Protect and Serve

“This asshole better show his face, or I’m gonna cave his in.” Jet Baskin grunt from the passenger seat. He had his partner Liam Masters had taken from the impound yard for their stakeout. They had set up a large drug bust after a tip from Jet’s confidential informant.

“Give them time. Maybe they are spooked, but we can’t mess this one up, we’ve gotta play it by the book. We’ve got eyes on us.” Liam answered. He was in charge being the senior detective of the two. They had been partners for almost nine years, joining the force only a few months apart, but Liam had been the quickest up the ladder. Thanks in part to several connections he had higher up in the force.

They had been sitting in the dark for almost three hours, neither had left, or really moved, and both were feeling the itch. “I’m gonna kill him. Fucking Jimmy,” Jet continued to protest. There weren’t any microphones in the car so what did it matter.

“Hey wait a minute. We got something happening here.” Liam said, raising the binoculars to his eyes. “All units standby, we got a bite.” He spoke into the radio before clipping it back onto his belt.

“What is it?” Jet asked squinting ,but unable to see anything.

The car was parked in a small alleyway on the opposite side of the street to where the deal was supposed to be done. A local corner shop owner who had a habit of selling more than sherbet to his customers was trying to establish himself as one of the big players in the city. Of course he was just the figurehead, his basement was used as a meeting place, the main business affairs were taken care of by his various family members, ranging from accountants to enforcers. Even his twelve year old nephew had been caught trying to sell to the kids in his school. It was all small time stuff in the grand scheme of things, the family didn’t have enough brains between them to notice they were out manned and out gunned by the three local gangs operating within the city. It was just going to be a nice easy bust, good for the records and statistics plus it would stop any bloodshed; for the time being at least.

“Shit” Liam spat. “Stand down, just a domestic.” He spoke into the radio again. “This gimp is gonna fuck up our night just because his woman thinks for herself.” He gripped the wheel tightly.

“Good thing this is just small time.” He glanced over at Jet who was looking at him, his face confused. “All units, leave it be, maybe they’ll take it home and one of you can respond later.” He began to speak. “Oh Shit. Alright, we’ll deal with it, try and break it up. Units one and three, keep an eye on the roads, unit two don’t take your eye from the shop.” He spoke as he threw the car door open, closely followed by Jet. They both burst into a run their feet slapping on the pavement, still wet from the afternoon rain.

“Hey, Hey Back away. Now. Hands in their air.” Liam bellowed, his voice booming over the road.

The man they were aimed at was a white man in his mid thirties, well built and slightly inebriated. He sported a thin beard which took much more effort to maintain than it was worth. He had a thick gold chain around his neck, he wore a T-shirt advertising a foreign rock band and had a large belt squeezed through the loop of his expensive ripped jeans. His fist was raised and already slightly bloodied where his young girlfriend’s nose had burst at the first punch. “What you say, you fucking bitch. Don’t you ever talk to me like th….” He was cut off in mid flow, his fist midway through its third descent into the girls helpless face. Liam flew from the road, over the curb and rugby tackled the man at chest height.

They both flew backwards and landed in a heap. “Don’t you fucking move asshole. Turn around and give me your hands.” He grunted through clenched teeth. The male beneath him was wriggling and harder to get control of. He was stronger than he looked.

“Fuck you, get the fuck off me.” The man threw an elbow out of nowhere and connected with the side of Liam’s head. He rolled of clutching his head, and the man was on his feet in an instant.

Jet was already by the girl’s side and had placed his jacket around her shoulders. She was crying with a mixture of pain, shock and fright, and it made her sound quite mad. She was only young, no more than nineteen, probably just moved to the city to try escaping her parents, or previous mistakes only to fall right in with another one. Her shoulder length chestnut hair was tied back in a simple pony tail. She wore no makeup, a plain dark coloured shirt, it looked black in the poor light, but it could have easily been blue or even green in the day light. Her jeans were a standard cheap pair, with no patch advertising a brand name and had the harshly obvious look of poor quality. Even her shoes were just a simple pair on one colour trainers. Although they were now streaked with red as she continued to bleed.

“Get your hands of my girl shit head.” The man started towards Jet, who stood up and went to pull his service weapon. Liam however, had also gotten to his feet, and filled with rage swung a big fist into the man’s face, following through with an elbow that spliced the skin under the abusers right eye. He fell backwards, not to the floor, but into the brick wall of the corner shop.

“Don’t move. You’re under arrest, and I really don’t want to shoot you today.” Liam spat. He was holding the man against the wall, his forearm pressing against the man’s windpipe, slowly pressing harder until he stopped squirming. “Now. Turn around and give me your hands, and I promise not to break your face anymore.” Liam whispered into his ear, slamming his head into the wall for good measure as he spun him.

“Get her away from him, and call her an ambulance.” Liam spoke to Jet as he snapped the handcuffs against his prisoners wrists. Eliciting another scream.

“What about me. I need one too.” The man spoke in a high pitched voice, pain blinding his senses.

“You’re lucky I stopped here. So unless you want to eat the pavement again I suggest you shut the hell up. Nobody lays their hands on a woman while I’m around and gets treatment afterwards you bullying shit.” Liam growled, his voice deep and menacing. He raised his knee into the lower back of the man.

