Thank you all for the reviews. Private Kappel and Corporal Mueller are both my creations. Mueller appears here and there when I need a somber, vaguely annoyed guard in a story.

Chapter 7

Private Kappel was walking the regular patrol between the barracks. Corporal Langenscheidt paced along beside him. The pair of Germans were expecting the normal boring routine of camp life at night. Generally speaking, the prisoners would all be sleeping inside the cold barracks, huddled in their bunks. The other guards would be watching from the towers and fencelines, in addition to other patrolling guards just like the pair.

Langenscheidt puffed out a breath and shifted his rifle to the crook of his arm to be able to put both hands to his face. Blowing on his fingers to warm them, he looked at Kappel and then shrugged. "It's very cold tonight."

"Ja." Private Kappel shifted inside his coat. He didn't really like walking patrols at night. It was cold and boring. He usually reminded himself a few times per night that it was infinitely more cold at the Russian Front. Also, he hardly ever had someone shoot at him here in the prisoner of war camp. Sure a few odd things happened on occasion, like the crazy band of commandos that had attacked the camp one night and faded away without hitting anyone or even being seen... but most of the time, he could walk his patrol half-asleep. The prisoners were unusually well behaved for the most part and he wasn't expected to be brutal or inhumane like some guards had told him. Corporal Langenscheidt was an agreeable fellow guard to walk patrols with.

That worthy spoke up again. "Did you hear something?"

"Was?" Kappel focused on his surroundings. They did occasionally run across a prisoner sneaking about, and of course they had that crazy Britisher who had started sleepwalking. "Is that footsteps? Just over there." He pointed at the corner of one of the buildings. They both hefted their rifles and walked faster.

Rounding the corner, they found the English prisoner sleepwalking again. "Donnerwetter..." Langenscheidt started towards the prisoner who was slowly wandering back and forth between two of the buildings. "It is just Corporal Newkirk again."

Kappel grabbed his arm before he could reach the prisoner. "Nein, the kommandant said we were not to hurt the Englander. He was very clear that if one of us harms him, we'll get sent to the Russian Front!" He kept his voice low.

Langenscheidt looked from his fellow guard to the prisoner. "I would not hurt him. I will just wake him and then I can take him back to his barracks. I'm a nice guy! I don't hurt people for no reason." Langenscheidt probably hadn't hurt a person ever, but it seemed impolite to point it out to him.

Kappel eyed the Englishman as he wandered in a wide circle, now mumbling to himself. "Ja, ja, but what if waking him up hurts him? What if he runs when you wake him up and then one of the tower guards will shoot him and then we'll both be in trouble."

Looking uncertain now, Langenscheidt nodded. "You are right... maybe I should grab him so he cannot run?" He lowered his voice even more. "I heard from my Oma that if you wake up a sleepwalker too quickly they could die. Their heart just stops!" He was eying Newkirk himself now, as the thin young prisoner paused in his wandering and then headed off at an angle. "You don't think he would die, do you? It's just a tale my Oma told me, ja?"

Kappel began to follow behind Newkirk at a safe distance. "I think that I don't want to risk a trip to the Russian Front that your grandmother is wrong."

"I think you're right." Langenscheidt hurried to catch up and walk a few steps away from the slowly ambling prisoner. "But what do we do? It's very cold out here... he will freeze."

Kappel hummed as he thought it over and then trotted around the Englishman to stand in front of him, holding his rifle out as a barrier. "Nein... turn back, Englander..." He kept his voice very soft and coaxing. "Go that direction, bitte..."

Newkirk paused briefly and seemed to waver before he tried to go around the obstacle. Kappel kept moving sideways, herding him in a wide arc back towards the barracks. Langenscheidt saw how it was working and joined in. Slowly they began to herd the prisoner back towards the barracks. He seemed quite insistent on any other direction however and it was a slow process.

Hearing some crunching footsteps in the snow, they turned and saw Corporal Mueller approaching them. "Was is los?" Mueller motioned towards the prisoner who had managed to wander around Kappel during the few seconds he was distracted by Mueller's arrival.

"It is the Englander. He is sleepwalking." Kappel tried to get around Newkirk to gently herd him back again.

Mueller frowned at both of them. "Why do you not take him back to the barracks? Prisoners should not be out of their barracks."

Langenscheidt joined Kappell in herding Newkirk back to a path towards the right side of the compound. Newkirk's soft mumblings began to sound annoyed. Langenscheidt spoke quietly to Mueller. "We don't want to cause him any harm waking him up. My Oma said you shouldn't wake up a sleepwalker and Kommandant Klink was very clear that we are not to harm him."

