Hogan awoke with a start in his bunk.
Sitting up, he tried to remember what had so viciously woke him, but whatever his dreams may have been eluded him.
Knock Knock Knock
His door inched open and LeBeau leaned his head in, looking worried.
"Colonel Hogan, some Bosch truck just pulled into camp! They've got escorts, guards, everything!"
Hogan's drowsiness let the words sink in. Quickly, he quipped:
"Didn't they know we close our doors at eight? We aren't an all-night truck stop, you know."
"Guess they didn't get the memo." Lebeau scoffed, leaving Hogan to his own devices.
A few moments later everyone was huddled around Hogan at the barrack sink, the one they had converted into a makeshift periscope. Carter took his typical position watching the door. Peering through the assortment of gritty lenses, Hogan watched as several SS officers stormed into Klink's office.
"Whaddya reckon they're doing here so early?" Carter asked.
"I don't know, but they look angry. They certainly aren't here to ask for directions to the nearest bed and breakfast." Hogan answered as he pushed the scope back down into its false spot as a faucet.
He rushed back into his bunk room, and plugged in the coffee pot. It burbled to life and the voice of Klink and Hochstetter could be heard.
"-don't know anything about it! This is absurd, you can't come in here and-"
"AND what, Klink? Accuse you of harboring spies? Because as far as we can tell, you could very well be charged with espionage yourself."
"E- Espionage?"
"Yes Klink, the points of interest where the saboteurs struck all triangulate to this very camp."
The third voice finally spoke, the other SS officer.
"We have received reports of prisoners in various uniforms entering and exiting your camp at will. A hive of underground activity apparently originates from this location..."
"That's preposterous!" Klink scoffed. "My record stands for itself. No escapes! Not one!"
Hochstetter snorted.
"Klink, we have a folder this big on you... I also have orders that any resistance will be met with the harshest of punishments."
Hogan could feel Klink retreating into his chair.
"We are going to investigate you, your men, and your prisoners, Klink. I would advise you to start preparing."
"...My camp is your camp," Klink weakly responded.
"I'm glad we could finally reach this conclusion, Kom-man-dant!" Hochstetter sneered.
Some shuffling could be heard, and an unmistakable plodding footstep could be heard entering Klink's office.
"Herr Kommandant! Herr Kommandant! Oh, pardon me. There's a truck that just came in through the front ga-"
Silence. Schultz had probably just realized who Klink was speaking with.
"Oh. I... guess you already know."
"What seems to be the problem, Sergeant?" Hochstetter mused.
"Well," Schultz began, "I was standing guard out by the front gate, when I heard-"
"Shut up Sergeant!" Hochstetter screamed.
Hogan started heading out the door, but Newkirk stopped him.
"Colonel, what are we going to do about our operation? What if they've got us figured out?"
Hogan looked at all the men, standing around the coffee pot like friends at a pool hall.
"We can't afford to risk getting seized, so prepare to pack up and scuttle everything."
LeBeau piped up, followed by Carter.
"What about you?"
"Yeah, we can make it out, but-"
"Don't worry about me," Hogan interrupted. "I'll figure something out. First I have to see how much they've figured out."
Hogan brisked by Hilda's front desk and proceeded to fling the door open in his usual, overtly clumsy manner.
"Kommandant! I wanted to ask you about- Oh, hi there fellas, I was wondering who parked the trucks out front."
Hochstetter didn't even bother turning around.
"What is THIS man doing HERE!"
Klink jumped at Hochstetter's sudden outburst. He looked over at Hogan, obviously displeased that he would barge in at such an inopportune time.
"Hogan! You are supposed to be confined to barracks! Schultz!"
Schultz, previously off in his own imagination, snapped back to attention.
"Take this man and throw him into the cooler!" Klink blurted.
"Wait, Klink." Hochstetter added.
Klink looked puzzled, and Hogan visibly became worried about what he had gotten himself into.
Hochstetter turned to Hogan.
"You are the senior ranking P-O-W officer here, correct?"
