I do not own any of the characters from the series Hogan's Heroes or the animated series Minuscule. However, I claim ownership of any original characters appearing in this story.
Continuing the series which began with my story, "The big ones don't bite", and continued magnificently in konarciq's sequel, "The Little Ones Do Bite".
The layout of Hochstetter's office conforms to the third season episode "Sergeant Schultz Meets Mata Hari".
It was watching him again.
With an almost superhuman effort of will, he kept his eyes on the open file on his desk, while reaching surreptitiously for the ruler in his top drawer. His muscles contracted in readiness, then he launched himself sideways, sending his heavy, ornately carved chair crashing to the floor.
The ruler slammed against the wall, exactly where the enemy had been crouched only a moment earlier. But the creature had already retreated to its lair behind the portrait of Hitler which held pride of place over the desk.
Frustrated, Major Hochstetter flung the ruler down on the desk, just the door flew open and the SS man on duty outside rushed in. "Was ist los, Herr Major?"
"Nothing," snapped Hochstetter. "Nothing except that this verdammt chair fell over. Don't just stand there, fool, pick it up!"
Geisler hastened to set the chair back on its legs. "Bitte, Herr Major," he said tentatively, "was it the spider?"
The major responded with a low-pitched growl: "Get back to your post."
He sat down again, and tried to immerse himself in his Stalag 13 dossier; but the hairs on the back of his neck continued to prickle, as if tiny arachnid feet were pattering across his skin. His shoulders twitched at the memory.
Spiders. A horde of them, erupting from a footlocker which seemed too small to contain such a living, scuttling mass of tiny eight-legged horrors. Even now, he still sometimes woke at night in a cold, terrified sweat as the horrors of the invasion burst from his subconscious to take over his dreams.
They had called in experts to deal with the situation; but by the time they had arrived, the entire brood, along with their monstrous parent, had escaped. But if Hochstetter had dared assume he'd seen the last of them, he would have been a fool. At least one had returned.
Or maybe not. This one was different. As far as he remembered (and even trying to call them back from the locked cabinet of unwanted memory made him hyperventilate) his original assailants had been grey-brown in colour, with sturdy, jointed limbs too long for their little segmented bodies. The current unwelcome presence took the form of a round hairy black blob, skulking around on eight spindly legs which seemed scarcely strong enough to support it. So perhaps this one had nothing to do with the previous incident at all. That thing hiding behind the Führer might be a lone operative, not part of the other band of terrorists.
Somehow, he took no comfort in this idea.
Enough of this. He shook his head, as if to dislodge the unsettling thoughts lurking in the dark corners of his mind, and turned his attention to his other adversary: Colonel Hogan, the senior officer of the prisoners of war at Stalag 13.
A high-pitched, irregular buzzing intruded on his concentration, drawing his attention to the ceiling. A fly had found its way into his office, and was now making a full reconnaissance of the area. He watched as it circled around, swooping down to investigate the impossibly lush and overgrown potted fern standing against the wall, before finally settling on the glass shade of his desk lamp. Irritably, he waved it away, only to have it return to the exact same spot.
"Bah!" he growled.
There was a pitcher of water standing on a small table by the window. He stood up, and went to pour himself a glassful. As he turned back, he froze.
The spider had emerged from its hiding place, drawn out by the prospect of a hearty meal. It had scuttled up to the ceiling, to a point directly above the lamp, where its prey was now cleaning its wings, apparently unaware of its immediate peril. Slowly, the spider descended, hanging from a thin, almost invisible thread, until it was barely a foot above its victim. It paused, as if bracing itself, then suddenly dropped the last few inches. But the fly had already taken off.
For a few seconds, the spider lay splayed out across the curve of the glass, then it slowly slid down the slope, and landed on the desk, while the fly zigzagged up towards the ceiling. It seemed impossible, yet Hochstetter could have sworn he heard a faint, malicious chuckle.
Nonsense. I must be going crazy.
He put down the glass, with enough force to splash water all around, and strode to the door. Geisler, still on guard outside, came to attention at once.
"I am going home," snapped Hochstetter. "Have my car brought to the front door."
Geisler saluted and hurried away, while the major went back into the office to collect his briefcase. He hesitated briefly over the open dossier on his desk, but decided to leave it, at least in part because he wasn't certain whether the spider had taken refuge between its pages.
For once, he would leave his work behind. A good night's rest was what he needed, and that was what he was going to get. At least, as long as he didn't dream...
