No ownership of the Hogan's Heroes characters is implied or inferred. Copyright belongs to others and no infringement is intended.
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Hogan stole a quick glance at the back row as Kinch stepped into the line up for roll call. "You talk to London?" he asked in a low voice.
Kinch raised his eyebrows. "Oh, yeah," he said, as though still reeling from the conversation. He was about to continue when the Sergeant of the Guard, Hans Schultz, came into earshot. Kinch shoved his hands in his pockets and raised his chin in the direction of the German to signal the man's presence to Hogan.
Hogan immediately turned around, stifling a yawn and shrugging deeper into his bomber jacket. Still bleary-eyed from lack of sleep, he rocked slightly back and forth, hoping the cold and the movement would keep him alert enough to pick up on any clues about the Kommandant's plans for the day. He yawned again, widely, prompting Schultz to do the same.
"Colonel Hogan. Please, do not yawn like that," the large guard said as he closed his mouth. "Yawning is contagious."
"Big night, Schultz?" Hogan asked.
"Ja, ja," Schultz answered, as he continued counting the men before him. "An SS patrol from the woods showed up here in the middle of the night and demanded to see the Kommandant."
Hogan raised his eyebrows to feign surprise. "So his carousing finally caught up with him, eh?"
Schultz paused mid-count to chuckle. "Jolly joker," he said. "The Kommandant does not like to be disturbed when he is sleeping. He is very cross this morning."
Newkirk looked over at the guard and grinned. "Would that be a right cross or an Iron Cross there, Schultzie?" For weeks now, he hadn't joined in the usual routine of heckling the Germans during roll call; it felt good to be back in the game.
Hogan smiled at the laughter that followed. "What did the SS men want, Schultz?"
"I do not ask questions when the SS come into camp, Colonel Hogan." Schultz shook his head. "You should not be asking questions either."
"Gee, Schultz, my mom always said you had to ask questions to learn anything," Carter piped up from the back row. "Are you saying my mom was wrong?"
Hogan shook his head. "You shouldn't be picking on Carter's mother, Schultz; it's against the Geneva Convention."
The men laughed at that, and Hogan accepted their appreciation with a nod. "That's right; moms are off limits!" Kinch added.
"Not mine," Le Beau continued, staring hard at Schultz. "Mine would rip the head off a Boche soon as look at one," he said. To Hogan, he said, "That makes her an ally."
"I did not mean it like that, Carter. I'm sorry." Schultz turned and looked down at Le Beau. "Please tell your mama that I—"
The rest of what he was going to say was lost as Klink's "Repoooort!" came ringing across the compound. The guard wheeled around and snapped off a quick salute. "Herr Kommandant! All present and accounted for!"
"Very good, Schultz!" Klink shivered under his warm overcoat, then surveyed the prisoners. "I need volunteers to shovel out the motor pool! The truck cannot get out to drive toward Hammelburg this morning."
The men started calling out in mock sympathy for their captors' plight. "That's a real shame, Kommandant," Newkirk called out. "But there's nothing like a good spot of digging to get warm—and to get rid of the some of the flab the guards are building up from their nice, soft jobs here in camp."
"You can't force the men to dig, Kommandant," Hogan reminded Klink.
"Maybe not," Klink answered smugly. "But if the truck can't get out, we can't collect your Red Cross packages, can we?" he crowed. "The truck that was to deliver the parcels today slid off of icy roads and into a ditch five miles from here. A truck from Stalag 13 was going to meet it. But clearly that cannot happen now."
The smirk on Klink's face irritated Hogan, and the grumbling from the prisoners was loud and clear. Still, Hogan had a sudden brainstorm, and turned to his men. "All right, fellas, all right," he said, loudly enough for Klink to hear. "Let's just get out of the cold. By the time we get the truck dug out, the Krauts'd have stolen all the stuff in the packages anyway."
The protests continued for a few seconds, then subsided as Klink, clearly affronted by Hogan's prediction, dismissed the prisoners and ordered the senior POW to report to his office. Hogan smiled at his men and nodded his triumph, then followed them back inside Barracks Two.
