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Emanations of Hate
Chapter 4
Tossing and turning in the sweltering heat, Sergeant James Kinchloe looked around the barracks. From the French curses above him and the way Olsen was kicking at his bunk, he figured everyone was having the same trouble he was. Damn, and it's only six o'clock in the morning. I'm definitely going to be working in the tunnel this afternoon. Praying that the forecasted rain would break the heat, he sighed and got up. Might as well put the coffee on.
Placing the coffee pot - the real one - on the stove, he realized he'd have to light it. Oh, I give up! Instead, he settled for a glass of water and spotted Carter lying on his bunk with his eyes open.
"What time did you two get in?"
"A half an hour ago."
"That's rough. Get any sleep at all?"
"No."
Kinch frowned. Carter's voice seemed oddly flat. He was about to ask if anything was wrong, but was interrupted by Schultz. The big German waddled in, panting.
"Raus, raus." It was a decidedly lethargic wake up call.
There were protesting groans from nearly every bunk. Only Carter and Newkirk got up without complaint. Vaguely surprised, Kinch saw both of them sit straight up without a word, or even much of an expression of their faces.
Lebeau, spying Schultz in his heavy uniform, commiserated with the head guard. "Mon Dieu Schultzie, it makes me warm just looking at you."
Schultz melted down onto the bench at the table. Usually he went back outside for the five minutes given to the men to dress, but today that was beyond him. In a wilting voice he replied, "Oh cockroach, it is so hot! I do not even want to eat!"
"Oh my God!" Colonel Hogan said, entering the main room from his quarters. "The end may be upon us! Isn't Schultz not eating one of the signs of the apocalypse?"
"Please do not joke Colonel Hogan. It is terrible! I do not think I could even eat Lebeau's streudel!" The fat guard sounded so dejected that all the men burst into laughter. Or nearly all the men. Kinch's eyebrow went up as he regarded an unsmiling Carter and a silent Newkirk.
"Ha ha, jolly joke. You would not laugh if I faded away and some other guard came to watch you." The idea of Schultz fading away just made the men laugh harder, but Kinch clucked sympathetically in hopes of placating the put out Schultz. Appeased by this, and thinking he had made his point, the large man reluctantly hauled himself up and waved the men out for roll call.
Contrary to Kinch's plans, that afternoon he found himself with the other men of Barracks 2 on a work detail on a farm outside of camp. Weeding a large garden filled with stunted cabbages he wondered who in their right mind would ever willingly become a farmer. Straightening up, he decided to take a break and get a drink from the water barrel. Lebeau and Olsen were already there, unashamedly dawdling. Olsen handed him the cup and he nodded his thanks as he took a deep drink.
"Boy, is that sun hot on my back!" Kinch exclaimed and scooped the cup in the barrel again.
"Yeah, it is warm," Olsen agreed.
"Oui," Lebeau said, but he seemed preoccupied. He was staring at Carter and Newkirk, still working in the carrot patch where they had been helping him.
"Anything wrong Lebeau?" Kinch asked, following his friend's gaze.
Lebeau shrugged and then shook his head. "Non. It is nothing."
The other two studied him a minute. "You sure?" Kinch prodded.
"You will think it's strange."
"No we won't Louie. Will we Matt?" Olsen nodded.
"It's just that it's…" he couldn't look them in the eyes.
"Go on Louie."
"Il fait froid." Olsen, not understanding looked to Kinch.
"It's cold?" Kinch said, surprised.
"I told you that you would it strange!" Lebeau said defensively.
"But Louie, how could it be cold in one part of the garden and boiling in another?"
"Je ne sais pas," Lebeau shrugged helplessly.
"Who cares about the how?" Olsen put in, "If it's true - "
"It is true!"
"Well, why aren't you enjoying it then? I'd kill for a bit of relief from this heat," Olsen argued. Both men looked at the Frenchman who was hanging his head again.
"I don't know, it's just…it's not a pleasant cold."
"How can any cold be bad today? C'mon Lebeau, if you don't like it, why don't we switch places?"
"No Lebeau, I'll switch places with you. I want to find out what's going on with those two," Kinch said.
