Slow Fade
Author: Firebird
Rating: T (violence, reference to non-consensual sex, offensive views (not shared by the author))
Disclaimer: Neither Hot Fuzz, nor its characters, nor the lyrics to Slow Fade, are mine. They are all used here without permission. Slow Fade, by Casting Crowns, is from their album 'Between the Altar and the Door.'
Author's Note: I thought I was done, but then I listened to this song and the fic just popped into my head. Many thanks to all the people who have taken time to review my fics, especially Spud, for her dedication, and Brother Bludgeon for his many kind words about 'When Duty Isn't Enough'.
**
'I was like you, once. I believed in the immutable word of the Law.'
Frank Butterman, to Nicholas Angel
**
His uniform was still so new that the starch prickled his skin the first time Constable Francis Butterman reported for duty at the Sandford Police Station. Sergeant Jim Pallister, who had been one of Sandford's four policemen for as long as Frank could remember, looked up and smiled at him as he walked through the door.
"Morning, young Frank. Inspector Tanner's expectin' you."
"I can go on through?" The back of the police station had always been forbidden territory, at least for a law-abiding lad like Frank Butterman. Jim chuckled.
"You're not a civilian anymore, lad. Go on through."
At nineteen, his ambitions were simple. Become a policeman (check); prove himself a man; marry his sweetheart, Irene Fielder; buy a nice little cottage; and raise a family. The simple ambitions of a simple country lad.
Be careful little eyes what you see;
Sergeant Pallister was assigned to show him the ropes, and it wasn't long before he began to see his village with new eyes. The streets were still his streets, the people were still his people, but now he saw not a safe and innocent haven but rather a defenceless bastion of security eternally perched precariously upon the brink of an ever-accelerating slide into anarchy and chaos. And the forces of evil determined to precipitate that slide had names: hippies, tramps, harlots, gypsy scum, drunkards, thieving kids... it was their job, Jim explained, to protect their village and their people from these threats.
It's the second glance that ties your hands as darkness pulls the strings.
He began to look twice at those around him, even people he had known all his life, wondering what dark secrets they were hiding. The endless suspicion was insidious, but he was a policeman now, and had the power to change things, to Make Things Better.
Be careful little feet where you go;
For it's the little feet behind you that are sure to follow.
He followed Jim like a shadow, watching and learning. He learned where the gypsies camped, always in the same fields like dogs returning to their vomit, and the way a kid would hunch his shoulders and flick his gaze rapidly from side to side right before he snatched something from a market-stall and made a run for it, and how to tell the difference between a drunk who was too inebriated to make his way home and a tramp who had no home to go to.
And he learned which pubs would supply a policeman with free beer in exchange for a blind eye turned to violations of the closing laws...
It's a slow fade, when you give yourself away;
... and that it was less bother to give a kid a clip or two 'round the ear than to march him all the way home in the hopes that his father would do it...
It's a slow fade, when black and white are turned to grey;
... and how to hit someone so it wouldn't leave a mark...
Thoughts invade;
... and how to run a gypsy or a hippie or a tramp out of town because it was your damn town, and they had no right to be there.
Choices are made;
He was uncomfortable with it at first. It wasn't the way he'd imagined it, or the way they were taught to do it back in training, and he was pretty sure Irene would be disappointed, maybe even disgusted, if she knew about it. But it was the way Jim did it, and Constable Walker, and even Inspector Tanner. It was the way it had always been done, and, as far as they were concerned, it was the way it would always be done. And, after a while, he simply went along with it.
A price will be paid;
Safety came at a price, he realised. The safety of his village, his friends, his family, and his beloved Irene, came at a price. He and his brothers in blue paid that price, protecting the good citizens of Sandford even when it meant bending, or outright breaking, the rules.
When you give yourself away.
After all, he told himself, it wasn't just about the letter of the law. It was about the spirit of the law, the intent with which it was drafted, by politicians who had never had to deal with the realities that the police force faced daily as they attempted to impose law and order on a lawless and disordered world. The reality was that things were no different here in rural England from the way they had been a hundred years ago in the American Wild West. If he and his brothers occasionally acted more like cowboys than policemen then it was no more than the situation demanded.
People never crumble in a day.
It's a slow fade; it's a slow fade.
