Her Second Chance: Treachery

Note and Disclaimer: Again, I don't own the characters to Hogan's Heroes nor do I own any of the songs I have posted. I would like to thank those who have created this series and those who have written these great songs. However, the character I have created, Colonel Michalovich, belongs to me, so if you want to use her, please email me with permission.

Again, I am continuing the story of Nikola Michalovich, so if you haven't read the first story, please do so before reading this on. For all who have read the first, remember: in the past, the Colonel has escaped humiliation, destroyed the rocket base and risen above her problems, for the most part. She's, all and all, almost happy and satisfied with her life at Stalag 13 and has accepted some of things that have happened in the past months of war and before then. What more can she ask for?


Journal of Colonel Nikola Anna Michalovich, U.S. Army: LC8547960
August 5, 1943
Hammelburg, Germany: Luftstalag 13, the Barracks – 1435 Hours

Well I never thought I'd make it here to Hollywood
I'd never thought I'd ever want to stay
But I seem to touch these days that turn to gold
What I seem to want, well, you know I'll find a way

For me, it's the only life that I've ever known
Love is only one fine star away
Even though the living is sometimes laced with lies – it's alright
The feeling remains even after the glitters fade…

Is this what I can come up with after so many months of captivity and empty unfeeling? These are the first lines I can come up with after dealing with all this anger and frustration? I'm longing for home in Bridgeport today. Hollywood? I've only been there once with Rob, when we went there as Desertstar. It was one of those nights the Generals had the decency to join the enlisted personal and the other "low life" of the army they considered despicable. They danced their hearts out with their extras, or, rare is the time, their wives, who came and watched them instead of waltzing to the music. Besides, why go to Hollywood when Bridgeport is still waiting for me and Rob to come back to?

Home is home and this place I'm in now can't possibly what I can say is home. It seems too fleeting and hopefully, we'll be out of there soon. But, instead of feeling as if this were the place where prisoners live, it's full of the people I want to be with. And yet, I am still at said camp, called Stalag 13 and not at my nightmare of Auschwitz, or even stateside, which was offered to me and declined with my conscience nagging at me. And I didn't mention to Rob about that yet. He would have yelled at me to take the chance, to leave, but he couldn't understand why.

From the beginnings of the war, my life has been an adventure and many people have joined me on this tour. The Fate of so many people I've known, during this journey from there to hell and then here, has been felt in my hands, even to this day. My mentor, G-d rest her soul, Major Nancy Donovan-White, has been executed in active duty by the Gestapo, location unknown, May 4, 1943. My mother, Victoria Marie Hozellenan, had been murdered by General Frederick Albert Hozellenan of the Russian Front, May 14, 1943; the latter was killed in an explosion later that evening. My eldest stepbrother, George Manfred von Rumey was killed by Major Hochstetter on the evening of May 6, 1943; my other stepbrothers, Werner Lothar and Kurt Martin von Rumey were killed in an explosion at the rocket base London wanted destroyed, June 19, 1943. All of those deaths were within a space of a month and a half and have hit me with such force that I still feel it today.

Yet, there are still others close to me that are still alive. My Father, now Soviet General Peter Alexis Michalovich of the Soviet Air Force (and possibly head of their Underground units as well, as far as I've figured) has been safely sent back to Russia and is still working on unknown activities. My partner, Colonel Robert E. Hogan (always Rob to me) is alive and well and still head of the operations underground here at Stalag 13. His main crew of men, Corporal Louis LeBeau, Staff Sergeant James Kinchloe, Corporal Peter Newkirk and Sergeant Andrew Carter, are also alive and deep into operations here as well. I am so grateful to all of them for everything that they have done for me. I wouldn't be alive if it hadn't been for all of them.

It was Rob's crew of four that presented this journal for my birthday last month, which I purposely hadn't told anyone of with much reason. Luckily for me, and with much gratitude, the day was spent concentrating on our mission in Paris and getting those plans from the Kraut Generals' dinner. It was only after our mission to Paris, which I attended with Kinchloe (Kinch to everyone), LeBeau (the last minute guide and French patriot) and Rob that Rob quietly mentioned the day to his men, in which case, I nearly killed him for. I mean, I had men coming up to me and saying, "Happy birthday, Miss Saucy Tongue!" Why mention something as small as that in the middle of a prison camp in the middle of a serious war? And worse, why use my nickname?