"C'mon Kinch, it was my idea!" Olsen griped.
"Just for a bit Matt, then we'll trade."
"Oh alright. It's probably not really any colder anyway," Olsen said and strolled off.
Lebeau glared at the retreating figure. "Don't get huffy Louie," Kinch said. The taller man pointed back to Carter and Newkirk in the field. "Tell me something, have you noticed anything different about those two?"
Lebeau watched the two men for a minute. "They have been very quiet today," he finally said, "but that's to be expected."
"From those two? Quiet is the last thing I would expect from them."
"Well, I think they are fighting," Lebeau confided.
"Fighting? About what?"
"I have no idea, but I get the feeling Newkirk was the one to start it. Carter came to me a few days ago and said Peter was acting strangely. I did not think of it much until yesterday."
"Why, what happened yesterday?"
"I did not hear the words, but Newkirk was yelling at Carter just before he fell. And then, after you and Schultz took Carter to see Wilson, Newkirk was very angry. He blamed Carter for the accident, not Schultz. He acted like Carter did it on purpose to get out of helping him."
"That's ridiculous. Carter could have broken his neck."
"Don't tell me, mon ami. It was Newkirk who thought so."
"Okay. I guess I'll have to try and find out what's going on." The two men each took another drink and then went back to work.
Kinch understood instantly what Lebeau had been talking about when he joined Carter and Newkirk in the carrot patch. A bizarre chill touched his skin the moment he got near them. As puzzling as this was though, it wasn't what he had switched places with Lebeau to find out. He nodded a greeting to the two stone-faced men who looked up as he approached.
"I thought I'd come help you guys for a bit. Lebeau said you could use some help because of your wrist Carter," he lied.
Carter glanced at his left wrist slightly startled, as if he hadn't remembered his injury, and then turned back to Kinch with a watchful expression. Kinch wondered why he hadn't tried to use it as an excuse to get out of the work detail. Then both men began weeding again without so much as a word; Carter making a point of doing it one-handed. Kinch kneeled down and got to work himself.
"So, how are you guys doing? Hot enough for you?" Kinch asked.
"Yes. It's very warm," Carter answered in the same flat tone he had used that morning.
"Hot enough to fry an egg on a rock," Kinch agreed, all the while thinking, No it isn't. God, it's almost like I can feel the cold seeping into me.
For awhile no one said anything, they just took turns covertly watching each other. Strangely, Kinch began to feel that the obvious hostility in the air wasn't directed between Carter and Newkirk, but by the two of them towards him. He couldn't explain it, it just seemed to be in the way he could feel two sets of eyes simultaneously light on his back when he wasn't looking. He tried to make small talk and was astounded by how awkward it was. He told them about what Hogan and Lebeau had heard from the French contact the night before, about Hogan's plans for the ball bearings factory, he even talked about little things, like the volleyball game in the compound a few days earlier. Carter made short, one or two word answers if Kinch asked him a direct question, but made no return on these attempts of Kinch's, and initiated no conversation for his own part. Newkirk said nothing at all. Meanwhile, Kinch was working hard not to begin shivering. This chill was in no way an impression of the antagonism he was sensing. It was a damp, icy, November rain kind of cold - the kind that made you uncomfortable and restless unless there was a good, strong fire going. Whatever it was, it was making his joints ache and he got up, unable to stand it anymore.
"Well, you two seem to be doing alright. I think I'll go help Louie for awhile." All of a sudden it was all he could do not to run off, he was so desperate to get away. He felt two pairs of eyes staring at him as he hurriedly walked to where Lebeau was working.
When the black sergeant had moved out of earshot, Carter moved closer to his companion.
"I believe concealment may present a problem," he said quietly and matter-of-factly. He kept at his work, not bothering to stop and look at the other man.
Newkirk found himself unable to do anything but keep working. His eyes glittered as he discovered that he couldn't even raise his head.
"I know that you can hear me," Carter spoke again. "Unfortunately the others cannot suppress you in the same way that I can with this one," he continued, unconcerned with the helpless, blinding, fury being radiated at him, "so you are still able to understand me. I want you to listen closely."