Marriage came, and the nice little cottage (not so little, actually, since he'd made sergeant and could afford a comfortable three-bedroomed place on Spencer Hill), but the family he longed for proved to be more difficult. In the end, Irene bore him only one child, a son they named Daniel. Little Danny was the apple of both their eyes, and Frank was determined that he would grow up in a world of order and safety, free from the threat of gypsies, drugged-out hippies, and the rest. And he made his son a little wooden horse to ride on, and bought him a cowboy outfit to match the outfits he and Irene wore to the village fancy dress parties, and played cowboys and Indians with him in the garden, 'bang, bang, bang'. Life was safe, happy.
And then he met Simon Skinner.
Be careful little ears what you hear;
He vaguely remembered Simon, who had spent some years in London before returning urbane and sophisticated, at least by Sandford's standards, as the owner and manager of Sandford's very first supermarket, Somerfields. Frank took one look at him at the meet-and-greet cuppa organised by the church social committee and felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. This was a dangerous man.
When flattery leads to compromise the end is always near.
And yet, Simon was charming. He charmed the younger ladies and flattered the older ones, the Women Of A Certain Age who hadn't been flattered in years, and stood rounds of beer for the younger men and whisky for the elders with a bonhomie which seemed entirely natural. He stood Frank a whisky as well, clapping him on the shoulder in a manner which was almost painful.
"So, I hear you're well on your way to becoming Inspector."
Frank wasn't sure how to answer that. "Well, I do have seniority, but that doesn't preclude the Chief Inspector from appointing someone from elsewhere."
"Oh, come now, Sergeant. Why would they appoint an outsider when the best man for the job is right in front of them?" Simon took a long swallow of his whisky and gave a satisfied sigh. "Of course, you could be even more effective, with a little help."
"What kind of help?" He was instantly suspicious, and more than a little resentful of the implication that he and his fellow policemen were somehow failing to do their job. He had, after all, sold half his soul in order to keep his village safe.
Simon, however, smiled winningly and held up his hands. "Oh, I'm not saying you're not good at your job. But you can't be everywhere at once, not with so few of you in so large an area. I'm merely suggesting enabling the good citizens of Sandford to play a more active role in helping you to do your job. An alliance, if you will, between us, and you."
Be careful little lips what you say;
Frank chuckled. "Oh, you mean a neighbourhood watch. We have one of those. They meet here on the first Thursday of the month. To be honest they don't seem to achieve much, apart from consuming a phenomenal quantity of Jaffa cakes, but perhaps you'd be the man to shake them up."
Simon narrowed his eyes, and the hairs on the back of Frank's neck prickled again. What on earth had he just done?
For empty words and promises lead broken hearts astray.
Time moved on, even in Sandford, and the world seemed to be going from bad to worse. Arguments which once would have been settled with words and fists were now settled with knives. Drugs began to appear, not the marijuana and occasional mushrooms of the hippies but stronger stuff, pills and powders that could turn the most unlikely person into a liar and a thief, or worse. Socialists and troublemakers chose protests and rioting over an honest day's work. Women abandoned their God-ordained role as wives and mothers in ever-increasing numbers. A new disease, which at first had confined itself to the addicts and the faggots, began to affect decent people as well. And violent crime, once mainly a distant phenomenon of far-off places like Bristol and London, began to appear in Frank's village too.
"We'll get the bastard," he told Helen and Tobias Brown, standing outside the hospital room in Buford Abbey where their eldest daughter lay heavily sedated, her face swollen and discoloured and her throat covered with bruises where her assailant had half-throttled her into compliance.
He promised them that they'd get the bastard, but he knew how these things went. Poor Maggie Brown was barely able to speak of what she had endured even to him – he could not imagine placing her on a witness stand and allowing some slimy defence lawyer to rip her to shreds. He had promised her parents that they'd get the bastard, but he felt it was understood that what he had meant was that he would get them justice and, really, where was the justice in that?
In the end, there was no trial. Robin Hatcher had been the Brown family GP for years, and had attended Maggie since she was a baby. The rapist's death certificate listed his cause of death as a farm accident, and who was to know any different? Who was to know that he had died begging, as Maggie Brown had no doubt begged, while Frank made him pay?