"Bloody Krauts, holding up our Red Cross packages," Newkirk complained. "We'll be lucky to see a single spoonful of that coffee by the time they get them here." He grabbed the kettle on the stove and sniffed the contents left over from last night with disdain.
"Don't worry; we'll get them. This gives me a chance to bargain with Klink. And it got him mad enough to call me into his office so I can find out what's going on with that code book." Hogan pulled up Kinch as the radio man was about to head back down into the tunnel. "What did London have to say?"
Kinch sighed, then said reluctantly, "They're pretty mad, Colonel. They say not being able to use the new code means they'll have to implement another one pretty quick—and that means delays in operations. They say they can't understand why we didn't get it in the first place."
Hogan's eyes flashed in sudden defiance. "And I suppose they wanted me to just waltz into the middle of that Kraut patrol, take it out of their hands, and say 'Excuse me, old chaps, but I think you have something of mine there.'" He shook his head in disgust.
"That's… about the size of it," Kinch admitted.
"Don't listen to them, Colonel," Le Beau advised. "You did what you had to do. They couldn't expect you to risk being captured by les Boches."
Hogan sighed and crossed his arms. "Yes, they could… but then they expect a lot of things—like for it to snow in July, and for Hitler to shave that hokey moustache." He looked at Kinch. "Any other good news?"
"They're insisting on radio silence until we get word through the Underground that they've got a new code ready for pick-up."
"Is that all?" Hogan asked, exasperated.
"Just one more thing. They want to send the 379th to bomb an oil refinery at Leipzig four days from now. But they need to get the Krauts away from it; it's too heavily protected."
"That's right," Hogan agreed. "So many Ack-Ack guns they could bring down half a squadron and never break into a sweat."
"So what do they want from us?" Carter asked.
Kinch shrugged. "A diversion."
"We're nowhere near Leipzig!" Newkirk protested.
Hogan remained silent for a moment, deep in thought. "We might not have to be," he mused aloud, drumming his fingers along his arm.
Carter looked puzzled. "What do you mean, Colonel?"
"I think I know how to create that diversion." Hogan suddenly sprang to life. "I'd better get to Colonel Klink's office. Our fine Kommandant doesn't like to be kept waiting. Especially when he's about to be help us bomb one of the Fatherland's oil refineries. Get that kettle boiling, boys; we're gonna be getting those Red Cross packages after all."
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Klink looked up from his desk when his secretary Hilda opened the door of his office. "Herr Kommandant, Colonel Hogan is here to see you." The blonde gave Klink a polite smile, but the one she turned in Hogan's direction as they passed in the doorway made the American forget all about code books and Red Cross packages for a minute.
"Very good; send him in."
After a few seconds of fairly harmless admiration, Hogan brought himself back to the business at hand at and came to stand before the Kommandant. "You wanted to see me, Colonel Klink?" he asked. This view wasn't nearly as nice as the one he had just left in the outer office.
Klink didn't look up when Hogan spoke. He made it a point of keeping his attention on the untidy stack of paperwork on his desk.
"Kommandant?" Hogan prompted expectantly, a bit annoyed with the game he knew Klink was playing, and not in the mood to put up with it.
Klink leaned back in his chair as he looked up at the American. "Colonel Hogan." His voice was cold. "I do not appreciate what was said during roll call this morning. German guards are not... what was the word?" He paused as though trying to remember. "'Flabby.' Nor is the job of guarding the prisoners what I would call 'soft.'"
"Oh, I don't know, Kommandant; have you looked at Sergeant Schultz lately? He's not what I'd call rock solid, sir."
Klink paused again, his eyes locked on Hogan's face. "Your men have been very disrespectful lately. Today's little performance clearly shows that you are the source of this disrespect." The Kommandant gave Hogan a baleful stare, clearly not willing to trade the usual barbs with the American.
