No ownership of the Hogan's Heroes characters is implied or inferred. Copyright belongs to others and no infringement is intended.

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"Send up the flares; we'll need the medical unit as soon as we hit the runway. Stuart needs help right away," Hogan ordered. After disengaging the enemy and eventually going far enough out of range so as not to be of further interest to the Germans, Hogan led the remaining bombers across the North Sea and back to England. The adrenalin had worn off, and now he was weary to the bone, a condition he knew was shared by the other men still in the air. Over the course of the trip, he had tried to take stock of the cost of the daring daylight raid; watching the crew of the Wildfire have to bail out in full view of everyone had been a more than sobering experience, and he wondered just how many B-17s wouldn't be returning home when the final count was done.

On the ground, countless crews and medical personnel were watching for their boys to touch the ground. The wait was always the hardest, with each crew straining hard trying to identify their plane, their machine, hoping upon hope that the work they had done was good enough to sustain the men in battle, that the care they had put into their work would be enough to keep any plane in the air, regardless of the damage.

And it wasn't just the crews. The brass was usually watching anxiously as well. And they were certainly keeping an eye on the skies today. Today, one clear day out of ten dreary, rainy ones. One beautiful day to fly to death.

Some planes had returned with very little damage. Others were merely limping in, smoke pouring from their engines, riddled with bullet and cannon holes, missing pieces of wings, rudders, entire engines. Medical teams burst into activity, in some cases merely removing the dead from the crafts; in others, attending critically wounded on the spot. Still others simply helped the walking wounded toward waiting ambulances. It was a busy afternoon at West Raynham.

Hogan removed his oxygen mask and headgear and unbuckled himself from his seat. Hopping out quickly as crews moved in, he checked for what seemed like the sixth time on Stuart, who was now being helped out of the plane. Hogan grimaced as he saw the tail gunner's torn pant leg, the blood soaking through the pressure bandages that had been put on his calf, the look of repressed pain on Stuart's face. There were too many people around the man to get close enough to help. Hogan shrugged inwardly and supposed it was for the best; Stuart was well looked after. Hogan would visit him when things settled down. He nodded to his crew, who were all disembarking themselves, and turned to look at his lady.

Goldilocks had managed to get home relatively unscathed in comparison to some of the other aircraft: her mangled rudder was a testament to some fine target shooting by an enemy fighter, and the number one engine was actually smoking, though Hogan couldn't tell if that was from damage or from over-exertion. Almost all parts of the plane had been penetrated by machine gun fire, something Hogan shook his head in amazement at, wondering thankfully how his men had gotten home. He couldn't remember taking half the hits they had, and he said a silent Thank you, God, before turning away from the plane and heading to the truck that would take him back to offices, where he knew he would be interrogated before being allowed to get some much-needed, much-wanted sleep.

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"Congratulations, Colonel. Mission accomplished." Group Captain Roberts greeted Hogan in his office privately with his hand extended after the crew had been questioned together. Hogan looked at Roberts tiredly and accepted the hand, then saluted. Roberts returned the mark of respect. "Sit down, Hogan. I'd say you've earned it today."

Hogan nodded and sat wearily in the chair.

"Tell me what it was like."

Hogan considered for a moment laughing out loud. He wondered if Roberts really knew what he was asking. What was it like? It was like staring in the face of Hell, looking death in the face, playing an all-too-real game of good versus evil. Hogan looked down at his flight suit; so anxious were the higher-ups for information that he hadn't even been given the chance to change, and he could see traces of blood on his suit when he had been in the back of the plane with Stuart. And he could feel any traces of remaining adrenalin pouring out of him. He was tired. This was the last place he wanted to be.

"It was bad."

Roberts waited for more.

Hogan spoke into the silence. "There were fighters everywhere, flak everywhere. We had no cover. We had to fend for ourselves."

Roberts nodded. Analyzing a mission was hard at the best of times, and normally he liked to give Hogan and the other Group Commanders time to digest everything that had happened before speaking to them; everything was still too close, too personal, this soon after a foray. But there was no time for niceties this time. Allied High Command needed to know now if this experiment was going to work. And the only way to do that was to get data as soon as possible. It was unfortunate for Hogan, thought Roberts, that this time around that meant not having time to come to grips with everything he'd seen and done before having to relive it all for someone else. "How quickly were the Jerries on you?"

Hogan shrugged. "Almost instantly," he said. "They weren't expecting us, but they weren't exactly asleep either. And our positions were pretty easy to ascertain; all they had to do was keep their eyes open."

Roberts couldn't miss the edge in Hogan's voice. "We knew that would be a danger."

"A danger?" Hogan scoffed sharply. Roberts raised an eyebrow but said nothing. Hogan didn't notice. "More like a certainty. There were Krauts all over us. We lost some damn good men today."