"Indeed."
Hochstetter smirked.
"Send him back to the barracks, as far as his involvement tonight is concerned... it doesn't matter. You will receive your punishment in due time, Hogan."
Hogan would have quipped back in his normal fashion, but something seemed off about Hochstetter, if only for a moment. That last statement... It seemed forced, as if Hochstetter himself didn't even know he had said it. Hogan quickly dismissed it.
Schultz shrugged and tapped Hogan on the shoulder. Walking together, Schultz and Hogan exited through Klink's door, then through Hilda's office, and back out into the inky blackness of the night. Schultz dropped him off at his barracks, then returned to his post.
"So, anything I miss on the romantic walk back?" Hogan asked as he breezed in through the door.
Kinchloe spoke up.
"They didn't speak about too many specifics, but they did mention calling in reinforcements."
"Reinforcements? Guess they want to do some digging again."
"Think they'll find anything?" LeBeau questioned.
"I doubt it," Hogan replied. "They never found our tunnels before, even when they suspected this camp like they do now."
"What about all the additions we've made since then?" Kinchloe added.
"Just for safe measure, bury them."
All the men let out collective sighs and muttering, as even during wartime back-breaking work was a pain.
An hour or two had passed when more noises could be heard outside. Trucks were coming in, likely the reinforcements that had been mentioned previously. Carter, stationed at the door, ran to the tunnel entrance and called down.
"Reinforcements incoming! Krauts everywhere!"
Hogan and his men were down in the tunnel, covered in soot and dirt from dismantling most of their tunnel network.
"What do we do now, Colonel?" Newkirk piped up.
"We should be fine if they don't get any wise ideas. Everybody get up topside and changed ASAP."
As they were gathering outside for morning roll call, Hochstetter's veritable regiment of SS troops could be seen on the fringes of the camp, combing every inch for traces of suspicious activity. That wasn't the most worrying aspect, however.
Hochstetter seemed happy the whole time, slotted in behind and to the right of Klink as they stood in the morning sun.
Klink began one of his usual canned anti-escape speeches that he had fallen back on whenever he was nervous, about how the prisoners could not escape no matter how much they wished, that usual hogwash. He then strangely changed the subject to something new.
"Changes are coming to this camp, changes that you men may find...difficult. If you think of escaping before these changes are made, you'd be best to forget it. By tomorrow morning's roll call, this camp will be an entirely different animal! I expect to see all of you in the morning!" He then looked at Hochstetter for some sign of approval.
Hochstetter simply smirked back at him.
Later that night, Hogan convened with his men in their barracks, with a few other men coming in from various barracks around the camp. Questions abounded as the men worried about Klink's cryptic message. Hogan stood in the center of them all, underneath the hanging lamp they often used for playing cards.
"Men, you all heard what Klink had to say this morning. All of today's signs we've seen from both Klink and Hochstetter show that nothing good is going to be happening to us over the next couple of days."
"What signs, sir?" one of them asked.
Hogan looked at him for a moment, then sighed.
"Hochstetter was smiling. Do you remember the last few times that Hochstetter smiled?"
Newkirk chimed in, "Got bloody close to being discovered, we did."
"Right. Something in Hochstetter's smirk told me that we may have finally outstayed our welcome here."
The men stood silent, looking at one another. They could tell that Hogan was just as disturbed as they were.
"We're going to be clearing out tonight, so rest up until after bed checks and then pack up all your belongings."
The men showed mixed reactions to the news, some happy that they would be moving on, others lamenting that they would have to leave their friends. Hogan walked back to his room, and closed the door behind.
With the allies getting ever closer to where Stalag 13 was located, it was only a matter of time before something in the system would change. Still, usually they would leave the prisoners behind and abandon the camps, last he had heard. This whole setup was unusual, and that's what really bothered him.
They knew something big, and Hochstetter wasn't going to let any of these potential rebels slip out of his grasp this time. What that grasp entailed was the real question at hand.
Cold.
Hogan felt a stabbing cool breeze against his face.
