Stalag 13, 1945

Liberation Day

Newkirk had politely waved away a seat in the first convoy out of Stalag 13, which was entirely reasonable; it made sense that he'd prefer to ride with his friends, none of whom were in that first group. True, logistically speaking, he probably should have been aboard; most of the other RAF fliers were. But then, everyone in Stalag 13 knew that if it came down to arguing with either Newkirk or a brick wall, you were better off taking your chances with the masonry. You had at least a slim possibility of winning the argument, and it was a less frustrating opponent, to boot. Kinch and Olsen were in the second convoy, though, and Newkirk had only shaken his head to a suggestion that he join them.

LeBeau had been in the third, with the rest of the Free French POWs. He didn't even suggest that Newkirk join him; they were going to Paris, not London. They had said their goodbyes earlier, in private, and the waves they exchanged as LeBeau left were almost convincingly casual.

Baker and Carter were in the fourth; Carter was actually a bit hurt when the Englishman had bluntly refused to take the seat next to his own, the one he'd saved specifically for Newkirk's use.

"Can't, Andrew. Something I've got to do first," he said.

Carter looked as though he was going to argue, but he thought better of it. He swallowed hard. "Oh. Okay. Well, then… I guess this is goodbye," he said.

"I suppose it is," Newkirk said. "Take care of yourself, Andrew. Been an honor serving with you."

"You too," Carter said. "And I wanted to…. Well, you've been about the best buddy anyone ever had. Boy, I just wish—" He stopped, out of words for possibly the first time in his life. Then he threw his arms around Newkirk and hugged him.

Newkirk froze for a moment, then hugged him back. "Good luck back on Civvy Street," he said. "I know you'll do splendidly. Just try not to blow up anything people might want later on."

Carter grinned. "No promises. Boy, I really couldn't have picked better guys to be locked up with. I wish you and LeBeau were coming to America with the rest of us. But maybe someday you'll come to Bullfrog, or I'll come to London, and we can catch up."

Newkirk forced a smile. "Maybe. Would be nice."

"But keep in touch, anyway," Carter said. "You've got my folks' address, right?"

"I do. And as soon as I'm situated somewhere permanent, I'll write and let you know," Newkirk said, fairly sure that he was lying through his teeth. "But you're about to miss your ride out of here; best get moving."

He thought for a moment that Carter was going to hug him again, but he mastered himself in time, and swung himself into the truck. The motor roared to life.

Newkirk stood still, propped against the wall of Barracks Five, and watched the truck roll through the gates. There was a system; you went to the rec hall, sorted yourself out by nationality, presented yourself to the appropriate officers, who cross-checked your name and serial number against their little lists, and once they'd decided that you probably were who you said you were, you got a seat on the truck and drove away. There were a lot of men in the camp, and most of them had been crammed in from other, further-flung camps at the last minute. The records were a shambles; the process was likely to take at least another full day.

Fine by him.

He wasn't in any hurry. He wasn't about to start the process before it was absolutely necessary, and he certainly wasn't going to do so before the rest of his friends were long gone. If matters proceeded the way he expected they would, he wanted as few witnesses as possible. He'd far rather his friends remembered that last farewell at the gates than a last farewell at the… well, anyhow, they didn't need to know and it wasn't as though they'd be able to do anything even if they did. Why burden them if he didn't have to?

"Don't tell me you're already feeling nostalgic about this dump," came a voice from behind him.

"Nostalgic? For this? Colonel, have you been at the bottle this early in the day?" Newkirk said. "No, I was just thinking that I'm sorry we didn't let Carter leave a few of those timed charges behind. Watching this hellhole light up the sky… well, sir, it would've been a nice memory to take away with us."

"Yeah. Speaking of things we take away… why are you still here? God knows you've got seniority. You should have been first out."

"Couldn't do it, sir. First out… I just couldn't."

"Why not?" Hogan shoved his cap back, looked at him.

Newkirk shrugged. "Because I was first in, sir. I need to see it through to the very end. I was first in… I have to be last out. So I know, really know, that it's all over."

That reasoning, to Hogan, at least, seemed as natural as his own heartbeat; it was very similar to the reason he himself hadn't made a beeline for the first available vehicle.

"The gates are open, Newkirk. The guards are gone. It's over," Hogan said anyway.

"Not yet, it's not. There are still men in here. If I look back over my shoulder and see faces behind the wire, if I have to live with that picture in my head, a part of me will stay locked up here until the day I die. Thanks, but no thanks. I've waited this long to get out; I'll wait the extra bloody day or two while they shuttle the rest of the men off to safety, if it's all the same to you, sir." It was true, every word of it. It wasn't the whole truth, but it wasn't a lie, either. Newkirk would have needed to be last out even if Berlin Betty had never stepped foot in Stalag 13. And wouldn't it have been nice if she hadn't.