Roberts nodded. He understood Hogan's anger. He remembered himself what it was like flying on raids and coming back with fewer men than he had left with. This was the wrong time to talk. He knew his superiors were waiting for details, but he wasn't going to get what he needed out of Hogan now, not until the Colonel had had a chance to shower, to eat, to sleep, and possibly to mourn. He nodded toward Hogan's bloody trousers. "How did your crew fare?" he asked carefully.

"One wounded," Hogan answered. "We got hit in the tail. Stuart's being treated; he should be okay."

"Good," Roberts said. He stood up. "We'll finish this later, Hogan. You need to get changed and have a bit of a rest. I'm sure you'll be in for a lot of strategy sessions in the next few days, and you'll need all your strength for that." He offered a small smile.

Hogan nodded and stood up. "Thanks, Robbie," he said quietly.

"Go on, now, Rob. I'll see you at oh-seven hundred."

"Yeah. I mean, yes, sir."

After exchanging military courtesies, Hogan left the office, weary and hungry but restless and unsettled. The sun was starting to sink below the horizon, casting a purple glow over the sky and turning the planes in the distance into silhouettes. Soon, other men would be heading for the airfields to go out on the regularly scheduled night time raid.

He wished he could have been with them, instead of leading men out to face their deaths in the cold light of day today. He hoped he'd never have to do it again.

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Hogan left the infirmary where Stuart was laid up feeling a little better than when he had come. Though the tail gunner's leg had bled profusely, the actual injuries had indeed not been too bad, and he would be in the air again in two weeks. Hogan was relieved, and made sure he gave Stuart just enough grief to let him know he was missed and worried about. Then Hogan went back to the barracks area to meet Stuart's replacement.

It wasn't hard to find him. Walter Kovacs was one of the newer recruits to the 504th. Loud and brash but good-natured and easy to get along with, he was a popular man among the ranks, and Hogan had been pleased when he was told Kovacs would be joining them until Stuart was back on his feet.

Hogan returned the salute Kovacs offered and got right down to business. "Welcome to the team, Kovacs. You ready to come aboard Goldilocks?"

"Absolutely, Colonel," the young man answered enthusiastically. "I've watched her go up; she's quite a lady."

"That she is," Hogan agreed with a touch of pride. "She's friendly, though. Don't think you can't get on her good side. All you need to do is treat her nicely."

Kovacs grinned. "Dames are all the same."

Hogan smiled. "Yeah, well this dame bites, especially when she's in unfriendly territory. See that she doesn't have reason to take a chomp out of you."

"She won't. Believe me!" Kovacs's smile went away for a moment. "Your other fella—he okay?"

Hogan nodded. "He'll be fine. Just needs a couple of weeks to get himself back in shape. And Goldilocks will be ready again tomorrow. So it's a night off for all of us, I guess."

"Good!" Kovacs said loudly. "I could use the break! Hey, Colonel, can I buy you a beer tonight?"

"Why not? I'll get all the fellas together; you can meet them properly."

"'Properly' is over a pint," Kovacs replied. "My shout."

Hogan nodded. "If you insist—but you haven't seen how much these boys can drink yet."

"Don't worry," Kovacs answered. "I'm an upstart American—I'm supposed to be loaded, right?"

Kovacs laughed loudly. Hogan couldn't help but shake his head and smile. "They'll make you prove that tonight."

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Hogan and his crew arrived back at the English airfield three nights later feeling exhilarated but exhausted. Happiest with a night time bombing mission, the 504th had successfully dropped its load over a secret submarine base at Bremen, destroying nine German subs and coming home with fairly light casualties. It had taken longer than originally thought to repair Goldilocks, and for once the Powers That Be had seen fit to offer Hogan and his men a couple of extra nights of R and R. Hogan's men liked to think of it as a reward for a job well done over Leipzig; Hogan thought of it more as a way to soften the blow to follow—another daylight bombing raid. He made sure he kept his opinion to himself.

Roberts had been right when he debriefed Hogan after the first experimental attack; the strategic planning sessions that followed had been long and tiring. Hogan had argued strenuously for fighter cover; the brass maintained that fighters could not be assigned to help since they did not have the range to get to and from Germany without refueling. Hogan explained time and again what it was like to be exposed out in the skies over Germany—what it did to the crews to see German Messerschmitts and Focke-Wulfs bearing down on them with little hope of effective retaliation, but rather with only the hope of out-maneuvering or out-distancing the enemy. He tried to point out the increased danger to the brave men involved in the daylight raids, and how that would certainly spread to the rest of the Bomb Group, if a bigger mission was staged now that the Germans knew that the Allies would be bold enough to try such a tactic once again.