Looking around, Hogan could see the outlines of tree branches and stumps, bushes and small shrubs forming large masses between them. Many of them were covered in snow, a very pretty, if eerie sight. The moon lit everything around him a dim blue glow, glinting faintly off of snow drifts in the night.
Voices. Shouting. Light.
Wheeling around, Hogan heard the sounds of men shouting in German. Peering into the thicket, beams of light shook and danced in every direction as dark-clothed soldiers trudged through the woods behind him. Some were even calling his name, in a heavily-broken German accent. Hogan stepped back from the shrub, afraid that he would be seen too quickly.
snap
Hogan looked down at his feet, a broken branch lying limp on either side of his right foot. For a moment, all was quiet.
CRACK
Bullets began whizzing through the shrubbery, and Hogan wasted no time in exiting as fast as his legs could take him. His heart was racing. His mind was completely blank. The only thing he could think about was how far away he could get from the bullets.
He ran through the woods for what seemed like hours, his heartbeat growing louder by the second. At first start, it was barely noticeable. Now it was pounding inside his skull, clawing at his eardrums and pressurizing his face and limbs with every pump.
Lights in the distance. Hope after all.
Hogan was approaching some kind of small town or village. Hogan vaulted over a fence, then another one, using hay bales to cover his line-of-sight to anyone behind him. Another row of trees lay between himself and the village.
Hogan leapt forward through the trees with all his remaining strength, but something was off. His right foot didn't come forward with him. He had tripped over a tall root. Was all this for nothing? Was he simply to die at the outskirts of freedom? More gunshots!
whiiiIIIZZTHUD
Everything went dark.
Knock Knock Knock
Hogan awoke with a start again. Two nights in a row, not unheard of but definitely uncommon.
He turned around, expecting one of his men to poke his head in through the door. Maybe they had good news, that Hochstetter had gotten a call from Berlin or that Klink had annoyed him enough to make him leave.
Nothing.
The air was as still as that of a tomb. Not a peep of activity could be heard outside. Fearing the worst, Hogan quietly tossed his bed sheet aside and lowered himself onto the floor. A faint glow was emanating from his window which silhouetted most of the objects in his room.
Something was off about the light.
It was a pale grayish hue, not unlike that of the searchlights around the camp's border. It sat in his window, casting itself with some weight on Hogan's desk and cabinet.
Knock Knock Knock
The knocking again. The first one caught Hogan off guard, but by the last hollow rap he located where it was coming from: His standing locker.
What on earth was going on? Should the others be around? Surely they too would have heard the knocking, it was loud enough to roust Hogan from the nightmare he so desperately wanted to leave! Hogan quietly approached the wooden frame and reached out to grab the handles, preparing to fling the doors open to get the jump on whoever may be inside. Hogan hated jokes in bad taste. Then he froze.
His hands had just grasped the locker handles, but a sharp, piercing chill ran up his spine, one like he had never felt before. It might have been cold outside with snow blowing down on the camp, but not even the winter gusts were this freezing! Hogan's hands and arms were locked in place and he couldn't let go of the handles. The only thing he could do was lean backwards, but that would also open the locker.
What had made it so damn cold? Had the men put ice inside? This prank was really going too far now, and Hogan was getting angry. He leaned back quickly, almost falling backwards in the process. The doors flew open and his hands were suddenly free again.
Crea-KNOCK-knock
The doors came to be still as Hogan regained his balance. He was looking down at the floor, and he raised his gaze slowly towards the now-open locker.
It was empty.
"Wha- What?" Hogan sputtered. Impossible. Absolutely impossible. It most definitely sounded like a man was knocking inside that cabinet, it was loud enough to wake him up! There was nothing inside, save for a few scattered papers and posters. Hogan stepped forward to take a closer look.