He sounds so smug, so confident that I'm going to do exactly what he says. Newkirk's resentful thought was the first clear on he could recall having since the night before. Inwardly he was screaming. Why can't anybody see this? Why isn't anybody helping me?
The Englishman's head was jerked up involuntarily to meet an inscrutable look coming from the face of his normally transparent friend.
"Are you listening?" It wasn't really a question, they both knew he was. "This will not end until I get what I want - so tread carefully."
That evening saw an exhausted group of men recuperating in Barracks 2. Hogan, who usually accompanied his men on work detail, had been detained that day by paperwork and was now regarding them with some concern. Mostly they were simply too tired even for the usual complaints that came after a day of work detail, but he noticed that both Kinch and Lebeau were pensive.
"So, anything happen out there today?" he asked.
"No sir, just your average, demented Nazi's idea of a holiday," Kinch answered. "Sunshine, fresh air, back-breaking-work-you-to-death labour. That sort of thing."
"Well, all of you can take it easy tonight. London hasn't got anything for us," Hogan consoled his men.
"Thank God!" Kinch exclaimed, and the rest chorused their agreement. "I'm just going to crash right out. Nobody wake me until the war's over." He went and stretched out on his bunk.
"Good luck trying to sleep in this heat."
The radioman groaned at this reminder. "Oh thanks, Baker."
"Speaking of heat Kinch, did you find Lebeau's cold spot?" Olsen asked from his bunk.
"Lebeau's what?" Hogan enquired. Suddenly everyone was staring curiously at an embarrassed Lebeau.
"Don't laugh Matt, he was right."
"Oh c'mon Kinch. Are you telling me it was nice and cool in the carrot patch?"
"Well…nice wouldn't be how I would describe it."
The others broke in, demanding to know what they were talking about. Kinch explained about the feeling of cold both he and Lebeau had felt in that part of the garden, and how both had found it extremely unpleasant.
"That doesn't sound like a good sign," Foster said.
"What are you talking about Tom? You'd have to be crazy not to want a bit of cool air on a day like today," Olsen argued.
"My father always said that cold spots like that meant that there were spirits around," Foster explained.
"Ghosts?" The others scoffed and poor Foster was bombarded with the typical sentiments of reasonable, logical, mid-twentieth century thinking men, namely: Are you kidding? and Crazy nut!
"It's true! He said that a severe and sudden drop in temperature was "often indicative of a spectral presence." "
"So you're saying there are ghosts in Farmer Bauer's carrot patch?" Olsen hooted. "And the boogeyman lives in my mother's china hutch. You see any ghosts out there Kinch?"
Kinch chuckled a bit himself at the thought of a haunted carrot patch. "No, all I saw were Carter and Newkirk and a whole lot of carrot tops."
The others laughed while Olsen and Foster debated the idea of ghouls and banshees. Hogan listened placidly, letting them blow off steam.
"I wonder why Carter and Newkirk didn't feel the cold?" Baker mused.
"What?" Kinch turned to look at him. Nearly everyone else kept listening to Foster and Olsen, but Hogan and Lebeau looked their way.
"You said they were helping Lebeau and then you. The cold chased both of you away, why didn't it affect them?"
"You know, I never thought of that." He glanced at Lebeau and saw the same taken aback look on his face.
"Speaking of which, where are those two?" Hogan asked.
Tony Garlotti caught the question. "They went down into the tunnel. Carter said he wanted to work on something in his lab and Newkirk was going to help him," he said, then turned his head back to the main event.
"Newkirk was?" Lebeau was puzzled. He was sure they had been fighting, or that at least Newkirk was angry with Carter, but now that he thought about it, the two men had been together most of the day. The French corporal looked at Kinch, who shrugged.
Hogan caught the look between the two and made a mental note to talk to his adjutant about it tomorrow. The guys were starting to wind down, even drift off. Within a few minutes only Olsen and Foster's murmuring voices could be heard, bringing the major philosophical argument of life after death down to the level of "could not" and "could so". After even this tapered off and the room grew quiet, he went into his quarters for his own rest.
