LJ Groundwater
But My Name's Not Sue!
Stay calm... stay calm... there's nothing here that you can't handle... nothing that you can't... oh my gawd, I'm soooo scared. No, okay... that's not going to help.
I put my hands down and they immediately come up cold. And damp. Yuk; what am I sitting on? I stand up and wipe my hands on the back of my jeans. Wish I'd brought a jacket, I think, rubbing my hands up and down my bare arms. Darn my eternal love of tee-shirts. But then, that's what I always wear when it's hot. And Washington, DC., is a hot place in May.
So why don't I feel like I'm in Washington?
I stand still for a minute, wondering how my logical head is going to get me in trouble this time. I try to think back to what I was doing when I suddenly ended up in the dark. I was in one of my favorite places in the world... the nation's capital... on my own in the National Archives... surrounded by nothing but books and photos and all those wonderful things that make life so exciting... I was just looking at photos and following my investigative nose from one item to another and then... POOF!
Well, it wasn't so much of a poof as it was a plop, and a downright uncomfortable one at that. Not to mention inconvenient. I'm supposed to be back at work at four o'clock tomorrow morning.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit nervous. It's almost completely dark in here, and there doesn't seem to be anyone around... and oh, God, what if there are bugs? Furry things I can handle, but bugs? Bugs like these damp, disgusting places... wherever this one happens to be. Maybe I fell down the stairs to the basement of the building. But I wasn't near the stairs….
I back up slightly out of sheer nervousness and hit something solid with my back. I turn around and feel for it as my eyes work to adjust. This is a... this is a ladder!
My nervousness takes a slight turn toward excitement. Ladder—up and out! I have no idea how I ended up in this basement, but I'm getting out... now! I grab hold of two rungs and slowly start to pull myself up, blessing the very uncool sneakers that I almost always wear instead of trendy shoes, and I only get a couple of feet up, when I hear a noise from above me, and a small trail of dirt comes down and hits me in the face.
Muffled voices reach my ears. I stop and try to make myself look small, even though I'm not very big to start with, and slim on top of that, and I hold my breath. Suddenly there's a shaft of light and hurried footsteps. Shoot, there's someone coming! I've gotta get off of this ladder! I try to move with the noise from above so I can't be heard, and I scramble to the floor and back up against the wall, hating the mere idea of what might be crawling on it—and therefore onto my shirt.
There are two people descending, I see, and I don't like the sound of them. "Move it, Andrew!" one of them says from above the other.
"I'm going as fast as I can!" answers Andrew, who then drops, surefooted, to the floor.
His partner, whose English accent was quite distinct, lands beside him as the light from above disappears. I stay perfectly still as the pair move around, obviously comfortable with their surroundings and in the darkness. What kind of trouble will I get into if I'm found in the private basement of the National Archives?
The beam of a flashlight pierces the darkness, and I try not to gasp out loud. But these two are still hanging around, and I have to breathe eventually, so I let out a tiny breath, then catch myself again.
Darn, it was enough! The beam swings in my direction. I duck down low and it narrowly misses me. "Did you hear that, Carter?" asks the Englishman again.
My brain suddenly connects the two names. Andrew. Carter. And the voice. English. And the darkness. Not a basement, but a tunnel. And the light—not from the National Archives; from outside.
It all happens in a split second. I'm in a tunnel under Stalag 13—I'm in Nazi Germany in the middle of World War Two! I'm with Hogan's Heroes!
I'm losing my mind!
No, no, no, no. This doesn't happen. I mean it doesn't. I've spent a lot of time reading about Mary Sues and people inserting themselves into stories. Fiction stories. Hogan's Heroes is fiction. It is. I'm not there. I can't be. It makes no sense. And yet—
The flashlight swings again and hits me right in the hot air balloon in the middle of my shirt. "Well, well, well. What have we got here?" The dry sarcasm in the voice is unmistakable, and even though I can't see him, I know exactly who I'm dealing with. Please, God, let Newkirk be as understanding deep inside as I've written him to be!
What am I saying?
Silence being the better part of fear, I decide to stay quiet for the moment. I don't think I really have any right to say anything right now, and really, I'm more than a tiny bit scared. I know these are good men (okay, at least they're good men on television and in the stories I've written—and read!), but since I'm not sure any of this is quite real, I'd better not take any chances. And besides, what can I really say?
I think I gulped. "This one doesn't look too dangerous," Newkirk says. I feel relieved. "But you never can tell—Carter, cover me," he adds. I gulp again as Newkirk—Corporal Peter Newkirk, RAF, I remind myself—moves in and waves the flashlight in my face. I blink in the light, but I'm still speechless. "Where do you come from?" he asks, with just the tiniest bit of menace in his voice. Okay, maybe a bit more than that. But who wants to think Newkirk is going to have a go at me?
"Uh—Washington," I say finally. Thank God at least I said that clearly. American accent, see, boys?
"Washington," Newkirk repeats. "You hear that, Carter? This bird just dropped down from the States to have supper and a chat with us. Isn't that nice?"
"Come on, Newkirk; she looks lost, and we don't even know who she is." Andrew Carter—Little Deer Who Runs Swift and Sure Through Forest—comes forward. I can almost see his reassuring eyes. "Hey, can you tell us your name?"
"I'm Annette," I say.
Carter smiles. Bless him. "That's a nice name," he says.
I nearly blurt out, "Oh, I'm so glad it's just you guys!" when Newkirk deflates my mood: "Yeah, and so is Mata Hari," he comments. "We'd better take her upstairs to the Colonel."
"Colonel Hogan?" I ask.
Newkirk's eyes narrow. Whoops. But I expect no less of him. "You know the Colonel?" he asks, now even more suspicious. He takes me by an arm, I struggle a bit to free myself and he eventually satisfies himself with the knowledge that he's bigger than I am and can probably catch me if I take off. "Come on, let's go."