Hogan bit the inside of his cheek hard to stop the bitter retort that was fighting to come out of his mouth. As he tasted the blood, he tried to forget the humiliation that came with being a prisoner of war, and instead tried to remember that, in reality, he was serving a greater good, and submitting to this kind of treatment was a way to protect the operation. He tried. But it wasn't easy. "I'll talk to the men," he said roughly.
"I would do more than 'talk to the men' if I were you, Hogan," Klink continued, standing up and coming around the desk. "As a matter of fact, I think the prisoners need to see that their commanding officer is as susceptible to disciplinary measures as they are. Therefore," Klink said eagerly, warming up to his subject; Hogan merely followed the Kommandant's pompous pacing with his eyes, "the electricity will be turned off an hour early in all the barracks for the next two weeks." Klink stopped and smiled almost gleefully. "And your men, Colonel Hogan—your own men in Barracks Two will do without hot water for that same length of time. How does that strike you, eh?"
Hogan turned his head away slightly from Klink's too-close face. "It's too cold for most of the men already, Kommandant," Hogan said, inwardly seething but trying to control himself. "They need the hot water and they need the light."
"Then you should have thought of that before you decided to insult my guards." Klink sat down, triumphant.
"The men were cold and tired, Kommandant," Hogan snapped. "Give them a break."
Klink nodded sagely. "If they are so tired they will not mind the extra hour of darkness for the next fortnight, Hogan. They will be able to catch up on their sleep!" Klink laughed at his own wit.
Hogan stood silently. He was in several minds: the code book was at the top of his list, and it was sitting in the safe only a few feet away from him; that was why he had allowed his insult about the Germans' honesty to slip out in the first place—he was sure Klink would order Hogan to his office, and he could try to pry information out of him. But Hogan was also thinking about the Red Cross packages that his men needed so badly to make it through the winter. And he was thinking, somewhere in the back of his mind, about his dignity.
Hogan finally swallowed the last thought. "We'll dig out the truck," he said quietly.
Klink raised an eyebrow and thought about smiling. "What was that, Hogan?"
"I said we'll dig out the truck," Hogan said irritably. "But you've gotta make some concessions, too."
Klink threw open his hands in mock innocence. "What type of concessions, Colonel Hogan?"
"No cutting off the hot water. And one week of early lights out."
Klink smirked. "Out of the question," he said dismissively.
"Kommandant," Hogan continued, starting to feel more like his old self. He leaned forward almost conspiratorially on Klink's desk. "I happen to know that the Red Cross packages aren't the only things this camp is waiting for."
"Oh?" Klink answered. A small frown crept onto his face.
"I happen to know that the Paymaster was hitching a ride on that truck this morning," Hogan said in a whisper. "And if the guards find out they won't be getting paid today, there'll be more than a little dissention in the ranks from the prisoners at roll call. Won't there, Kommandant?"
"Hogan, you're being ridiculous," Klink said almost desperately.
"And men who are cranky because they can't get a hot shower… or enough light to huddle by in this cold winter… might find themselves with a few loose lips about these things," Hogan continued. "You know how gossip spreads like wildfire." Hogan sighed and stood up. "Still," he said in his normal tone of voice, "I'm sure you're not worried about such things, Kommandant. You have your men much more under your control than I do mine!"
Hogan executed a salute that Klink would have found respectful at any other time than when he was worrying about something the American had concocted. This was one of those times. "Hogan, where do you think you're going?" he asked as Hogan made for the door.
"Well, you said the deal was off, so I—"
"It's on, it's on," Klink conceded quickly, bunching his fist in frustration.
Hogan turned back to the desk. "The men will be grateful, sir. And they won't tell the guards—honest." Klink nodded, beaten, then stifled a yawn. Hogan grabbed his chance. "Didn't you sleep well last night, Kommandant?" he asked.
Klink shook his head. "As a matter of fact, Hogan, I didn't," he answered. "I had the SS here in the middle of the night."
"The SS, sir? What did they want?"
"None of your business, Colonel," Klink said, suddenly catching on. "You're dismissed, Hogan. See that your men gather at the motor pool in ten minutes!"