Mueller looked at them for another moment, frowning and shaking his head. Then he stepped up to Newkirk and grabbed him by an arm. "Englander! Wake!" He shook the Englishman roughly, holding his arm firmly as he flailed about and shouted in alarm.

Newkirk was staring around with wide eyes as he realized he was outside and cold. "Blimey... where am I?"

"Come." Mueller kept his tight hold on Newkirk's arm, half dragging him along to Barracks 2. It took a moment at the door, but as soon as it opened up, Mueller shoved the prisoner inside and shut the door again. Turning to the two other guards, he frowned at them. "There. He is inside." said Mueller in a matter-of-fact tone. Then he headed back to his regular patrol leaving the two others behind.

Both of them stared after him and then they looked at each other. Langenscheidt cleared his throat awkwardly. "Well, at least if he was harmed, it was Mueller and not us."

Brightening, Kappel agreed. "Ja, and he was still asleep when we were there so he can't report us for anything."

"Let's go patrol on the other side of the compound for a while." Langenscheidt didn't even wait, but headed away from the troublesome Barracks 2 immediately.

Kappel followed close behind him. "Ja, that is a good idea."

The crashing of the pots off of their booby-trapped chair woke almost everyone, including Hogan. There was a second bang as someone tried to open the barracks door. Hogan was halfway to the door, looking for Newkirk before he realized whoever was banging on the door was on the outside trying to get in. "Get the chair!" A loud voice in heavily accented German demanded that the door be unblocked immediately even as Kinch managed to grab the chair out of the way.

The door swung open suddenly to show a very annoyed looking Corporal Mueller. The guard held a bedraggled Newkirk by the collar of his nightshirt. The stoic German shoved Newkirk inside, reached to grab the door and yanked it shut again without another word.

"Sorry." Newkirk shuffled to the stove and hung his head as he tried to warm up.

Hogan puffed out an exasperated breath. "How did you get out?"

"I don't know." Newkirk showed a flash of annoyance. "I was asleep, remember?"

Before Hogan could reprimand him for the quip, LeBeau spoke up. "He can't help it, mon Colonel." The smaller man was holding the untied rope in one hand. "I never felt him get loose."

Hogan reined in his temper quickly. LeBeau was right. Newkirk wasn't choosing to go through all of this. "It's the second time tonight that he got untied." Rubbing his face, he put a hand onto Newkirk's shoulder and felt him shivering. "Are you okay?"

"Yes sir. Just embarrassed. I don't fancy being woken up by Mueller shaking me either." His eyes flicked around the room at everyone looking at him. The other POWs ranged from concerned to annoyed and he just wanted to go to sleep and wake up in the same place that he'd gone to sleep in. "I'm sorry I woke everyone."

Carter smiled at him, yawning sleepily. "Well, Mueller woke everyone up. If you'd woke even one of us up, you wouldn't have gotten out."

Snorting at his friend, Newkirk narrowed his eyes. "Leave off, you."

Olson climbed up onto his bunk and looked down at them all. "Well, we really seem to be pretty bad at caging Newkirks. So what do we try next?"

Carter shrugged. "We have handcuffs."

"You are not handcuffing me to the bunk." Newkirk's tone wasn't even slightly amused.

"Newkirk..." began Hogan.

"No sir! No one is putting me into restraints. No one." Newkirk's jaw set firmly. "I'd rather get shot by the guards."

"You might end up shot if you don't..." said Hogan with some real heat.

"Mon Colonel..." LeBeau interrupted him gently tugging at the sleeve of his pajamas. "Please... don't. He won't agree to that."

Hogan turned to reprimand LeBeau for opposing his orders and stopped when he saw the appeal in the Frenchman's eyes. "Alright then what do you suggest?"

"I don't know. Maybe we could get Schultz to put an extra guard on the barracks?" said LeBeau.

Newkirk was still angrily eying Carter. "Yeah, do that. Or just let me wander until someone shoots me." He climbed into his upper bunk and lay down facing the wall.

"Newkirk!" Carter started to step up to poke him but was tugged to a stop by Kinch. "But he..."

"Leave him alone." said Kinch. He picked up the heavy twine and tapped Newkirk on the shoulder. "Peter, give me your wrist, we'll try the leash one more time." He waited for a moment. "Please?"

"Fine." Newkirk shook the blanket loose enough to get an arm out and stuck it out towards Kinch and waited impatiently while their radioman tied it on securely. Then he tugged his blanket back into place.

