May, 1945
The last few weeks of the war were a positive flurry of activity. The tunnels needed to be filled in. Their tools and equipment needed to be broken down and packed away, or smuggled back out to the Underground, who could always find good homes for orphaned radio equipment. The forgery tools had also been gratefully accepted; Hogan had not inquired too closely as to what, if any, legitimate peacetime uses they were to be put. They also needed to restore the barracks to factory specifications before anyone got too close a look at their improvements; very few stoves, for example, are on hinges, and it is a rare sink that can unfold into a periscope. There was, they had reasoned, at least a fifty percent chance that the camp would end up with a new set of residents, and if the Nazis wanted a tunnel, they could damn well dig their own.
Yes, there was a lot to do. There was a lot of documentation that needed to be burned, too; maps and contact lists and codebooks and half a forest's worth of other paperwork. Hogan, with Kinch's assistance, took care of much of that; together they sorted out the very few papers Hogan felt it might be important to keep, and the rest of them were piled into crates for discreet disposition.
Hogan chuckled as he picked up an envelope full of blackmail photos. Half of the Nazi chain of command, it seemed, had been caught (or, usually, been carefully maneuvered,) in flagrante delicto at one time or another, and they'd gotten pictures of all of it. "Wow; get a load of these! Think anyone will want them after the war?"
"Ugh. As what? Rat repellent?" Kinch, flipping through the sheaf, was unfortunate enough to get far too good a look at a cheesecake photo of General Burkhalter in close-up, and made a face. "Please, Colonel; no one should ever have to look at that. Chuck them," he said, handing them back.
Hogan might have argued the case a bit further, simply for the pleasure of being contrary, if he hadn't looked down and noticed a shot of Major Hochstetter wearing nothing but a swastika and a smile. He shuddered. "Yep. These need to go. Pronto," he agreed.
When he came to the just-in-case file, Hogan stopped. Slowly, he opened the folder, removed a handful of smaller envelopes, each with a name written across the front, and stared at them for a moment. "Kinch?" he said. "Do you think anyone will want these?"
Kinch started to say no, then yes, then, shook his head no again. "Probably not. God knows I don't want mine, but I can't speak for anyone else."
"I don't blame you," said Hogan. Raising his voice a bit, he said, "What about the rest of you fellows?"
Olsen grinned. "Not me. You can do the honors, Colonel."
Baker, too, just shook his head. "I was never much of a writer. Thanks anyway."
LeBeau shrugged. "What would I want it for? I am going home to say 'bonjour;' no need for an 'au revoir.' Into the fire with it."
"No. Definitely not," said Carter, looking into the past for a moment, and remembering the prettiest girl in Rutherford B. Hayes Polytechnic High School, whose letter was long since gone from the folder. Somewhere along the line, he realized, the memory had lost all power to hurt.
I don't think I ever want to see mine again, either," Hogan said. The last envelope, the thickest and most battered, he hefted in his hand for a moment. "Newkirk?"
"There's at least three dozen blokes listed in there who'd not thank me for sharing their personal shortcomings with the general public," said Newkirk, with that familiar Cheshire Cat grin on his face, not unmixed with a fierce sort of triumph. "Best feed the fire before they find out about it."
Hogan met the grin with one of his own. "Fair enough," he said, and with one motion, pitched the file into the stove. For a long moment they just stood there, watching the flames devour all the goodbyes they'd been spared and the precautions that had proved blessedly unnecessary, and it struck them all, more or less simultaneously, that the goodbyes still to come would be, if hardly as tragic, at least as difficult as the ones for which they thought they'd prepared themselves.
*.*.*.*.*.*
Author's note: As the old saying goes, it's better to have and not need, then need and not have. But best of all, in a case like this, with a team like this one, to have and not lose. Baker might have been a perfectly fine radio operator if Kinch had actually left; whoever was on that list might even have been just as talented a thief if they had happened to misplace Newkirk somewhere along the line... but it would never, ever have been the same. The story title was drawn from the Mikado, and the song is all about people who, should they be made to permanently disappear, 'never would be missed.' I think we all know that's a load of nonsense.