"You'd've made one hell of an officer," Hogan said, shaking his head.

"No need to be insulting, Colonel," Newkirk said.

Hogan laughed. "I'm going to miss you, Newkirk."

"Keep practicing. Your aim will improve eventually."

Hogan gave that the eye-roll it deserved, then got serious. "I mean it, Newkirk. It's been an honor serving with you."

"No, sir. The honor was all mine," Newkirk replied, and snapped to attention. He saluted, one last time. "And I wouldn't have missed a minute of it, sir, not for all the jewels in the crown. Just you remember that."

Hogan returned the salute, more moved than he quite wanted to admit. He would never have expected this, back in 1942. Newkirk, on first glance, had looked like a dishonorable discharge waiting to happen; a lazy, insubordinate, self-centered discipline problem with the survival instincts of a cockroach and about the same number of redeeming features… who just so happened to have a skillset Hogan needed, one that he was not likely to find in a less repellent example of humanity.

Hogan still didn't know quite what had prompted him to take a second look. Blind luck, subconscious instinct, divine intervention… possibly all three… but taking the time to realize that his first impressions had been wrong in literally every way possible had been one of the best decisions he'd made in the entire war. Probably one of the best decisions he ever would make.

"I couldn't have done this without you, you know that?" he said. "For three straight years you argued with me, you challenged me, you picked holes in my plans, you pointed out when I was wrong, and you backed me to the hilt anyway. You're a good man, Newkirk, and I'm proud to know you."

Newkirk ducked his head, embarrassed. He didn't do well with open displays of emotion, Hogan knew, and he grinned, to lighten the mood. "Of course," he continued, with the old mischievous glitter in his eyes. "There were days I would have bet my last nickel that if the Krauts didn't shoot you, our side just might have to do it ourselves."

"Well, the war's not quite over," Newkirk said cheerfully, after only the most infinitesimal of pauses, with a gleam in his own eyes and a saucy grin that probably counted as the greatest acting job of the twentieth century. "Still time to see the bookmaker."

"I'll pass. Look, I've got to go back to London for immediate debriefing," he said. "And after that I'm being sent home to report back to the Pentagon. But I'll be back in London in a few months. I'll see you then, all right? After listening to you rhapsodize about the pubs there for three years, I hope you'll give me a guided tour of the good ones."

Newkirk's eyes flicked away for a moment. "Depends on how many of them are still standing; from what I've heard, a lot of the places I used to go aren't there anymore. But we'll see what can be arranged, shall we?"

"Great. I'll hold you to that," Hogan said. "So I won't say goodbye. I hate goodbyes. I'll just say 'see you soon.'"

"Maybe," Newkirk said, very, very softly, as Hogan climbed into a jeep and drove away, with what looked like a very overawed Yank corporal at the wheel, and he prayed that Hogan would be too busy to remember a round of drinks he knew they were never going to have.

*.*.*.*.*

The last batch of no-longer-prisoners was being processed in what was nearly a carnival atmosphere. Newkirk reported in with the rest of them.

"Name?" asked the lieutenant behind the desk.

Right. Moment of truth time. "Corporal Newkirk, sir. Serial number one-eight-four-two—"

Automatically, the young man began flipping through his lists to check off his name… then stopped as his brain caught up with his ears. "Newkirk?" he said, giving him every chance to recant. "Corporal Peter Newkirk?"

So much for that. "Yes, sir," he said, knowing what was coming.

The lieutenant's face hardened. "Then you're under arrest."

Newkirk let out a breath, then slowly lifted his hands in surrender. He wasn't surprised, and he had lived with this for too long to even really be all that disappointed that it was starting all over again. But part of him did resent how natural and unthinking the gesture had become. Resented how unremarkable it felt to be utterly at the enemy's mercy.

The cooler was full of Germans, those few who hadn't deserted in those last few desperate months. The soldier went down the row, peeking through the Judas holes in the doors until he found one that was not already filled to capacity. He picked up the heavy iron key and opened the door.

Newkirk went in under his own steam before the guard could get any clever ideas about pushing him in. Klink was already inside, looking devastated. "Oh. Hallo, Kommandant," he said.

"Newkirk. Are you here to gloat?" Klink asked bitterly.

"No," Newkirk said flatly, and left off the honorific. They were well and truly on the same footing now, after all. Klink was sitting on the cot; that didn't leave any other seating options. He sat down on the floor, instead, resting the back of his head against the wall. "I'm here for the same reason you are."

"But your side won," Klink said. "Why would you be here?"

"Because they think I'm on your side. Collaborating with the enemy isn't the sort of thing that gets overlooked."

"Collaborating? When did you collaborate? When did you even cooperate? You were terrible! You're the worst troublemaker I've ever known," said Klink. "I spent half the war putting you in the cooler. And the other half wondering why I ever bothered letting you out of it."