Much later, Carter, or technically the entity now inhabiting him, was still awake and pondering his situation. It was perfect in so many ways, but there were a few inconvenient matters. The restrictions placed on him by such things as work details and roll call, he would abide with for awhile; he was impressed with Hogan's organization and had no wish to see it ended, but time and location could become critical and then he would simply have to do what was needed. At the moment, the larger problem was passing himself off as the American sergeant. He wanted to make use of Hogan's resources - he truly could not believe his luck at finding all of this - and to do so meant that he could not raise anyone's suspicions. For something like this would have to involve men who knew how to keep secrets; who knew how to gather information. Men who would know - and need to be in control of - what was going on around them, and who would therefore be very sensitive to anything new and unexpected.
The problem was that this Andrew Carter seemed to be almost the complete opposite to him. He was sociable and casual, addressing the other men by their first names at times, or even by nicknames. He was friendly with the guards. Of course, that would be necessary to Hogan's plans, but he could sense no animosity in Carter towards a good number of them. Examining Carter's thoughts on how the others saw him, he discovered that the men would expect him to be talkative, excitable and good-natured. Probing even further, he learned that Carter believed that his own friends considered him indecisive, forgetful, perhaps even stupid. He felt the young man's hurt at this. He also learned of Andrew's confrontation with his friend Peter. That he considered interesting, but of no importance at the moment.
No, passing himself off as the munitions man would be no easy task. True, he could stay down the lab a good deal of the time, using Carter's need to build charges for Hogan's tunnel idea as an excuse, but it was still unlikely that no questions would come up.
Clearly, diversions would be needed.
James Kinchloe was not one for nightmares, or even disturbing dreams. For most of his life, even during the hardest times, he had always slept deeply and well. If dreams did come they were almost always pleasant, allowing him to wake in that state of calmness that seemed to mark his nature. But that night was different. He was thrust awake, shivering and breathing hard, with no memories as to why, other than a disconcerting image of huge shapes looming above him and the feeling of something sickly sweet covering his mouth and suffocating him. By the time his breathing finally slowed, he had forgotten even this much and he soon feel back into a fitful sleep.
In the bunk next to Kinch's, Louie Lebeau was also dreaming. Writhing in his bunk, in his mind he was running. Running desperately, hopelessly, all the time weeping hysterically for parents that he knew had been dead for years. He awoke both angry at such a feeling of abandonment and helplessness and with an unexplained sadness that lingered somewhat longer than Kinch's fear. Deep down, it was still with him when he too fell back to sleep.
It was nearly morning and in his own bunk, Peter Newkirk was not asleep. Terribly confused, he felt like his brain was swathed in damp and mouldy cotton batting. His thoughts were sluggish, with only enough coherence to experience fear. He lay there, unable to think, unable to feel the hard boards and lumpy mattress beneath him, only able to feel the cold, watchful eyes boring into his back from man in the bed below him.
Why isn't anyone helping me? echoed round and round through his terrified mind.
Author's notes:
1) Okay, the composition of the barracks as I've written it may be a little confusing to some folks. The thing is, I often find too many original characters in a story - especially if they become the main focus to the point where you don't see the canon characters at all - a bit dull. So I've thrown in a few of the show's recurring characters into Barracks 2 so that fans can get as much time as possible with guys they recognize.
2) Kinch's bunk: I know that sometimes he sleeps on the bunk above the tunnel, but I've also seen him sleep in another bunk across the room. I figure that if he knows someone is out, it's only logical to sleep here so that he won't be woken up.
3) The name game: I'm using James for Kinch. I have no problem with other people using Ivan, I'm only using James because it also happens to be my grandfather's name. I also have to say, I've always personally believed that the episode where "Ivan" was used was simply laziness on the part of the show's writers. In fact, I believe there's an episode called "Man in a Box" where Hogan puts a hand on Kinch's arm and calls him Sam, so if Kinch gets a middle name from me, it will probably be Samuel. As to the others, I think "Tom" for Foster has been used. I hope whoever did it won't mind if I use it as well. If it's you, and you do mind, please let me know. For everyone else, I used names I picked instead of what might be the consensus. Hope it's not a big irritant for anyone.
