Warning: if you're not a sucker for a happy ending, or at least a semi-happy ending, you may wish to forego reading the epilogue. You're welcome to believe that no one lived happily ever after if you wish.

Disclaimer: besides the fact that I don't own any of the Heroes, the events of this chapter are inspired by a line from Season 2, Episode 25: The Top Secret Top Coat. Any resemblance to any person or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and unintended by the author.

Occupied Germany, the American sector, 1945

The general's heels clicked smartly along the hall as he returned salute after salute from passers-by. There were lieutenants, captains, two slightly sleepy corporals, and an unshaven sergeant who received a scowling reminder of his conduct the previous evening, but the general was looking for a certain colonel.

The trouble was, no one could ever be certain exactly where they would find that colonel.

He was in great demand among the upper echelons of the Occupying forces as a guide, string puller, and black market QMG. Word around the base was that it didn't matter what you wanted to know, who you wanted to meet, or what you wanted to look for, Col. R.E Hogan could produce it from his vast storehouse of knowledge, contacts, and impudence. You just couldn't ask for details, for fear that he would tell you the truth.

They'd had their differences during the war, when the general had been shot down over Nazi Germany, but toward the end of his captivity he had developed an immense respect for the man who had seemingly done the impossible over and over again.

A faint smile relaxed the general's features as he saw a tall figure in full dress uniform striding confidently toward him. "Colonel Hogan!"

"General Barton. What brings you here, sir?"

"Looking for you." Barton's salute was definitely better military form than Hogan's. He wasn't expecting the deflated look that crossed the colonel's face.

"If it's another mission finding cases of 1936 red wine from some obscure vineyard in the back of nowhere for some stuffed-shirt general who doesn't have the sense—sorry sir, didn't mean you specifically. But if I'd known I'd be stuck with a couple officers more concerned with what's on their dinner table than what's on their desk I'd never have stayed in the military after my furlough."

Barton looked him up and down. "It's okay, Colonel. No red wine. Why the dress uniform?"

"Because I'm on my way to get married. The paperwork finally came through for her to come back to the States with me."

It wasn't the answer the general wanted. "Then the rumors weren't just wild tales. Isn't it enough that she helped keep our boys prisoner during the war? A girl like that—"

"Hold it!" Hogan gave him the most disapproving look he had ever received from anyone in the military, superiors included, and Barton was shocked into silence, both by the colonel's words and the tone he had used. "A girl like what? A girl who lost her whole family to the Nazis? A girl who stayed in Germany to look for them—and helped our operation at the risk of blowing her own cover? Who understands the effects of this war that I have to live with, because she has her own memories to deal with as well? A girl like that, is that what you mean?"

"I'm sorry, Hogan." And he genuinely meant it. "As for the fraternization regulations, well, you never did give a hoot about them, did you? Did you know about her all along?"

The colonel crossed his arms. "Do you think I'd have let Klink hire a secretary without running a check on her?"

"Klink." Barton recalled his mission. "That's why I came looking for you. He's come up for trial for war crimes."

With the change of subject, Hogan relaxed into a chuckle. "Couldn't happen to a nicer guy . . . except maybe Hochstetter or Burkhalter."

"It's not quite that simple. Headquarters needs him to be found not guilty."

"What!"

"You and your men were involved in a great many highly classified operations," Barton explained with more patience than he usually accorded to audacious, smart-mouthed colonels. "Yes, the war is over, but that doesn't mean the losers are happy about it. Already there have been attempts against some of our more publically known heroes."

"Klink doesn't have the guts for something like that." Hogan waved his hand dismissively.

"No, but he has a big mouth, and everyone on both sides knows that. If he gets locked up with all the other war criminals, something's going to spill out. Unfortunately the trial's already in progress, and Justice Willard won't stop it just because London and Washington want to keep their activities private. We don't want to give the German people the idea that we're trying to conceal anything, either. Everyone's agreed that the simplest way is to use your eyewitness testimony to have Klink acquitted. Say whatever you need to about him, just don't give names or mission details, and whatever you do don't give names of underground people."

"Thanks a lot. I wasn't asked to vote, you know," Hogan grumbled. "Oh well, I've done it so often that I should be used to it by now. When?"

"Right now. Transport's waiting."

The colonel stared at him. "You're kidding me! Didn't you just hear me say I'm on my way to get married? Do you know how hard it is to find someone to perform one of these ceremonies?"

Barton sighed. "I'm sorry, Hogan. I'll see if I can pull some strings and have Justice Willard marry you the moment the trial ends, but we need you in that courtroom pronto. If it makes you feel any better, you're not going to be the only one testifying."

"Oh yeah? Who else you got? I don't think General Burkhalter will feel like taking the stand."

"An RAF corporal, a short Frenchman, and two Americans who are being flown back to Germany on the first available plane. They should be landing any moment." It was the general's one ace in his hand, and he hoped it took the trick.

