What hibernator hopefully does about, say, soldiers returning with spades (2-7)
I believe the answer is:
re-emerges
'what hibernator hopefully does about' is the definition.
The definition suggests a comparative adjective but the answer is not.
'soldiers returning with spades' is the wordplay.
'soldiers' becomes 're' (Royal Engineers).
'returning with' becomes 'emerge' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'spades' becomes 's' (abbreviation in card games).
're'+'emerge'+'s'='RE-EMERGES'
'say' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for re-emerges that I've seen is " Comes forth again".)