But he was outnumbered, out-argued, and in the end, outranked. They appreciated his point of view, they said, but for the good of all in the long run, the daylight raids would more than likely stay. And, apparently oblivious to the salt they were rubbing into the wound, they informed Hogan that the fine record of the 504th ensured that it would be the Bomb Group to lead another experimental raid. Hogan bit his tongue when he felt the urge to tell the brass that the Group's record wouldn't hold up long if the unescorted daylight missions continued; getting himself disciplined for disrespectful behavior wasn't going to help him or his men.

Hogan left those meetings full of information about plans for the coming months. Allied strategies, ideas on changes in flight formations and attack times, targets and objectives. Projected gains—and projected losses. None of this information he could share with his men. It was all classified, and Hogan did his best to sort it all out without anyone to hash it out with. A daunting task at best, he found it frustrating that he was considered important enough to discuss these issues with—but not important enough to listen to when it came to making the decisions that affected his men. They would happily accept his fresh point of view when it came to making plans of attack and coming up with different ways of befuddling the Germans. And he was praised loudly and often for his efforts, and for the performance of the Bomb Group under his command. But he couldn't help wishing he could make an even bigger difference somehow. There had to be more he could do to turn the war in favor of the Allies, and get them all home where they belonged.

The dreaded middle of the night call came less than forty-eight hours later. Pulling himself out of bed as sleep tried hopelessly to cling to him, Hogan stumbled into his clothes and, rubbing his eyes, he made his way to Roberts's office.

Hogan offered a somewhat ill-executed, drowsy salute. Roberts returned it without comment and motioned for Hogan to sit, as he took a seat at his desk to face the Colonel. "Your target today, Colonel, will be Hamburg."

Hogan blinked, unable to find words. So his arguments had made no impact at all. Being dragged out of bed in the wee hours of the morning, with no other Group leaders around, told him it was his group alone going out again. One more experiment. One more time for his men to be used as guinea pigs on a wheel that Hogan insisted was missing one of its vital spokes. "Today?" he asked.

Roberts nodded grimly. "That's right." Hogan said nothing. "Look, Hogan, I know you're unhappy about it, but we have to try it. We have to see how the Bomb Groups can handle the daylight raids on their own."

"I've already told you how they handle it—badly!" Hogan was wide awake now, and he felt a familiar anger starting his blood boiling. "We need fighter escort, Robbie; it's as simple as that—and as difficult for the brass to figure out! You send a small group of airplanes out to face fully armed German anti-aircraft guns and a few dozen Kraut fighters and you've got a perfect disaster just waiting to happen. You could win the war for the other side, hands down."

"Easy, easy, Hogan. No one is saying it's a walk in the park."

"That's supposed to make it better?" he retorted.

Roberts shook his head grimly. "No."

Hogan paused at the quietness of Roberts's voice.

"No, Colonel Hogan, it's not better. I understand what you're saying. You feel like we're sacrificing your men. In a way I suppose we are. But you can see for yourself where Headquarters is coming from. Regardless of how it seems to you in the air, your mission the other day was considered a success. Target achieved and destroyed. Minimal losses, even with a small group. We have to try again. Our fighters will be busy elsewhere."

"Minimal?" Hogan echoed. He felt a quiet outrage that burned right through him, as the memory of Wildfire plunging toward earth with men trapped inside her came into his mind.

Roberts stopped him before he continued. "In war, Hogan, yes… minimal. And though the Krauts may be a bit more on the alert for a daytime raid, with the night time attacks continuing, we are hoping they will still be somewhat off balance for your outing today. If this one is a success, we'll launch full-scale daylight bombing missions next month: full squadrons, full loads."

"Sending even more men out on suicide missions. With no fighter escort."

"Escorts may come with time, Hogan. The planes are already in development. But they're not ready yet, and we have to try something now. We have to be in as many places as possible if we want to bring the Germans to their knees."

Hogan stood up. "I can't help but think we're bringing the US Army Air Corps to its knees this way," he said without rancor.

Roberts suddenly got quiet, and informal. "I'm sure you're right about the fighter cover, Rob. I have no doubts about that. I was one of the ones who called for the RAF to stop its daylight bombing raids."

Hogan looked at a loss. "Then why are you supporting—?"

Roberts shrugged. "Brass is brass, Rob. They have to try everything else first. And it is wartime. The loss of men is, unfortunately, expected."

"And ignored," Hogan said in a flash of anger.

Roberts raised his chin. "You'd best watch that sort of attitude when you talk to the higher-ups, Hogan."

"I thought they expected it of me by now," the American answered.

Roberts paused for a moment, then chuckled softly. "I suppose they do," he answered. "Too bad they don't consider the wisdom that comes with it."