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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"What do you think—did it work?" Newkirk asked, still looking out the door of the barracks at Schafer's retreating form.

"Sure it worked," Carter assured him, nodding. He wanted to smile, but Hogan's behavior in his quarters a short time ago had him worried. "The Colonel's plans always work."

"I wonder if you're gonna be in for trouble later, though, Andrew," Newkirk pondered, closing the door and coming back to the table.

"What do you mean?" Carter asked.

"Well, the gov'nor was changing his story there for a minute. I wonder if he knew something we didn't—and he just didn't have a chance to tell us before we went in there."

"No," Carter said knowingly, shaking his head. "He didn't find out anything."

Newkirk shrugged. "Maybe. I sure blew it asking him about those bloody Kraut pain pills, though. I wish taking them had been part of his plan to show Schafer all was forgiven. The sooner we put this whole mess behind us, the better."

"I don't think that will happen for awhile, Newkirk." Carter sighed as he remembered the broken look in Hogan's eyes. Because the Colonel hasn't forgiven himself.

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"What are you doing here, Colonel?"

Hogan gave a slight start when the voice interrupted his thoughts. He turned to see Corporal Langenscheidt looking at him with a mixture of curiosity and concern, and felt a tiny thrill of fear shiver through him. He closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall of the Recreation Hall, forcing himself to speak calmly. "Hiding."

He waited to hear the sounds of retreating footsteps. There were none. Go away. Please, just go away.

"Who are you hiding from, Herr Colonel?"

Hogan opened his eyes but did not turn to look at the guard. "Germans," he answered flatly.

Langenscheidt lowered his eyes, bowed his head slightly. "I understand," he said softly after a moment.

Hogan sighed, still staring at nothing. "No, I don't think you do," he said wistfully.

Another silence between them. "No. I suppose I do not."

Hogan closed his eyes again and concentrated on breathing. In… out. In… out. That's a nice breeze…. I'd expect to be colder at this time of year…. In—

"May I ask you something, Colonel Hogan?"

Hogan held his breath. No. No, no, no, no, no… He breathed out deliberately and opened his eyes. "What is it?"

Langenscheidt seemed to hesitate, then began, "When you were in the car… with Gunter that day…"

Hogan closed his eyes tightly and pursed his lips. Please. Please, no.

Langenscheidt saw Hogan's reaction but, swallowing hard and taking in a deep breath, continued, "… did he talk about his brother, Karl?"

A whole conversation came racing back to Hogan, and he could feel beads of sweat trickling down the back of his neck as he began to find breathing more difficult. The throbbing in his left leg suddenly intensified. He licked his lips and turned to face the guard. "He didn't talk about anything," Hogan said hoarsely. "He died when the car crashed."

Langenscheidt's deep blue eyes grew sad. Then he locked them onto Hogan's face. "I know what was reported, Herr Colonel. But there was more that happened, wasn't there?"

Hogan shook his head and looked away. "No, there wasn't," he maintained. "I was delirious. I imagined everything." It doesn't matter if the odds would be a million to one that I'd get the kid's story right. I've always played the odds. I imagined everything. I imagined everything….

The young guard shifted uncomfortably. "Colonel Hogan," he said softly, insistently, almost pleadingly, "the things you said when the search party found you—you could not have made those things up. They were all correct—the names, the places. Gunter must have told you."

"He didn't!" Hogan snapped, too harshly, looking fiercely at the Corporal. He saw something in the German's eyes that stopped him before he continued. He took a few seconds to calm himself down, slowed his breathing, and regrouped his thoughts. The life went out of his own dark eyes, and he closed them and once again propped himself against the wall, tilting his head back against it. "Why do you want to know, anyway?" Hogan asked softly.

"Because Karl Kleinschmidt was my best friend."

Hogan could say nothing in reply. He did not move, or show that he even registered what the guard said.

Langenscheidt waited, then slid next to Hogan, leaning beside him against the wall of the building and looking out toward the fence beyond them. "Karl and I grew up together, Colonel Hogan. When the war came, he was sent to fight, and I—well, I was not." A small, almost embarrassed laugh. "He was fit and strong. I was also strong—but I could not see fifty feet in front of my face. If they put a rifle in my hand on the battlefield, I would almost have to use it as a walking stick."

Hogan allowed himself a tiny smile. "But you're a camp prison guard."

"I do not get duty in the guard towers, you have probably noticed."

Hogan shrugged. He knew the schedule of the guards in all sections like the back of his hand.

"Karl and I were inseparable. We were always the best of friends. Karl und Karl. People joked that we were twins—they would never find one without the other, we were so alike and so often in each other's company. I was part of his family, and he was part of mine. Of course, we were all worried about him going off to fight. But it was not the first time young men from Helmstedt were called up. Annaliese—their sister—her sweetheart was conscripted. He was declared Missing in Action at some stage… there is little hope that he will come home. I was in love with Karl's other sister, Helga, but I was never able to tell her; she always told me I was like a third brother to her. And one does not fall in love with one's sister."

Hogan let the story wash over him. All through the telling, flashes of the impossible memories of his time in the car after the accident ran through his brain. Annaliese especially had a sweetheart. But he was called to fight…. He shook the thoughts away. I imagined everything.

Langenscheidt wasn't done with his confession, though, and he continued. "The night before Karl left, he made me promise to look after his family. I did not know how I was going to be able to do that, since I was coming to Stalag 13. But then when Gunter was recently transferred here, too, I knew that I would be able to keep my promise—at least to him, and through Gunter, I could keep watch over Annaliese and Helga."

Hogan opened his eyes slowly, tiredly. "Why are you telling me this?" he asked quietly.

Langenscheidt turned earnestly to the American. "I need to know what happened in the car, Herr Colonel. I need to know, for Annaliese and for Helga. For Karl. And… for myself."