He quickly poked the handles again. They had returned to the familiar metallic cold that everything seemed to be during the winter, nothing strange at all. Looking in, the locker was indeed empty: He had already packed all his clothes and belongings, only leaving a few unnecessary posters behind. Nothing else was left. Hogan checked the inner panel where he had once kept the map of the West Wall, assembled in pieces via a local underground contact. Nothing was there, either. He was about to close the doors on this mystery when he noticed something on one of his posters. It was a door-mounted pinup print he had received from home, he had hung it up the day he got it and had left it for whoever might be getting his room in future.
The pose the woman was striking was off, there was some kind of 'looseness' to her that he couldn't describe. Quickly, he noticed that her face had changed. Instead of the devilish smile she had worn before, she now looked panicked, horror-stricken in fact. As he perused her figure, something else caught his attention. A small hole could be seen in her neck, as if she had been shot. Blood running from the wound had stained her white dress, running a trail down from her neck to the tips of her toes.
Hogan felt something on his foot. At first he thought it was just his muscles twitching involuntarily, but he felt it again... and again... and again. Looking down, he noticed a red streak running down the door... and onto his foot. It was the blood from the poster.
Hogan leaped back. He quickly reached for something to wipe the blood off with, finding a small piece of paper on his desk. As he bent over, the blood had disappeared. Looking up, the streak was erased from the door, and the poster was back to normal. Just like that, everything was quiet and still again.
Hogan looked around, then at his foot. Was he going crazy? Perhaps he was still asleep?
"I- I need to check on my men," he muttered. He quickly slipped on his shoes and opened his door to the common room.
The common area was dark as usual, as the lights were cut off at nine in the evening without fail. Hogan checked his watch. Oh-one-hundred hours. Hogan walked over to the bunks to wake up Newkirk as he was the closest. He reached up and patted Newkirk's sheets, expecting to get some grunting followed by an "Oh blimey" or some snarky remark about getting up early. Instead there was nothing; Newkirk's bunk was empty. Looking around, it became apparent that everyone's bunks were empty.
"Alright men, now's not the time to be playing hide-and-seek." Hogan stated.
Silence.
Perhaps they had gone down into the tunnel already, although Hogan couldn't have guessed why they would have done so. He gathered his bag of belongings in his room and headed back out to the commons again. He noticed the tunnel bunk was closing, and a shadow cast from the dim lights below could be seen climbing downward.
"A-ha!" Hogan exclaimed as he ran to the bunk and gave it the usual palming. The bunk rose and the ladder lowered, and down Hogan went into the hole. Jumping off the last rung, he quickly wheeled around and ran into the main radio room.
Not a soul could be heard, save the quiet thudding of Hogan's own pulse. Guess he had gotten a little out of shape after all. He called out to his men, but there was no response, just like upstairs. He checked the dark room, the lab, the closet, the auxiliary tunnels, everywhere, but no signs of life seemed to exist. After giving up on finding anyone down there with him, Hogan hurriedly returned to the radio room. Perhaps he could get a hold of London?
"Goldilocks calling Papa Bear. Goldilocks calling Papa Bear. Do you read, Papa Bear?"
Hogan listened and waited, hoping to hear a warm English accent come flooding through the speaker unit at any moment. London was supposed to have given their installation top priority, they would normally have someone manning the receiver at all times. Hogan listened as the static buzzed and crackled.
But that's all that came of it; no voice came to answer his calls for recognition. Hogan stood up abruptly, knocking his stool over in the process.
"What in the world is going on!?" he exclaimed. "First the poster, then the tunnel entrance and now London doesn't seem to exist anymore? I swear…"
Hogan walked over towards the entrance to the hall which led to the storage area. Perhaps he could find some parts for the radio there...
Hogan stopped dead in his tracks. A shadowy figure was blocking his path to the storage room. He couldn't make out who it was, and called out for them to identify themself. There was no response, and the figure did not move. Hogan slowly reached up to one of the oil lamps they used to light the halls and placed it on ground, kicking it over toward the figure. As the light passed through the figure, Hogan saw that it was not solid, instead being of a misty construction. There was only one portion of the figure that was not cloudy, a part which Hogan recognized immediately: a pair of piercing blue eyes, glaring at him as if he had wronged them deeply.
