A/N: In canon, I noticed that LeBeau never seemed as interested in cards as the others. And so, this story slowly morphed into a picture of what exactly LeBeau finds (or could find) fun.
LeBeau looked up from his cards, bored. He had never been as infatuated with cards as the others seemed to be, preferring to stand in front of the warm stove basking in the delicious steam of food or hanging out with the German shepherds when the Krauts weren't looking. Today, more than ever, he was itching to move around, sing a song, do something. He settled for seeing if he could distract his all-too-serious friends from their intense game of gin. He opted out of the next round and started prepping some soup at the stove. About half-way through their hand, he made his move.
"Newkirk's got a six of hearts," LeBeau called out in a sing-song tone from the stove.
"Why you—!" Newkirk growled as he lunged for LeBeau. Carter was grinning madly as LeBeau neatly skipped around the stove, Newkirk stumbling after.
LeBeau drew out the encounter a couple of more seconds, then chirped, "Carter's got an ace of diamonds!"
"Hey!" Carter got to his feet as Newkirk straighted and looked at Carter triumphantly. Kinch rolled his eyes good-naturedly. At this point, all the men in the room, those in the game and those hanging out on their bunks fiddling with this or that, had tuned in. LeBeau decided to really have some fun now. He innocently informed the whole room of a card in each of the gin players' hand. At this point, Newkirk had almost forgotten—almost—about LeBeau giving his card away, and he started memorizing everyone else's. Some of the others weren't so lucky to be blessed with such memorization skills and started blustering. Kinch was laughing to himself and Carter was busy developing ways he could beat Newkirk more creatively with Newkirk's advantage. LeBeau—to keep things fair, of course, nothing else—ended with another of Newkirk's cards.
"Blimey, LeBeau! You 'ave to ruin all the fun, don't ya?" he seethed, but stopped again when he realized that LeBeau was now recounting what all the men on the bunks had been doing before he had interrupted everyone—a line from a book here, a description of a look there—and when he finished, everyone was staring at him, thoughts of what LeBeau might know about them without their knowledge floating through their heads. Carter broke the silence.
"Boy, that was uncanny, LeBeau! I bet you even know what the Colonel's doing right now." All eyes swiveled to the closed door.
"Yeah, LeBeau. I wonder what 'e's doin'." Newkirk came over and gave LeBeau's shoulder what looked to be a friendly squeeze. LeBeau started to sweat.
...
Hogan was brought around by a knock on his door. He had been deeply concentrating and so hadn't noticed the unusual sounds coming from the other side.
"Come in," he called. Kinch opened the door with Newkirk right behind him.
"Sir," said Kinch, "if it's not officer stuff, we were just wondering what you were up to." Hogan crinkled his brow in confusion.
"I was reading Mein Kampf. Why?" he asked. Kinch had to raise his voice over all the whooping in the background.
"It's nothing, Colonel. Just the boys having some fun." He closed the door. Hogan stared at the now-closed door. He stared at it for a second longer.
Then, he shook his head and reached for his book, mirroring the shrug Newkirk was giving out in the barracks as he picked up his cards again. LeBeau had a pretty good memory. He'd have to keep that in mind.