“Bitch deserved it. Fucking whore, trotting behind my back, visiting family without asking permission. She lucky I took her outside tonight.” The man spoke, unable to recognise the fact he should quit while he was behind.

“What did you say?” Liam spun the man around so he was facing him again. “Tell me you didn’t just say that.”

From down the street Jet had just finished radioing the ambulance when he heard the man’s remark. “Hey Liam, come on man, now isn’t the time. Let it go.” He knew it was pointless, but hoped that the fact they were being watched by other units would have a controlling effect.

“You heard me. Fucking woman left the house without asking. She needs a good beating to put her back in her fucking place. Either the kitchen of the fucking bedroom, and trust me, after a few nights you’d rather she be in the kitchen. Bitch fucks like a corpse. Now get your hands off me or I’ll call this in for brutality.” He smiled as he spoke the last few words.

“Ha, this isn’t brutality fuck head. Plus how could I justify letting someone go in possession of Class A narcotics. That’s an arrestable offense.” It was Liam’s turn to smile now.

Further up the road, the other units were busy responding to the gun fight that had been radioed in. One team remained and they were watching the roads checking for the van whose number plate they had to show its fenders.

In the distance thunder rumbled, the storm of the afternoon had stopped and decided to come back for more. The air was heavy with the smell of rain.

“I don’t have any drugs on me pig.” The man replied confused.

Liam pushed him backwards and wrestled him to the floor, the man’s arms being crushed behind him by his own bodyweight. Liam reached into his back pocket and pulled out two small tin foil bags.

“Open wide bitch” He said the same smile on his face. Under the fluorescent orange glow of the street lamps he looked psychotic, his eyes wide and bright.

“Fuck you.” The man clamped his mouth shut. Liam clenched his fist and punched him in the groin. The man’s mouth opened instantly in surprise and after a few seconds once everything filtered through to his brain he widened it further in agony. Liam too the chance and pushed the two bags into the mans throat. He clamped his mouth shut in one hand and smothered his face with the other.

“Swallow dickwad.” He shouted, a guttural viscous tone filled with a deep seated rage. A vein had emerged on the side of his neck and every muscle in his body was tensed and ready for action. He was breathing fiercely, exhaling through his nose, snorting like a fire breathing dragon.
The man swallowed, coughing and spluttering as he did, his eyes filled with tears glistened in the night light. “Good boy.” Liam squeezed his cheeks hard between his thumb and forefinger.
He let go just as the two uniformed officers who had been watching the road emerged, closely followed by the ambulance which luckily had just been around the corner when the call came through.

“Great. Well you guys can take it from here. This scum swallowed something when he saw us coming, so make sure he throws it back up before you let him go.” Liam said his voice friendly and honest again. He hoisted the man to his feet and shoved him towards the other officers.

“No problem detective. Ambulance is here for the girl, but you’re gonna want to head over to Duke street, reports of heavy gunfire. Two Pakistani casualties so far, could be your guys.” The taller of the two men spoke. He had joined the force the same year as Liam, but was happy to send his time patrolling the streets, waiting for the good pension to kick in, letting him spend his time playing golf and seeing the world.

“What. When?” Jet asked striding towards Liam. The paramedics were busy loading the woman into the ambulance. Her face was still bleeding, her nose was broken and her lips were split, and both her eyes were swollen shut.

“Call came in about ten minutes ago.” The other officer spoke. A rookie who was still at the stage where he hung back and only answered the simple questions, the ones that wouldn’t make him look like a fool or mess up his record. Jet glared at him as if he had just told them the call was three days ago and he shrank into his boots.

“Great. Fucking great. There goes our bust.” Exasperated he kicked at the ground. “Well I guess we’ll head over that way. Oh um, one of you will need to go with her, take her statement at the hospital. Medics don’t want to wait. They think you fractured her face you looser.” He aimed the last sentence at the sad looking man, speak to him slowly with overemphasised breaks and between words.

Liam and Jet headed back to their car in silence and left the others to clean up the mess. It was just starting to rain when he turned their crappy beat up Ford Escort sprung into life.

“Let’s take this piece of shit back and get our own wheels, then we’ll see what mess there is to scrape up.” Liam said absently as he pulled onto the main road and sped away into the night. The area they had been in wasn’t the best in town, although certainly wasn’t the worst. Several lights had come on in windows during the commotion, the dwellers of this section of society all too keen to witness a bit of action, ready to use it as leverage when they inevitably fell afoul of the law. “You brief the girl on what to say?” He asked almost as an afterthought.

“Yeah, she’ll be fine Chump really messed her up good. What about you? You ok, he caught you kind of hard?” Jet seemed to gloat with his question. The rivalry between the two friends was somewhat sibling like in its competitiveness.

“I’ve got a lump but nothing that will slow me down to your level.” Liam smiled back.

“Shame I thought it might knock a bit of sense into you.” The pair looked at each other and laughed gently.

They made the ten minute trip in relative silence, the night time sounds of the radio quietly pumping dance beats into the car. The impound was locked when they got back so they dumped the car outside and got into their own parked two streets further over.