I walk with what could pass as confidence down the tunnel, trying to take in my surroundings as the light increases and we get closer to the radio area. I'm trying to take in that this is all real now—that all these places that I wrote so carefully about, that I watched so often on television—do truly exist. I look left and see a cot with a blanket tossed carelessly over it. I look right and see a small table with a rickety-looking wooden chair in front of it, a radio with lots of switches, a table microphone (almost like the one I use at work!), a couple of pairs of headsets, a clipboard with a roughly sharpened lead pencil on it—and a little stack of blue paper neatly clipped inside it.
And then, there's the ladder. Oh, God. I'm excited, but I'm a bit nervous. Without waiting for directions, I start up the ladder and get as far as the second rung before Newkirk physically stops me. "Hey, there, where do you think you're going?"
Time to give him a bit of reality—wow, does that sound weird considering where I am! "You said you want me to see Colonel Hogan. Well, he's upstairs in the barracks, right? At the very least, he'll be out in the yard. So let's go!" For some reason, as much as I think this will be absolutely thrilling, part of me is totally petrified. Please stop me... please stop me...
But Newkirk merely exchanges glances with Carter and nods. "I'll go first," he decides. I can't argue with that, so I hop back down, and Newkirk leads the way after warning Carter to keep a close eye on me as he brings up the rear.
And suddenly, there I am, in the middle of Barracks Two. I can't even begin to explain the feeling that washes over me—the familiarity of everything is so comforting, so... joyous. There is the table, the benches. There is Newkirk and Carter's bunk. There is the stove—with Le Beau standing there, in his torn red sweater, cooking at it! There's the sink. There's Kinch at one of the lockers, tall and handsome, with that brilliant moustache. And there—oh, good heavens—there is the door to Colonel Hogan's office. Closed.
The look on my face must tell them something, because all of a sudden, Kinch is practically on top of me. "What's this all about?" he asks Newkirk and Carter, who have not yet left my side. I can't take my eyes off him—even when I hear the bunk behind me fall back into place and I am so tempted to turn around and see it happen for real. He has a real command presence that strikes me. Something that doesn't get mentioned often enough on the series or in the writing, I realize.
"We found her in the tunnel when we came back in," Carter says. "Her name is Annette."
"And she's...?"
"She says she's from Washington."
Kinch and Le Beau exchange looks. "Washington?" Kinch repeats. Why does everyone do that? "London didn't tell us anything about any visitors."
"And she knows about Colonel Hogan," Newkirk adds, distrust all over his face.
"She is a spy," Le Beau says with a sneer. He turns his back on me and goes back to his cooking.
"How do you know that?" Carter asks.
"Hmf—just look at the way she is dressed. What woman walks around in clothes like that?"
I'm offended. I wasn't expecting to be wandering into the middle of Stalag 13, after all. And I didn't realize that POW camps were black-tie affairs. And being a spy means I'm not a woman? "I'm dressed just fine for where I was supposed to be, thank you," I say before I can stop myself. The room pretty well silences at that. I reconsider my position. "I mean... I didn't expect to come to Stalag 13 today, Corporal Le Beau," I reply.
Le Beau's eyebrows arch as I say his name with no introduction. "She is a spy," he repeats coldly, and turns away. "Let le Colonel deal with her."
With Kinch nearby, Newkirk has headed toward the Colonel's office and knocks on the door. It opens, and when Robert Hogan steps out I'm left nearly breathless.
God help me, he does exist.
He comes out, and when Newkirk murmurs something to him and he looks at me, the expression on Colonel Hogan's face becomes understandably (though disappointingly) slightly less than pleased under his familiar crush cap. I always wanted one of those, I think irrelevantly. I don't dare say it as he takes in and lets out a heavy breath. "Great," he says. "That's just great." I knew you were going to say that, I think, forcing a tiny smile not to curve the edges of my lips. He crosses his arms in front of his chest. "What's this?"
"She's a spy," Le Beau says for the third time. He's starting to get on my nerves.
"She says she's come from Washington," Carter explains, again.
I wait for Colonel Hogan to repeat that (funny, I can't think of him as "Hogan," as I do when I'm writing!), but he doesn't. Instead, he nods slowly. And I can't help thinking that he looks tired. A small part of me can't help wondering if I'm partly responsible for that—when I've been writing what I thought was his character, I have tended to run him around a bit…. But then I think, Heck, if he's real, then nothing I write will affect him anyway!... Right?
"We've got roll call in a couple of minutes," he says. "Get her out of sight and get her changed. If she's spotted, she'll need to try to fit in." He looks over at Le Beau. "Le Beau—get her one of your shirts and a pair of pants. She's closest to your size. It'll work for now, anyway."
I look at the French Corporal, whose immediate protest is cut off by the Colonel's firm voice. "There's no time to argue, Le Beau; just do it. When roll call's finished we'll get on the horn to London to sort this out once and for all."
LJ Groundwater's notes: The reason I chose the name "Annette" is when I was a child I thought it would be the most wonderful thing in the world to be named Annette... yeah... like Annette Funicello.
I DO love Washington, it's one of my favorite places in the whole wide world.
I did work with those old microphones, when I worked in radio.
I am about Le Beau size-- maybe an inch and a half more, but not much else.
And... the reason he doesn't seem to like me, is that every time I talk to someone new about the biography, they ask me if I've spoken with Robert Clary, tell me how wonderful he is, then tell me he must not understand the project... but that he can be tough to get around to... obviously, I'm one of those people!
And... I do have a bit of a mouth, but only when pushed. And if I DO push when I shouldn't... I tend to apologize, at least in some small way. And like most people, I suspect, I do think totally irrelevant thoughts at the most inappropriate times!