The clock tower across the square chimed the hour: two o'clock. Major Hochstetter tossed uneasily in his sleep. A single moonbeam had found the gap between his curtains to shine with insistent brightness on his closed eyelids. He blinked them open, and peered around, disoriented by the abstract patterns of shadow and light which defined his surroundings.
The room seemed familiar, and yet strange, as though a place he knew well had somehow been twisted into a new shape; or rather, as though he was seeing it from an impossible angle. He focussed on one particular shape which seemed to be suspended above him, its curved surface glinting green in the silvery light.
Gradually his perspective shifted, as he recognised the glass shade of his desk lamp; not hanging overhead, but standing where it always stood, on the left-hand side of the desk in his office at Gestapo headquarters, while he looked down on it from a position high on the wall, close to the ceiling.
How did I get here? He couldn't remember, but here he was, clinging by some means (and with what felt like a surplus quantity of appendages) to a perpendicular surface, staring at a room he knew well but hardly recognised. No doubt it was his unusual vantage point which made everything seem so distant, and so much bigger than normal; an effect heightened by the silvery moonlight pouring through the window.
It was puzzling. More than that, it was deeply suspicious. Whatever had happened to him, he must investigate at once. He started forward; stopped, disconcerted by the scratching of his feet - all eight of them - against the panelling; then set off again, determined to get to the bottom of this.
He had a feeling he knew who was responsible. Well, this time his foe had gone too far. It was time to bring the swaggering oaf to account; and Hochstetter, making his way down the wall, allowed his imagination free rein as he planned his revenge.
So distracted was this pleasant mental exercise, that when something whizzed past he almost tumbled off the wall. He steadied himself, and peered around. The hum of its wings faded, then grew louder as it came around for a second pass. He hunkered down; the fly swept past, much too close for comfort, then headed for the potted fern, where it landed on a convenient frond and began grooming itself.
Now I have you, he thought grimly.
A single leap brought him to the desktop. He took cover behind the thick dossier which lay on the left-hand side; then scrambled over the top, and darted to the base of the lamp, where he paused to reconnoitre. Then he crept to the edge of the desk; assessed the distance from here to the target; gathered himself together, jumped...and missed.
As he plummeted towards the floor, one of his wildly flailing legs somehow managed to catch hold of one of the lower fronds. He wrapped every available limb around this unexpected lifeline, which bowed under his weight, so slowly that he had time to wonder whether he was really heavy enough, or the fern elastic enough, for it to stretch so far downwards. But before he could work this out, the frond reached its limit, hung inert for a millisecond, then snapped back, catapulting its unwilling passenger across the room. He sailed over the desk in a perfectly beautiful arc, directly towards the water jug on its little table by the window.
Not again, he thought, as he plunged into the water, turned cephalothorax over abdomen, and sank like a rock.
Then, just before he hit the bottom, he gave a shuddering gasp, flung his arms out and sat bolt upright, his eyes wide open, fully awake.
No water; and the moonlight was long gone. He stared into the darkness, breathing hard, his heart pounding against his ribs. It took almost a minute for him to realise where he was.
"Foolishness!" he growled at last; thumped his pillow into shape, and lay down; but he got no more sleep that night.
"Guten Morgen, Herr Major."
Geisler was on sentry duty outside Hochstetter's office as usual. In spite of all discouragement, he still persisted in being polite and amiable; he would never be a real SS man. Hochstetter ignored him, and went on into his office, slamming the door.
He peered around, eyes narrowed, then went to the desk, pausing beside the potted fern to tug at one of the fronds. It didn't stretch, of course; why should it?
He sat down, and was just about to open the dossier which still lay on the desk, right where it had been all night, when the buzzing of wings drew his eyes to the ceiling. Sure enough, the fly was still there, circling round as if it had nothing better to do; and yes, there was the spider, perched on the frame of the Hitler portrait. As Hochstetter watched, it raised its front legs, readied itself to leap on its prey, changed its tiny mind at the last minute, teetered violently, and fell off the frame. For a moment it dangled at the end of its anchoring thread, then ascended rapidly and disappeared behind the painting.
Hochstetter allowed himself a tiny, sardonic smile. The creature still made his flesh crawl; but he could not deny the hint of sympathetic fellow-feeling. There was one point at which the two of them had a lot in common.
"Never mind, little friend," he said softly. "Today may not be your day. But there is always tomorrow, or the next day. Just be patient. Sooner or later, our time will come."
But from overhead, a faint cackle of laughter, real or imagined, told him their mutual foe thought otherwise.