Story is complete in 15 parts. Postings will be three times a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Written for Hogan's Heroes Big Bang 2017. Thanks to the mods for organizing it!

Characters: Robert Hogan, James Kinchloe, Louis LeBeau, Andrew Carter, Peter Newkirk, Richard Baker, Wilhelm Klink, Albert Burkhalter, Wolfgang Hochstetter, OCs

Special thanks to 2lieutenant for beta reading! Thank you very much! All remaining mistakes are my own.


PROLOGUE


Newkirk sighed and rubbed his hands together to generate some warmth. Despite being July, the cooler fully deserved its name.

Colonel Hogan had promised to have him out after ten days - maximum. He deserved this after involuntarily volunteering to take the fall for the stolen papers.

As he waited for the heavy boot steps of the new guard in time for breakfast, Newkirk gazed back to the gray wall. He had marked neatly thirteen days.

In the silence of the night he had searched the room for a hidden entrance to the tunnel. However, they never had gotten around to connecting all the cells to the tunnel system and now he was stuck in here.

On day one after the deadline, he had been angry. Nobody visited to apologize or to offer an explanation. Not even LeBeau.

On the second day, he started to worry.

The worry had increased until he couldn't sleep anymore. If at least Schultz had come around to bring him food, he could have needled him until Schultz had explained everything. But Schultz also never came around again, and without him his main source of information.

Instead, there were always new guards. Some experienced, some young and skittish, but they were all new. He never had seen them before.

Finally, the familiar sound of heavy boots and jingling keys announced the return of his guard.

With a creak, the door opened.

"Did you get my order?" he called out. The stuff they served as food could only be called so because it came with a spoon and a plate.

The guard entered the cell. He only had keys in his hands.

The towering man in his German uniform stared at Newkirk as if he was a little cockroach he wished to squash under his boot.

Newkirk had to fight the urge to jump from his cot and rise to full height in response to the silent challenge. He tensed up but remained sitting on his cot, his knees pulled against his chest. He wouldn't lose this game of will.

"Get out." The guard pointed to the open door behind him.

It was unexpected but Newkirk wouldn't argue with an order like this. Maybe Colonel Hogan just had taken longer than normal to talk Klink into reducing his sentence.

He straightened and stood up. Following the guard, they navigated the three corners to the front door. For the first time, Newkirk couldn't think of a single useless thing to say.

This wasn't a guard to trade jokes with. Come to think of, he hadn't met a guard to joke with the last few days.

But as he saw the first rays of sunshine, he sped up and hurried outside.

Stepping into the blinding bright sun, he enjoyed the comfort of the warmth it provided.

Around him he took in the sound of many people in a small space mixed with a few raised voices. The smell of washing soap, wet clothes and sweat overlapped the scent of summer.

Everything seemed normal.

And yet nobody greeted him.

Disappointment and worry began to mix with anxiety. He tried to take a deep breath. It didn't have to mean anything.

Holding up his hand up to shield his eyes, he scanned the camp searching for a familiar face.

His eyes found the front door of barracks 2. But there was no LeBeau or Carter lingering around. He couldn't find the familiar brown cap of Colonel Hogan.

Behind him the heavy door fell shut propelling his feet toward the greater freedom of the camp. But the hope he had felt at first disappeared into a black abyss.

What started as a normal walk soon got faster until he was almost running.

He couldn't find his friends. He couldn't find the towering signal of strength of Kinch, or the babbling voice of Carter.

A lot of voices whirred through the air and stopped whenever he got near, but none of them were Carter.

None of the smaller men wore LeBeau's red scarf.

He couldn't even find Schultz. And Schultz wasn't a man easily missed.

Newkirk finished his circle around the camp and ended back in front to barracks 2.

With dread he hadn't felt since his first day as a POW, Newkirk entered the wooden building.

His eyes needed a moment to see in the darker indoor. But this didn't matter, he should have been greeted already.

A man he had never seen before slowly rose from his seat at the table. He had dark hair and a small face with a significant burn scar running down his neck until it disappeared in his shirt. The insignia of a major rested on his epaulettes.

The men around the table stopped their game and looked up, staring at him.

"Corporal, I'm glad that Colonel Heinrich finally let you go. I'm Major Norris, United States Army Air Forces. I am the highest ranking officer in this camp."