Kinch dug out more string and rigged more ties for the windows. His voice was just a whisper as he bent close to Hogan. "It's only a couple of hours until roll call. Hopefully he won't sleep deeply enough to start wandering." He gestured at the windows. "If so, maybe the new strings will confound him."

Thinking back to how carefully the thoroughly asleep Newkirk had explored the bobby trap on his window before disabling it, Hogan grimaced. "We can hope. He already tried my window earlier. We'll talk in the morning. He can't keep doing this."

"We'll think of something." Kinch turned and motioned LeBeau back to his bunk over the tunnel. "Carter, just go back to sleep and leave him alone."

Carter moved back to his bunk, getting ready to lie down and grumbled. "I still think we should cuff him to the bunk. If we secured him so he can't reach to untie anything, he can't escape." He glanced upward and then looked at Kinch before speaking quietly. "We could just tie him down when he's asleep and he wouldn't even know and if he did, so he's mad, at least he wouldn't get loose."

Before Kinch could respond, Newkirk rolled off his bunk and landed halfway on top of a very startled Carter. Rather than getting off him and apologizing, the Brit grabbed him to slam his back into the floor hard. "You bloody try it and I'll slit your throat when I get loose."

LeBeau was already grabbing Newkirk's arm to tug him away from Carter. "Non! Mon ami, Carter didn't mean it! Let him go!"

Newkirk dropped Carter and shrugged off LeBeau. "As long as he bloody understands." Hogan stepped between Carter and Newkirk looking angry. "And you can sod off too!"

Hogan bristled and LeBeau shoved between the Colonel and Newkirk. "Mon Colonel, please..."

Hogan turned on the short Frenchman. "He's out of line! Threatening Carter and hitting him are way out of line and there's no way any member of the team is going to get away with that."

Newkirk pointed over LeBeau's shoulder. "He bloody threatened me and no one is going to tie me to any ruddy bunk!"

LeBeau twisted around to push Newkirk back. "Shhh, Carter wouldn't do anything bad to you, you know he would not hurt you."

Hogan was still angry but he began to take note of how panicked Newkirk was looking. "What's going on?"

Kinch stepped up and reached to tug a very bewildered Carter to his feet. "It's nothing, sir, really. Are you okay Carter?" He brushed the younger man off carefully. "Peter didn't mean to hurt you, he really didn't. You can't threaten him like that though, he gets a little bit nuts about it."

Hogan was still scowling. "He didn't threaten Newkirk..."

Carter spoke up hesitantly. "I really didn't! I wouldn't! I just want to make sure he doesn't freeze to death or get shot."

Kinch sighed. "Saying you'll tie him up isn't exactly a friendly suggestion either. Especially not when you're threatening to tie him to a bunk, okay?" His look said there was more to it all and Hogan resolved to ask him about it later. "Just let it go, he's really sorry."

Hogan stepped up, taking the situation in hand. "Okay, that's enough excitement for the night. Everyone get to bed before we have the Germans in here too. Carter? You okay?" Carter assured him he was only shaken and quietly crawled into his bunk. "Kinch, everyone, get in your bunks." Hogan walked over to where LeBeau was still whispering with Newkirk. "Are you calmed down now?"

Newkirk had looked more settled but bristled angrily at Hogan's words. "Depends, sir. Is someone going to try tying me down to a bunk?"

"No one is going to force you to do anything." Hogan tried to be reassuring. He was trusting Kinch's judgment on this. "We can talk about it tomorrow. Just try to get some rest, inside the barracks, if possible."

Shaking out his twine leash, Newkirk climbed back up into his bunk and settled in. LeBeau straightened the string out on his end before he went to his bunk. Eventually it became quiet again as Hogan shut the door to his quarters. Kinch lay down but couldn't sleep for quite a while. He could hear soft rustles from either Newkirk or Carter's bunks. He doubted that the Brit would actually go back to sleep voluntarily. He would be too keyed up, and if Carter tossed about in his sleep, Newkirk would definitely wake up.

Kinch let out a soft sigh and closed his eyes. Suddenly he opened them again. They hadn't even found how Newkirk had gotten out this time. He himself had added more ties to the windows but none of them had actually been untied. Kinch frowned for a few moments thinking about it and then gave up. They'd figure out how he'd gotten out in the morning. It wasn't all that long until roll call.

Surely they could keep one stubborn Brit in the barracks through the night. It couldn't be impossible.

End Chapter

I know, seems a bit out of character but I did have to create a reason they couldn't secure him by tying him to a bunk, so I apologize. They'll explain it. It's just a reason that Carter's idea can't be used. Thank you for reading.