End of the Road (The Rozzers) (6 page)

The driver was killed instantly, whilst the passenger remained strapped into his seat as the vehicle rolled over and over, coming to a stop off the road. He was lucky to get away with ‘just’ a serious head injury. Had their vehicle been a second faster or slower, the trailer would have missed them altogether. I never found out if his eyesight was saved.

The impact of the Land Rover spun the trailer further to its right through 45 degrees, leaving it travelling along and across the road at 90 degrees. Robin had been following the Land Rover. As the Land Rover was knocked off the road in front of him, he slammed into the side of the trailer at about 60 mph. This low-point impact stopped the trailer dead, causing the whole combination to tip over onto his car, squashing it to less than half of its original height. Another few inches and he’d have been killed instantly.

Cat’s career didn’t suffer as a result of the accident. It wasn’t the first time metal fatigue had caused the towing eye to break off on that type of military trailer. He later applied to become a pilot at the Army Air Corps, but failed the course for being ‘too mechanical’. Shortly afterwards he left the army and joined the police service.

Donk rose rapidly through the ranks and remained a committed career man.

Sgt. Smudge Smith eventually achieved the rank of Warrant Officer and retired to a well-paid civilian construction job.

Pizza’s story is unknown.

I have no idea why the first aider was so unpleasant towards us. She was, however, the first to park her car up and come down and help. She also helped the injured soldier greatly and, for these reasons, I will always be grateful to her. I never heard anything more of the casualties in this story, it’s not something the Royal Military Police excel at; updating the common soldier. Sadly, I don’t even know if Robin survived.

I will be eternally grateful to Major Cummins for talking me out of joining the Prison Service. How I even considered it reminds me of just how lost I was back then. First aid, however, still scares the hell out of me.

L/Cpl Burden in 1988

Part one of THE ROZZERS by DIEM BURDEN

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COPS DON’T RUN, part 2 of THE ROZZERS (a free sample)

“Jeremy
’
s a loser, a complete waster,” said Danny as we responded to a lunchtime call of a street disturbance. “A washed up druggy who usually only comes to our attention nowadays for petty domestic stuff along with his fat, ugly missus. Used to be a handful in his time did our Jeremy,” he added, almost in admiration, “but this’ll be a load of crap, a waste of our time. Just you see.”

I’d know PC Danny Green for exactly two days at this point. I knew he had nothing against Jeremy; it was people in general he disliked. Danny was my tutor; a world-weary cop who was, on account of his length of service, ‘qualified’ to take new recruits out on patrol. As the new boy I was
–
naturally
–
in total awe of him. With an expanding waistline he was dry, apparently humourless, completely in-excitable and hated everything and everybody, including - it seemed - being burdened with excitable, incompetent new recruits.

For the last two mornings we’d been patrolling the northern half of the city - the rough council estates - in our little Ford Escort panda car. Yesterday - my first day out on patrol with Cambridgeshire Police - had been dull and routine. Tonnes of paperwork which Danny had to complete whilst I sat and watched, trying to look interested, interspersed with false intruder alarms activated by cleaning staff. This call was different though. This sounded like real police work.

As Danny cut through the chaotic streets of the council estate like a racing pro, I kept glancing at a little switch on the dashboard. This was no ordinary switch, this was th
e switch that activated our blue-light
. It had remained permanently off since day one and I was bitterly disappointed that we hadn’t used it yet. Surely this was such an occasion? No matter how much I willed it, our solitary blue light remained switched off, much to my dismay. I think Danny knew what I was thinking and detested me even more for it. I later discovered Danny’s aversion to any form of excitement and activating a blue light would just draw unnecessary attention down on us. So it stayed off.

Before long we turned into a small cul-de-sac packed with too many houses. It looked like the constructor had thrown all the houses up into the air and built them where they’d landed.

“That looks like the scroat there,
”
Danny said, indicating a man on the pavement fifty metres ahead of us, attempting to open a tall, wooden garden gate. I had no idea what a
scroat
was and I had no time to ask as Danny continued his brief. “Yeah, Jeremy
’
s the tall guy standing by the gate - his gate - and that looks like his stupid wife on the other side of it, if I’m not mistaken.”

I was sitting in the passenger seat with the window down, which also happened to be the closest window to where Jeremy was standing as we approached at an unimpressive pace.

“You mean him?” I asked, pointing. “The one with the
axe
?”