Newkirk shock his head. This was wrong. "No. The senior officer is Colonel Hogan." He forced the unexpected words out. "Where is he?"

Major Norris sighed. "I'm sorry, Colonel Hogan isn't here anymore."

"What?"

"The camp had been cleared on General Burkhalter's orders. Everybody is gone. We're all new here. You're the only one from before."

For a moment, Newkirk couldn't breathe. A kick in the kidney would have been more merciful.


Three days earlier.

Hogan nervously awaited Carter's arrival. The young sergeant had just returned from a joint mission with the Underground in broad daylight.

The moment he left the tunnel, Carter began changing his clothes.

"This is going to be the greatest Fourth of July ever," Carter said jubilantly. He put on his jacket and folded the German fire inspector uniform. It was a good way to be allowed to inspect one of their last major bridges.

"This will be the biggest, most -" The excitement threatened to explode within him.

"Carter," Colonel Hogan interrupted him. "If you talk a little louder, they will find your bombs and then there isn't going to be a holiday."

"Oh," Carter deflated. "But I have been working so hard."

LeBeau sighed. "And that's the reason why I have to go out again and set the detonator." He glanced to Olsen who had watch at the door.

"I'm sorry," Carter grumbled and handed the uniform to Kinch to stash it in the tunnel. "It was hard enough to attach them in the right places, without raising suspicions."

"You did good, Carter," Hogan said and grabbed himself a cup of cold coffee. "Now that we have set the explosive, it should be easy to destroy the Hindenburg Bridge any time." Depending on time and other missions, it would have to be either LeBeau or Olsen.

"But the Fourth of July is a good date for the morale in the camp," Kinch added and closed the entry to their tunnel behind him. "It's in two days."

"No arguing there," Hogan rubbed at his forehead. "I still haven't been able to talk Klink into springing Newkirk from the cooler."

LeBeau crossed his arms. "He is going to be insufferable."

"Well, we all need to make sacrifices," Hogan said and put his mug back on the table. "There is a -"

Out of the sudden, the door flew open.

German soldiers with machine guns stormed in.

Adrenaline shot through Hogan's body.

Everybody in the barracks froze as the German soldiers raised their guns and took aim at the prisoner there.

LeBeau tensed his fingers around his cup before he could drop it.

Hogan swallowed against his dry throat. So this was it. They had been made. Somebody had talked or had found their newest bombs.

He caught the panic glances from Carter and LeBeau. Then he found the serious face of his second-in-command. Kinch had known, like him, the whole time that this day would come.

Hogan cleared his throat. He would probably never learn what their mistake had been but he could ask. "What's going on here?"

Behind the soldiers, a German officer entered the Barracks. "Colonel Hogan, General Burkhalter wants to see you. Follow me."

His hands began to tremble in response to the adrenaline and Hogan had to hid them in his pockets.

Kinch caught his eyes and glanced to his left. At the threat of the Germans gun he had raised his hands. His fingers were now near the closing mechanism of their tunnel entrance. He just needed to hit against the wood and they could try to go underground.

If they had been made, this was his one and only chance to save some of his men. The ones who'd died in the unfair fire fight would at least be spared the advanced interrogation techniques of the Gestapo.

But, Hogan glanced again to the German officer, if this was just an inner German fight and they hadn't been made it would needlessly kill his men.

He needed more information. Trying to fight now, would result in an incomparable bloodshed.

"What does General Burkhalter want?"

"General Burkhalter's orders only concern your escort to his office!" The German officer, going by his uniform a major, repeated.

Hogan tilted his head. The other option was to take his chance and hope that General Burkhalter wanted something for himself and that this wasn't about Papa Bear.

He hesitated and then made a decision. Having always been a gambler, he gave Kinch an almost invisible shake of the head. This time he gambled with the life of his men.

"Okay, I'm just going to grab my -"

"You won't need your stuff," the German major said. "If necessary, we will get it for you."

A cold shiver run down Hogan's back. He took the time to look at everybody he could see before he followed the German officer out of the barracks.

The hot sun failed to warm his cold hands.

He had taken the gamble and now he could just hope that he hadn't signed the death sentence of his men.


TBC