Rob's answer: "Well, Nikki, why not boost morale? I mean, come on. Do you want to let these poor, powerless men down?" We were arguing in the doorway of his quarters and all of the men were listening with ears full of gossip. I looked from Rob in the doorway of his quarters to the men outside his room, who, all purposely, on Rob's signal, gave me sad puppy dog faces. It was so funny I had to laugh: grown men giving me whiny faces like little children!

I consented, but asked that it be a small party because I've had enough of the big parties and explosions of happiness – there are people suffering out there in this war – and I had a headache that day that could have intensified with loud festivities. Naturally, instead of what I inquired, the party turned out to be bigger and louder than I thought it was going to be. Indeed, I had to endure a larger headache later in the evening, staying up most of the night nursing it.

I mean, it was at night with over fifty men asking me to dance to some music Kinch grabbed from the tunnels (the collection was large and some Kraut guards were suspicious as to where it all came from because none of it came in packages), plus Schultz, our guard, pestering me for food and a dance! This doesn't include the glorious food LeBeau cooked, our Kommandant Wilhelm Klink yelling at us about how we were disrupting him while he was working on important papers from Berlin and Major Hochstetter and the Gestapo breaking up the merrymaking upon their arrival with a radio transmitter. Apparently, they had found some radio messages from London in the area and wanted to catch us red-handed, as Hochstetter is very persistent in his searches, especially here. Oy vey!

During the party, before all the festivities ceased on the orders of the Gestapo, the men presented me with this gift of a journal, which of course I am writing in now. It was leather bound (rare to find) and had many, many pages of paper in it (Kinch must have sacrificed most of it from the radio room because most resemble his blue stationery). I could add paper to this edition and could take out anything, especially those pieces I don't want the Gestapo to see. Each edition or chunk can be stored away as I have been known to write too much.

Anyway, the party was broken up by Hochstetter, who had come on business with Klink. The radio transmitter said it all, though ("Klink, what is going on here? What are these prisoners doing?"). Here afterward, we were all confined to the barracks on the orders of Major Hochstetter because a party was against prisoner of war rules and Klink should have stopped it. Of course, Rob got Klink out of trouble by saying that when Klink was yelling in the doorway, he was breaking up our party and that he didn't know about it in the first place. And this made Hochstetter angrier, hence the order of confinement to the barracks. Our supply of food was pretty low, especially after the party because the Gestapo guards overturned the tables of food, which created a fury of rage in LeBeau that Rob ordered Kinch, Carter and Newkirk hold him back before he was shot and killed. Schultz couldn't go out to get supplies because that too was against regulations. We couldn't go out down to the tunnels for supplies for we were being watched closely by the Gestapo (it doesn't include the radio transmitter they installed here). There was also a guard in the barracks all hours of the day and night. They were always armed and having roll call at least eight times a day. It doesn't count the three at night plus the harassing bedchecks I've had.

One night, I went out of my mind when I saw that a Gestapo guard snuck into Rob's quarters and had come into my bed (I still call it Rob's quarters because Klink hasn't seen able to find a decent room for me, for if he did, he'd have to double up barracks and I don't want a hut to myself or any men complaining about how they had to move for my benefit). He was silent and pointed a gun at my head, just to keep me quiet. He then took out something and gagged with that something – a large handkerchief. The guard then shoved me down my bunk and put his gun down. I somehow managed to get him off of me (I still don't know how, I was struggling so hard) and screamed for bloody hell, muffled, through the handkerchief.

Rob jumped off his bunk immediately (he thought I was having another nightmare) and said in his drowsy voice as he turned the lights on, "Nikki, what the hell is wrong now?" When he saw the guard with the lights on, however, everything started to change. Rob pulled me immediately from the bunk to the other side of the room and untied the gag as the men (Rob's crew of four and some random groaning men in their bunks behind them) opened the door and came in and asked what was wrong this time. The scene before them explained all and before I knew it, Kinch had knocked the German guard out temporarily.