They were Newkirk's eyes.
Before Hogan could begin to ask anything, he heard a rushing sound, as if by a small waterfall. The ground began to shake and some of the oil lamps fell off their perches. Hogan rushed back to the radio room and grabbed his things, turning around to look back at the figure. It was gone, and in its place was an ever-rising wall of thick red liquid rushing right at Hogan. He managed to barely make it to the barracks ladder before the stinking liquid reached him, coating his shoes and ankles in a layer of foul-smelling crimson. He threw his pack back out of the tunnel entrance and hurriedly shut it behind him.
Standing back a few feet, Hogan watched the bunk for any more signs of the liquid. The rushing rapid could be heard beneath him, but it suddenly quieted. Once again, all was still, save for Hogan's mind which at this point was close to breaking. What the hell was that? Why was there so much of that... blood down in the tunnels? And what was wrong with Newkirk?
Hogan was on his last nerve, and he needed answers. There was only one more place he could think of going now…
Klink's quarters.
Hogan hurriedly opened the barrack door only to be confronted with an arctic gust of wind. Normally this wouldn't have bothered him, but the waves of air were more piercing than buffeting, almost as if he had no clothes on at all. As he stepped outside, the air was dense and cold, colder than it had ever been, as if all the possible warmth in the area had been ripped away. It was also very quiet, with only the moaning wind and various creaks and groans from the surrounding shacks comforting Hogan's worn nerves.
The sky was pitch black, and even without light pollution from around him the stars were not visible. Not even the moon could be found in the sea of darkness that blanketed the camp. Hogan looked around to see if any guards were on watch, only to find that exterior of the camp deserted. All the SS troops who had arrived earlier were gone, but their trucks were still there, as well as the camp's vehicles.
Hogan's checks of the other barracks all ended in a similar result to that of his own: all were empty. It was as if everyone had vanished into the night, disappearing where they stood. But what about Newkirk? Could Hogan's other friends still be here?
Hogan continued slogging through the weather, when suddenly he felt a crawling, cold sensation. He was being watched. But from where? He looked at all the barracks. None of the windows were open, and the doors were all shut. Klink's office showed no apparent signs of life, and the guard posts were all deserted. Hogan then looked towards the main gate, where he spotted Newkirk again. Newkirk wasn't alone.
Standing inside the wire next to Newkirk were three other shadows, all recognizable from their heights and eyes. Newkirk, LeBeau, Carter, and Kinchloe. All four stood motionless, silently glaring at Hogan. They were wispy, only materializing enough for the contours of their clothing to be apparent. Hogan predicted the worst if he got close, like what happened in the tunnels, so he kept his distance. He called out to them.
"Newkirk? Carter? LeBeau? Kinch? What's going on?!"
Crunch...Crunch...Crunch
The figures began to walk towards Hogan. They advanced towards him slowly, keeping all their gazes fixed upon him as if they were stalking prey. Hogan's gut instinct kicked in, turning and running up across the remainder of the yard and into Klink's front office. Slamming the door behind him, Hogan grabbed a nearby desk and barricaded the door. He then ran into the main office and slid a large cabinet in front of Klink's windows, preventing the shadows from climbing in that way. Hogan crouched in Klink's doorway and waited to see what these shades would do, grabbing a chair leg to use as a club if need be.
Kathunk...Kathunk...Kathunk
They had made it to the stairs outside, and were making their way up. Hogan checked the door to Klink's personal quarters to make sure he could escape if they got through. It was locked. Hogan could here a clicking sound again. The door knob was turning in the front office, back and forth, back and forth. Hogan waited for impacts as the shades would likely try to break the door down.
Thud...Thud...Thud
The sounds were above him now, on the roof. The steps were just as slow and methodical as they were before, but Hogan couldn't do anything in his present state to stop them. He still had no idea what these shades were doing, or why they were trying to attack him. They obviously weren't his men, or even human at that. While considering this, the thudding faded over top of Klink's quarters. The office was now silent, like the rest of the camp had been.