"All the men? They're coming back here?" A grin split Hogan's face for an instant. "Boy, I can't wait to see them again! They—how'm I going to tell Hilda?" He broke off as shoes approached from the hall behind him and turned to see his fiancee. "You explain to her, General. I have a phone call I need to make."

"We need to leave immediately," Barton insisted, but Hogan's expression had brightened into his mischief-look, and he didn't show any sign of having heard. He delivered a swift kiss to Hilda's cheek and was striding down the hall before anyone could stop him.

When General Barton entered Justice Willard's courtroom, he found five men enjoying an enthusiastic reunion.

"General, thanks for bringing the guys over," Hogan grinned. "Kinch, you look great in captain's bars!"

"Shucks, Colonel," Kinch grinned sheepishly. "It takes a bit of getting used to. I even went to salute a departing first lieutenant before realizing it was Carter here."

The gangly, boyish pyrotechnics expert blushed, but whatever he was going to say was cut off by the clerk's call for attention.

Once again Klink was marched in with his head down, taking no notice of the spectators in the courtroom.

"I see that the witnesses are present and accounted for," the judge observed. "The court will hear testimony from Colonel Robert Hogan."

Klink's head snapped up and he glared across the courtroom. "What are you doing here, Hogan? Have you come to gloat?" he demanded. The judge rapped his gavel.

"No I haven't, I've come to save your neck," Hogan retorted, taking the chair that the judge waved him to. He was directly across from Klink. "Why? I can't tell you, because I don't know."

After Hogan had been sworn as a witness, the judge peered at him. "You were senior P.O.W officer in Stalag 13?"

"Yes, sir, I was," Hogan acknowledged. "With me are four of my men, and they can verify everything I say."

"Yes, yes, we'll get to them," the judge nodded. "Now, what can you tell us about the activities of the defendant?" Evidently Barton's string-pulling had been effective enough that Justice Willard himself wanted to question the witnesses.

"Well sir, I can honestly say that without this man the Allies may not have won the war," Hogan began. Klink winced. "Sir, he made it possible for us to run an extremely effective escape organization, helping to outfit prisoners and send them out of Germany and back to their units."

"B-b-but . . ." Klink stuttered. Kinch smirked from the back of the courtroom, and LeBeau nudged him to silence.

"Is that so? Counsel will please refrain from comment," the judge added as the prosecutor opened his mouth.

"Many of the operations we were involved in are classified, but I can tell you that Klink looked the other way on numerous occasions, enabling us to conduct sabotage activities from within Stalag 13," Hogan continued blithely. "Bridges were mined, military establishments attacked and destroyed, and countless Nazi operations were interrupted because this man—" he pointed to the cowering ex-commandant, "This man allowed us to operate a secret radio to broadcast information to London."

"Hogan . . ." Klink tried to interrupt.

"I understand, Colonel Klink. You're so used to denying your activities to your superiors that it's hard for you to come into the open now," Fake sympathy was thick in Hogan's voice. "To tell the whole truth, Your Honor, the tunnel system beneath the grounds of the prison camp was so extensive that it baffled engineers."

"Heck, you could lose a gopher down there and not find him for a week," Carter piped up from his seat. The judge whapped his gavel again, but hid his smile.

"We operated a press to print German money, stored weapons, ammunition and explosives in the tunnel, and operated several entrances and exits to the system which remained undetected throughout the war, thanks to Colonel Klink's expert display of bumbling inefficiency," Hogan concluded.

"Don't exaggerate so much or they'll never believe it," Klink hissed, unable to grasp the fact that the account was truthful.

"Your Honor, may I show you a couple of photographs?" Hogan reached into his jacket. The judge waved him over. "I ask you, do these look like Klink was a hostile Kommandant?"

Willard looked down his nose at the first photograph that Hogan laid in front of him. It was one that Hogan had filched from Klink's desk early in his time as a prisoner, posed for at a time when Klink thought that the Allies were about to liberate the camp. Wearing each other's uniform caps and friendly smiles, the two colonels inspected each other's men, who were standing in rows in front of the kommandant's office.

"Dear me," the judge said mildly.

"This one is of our tunnel, sir. That's Sgt. Carter—later Lt. Carter, who happens to be here today—holding the package of dynamite."

"Most extraordinary." The judge eyed Klink's huddled form. "If what this man says is true, Colonel Klink, you were a busy man during the war. How did you escape detection by your own side?"

"That would be in part due to his acting ability, sir," Hogan butted in, returning the photos to his pocket. "He plays the cringing bootlicker to perfection."

"Thank you, Hogan," Klink said sarcastically.

"Thank you, Colonel," Willard echoed. "The court will hear testimony from Corporal Peter Newkirk of the Royal Air Force."