Afterward, Newkirk, Kinch, LeBeau and Carter had to watch me as Rob went to complain in Klink's quarters. After Rob tried to get out of the barracks, however, the guard ran behind him with a gun to his back, his unconscious state gone (Kinch thought he hit him hard enough). He threatened in German that one wrong move and that he was a dead prisoner (we learned later that this was a setup between the guards and Hochstetter). Of course, with security tight because of our lovely Major Hochstetter, Rob was almost shot as he exited the barracks to go to Klink's office even with the sentry holding him hostage.

From Rob's lodgings, I heard shooting and Rob yelling about surrendering. He hit the ground, knocking over a barrel of water and it just happened to be the one with the periscope (it was underground and covered so the barrel only rolled and the water splashed out). Only Schultz, who was on duty and stopping those trigger happy Gestapo monsters (thank G-d), was able to get him to Klink's office and back to the barracks afterward without any more trouble. The guard was, meanwhile, accidentally shot but not dead (it serves that bastard right). Rob, meanwhile, was not hurt. He was there, in Klink's quarters, for over two hours and has had no luck in getting that guard apprehended, of which by that time, he was taken to a hospital.

"Are you all right?" Rob asked me as soon as he came back. I was so scared that I could only nod. I was sitting at his desk and was too frightened to move while the men surrounded me. It was more than just the usual crew of four for many men from our barracks were angry about this and armed themselves with whatever we prisoners could have (mostly pots and pans, although Jerkins, LeBeau's assistant, had taken an old piece of wood out of our stove, burnt as it was at the ends).

Newkirk was behind me at that time, holding a blanket over my shoulders and rubbing them even as I winced with each roll to my right. The others, who sat silently at my bunk and around the quarters, could only stare out with anger in their eyes and murder in their minds. "I don't think the gov'ness has 'ad the final 'ord yet," Newkirk said, rubbing my shoulders still.

Indeed, I had not. This was not the end of it, either.

And of course, the Gestapo denied everything even as Rob complained, through Klink of course, that it violates the Geneva Convention and all moral standards secularly and religiously (I could personally care less about that but that it stops). When I started to formally criticize this inhumane practice to Klink the day after it happened with Rob rightfully behind me on this (he was complaining about it before and called me in to testify), however, Hochstetter became angry, as he heard it through the grapevine. He ordered that Rob and I be put in solitary confinement for two days, no food, water or anything…in separate cells.

I was so worried about Rob, because I knew about Gestapo tortures all too well, that I cried on the first day, which I don't usually do. It was Schultz (ever the humanitarian) that saved the both of us again. He guarded us and our barracks that time. And that first day, he saw my tears as he checked on me that evening and said, "Colonel, ANY-THING you want, I get." I was jumping for joy. Schultz saved the day again!

It was only Schultz that snuck us food, water and a (only one) piece of paper to message each other on the last day of confinement because I asked him. It was my only request other than water and food, as he offered more but I declined.

I was the first to write to Rob, and I didn't know what I could write without it being twisted by the Gestapo if it landed in the wrong hands. I thought for a while until I figured out what I could say (I mean, anything can be perverted by the Gestapo, so if Hochstetter saw this, let him fiddle with it as if it's a code): If anyone falls in love, it would be done to us. If anyone falls in love somewhere, twilight, dreamtime, somewhere in the back of your mind.

Rob's reply was immediate and Schultz brought to me as soon as he could (I heard an exchange with Hochstetter outside of my cell and Schultz kept his secrets well). And I never known the words, but I have tried to be true. I have never known what to say, how to say it, seen anything today…I've never seen anything like you.

After those two days, Klink had us confined to quarters for the remainder of the day for Hochstetter was still around and a thorn in our sides. By the end of the day, Hochstetter had left with his radio transmitter, although it didn't find anything, much to Hochstetter's dismay and disappointment (I guess the promotion isn't coming in soon enough). It was dismantled at the camp even.

The threat was gone for a while. I knew that Hochstetter will be back, however, and very shortly. It was just a matter of time.

This has been what I've had to deal with as of late. In between running on those missions for London and the Underground, I am drained and running on nothing but my own stubborn determination to survive in Nazi Germany. I've had no time to write anything for the month since I've had this journal because I've been empty of words. I can't even think about all of this and all I do is concentrate on the bugs around the camp and the happenings of the Kraut army (one and the same thing). After all this and so many narrow escapes from Hochstetter, I deserve this rest.

Alas, there is never any rest for the weary. And so it goes onward, such as yesterday.