After waiting for what seemed like an eternity, Hogan double-checked the door to Klink's quarters. It was now unlocked. Hogan eased back up and grabbed the handle, readying his improvised club. He wasn't going to go down without a fight here, and these shades had caused him enough grief. He turned the knob and flung the door open.
Immediately the cold was replaced by intense heat. Klink's quarters were ablaze with fire that almost scalded Hogan from proximity alone. Standing midst the flames were those four shadows again. They had been waiting the whole time, staring intently at the doorway which they knew Hogan had been behind. Hogan watched as they stepped apart, making a space in the middle. LeBeau and Carter's shades could be seen bending aside, as if they were welcoming someone into their ranks. Regardless of what they were doing, they never once blinked or took their eyes off of Hogan. Suddenly, a large plank from the roof collapsed between them, erupting in a pillar of fire from the floor. Hogan pulled away from the heat, looking back again only to see nothing but a wall of embers and flames. Fleeing the burning room, Hogan hurriedly wrestled the desk blockade away from the front door and opened it.
BANG
An explosion detonated behind Hogan, pushing him out the now-open front door and onto the decking outside. Hogan's vision was blurred and he felt no pain, just a ringing in his ears and an increasing sense of nausea. Slowly he began to crawl towards the stairs. With each movement his discomfort grew worse, until he reached his limit at the very edge of the deck. He vomited, which relieved his discomfort somewhat until he realized that it wasn't just what he ate that came up... It was also blood.
Hogan looked back over his shoulder and realized why he had been coughing up so much of the stuff. Large shards of wood jutted out like wings from his back, and his jacket was stained. Realizing his fate, Hogan slowly crawled down the stairs and sat up against them, letting the shards rest in the space between the steps.
He was going to die in front of the very place he had wanted to escape from so badly for so many years. He wouldn't be able to tell his men goodbye, either.
Hogan sat there, wondering about all the things he could have done, and whether or not he should be surprised that it would come to this, considering his routinely dangerous behavior.
Crunch Crunch Crunch
More footsteps… those shades again.
"Well, well, well. Colonel Hogan, what a surprise."
That voice... It was Hochstetter? Hogan looked down from his gaze into the inky sky, to find Hochstetter and the shades standing around his dying body.
"H- Hochstetter... What are you doing here?" Hogan choked. He was starting to feel cold, his warmth was leaving him.
"Making sure that your men got the revenge they so deserved, that's what."
"Wha-What? They were fine j-just yesterday."
Hogan hacked up another mouthful of blood.
Hochstetter knelt down in front of him.
"Those weren't your men, Hogan. They've been dead for many years now."
Hogan's eyes widened. That's impossible, he just saw them yesterday!
"You're- You're lying!" Hogan shouted.
"Oh? Believe me or don't, but you will be judged for what you've done, Hogan." Hochstetter said as he got back up. "You think you've had everyone here under your thumb this whole time, eh? That everything would always go your way... All the victory, all the women, all the credit... All the pride."
Hochstetter then moved away from Hogan and the four shades began to merge together, forming a new, singular entity.
"To pursue something means you must leave something else behind. When I pursued my position, here, I left my comfortable reality to come visit you in this… dump. What, pray tell, did you try to run away from to stay here, hmm?"
As he finished, he looked back to the shade behind him, which had now formed into a new human shape. One that was oddly familiar. A cap... loose pants... No. No it couldn't be...
It was Hogan.
Hochstetter stepped aside as the shade approached Hogan, staring down at him as Hogan lay dying. The shade bent over and reached out its arm towards Hogan's face.
"You may not remember what you've done, Hogan, but you will soon enough."
The hand was just about to engulf Hogan's vision, but Hogan decided to take one last glance at this man... If Hochstetter was a man at all at this point. Who was he, really? Why was he here? What did he mean by all this? With his last moments, Hogan saw one of the things he came to fear most that night. A sight illuminated by the dancing light cast by Klink's burning office:
Hochstetter was smiling. Smiling a deep, devilish grin.