"Yeah. I noticed."

"Newkirk…" Klink began, and lowered his voice. "This is another one of Colonel Hogan's little plots, isn't it? You're not really in trouble; you're here to help me, aren't you?"

"No, this is nothing to do with the Colonel, and yes, I'm really for it." Newkirk shrugged. "Sayla vee, sayla gayer, as Louie used to put it."

"Yes, but Newkirk… this makes no sense. You were a terrible prisoner. In fact, I wanted to shoot you myself."

"You know, people really don't need to keep telling me that. I'm already quite aware. And don't take this the wrong way, but I seriously doubt that being vouched for by a Kraut is going to convince anyone that I didn't go over to your side. Do me a favor and let me alone."

"But you didn't! What is this 'collaboration' nonsense all abo— ohhhhh," Klink said as he remembered. "Berlin Betty?"

"In the extremely attractive flesh. I can't help you, Klink. Play your cards right, and they might even let you watch my grand finale while you wait for your own turn against the wall, but that's the best I can do."

Klink looked horrified. "Newkirk! Do not even say such a thing!"

"Fine. If it makes you happy, I won't. Can't make any promises for the judge at my court martial, mind. Or yours, come to that."

"But… it won't come to that. It can't come to that. What is Colonel Hogan waiting for? I'm sure he could think of some way to take care of things; he was always planning something. He can help us both, can't he?"

Newkirk looked straight ahead. "No. He's gone."

"Was is los?"

"I said, he's gone. And a bloody good thing, too. Bad enough if you're there in the peanut gallery while they're tying on my blindfold. Having Hogan there too would be far too much of a good thing."

"But Newkirk…"

"Shut up, Klink. I've wanted to punch you square in the monocle since 1942, and they can only kill me once. So shut your bloody gob before I give myself the satisfaction, all right?"

Klink subsided, and there was silence for an hour or so. At which point, he exploded. "I can't stand it in here. I can scarcely breathe!"

"Count the bricks," Newkirk advised. "It'll calm you down."

"Oh, what would you know about it?" Klink snapped, before he thought.

Newkirk just gave him a Look. "You spent half the war bunging me in here, remember? There's not much I don't know about how to make the time pass in one of these vertical coffins."

"Yes, I did, didn't I?" Klink thought about that. "Would it do any good to say that I'm sorry?"

Newkirk pressed his back a little more firmly against the wall and didn't say anything. "No. But you're not the one with the most to be sorry for," he finally said. It was true. He didn't think he could forgive Klink that easily, and possibly not at all. But there had been… worse Kommandants. "The next time you Krauts start getting itchy feet and decide to invade somewhere, though… don't, all right?"

Klink didn't say anything for a minute. "He's really gone? He really left us here?"

"What 'us'?" Newkirk said. "Klink, I'm not your friend. I'm not your rescuer. I'm not on your side, and I never have been. I'm just the bloke who happens to be sharing your cell for the moment, and even if there were something I could do to save your neck, I probably wouldn't bother. And I doubt the Colonel would feel any different. So shut up!"

Klink shrugged. "No, I'm sure he doesn't care about saving my neck. But doesn't he care about yours?"

Newkirk's voice went subarctic; it was the difference between frustration and fury. "Don't you dare. Just… don't you bloody well dare. He's well out of this, and it's going to stay that way. This is my concern; not his, and certainly not yours."

"He doesn't even know about this?" Klink was horrified on two counts, and, to his credit, his own plight—and his quashed hopes that Hogan would be able, one last time, to save him— was no longer at the forefront of his mind. "How do you think he's going to feel when he finds out?"

Newkirk flinched, just the tiniest bit. "With any luck, he won't."

Klink shook his head, but before he could say anything, the door opened. A burly MP was standing there.

"'Colonel' Wilhelm Klink?" he asked, with a hint of a sneer.

"Yes, that's me," Klink said, standing up.

The MP nodded. "Fine. You're free to go."

"Really?" he said, disbelievingly. "I am?"

"We have bigger fish to fry," he said, with some disdain. "In any case, if the reports we received are at all accurate, you're the sort of German officer we want to leave in place."

"Well, I am—"

"Incompetent. Either way, you're not worth the trouble of prosecuting."

"Oh," Klink said, deflating. "I see."

"Glad we had this little chat," he said. "Get moving."

Klink straightened his tunic, and walked out with as much dignity as he could manage, escorted by the MP. He glanced back once, just in time to see the door slam shut with Newkirk still inside, just as it had scores or hundreds of times before. It had never, he thought, sounded as implacably final as it did that day.

*.*.*.*.*.*.*

Translated from Newkirkese to French to English:

Sayla vee, sayla gayer = C'est la vie, c'est la guerre = That's life, that's war.