from London. Newkirk, your intel was almost one hundred percent correct and will be invaluable to Allied troop distribution."

Newkirk looked up from his cards and frowned slightly. "Almost a hundred percent, sir? What did I mess up?" He looked distressed over not having it all perfect.

"You were really tired, buddy. No one could have gotten it all right." said Carter.

Newkirk scowled. "I still should 'ave gotten it all right."

Hogan smiled. "Well I wouldn't say it was so much that you got anything wrong so much as there's no way to confirm whether Burkhalter prefers his weinerschnitzel spicy or not. And that's apparently the last thing you wrote on the notes."

"Oh." Newkirk's attention returned to his cards. "Well, I was pretty tired, it was hard to separate what was important." The smugness was back in his tone.

"Yes, well once we got done with London, we got a very interesting report..." Hogan leaned over to Newkirk who studiously ignored him. "A report from the Underground." His arm landed softly across Newkirk's shoulders. "It seems that the SS picked up four of our Underground agents." Newkirk had frozen. Hogan's smile was firmly in place as he drew the Brit in closer to continue. "Luckily they were rescued."

Carter was following the conversation and exclaimed excitedly. "That's great! Boy, I bet those guys were relieved!"

Newkirk fiddled with his hand of cards. "Yes. I uuhhhh... good thing someone rescued them then." His eyes were fixed on the cards but he could feel Hogan's stare.

Carter happily continued. "I wonder who it was? Another Underground agent?"

Newkirk sniffed a little and waved a hand dismissively. "Probably never find out. The important thing is that those agents were freed."

Hogan's arm tightened. "Oh I don't know. There's a lot of clues. For one, he picked the lock on the door to the basement they were being held in."

"Hey! Just like Newkirk!" Carter smiled.

"Yes, just like him. And then he managed to unlock all the chains in a remarkably short time too." Hogan's arm was now holding Newkirk close to him.

"Wow, that's exactly like you, Newkirk! I never saw anyone pick a lock as fast as you can." Carter seemed pleased at this unknown agent's abilities.

Newkirk cleared his throat slightly. "Yeah, well... there's probably a lot of lockpicks around." Newkirk attempted to slide sideways but Hogan tugged him back.

The colonel bent to speak directly to the Englishman. "Would you care to guess the last clue?" When Newkirk looked aside, Hogan continued. "He was not only English, he was in a RAF uniform. Now... who could possibly meet all those qualifications?"

Newkirk twisted to look up at his commanding officer. "Sir, I can explain, really! I mean 'onestly, what else could I do? They were going to torture information out of them and what if they knew about Papa Bear? I 'ad to get them out."

Hogan frowned. "While you were already in a compromised position, and under the guard of a general, no less? So you decided to be a hero and rescue four people being held by elite SS troops? This seemed like a good idea? What made you come up with such a crazy idea?"

Newkirk met his eyes with a smirk. "I thought to myself, 'Newkirk you old sod, what would Colonel Hogan do?' and the plan just came to me."

Hogan rubbed a hand over his eyes. "You give me more grey hairs than the rest of the team combined." He shook a finger. "In fact, you give me more grey hairs than the Germans AND the rest of the team combined!"

Carter was staring at them both. "Wait... Newkirk rescued the agents? While we were all worrying over whether you were even alive? And you were doing a mission that you came up with all by yourself? And you didn't get killed doing it even though you thought up the plan all by yourself?"

"Thanks for the bleeding vote of confidence, Carter." Newkirk grumbled under his breath and went back to looking at his cards.

"Well, you're just crazy!" Carter seemed a little outraged. "We were really worried and you were doing even MORE dangerous stuff than we were even thinking." He settled back down. "But it is kind of cool that you did it too. How did you do it? Where was General Burkhalter, and how come you didn't get caught?"

Newkirk smiled at his friend's enthusiasm. He pulled a card out of his hand and placed it, drawing a new one. "Well, I was up in Burkhalter's 'otel room, on the fourth floor see? The guard in the room fell asleep so I climbed out the window and down the wall, which was no easy thing, mind you. Only someone with extreme skill and strength and a steady mind could possibly 'ave pulled it off."

Hogan was smiling now. "But you managed..."

Cutting his eyes over in an annoyed way, Newkirk cleared his throat. "ANYway... I knocked the SS guard out cold, got the agents out of the room and they took off, took the SS goon with them too. Then I climbed back up the bloody wall but the guard 'ad woken up and so I couldn't climb back in the window. I tell you, I thought I was sunk!"

Carter shifted his weight and edged closer to the table. "Wow... how did you get back in?"

"I 'ad to wait, and 'ang there until they found out them agents were all gone. So a SS goon showed up at the room and Burkhalter's guard stepped out to argue and I got in the window and acted like I'd been there the whole time. So when the SS lieutenant came in and grabbed me..." Newkirk was fully involved in his story when Hogan interrupted.

"What? You were in the hands of the SS? Why didn't you tell me?" asked Hogan hotly.

"Well I've been ruddy sleeping, 'aven't I? Anyway, since Burkhalter's guards thought I'd been in the room with them the whole time, there wasn't a lot the SS could do." Newkirk sniffed disdainfully. "If it weren't for me grand acting abilities, and me equally grand skills at burglary, them agents would be in Berlin right now, spilling all their secrets." He scowled up at Hogan. "I think I deserve a bit of praise for all that, instead of being yelled at, I do."

Hogan sighed now. "You deserve to have your head examined."

"Wilson already did that." replied Newkirk casually. "Didn't find a thing."

"Couldn't have said it better myself." quipped Hogan, eliciting a new frown from Newkirk. "Good job all around, old bean but try to not get into life-threatening situations for a few days, okay?"

"For you, sir..." Newkirk took a long drag on his cigarette and let it trail out before he turned to smirk at his commanding officer. "For you, I'll stay out of trouble for a whole week."

The End

(Of this fic, I have more stories to post soon)

Thanks for reading!