“An axe? He hasn’t... Oh God he has, hasn’t he? OK, don’t get out.” Danny said all this in exactly the same tone and volume as before, and I never did understand why he thought that I might have actually got out of the car at that precise moment.

Jeremy was now fully aware of the cop car slowly crawling towards him along the quiet street. As if to prove it, he looked menacingly at the axe in his hand before raising it high above his head and slamming it into the top of the wooden gate several times, splintering the wood. He turned his head and stared directly at me, the nearest ‘cop’. I did what any person would have done in my situation; I crouched down in my seat and acted invisible. I was just about to close the window and lock the door when Danny leant across me and called out of the window.

“Come on now, Jeremy. Put the axe down, don’t be stupid,” he said, sounding inconvenienced. I wondered at his choice of words
–
surely calling an axe-wielding scroat ‘stupid’ wasn’t something we’d be taught at police college?

Confirming my assessment, Jeremy yanked the axe out of the gate, turned and marched directly towards us
–
towards
me
. Danny must have anticipated this response as he calmly put the panda into reverse, backing out of the cul-de-sac just fast enough to keep ahead of Jeremy but not too fast to get noticed. After a short distance Jeremy gave up and returned to his gate. I breathed out again.

I was armed with nothing more than a small, wooden truncheon hanging from my belt, a police weapon invented one hundred and fifty years earlier. Nobody had taught me how to use it, just how to loop it around your belt so that it didn’t fall down the inside of your leg and trip you up when running. I knew we wouldn’t be expected to take on this axe-wielding, six foot tall, ex-druggie scroat with our pathetic pieces of wood for defence.

That’s it, then; time to call in the specialists, take this loony out.

Then Danny did something unexpected. He drove back towards Jeremy the Axe. My eyes were white. What the hell was he thinking? He hadn’t even called for backup
and
the blue light was still off.
He stopped the car in the same place, leaving Jeremy the Axe just a few metres from my half-open window.

“Jeremy, don’t be bloody stupid; put the axe down, will you?” There was
that
word again. Danny’s voice went up a tad in volume, but still showed no sign of fear or excitement - or even interest, come to think of it.

As I stared at the axe splitting the gate I began to have serious concerns about having chosen the wrong police force. I’d assumed that Cambridge would be full of students and old ladies drinking tea and that absolutely nothing ever happened there. The fact that Jeremy the Axe was happening to me on my second day out on patrol, and the calm, matter-of-fact way Danny was dealing with it made me really worried
–
was it
always
like this?

We reversed a bit further this time, on account of Jeremy chasing us a bit further, before he gave up again and returned to his rapidly deteriorating gate. This time Danny did get on the radio, but asking for assistance came hard to him.

“Yeah control, Jeremy has an axe and won’t put it down. I think we’re gonna need a bit of help here.” (Police radio messages, especially urgent calls,
always
begin with the word ‘yeah.’ I have no idea why.)

I smiled. I saw dogs, helicopters and dozens of beefy cops equipped in full riot gear. I anticipated seeing Jeremy the axe-wielding scroat being unceremoniously de-axed and dragged away screaming, bundled into a waiting police van and carted off to prison sobbing. Pats-on-the-back all round. That always happened on the TV series
The Bill
, and now I had a front-row seat as a real-life police drama unfolded before me, a real blue-light job! I looked at that switch and smiled. I was rather looking forward to this next bit.

Book two of THE ROZZERS series - COPS DON’T RUN - coming soon.

Be the first to get it!

Part two of THE ROZZERS by DIEM BURDEN

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Diem Burden served his full six years with the Royal Engineers before joining the UK police. He was a cop for about 12 years, leaving with the rank of sergeant.

He now teaches English as a foreign language in Spain, where he has been living for the last nine years. His dream is to become a full-time writer, having conjured up – at the time of writing this – another fifteen books to write.

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Thank you.

Diem Burden

Part one of THE ROZZERS by DIEM BURDEN

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Finally, a big thank you goes to the following folk for their honest and helpful advice in the creation of this book.

Patrick Volpe

Jessie Stank

Debby C Foulkes

K. Wodke

Miles Brough

Paula Carvalho Burden

Every effort has been made to make this book as complete and accurate as possible. However, no matter how hard we try, a mistake can sometimes slip through. Please feel free to
email me
directly should you find any, and I’ll see to it that it is swiftly rectified.