And then, blackness engulfed his vision.
Plinkrunch. Fwup. Chirsh.
A familiar sound. Shovels digging away at the earth, trying to find a new pathway through the dark we humans tread above on a daily basis.
Plinkrunch-krunch. Fwupap. Chirshush.
Multiple shovels. Listening closer, he could hear multiple grunts and heavy breathing.
"Just a bit farther," he heard someone whisper. An American voice, deep and timbrous. An officer's voice.
"What do we do when we make it out of here, Colonel?" An accent accompanied this voice, most likely French.
"Oy, I see somethin'!" An Englishman?
"Watch your heads, fellas! Top's comin' in!" Another American voice…
Hogan could hear the clattering and fizzling echoing around him as stones, leaves and snow came bursting into his vision. Suddenly, he was able to see around him, however he could not control his body movements, as if he had been merely relegated to observing the current situation.
Surrounding him, covered in soot, mud, and fresh snow were three men. An African-American, a Frenchman, and an Englishman, all dressed in German uniforms.
"Get up there and check things out, Colonel!" The American whispered.
Hogan, still confused as to his present state, watched as he hoisted himself out of the pit via a flimsy set of wooden planks that the men had pressed into the soggy walls of the tunnel's exit shaft. Sticking his head up above the edge of the hole, he surveyed the perimeter.
All clear, but not for long with the noise from the tunnel collapse.
WHAAAAAaaaaaahh
A siren began to blare through the air above them.
"Hurry!" One of the men urged.
Hogan pressed his feet down to push himself out the tiny opening of the tunnel.
CRUNCH
Hogan watched as he fell forward, gripping the earth in front of him as tightly as he could. A sudden thrust of support from underneath helped to push him the rest of the way out of the hole.
Turning around, Hogan could hear shouts and dogs barking, catching glimpses of flashlights through the thicket.
"I hear them coming!" One of the men shouted from down in the tunnel. "They're in here with us!"
Hogan watched himself waiver, standing there at the precipice of freedom for three men.
The shouts and lights were getting closer.
"Help them up!" Hogan shouted at himself. "Help them!"
But the Hogan he saw did not respond, reserving instead to stand there, frozen at the sound of incoming pursuers.
"HELP THEM UP DAMN IT!"
Hogan was chomping at the bit now, furious with this version of himself. A minor setback was causing him this much terror? Escapes were straightforward affairs, but doing so alone was risky. He needed these men, just as much as they needed him now. To teeter there instead of helping them towards their collective goal was just… cruel.
"Give us your hand!" The men shouted from the pit.
Hogan's body seemed to snap to attention when the words reached it. He immediately dropped to his knees and reached his arm down into the hole, even though his men were no longer visible inside. He felt a gritty, warm and sweaty hand grasp his wrist, and he in turn grasped it's wrist.
BANG BANG BANG
Gunshots rang out from the entrance of the tunnel. Hogan could hear screams and shouting between the intense pressure waves impacting his outstretched arm.
The hand holding his arm tightened, then suddenly went limp. Hogan tried to continue pulling, but his strength had left him from all the digging.
He had to let go.
"No! Pull them up! Pull them up!" Hogan screamed.
Once again, the Hogan he was watching did not seem to listen. He simply fell back away from the tunnel, dropping the limp arm back down the hole with a sickening thud.
The lights were practically on top of him now.
In a sudden burst of adrenaline, Hogan got up and ran through the forest. Thinking he had gained some ground between himself and the search party, Hogan stopped to take a break. Breathing heavily, Hogan turned around to check.
Hogan could hardly believe his eyes. The forest around him was the exact same spot in which his previous dream had started. The shrubs. The logs. The branches. Everything was identical.
This wasn't a dream.
Bunk... He was lying down, slightly elevated from the waist up. This was no ordinary bunk. He tried to open his eyes, but the brightness of the outside world forced them shut again. He tried moving his arm, which felt much heavier than usual. Sliding it outward, it knocked against something cold and metallic. He tried to lift the arm, but it was far too heavy. Perhaps he just needed to wake up more?