After a confirming nod from Hogan, each of the four took the stand to affirm that Wilhelm Klink had been quite out of the common way as a prison camp commander, although LeBeau reminded everyone that his mushrooms had been confiscated and Klink had once insulted his cooking abilities.

Finally the judge heaved a sigh and asked if there was anything they would like to add to their testimony.

"There's one other thing I'd like to say, Your Honor," Hogan smiled. "You've agreed to perform a wedding ceremony, I believe? I wonder if it would be possible for Colonel Klink to attend. After all, he knows the bride."

"I do?" Klink asked.

"Of course you do," Hogan assured. "And Your Honor, Colonel Klink's fiancée is also present at the base, and we were hoping that you would consent to performing a double wedding. I know that you would make Klink a very happy man."

"Wha-at?" Klink wailed.

"Oh, very well! Let's just get this all over and done with!" The judge was evidently wearying of the whole affair. "Colonel Wilhelm Klink, based on the testimony of Colonel Hogan and his men, who all happen to hold very exalted positions in the opinions of several very influential persons, you are hereby found innocent of war crimes and released."

"After his wedding, sir," Hogan added in a stage whisper.

The judge frowned at him. "Yes, yes, after the wedding. Counsel, you are dismissed. Release the prisoner. Bring in the wedding party."

Amid the activity in the courtroom, Klink made his way over to Hogan, who was still standing at the front of the room. "Hogan, I don't know how you came up with that tale about Stalag 13, but I do think you should have told that judge something that wouldn't be so easy to disprove!"

"How do you know it's not the truth?" Hogan retorted. The door opened to admit two women, one dressed in an elegant cream outfit and the other in a dark brown tweed suit. "I believe your bride is here."

"B-b-but that's . . ." Klink groped at a nonexistent pocket.

Hogan reached into his own pocket and pulled out a monocle. Klink took it thankfully. "Now there's the Colonel Klink we all know and love," Hogan quipped.

"Hogan, that's Gertrude Linkmeyer!" the ex-kommandant hissed, halfway between horror and despair.

"Mm-hmm," Hogan shrugged. "Come and stand over here. I think that the brides are nearly ready to walk down the aisle."

"How you must hate me, Hogan," Klink whimpered as music started from a phonograph in the corner. Kinch prepared to lead Hilda toward the front of the room, while LeBeau gallantly offered his arm to Frau Linkmeyer.

The music stuttered, and Carter hurried to adjust the phonograph needle. "Hey, maybe we should use the ol' coffeepot. It might work better than this."

"Coffeepot?" Klink whispered.

"Yeah, didn't you know? A coffeepot makes a very effective listening device and speaker," Hogan muttered out the corner of his mouth as the judge took up a position between the two of them. Klink merely shook his head in disbelief.

The wedding ceremony was brief and to the point. Newkirk and Carter stood as witnesses for the two couples, and the judge read out the vows with the resigned air of a man who was overdue for his midday meal. Afterward, the new Colonel and Mrs. Hogan enjoyed a long kiss while Klink scrunched up his courage and his face and delivered a brief peck to his bride's cheek.

The judge vanished from the courtroom as soon as his duties were performed, leaving the newlyweds to the congratulations of the few guests. General Barton pulled Hogan to the side of the group.

"Hogan, when did you come up with this scheme of Klink's wedding?" he asked.

"Yesterday, standing in the base hallway."

"Then you weren't planning it all along? How did you manage to convince, eh, Mrs. Klink? And how did you get the paperwork arranged?"

Hogan chuckled. "Sounds funny to hear her called that, after all the times I prevented it while I was a prisoner. I don't understand it, sir, but she actually wanted to marry the man. Her brother had been plotting the match for a long time, and he had everything prepared. I was relieved to hear that he'd left all his important papers with her when he surrendered to the Allied army."

The general shook his head sadly. "And Klink?"

"Let's put it this way," Hogan shrugged. "I didn't want to see him hang, but I didn't exactly think he should live out his life in total ease and comfort either."

"You amaze me, Colonel," Barton admitted. And for the second time in his life he drew himself up at attention and offered a salute to an officer ranked lower than himself.

Hogan returned it crisply.

"Hogan? Colonel Hogan!" Klink's whine approached from behind him, and he automatically raked his fingers through his dark hair to allow it to display to full advantage. It was a habit he'd gotten into early in his captivity when he realized how sensitive Klink was about his own bald dome.

"Hogan, don't you owe me something?" Klink cast a furtive glance over his shoulder.

"What's that, a punch in the mouth?"

"No! My violin. You promised you'd return it to me."

"And I have every intention of doing so." Hogan snapped his fingers in Newkirk's direction, and the Englishman disappeared from the room, returning after a few moments with an alligator-skin case. "Here you go, sir, a wedding gift for you. I trust that it will bring many happy moments to your new life together."

Klink sent him the familiar look of despairing disgust that had characterized the last several years. "Thank you, Hogan. Thank you very much."