Hogan agreed and was heading out again when the door to Klink's office opened and Hilda appeared. Hogan watched her appreciatively. "Major Hochstetter is here, Herr Kommandant," she said. Klink told her to show the Gestapo officer in, then she winked at the American in secret on the way out of the room. Hogan let out a contented sigh.
"Hogan, don't you have anything better to do besides ogle my secretary?" Klink asked, exasperated.
Hogan shook his head slowly at the memory of the hips that swayed out of his sight. "I can't think of a thing, sir."
Wolfgang Hochstetter burst into the office seconds later, pulling Hogan reluctantly out of his fantasy. "Good morning, Klink. I understand you have something here I need," the Major began without bothering to offer the Kommandant a salute. Trapped in the room now that Hochstetter had appeared, Hogan decided to wait instead of leaving; maybe he could salvage some of this mess after all.
"Good morning, Major Hochstetter," Klink greeted the Gestapo officer. "I don't remember calling you about anything."
"That is because you did not," Hochstetter answered, eyeing Hogan quickly and then choosing to ignore him. "I was told this morning that a patrol came to see you last night with something of great interest to Berlin."
"Oh, that," Klink replied proudly. He smiled widely. "I think Berlin will find that very interesting. I'll just get it for you now."
Hochstetter glanced over at Hogan. "What is this man doing here?" he asked.
Klink crossed the room to get to his safe. As he crouched down to work the lock, he glanced over his shoulder at the Gestapo officer. "Colonel Hogan is here on a disciplinary matter, Major."
Hochstetter looked from Klink to Hogan. "'A disciplinary matter'? Do you mean to say that for once, Klink, you're acting like you're the one in charge around here?"
"No," Hogan said cheerfully, "he means we're setting up a new schedule for teaching the guards to goose-step so they make pretty patterns in the snow; what they're doing now just aren't regulation footprints."
Klink stood up with the code book in his hand just in time to see Hochstetter's hand curl into a fist. Appalled at the thought of the Major striking Hogan right in front of him, Klink turned to the American Colonel. "That's enough, Hogan! We'll discuss this matter later. You are dismissed!" He snapped off a quick salute, hoping that Hogan would take the hint and get out before he made matters worse.
But Hogan just stared back innocently and craned his neck to take a look at what was in Klink's hand. "Hey, that's an Allied code book!" he said with feigned indignation.
Klink immediately drew the book back toward himself, leaving Hogan looking affronted. But Hochstetter smiled and said, "That's right, Hogan. That's exactly what it is. And it's going to help us win the war, at least for a little while, ja? Klink, let him have a look at it."
Clearly puzzled, Klink handed the book to Hogan. "There's no reason for the good Colonel not to know what we are holding here," Hochstetter explained. "After all, a little bit of bad morale on the part of the Allies never hurt anyone… anyone who is German, that is."
Hogan sneered. "You're a nasty piece of work, Hochstetter," he said angrily, scanning the book quickly, wishing he could just take it with him right now, remembering how cold he had gone inside when he spotted the German patrol last night as the drop was being made.
Hochstetter smiled. "Why, thank you, Colonel Hogan. I can't think of anyone I would rather hear that from." He snatched the book out of Hogan's hands. "You can go now. We are quite through with you. You can tell your men that the Third Reich is just one step closer to being able to thwart any Allied plans against us. The Allies will lose many fighting men this way, Hogan. Many men."
Hogan felt anger sweep through him, making him almost dizzy. But he held his tongue. Now wasn't the time to lose control. "You haven't had the last laugh yet, Hochstetter. Eisenhower's on his way; you can count on it."
"When your precious General Eisenhower arrives, Colonel, I'll be sure to have him transferred to Stalag 13 so he can keep you company!" Hochstetter laughed and shook the code book in Hogan's face. "Having this will help get him here that much faster."
Hogan's spirit dropped with his forced cheerfulness. "You know, people like you take all the fun out of the war." He turned to Klink. "The men will be ready in ten minutes," he said. Then he offered up a sloppy salute and quickly left the office.