He tried to speak, but his voice was essentially nonexistent.
Speech. He heard someone talking, although his ears felt clogged and he couldn't understand what was being said. A woman...
Where was the forest? Where did Hochstetter and those shades go? What about his pursuers?
Just as he began to remember, everything went dark again.
Beep Beep Beep
Hogan was conscious... again. Was this the third or fourth time he had awoken? He'd lost count after the first two.
Hogan's vision was slowly returning. Everything had been very blurry at first, but now he was able to make out what things were, roughly. He was in a hospital bed, surrounded by various machines and occasionally visited by a female nurse.
Every day, while he was awake he tried desperately to understand what was going on. Was this the real world, or was Stalag 13 waiting for him to return once more?
Beep Beep Beep
The machine to his right... That was the source of the beeping sound he had heard in his nightmares. It was measuring his heart rate.
However, this deeply worried Hogan. They didn't have advanced versions of these machines the last time he had been in a hospital. How much time had passed since he had gone to stay at Stalag 13?
Hogan was told eventually, once he had stabilized his cycles of consciousness. He had been asleep for over a decade. He had been shot, and was rescued by local villagers and stabilized in a vegetative state, where he was cared for by the underground and then shipped stateside at the earliest opportunity, where he remained for many years. Hogan was amazed to be alive, especially considering his circumstances. But something still nagged him.
The dream of the tunnel in the forest, the time spent in Stalag 13, was any of it real? If so, which was reality and which was fiction? One thing was for certain. Hochstetter's cryptic message still rang clear as day in his mind.
"Believe me or don't, but you will be judged for what you've done, Hogan."
Hogan was a religious man, at least he liked to think of himself as one. The idea of judgement was not a foreign concept to him. He had been in court many times for speeding tickets, he had many relationships that had soured over the years, and he had let many people down over the course of his life. He knew of God's judgement on man for their sin, one that would come to everyone at the end of their life. These were all seemingly distant things though, some far behind him and others far in front, all having very little weight on his collective conscience.
But Hochstetter's message was different, it rang in his mind like no other sentence ever had before. Would Hogan's fictional counterpart be the one who Hochstetter was referencing? Surely not, as he had encountered death in that world already!
Perhaps, he meant… here? Now?
Impossible. Hochstetter was merely a figment of his imagination, a tool used by his mind to wake himself up.
But if this was the case, then why did Hogan feel an ever-deepening sense of guilt whenever Hochstetter's words sprang forth?
It was a normal night in the city, albeit a bit colder than usual. Hogan had been up for a few hours, watching some television and reading about world events to try and catch up on lost time.
Nurse Anne had just finished her rounds when a visitor came to see Hogan. After getting their name and relationship, she admitted them into his room. George was going to have the night shift tonight, thank goodness.
She went home, fixed a sparing dinner and stayed up for a while watching the new soap opera that was just starting its third season. After the new episode, she went off to bed.
The next morning, she came into work as usual, noting there were several police cars parked out front of the building. Stepping off the elevator, she immediately noticed that several police officers and some various officials were scattered around the area. She then ran into George, who seemed exasperated.
"You look like hell, George. Something happen?"
"It's.. It's Hogan… he didn't make it."
"What? He was alive and well last night!"
"I know, I know! Heart attack got him in the middle of the night, not long after you left. I… was the one who found him."
"You've seen patients pass away before, why is this so much worse? Why all the fuzz?"
"His face… The look on his face was the most terrified that I've ever seen in all my years of working in this field."
"So you're saying it wasn't a natural heart attack?"
"I… I dunno. Cops don't think it was, from the looks of it. Who was that guy in there with him?"
Anne thought for a moment and walked over to the guest list.
"A... Wolfgang Hochstetter? Reason for the visit was… Business?" Anne questioned.
"Hell if I know," George replied, "but the strangest thing is, he never left."