When Duty Isn't Enough
Author: Firebird
Rating: K+ (may change)
Disclaimer: Neither Hot Fuzz nor its characters, settings etc. are mine (although I'll take Nick if no-one else wants him). Original characters are, as the name would imply, original and belong to me.
Author's Note: At the end of the movie it was clear that Nicholas Angel intended to remain in Sandford, and the 'One Year Later' epilogue showed him still discharging his duty as a police officer there. But what if, over time, duty ceased to be enough? Nick/OC
A/N #2: Okay, I'm re-posting this because I caught a few errors in the original. R&R please people!
**
"I'm off for the night. You need anything before I go, Chief?" Doris asked as she stuck her head around his door.
"Hmm?" Inspector Nicholas Angel of the Sandford Police looked up from the files he was reviewing to see his only female officer standing in the doorway of his office. "Oh, no. Thank you, Doris," he replied absently. Constable Thatcher shook her head fondly as she turned away.
"Try not to stay all night then," she advised him.
Nick nodded absently, rubbing his temples. Two years. It had been almost two years since he had stumbled unwittingly into the middle of one of the most horrific conspiracies modern England had ever seen. Taking down the Sandford NWA had only been the beginning of a very significant amount of paperwork.
First of all, there had been the grim task of removing the bodies from the crypts beneath the church, formally identifying them, and notifying their families of their loss, in some cases only days after assuring them that their children had probably just run away ('Happens all the time, ma'am. He'll be home soon enough, when he gets tired of cold nights and an empty tummy. Try not to worry.').
Following this, there had been the equally morbid task of determining just how many of the deaths which had occurred in Sandford in the last two decades had been the work of the NWA, an investigation hampered by the fact that both the Inspector and the local coroner had been part of the conspiracy. In the end, there had been no option but to exhume many of the bodies and re-examine them. In most cases the new investigation had confirmed the findings in the original reports, but some results had come back inconclusive... and far, far too many had been ruled suspicious.
Three members of what the papers were calling 'The Sandford Conspiracy' (when they weren't calling it 'The Notorious Sandford Conspiracy', 'The Bloody Sandford Conspiracy', or worse, anyway) had turned Queen's witness in exchange for shorter sentences and new identities, but it had soon become obvious that, with the possible exceptions of Butterman and Skinner, none of the NWA members had been involved in, or even aware of, all the murders.
Almost every resident of Sandford had received some form of counselling, from the youngest members of the Primer class at Sandford Primary, who had learned far too young not only that the monsters were real but also that their headmistress had been one of them, to the elderly parishioners who had made the same discovery about their priest. Danny, who had been instrumental in bringing down his own father's conspiracy, was still attending regular sessions, and Nicholas suspected that he would be unlikely to abandon them anytime soon.
As word of what had happened had first begun to filter out into the village following the shoot-out, Sandford's instinctive reaction had been to close in upon itself, turning its collective back upon the 'outsiders' who had forced them to confront the corruption at the heart of their picture-perfect lives. That isolation had, however, been unable to last: with so many key members of the community arrested the village had had no alternative but to accept new arrivals to fulfil roles vital to Sandford's very survival.
None of the conspirators had made parole, with the exception of the three turncoats, who were being kept in protective custody until the first trials could begin. Now, after two years, it looked as though that was finally likely to happen. Tomorrow morning, Nick would release a statement to the press announcing that the police had completed their investigations and were ready to turn their evidence over to the Crown. They would therefore be scaling back their operations in Sandford, although they would continue to investigate all leads as new evidence came to light.
Sixty-eight. That was the final, confirmed, death toll, although the number was well over a hundred when one took into account all the deaths for which there were more questions than answers but no specific evidence of foul play. In spite of a nationwide campaign encouraging all former residents of and visitors to Sandford to check in with either loved ones or the police, the number edged perilously close to two hundred if you also included the many missing persons last seen in or around the village. Apparently, not all the bodies had made it to the crypts...
Almost two hundred. Unthinkable. 'And yet,' a traitor voice in Nick's head whispered in relief, 'it could have been so much worse.' It now appeared that the NWA had been becoming progressively more blatant over the years as they came to feel secure in their control of the village and immune from any consequences of their murderous actions. According to the analysts, over the last two decades there had been an increase in violent and accidental deaths in Sandford almost every year, with an annual peak during the month leading up to the arrival of the Village of the Year judges, but 2006 had been the worst.
Nick had offered a prayer of thanks for that to any theoretical deity who might be listening, even as he had felt the sick, cold certainty that his own actions had led to at least some of those deaths. If only he hadn't thrown those youths out of the pub that night... but he hadn't known, could not possibly have known, what would become of them as a result of their youthful indiscretion and his determination to do things by the book. And he had not been the one who had murdered them and dumped their bodies in an ancient crypt, before offering their anxious families false assurances of their wellbeing. No, he was not to blame. And perhaps one day he would believe that.
And all had not been roses in Sandford once the NWA were arrested. Some refused to accept the evidence of the NWA's evil and continued to be vocal both in their support for the NWA and in their longing for 'the good old days'. Others had reacted with horror and many had moved away, unable to remain in Sandford with the knowledge of what had been done there to their loved ones by people they had trusted. There had been a number of suicides. On top of that, a potent combination of fear, anger, and mistrust had led to any number of violent confrontations, some of them with the police, others between citizens on opposite sides of the 'NWA line'. Sandford had had its first recorded murder in twenty years, to go with all the unrecorded ones.
Nick read over his statement one more time, then saved it, printed a copy just in case he didn't have time the next day – it never hurt to be prepared – and shut down the computer. He stretched as he rose, wincing slightly at the pull on muscles hunched too long in one position, and reflected that that had been happening far too often lately. He had never wanted a desk job – his office had always been the street – but there had been no-one else to lead the confused and demoralised Sandford Police Department. His duty had been clear and, as always, he had not hesitated to fulfil it.
And now what? he asked himself, as he nodded to Turner and headed out into the cool night air. Although the trials were still to come, and with them the inevitable reopening of old wounds, Sandford was now back on a more or less even keel. And he was bound. By his duty, by his loyalty to his friends and his adopted community, by his own stubborn determination to do what was right.
His duty held him captive.
And, for the first time in his life, he wasn't sure whether it was enough anymore.