Hogan took in the intensity of the German's expression and for a long moment could only look at him, beyond speech, and with more than a little fear. His voice was scarcely more than a whisper when he finally spoke. "Gunter died right away, Langenscheidt," he said. "I spent the whole time in that car talking to myself, making up a conversation with someone who wasn't there any more, just to survive." Hogan shifted his weight in deference to his injured leg, using the movement to turn away from his persistent companion. Please, God. Please, let this end now.

The guard shook his head slowly, as though he was afraid to contradict the Colonel, but could not agree. A hesitant question. "Do you believe in Heaven, Herr Colonel?"

I used to fly in it, Hogan thought. Then, softly: "Yes."

"And… do you believe in angels? You know, those that watch over you, like guardians?"

Hogan wanted to say no. That might be all it would take to put off Langenscheidt enough to make the young man go away. But it was Hogan himself who had suggested that some sort of heavenly intervention was responsible for the wrecked car being found before it was too late for him and—so he had thought at the time—for Gunter. And so something inside him would not let him deny it now. "Yes."

"Colonel Hogan. Gunter… he was an innocent. He was impetuous sometimes, but he was a good boy." Hogan closed his eyes, his tortured spirit beginning to weep. "Please, Colonel Hogan. Please, tell me what he said."

A storm raged in Hogan's soul. If he revealed all those hallucinations to Langenscheidt, he would be confirming them as real—because Langenscheidt was the one man who knew everything about the Kleinschmidts. If he kept the stories to himself, he would be denying this young man the peace he sought regarding his friend, and possibly denying the reality of what had actually happened in the car that day. Once spoken, Hogan could never take the words back, could never go back to the security of denial. Which did Hogan believe was real? Had some part of Gunter Kleinschmidt really remained to keep watch over the Colonel until help arrived? Or had Hogan created all of those conversations in his mind? And how could he have, since everything he had related later on had been correct?

After what seemed like hours, Hogan opened his eyes. "Langenscheidt," he began. He stopped when he saw once again the earnest look on the man's face. He paused. "Karl…" The German leaned in to hear Hogan's faint voice. "Gunter… said… that Karl was a very good actor… and… that he performed Shakespeare…."

"Ja, Herr Oberst," Langenscheidt confirmed, nodding. "Ja, Karl loved the theatre."

Hogan nodded. "And the two of them were…" Hogan's voice caught as he related the now-impossible dream that the two boys had shared… "hoping to go to America after the war."

Langenscheidt nodded sadly. "Ja. Ja, that is true, too."

Hogan fell silent. He knew it was true. He knew, in his heart, that everything he remembered and insisted on denying was real. He remembered how absolutely terrified he had been in the car, when he felt comforting darkness moving in to try and claim him. And he remembered how strong the voice of the young guard had then become, calling him, insisting on keeping Hogan active and alert, somehow urging him on to hold on. He remembered how frightened the German's voice had been, prompting Hogan to hold onto the small bit of strength that he still had, to comfort the guard when things were looking grim… and how in the end, it turned out that the weakness and fear had apparently been an act—something Gunter Kleinschmidt, or whatever part of him was still in the car—had been using to keep Hogan determined to survive until rescue came.

"I don't understand," Hogan whispered eventually. His mind was locked in the car, seeing the wreckage and seeing Gunter's still body beside him. He could feel the despair and the pain, and he could hear the silence, the frightening, overwhelming silence that meant no one had come to save him from this nightmare he could not escape. "I don't understand why."

"Sometimes there is no reason we can comprehend," Langenscheidt declared softly. "Sometimes it is just the mercy of God, and we have to accept it."

Hogan shook his head, still staring, trance-like, at things the man beside him could never see. "I don't understand," he repeated.

"Colonel Hogan…" said Langenscheidt, a little more strongly.

The German accent pulled Hogan abruptly out of his memories and into the present. Hogan tried to compose himself, and he looked at the guard with eyes appearing sunken into his face, his features tired and spent, as though he had been up all night, haunted by nightmares that made sleep more of a torture than a way of refreshing the mind and body.

"You remind me of Karl in many ways, Colonel Hogan," Langenscheidt admitted. "Even Gunter noticed that in the short time he was here. Karl was always the stronger of the two of us, the most resilient." Hogan lowered his eyes. "What Gunter told you about Karl that day—it was all true. What he said about his family—that was also true. What you are trying to deny, Colonel Hogan, it all happened. I believe that. Do not torture yourself with doubts about what was simply a gift to a good man."

War cannot hold down a good man forever. "What's so good about me… that wasn't good about Gunter?" Hogan asked, his voice weak with grief, and something else he was just now beginning to recognize: guilt that he had survived.

Langenscheidt paused thoughtfully. "Perhaps something… perhaps nothing." The guard shrugged. "It is not for us to know." He looked at Hogan and realized he had taken the American almost past his endurance, and he regretted it. "Please do not mistake me, Colonel Hogan. I grieve for my friend. Gunter was also like a brother to me. But I would like to think that he died nobly, and if he stayed to help you as you claimed that night, then I can believe quite honestly that he did."

Nearly paralyzed with anguish, Hogan eventually choked out his reply. "He did, Langenscheidt. He did."

Langenscheidt absorbed Hogan's words, and his suffering. "Thank you, Colonel Hogan," he said gently. Then, the guard changed the subject and his tone. "I will leave you alone now, and make sure the other guards stay away from here. Since you are hiding," he announced more brightly.

Langenscheidt left without waiting for a response. Hogan remained stock-still for a few moments, then slowly gave in to the unbearable pain rising within him, releasing a single, gut-wrenching sob. He raised his shaking hands to his face and covered his eyes, as tears finally began to roll down a face contorted with sorrow.