It's a slow fade, when you give yourself away;
The bastard had had it coming, but Frank couldn't get the rapist's death out of his mind. A staunch Anglican from the cradle, for the first time he could see the attraction of Catholicism and, in particular, the rite of confession. To his surprise, Reverend Shooter was not only willing to listen to his story but was quick to assure him that he had done the right thing.
"Our God is a God of justice," he told him. "People have forgotten that in this God-forsaken age. Mercy should be reserved for those who deserve it. You did the right thing, Frank."
It's a slow fade, when black and white are turned to grey;
He was reassured, and life returned to normal. Danny was growing fast, and to Frank's relief he was a good-natured and obedient lad, unlike some of his peers. For far too many, a clip 'round the ear no longer sufficed, and if you marched them home they simply rolled their eyes whilst their parents wrung their hands in impotent despair. So once again it fell to the police to impress upon the adolescent troublemakers the consequences of their actions, with a few well-placed blows and a warning that worse would happen if they didn't keep their mouths shut about where exactly the bruises had come from.
Thoughts invade;
Irene, however, was restless. Having devoted her life to the role of village wife and mother she was beginning to wonder whether she had somehow missed out on something. Frank hardly felt he had a right to complain: she had been nothing but supportive all these years, whilst their marriage was little more than a sham, so different did he know himself to be from the person she thought he was.
So when the Neighbourhood Watch Alliance – now imbued with Simon Skinner's sense of focus and purpose – decided to enter the Village of the Year competition and elected Irene to chair the committee he was more than happy to support his wife, thrilled by the way it brought a new spring to her step and a new smile to her lips. Not to mention a new passion to their bedroom, where things had been flagging for years.
And then the travellers had arrived. He went down to talk to them, asked them politely to move on. And then a little less politely. But his thinly-veiled threats seemed to fall on deaf ears.
They had to have known, he thought later. They had to have known when they did that to the market-place that the Village of the Year adjudicators were due the very next day.
Irene didn't come home that night. He waited and waited, and in the grey dawn light he called his men and sent them out to look for her.
Choices are made;
They found her Datsun Cherry at the bottom of the gorge. A terrible accident, everyone said, but he knew better. She had been so determined to win. Had poured her heart and soul into it, and those gypsy scum had torn it away.
A price will be paid;
They had to pay, of that he was certain. They had to pay.
When you give yourself away.
Almost everyone had a gun in Sandford, but that wasn't what he wanted. He wanted something more personal, more intimate.
People never crumble in a day.
In the end he chose his police billy-club, familiar and trustworthy, and a ten-inch hunting knife. He took his pistols as well, because there were more of the gypsy scum than of him. He would need to take some of them out quickly if he was to properly savour his vengeance upon the rest.
The journey from your mind to your hands is shorter than you're thinking;
Afterwards, it was like awakening from a dream. His body was aching and he was covered in blood. The walls and floor of the caravan were thick with it too. None of them had escaped, not one had survived. No, he thought, in the blood and the pain, it wasn't like awakening. It was like being reborn.
Be careful if you think you stand – you just might be sinking.
The clean-up was too big a job for him to handle alone. He returned home in a daze, washed off the worst of the blood and dialled the one person he could think of who could help him. Simon Skinner.
It's a slow fade, when you give yourself away;
Simon helped him, and Robin. Philip helped them to conceal the bodies in the crypts. Afterwards, they looked at one another in silent accord. There could be no turning back after this.
It's a slow fade, when black and white are turned to grey;
At first Frank was too busy grieving to feel anything about the killings. Over time, he began to grow anxious that someone might notice, that questions might be asked. But time went by, and no-one said anything.
Thoughts invade;
In no time at all, it was once again time for the Village of the Year festival. This year, Frank was determined they would win. For Irene. And nothing would stand in his way.
Choices are made;
Not gypsy scum. Not thieving kids. Not tramps or hippies or harlots.
A price will be paid;
His village would be safe again. It would be happy again. Whatever the cost.
When you give yourself away.
So it went on, year after year. Danny joined Frank on the Force, and if he ever wondered about the accidents, or where his father went to at night, then he never said anything. The NWA, under Frank's leadership, became the silent, shadowy guardians of their village, willing to pay any price to maintain its safety and order.
People never crumble in a day;
Until the day when a shiny new Met Sergeant landed on their doorstep, and Frank could see it all about to come crashing down.
Daddies never crumble in a day;
He had held a gun to his boy's head. As long as he lived he would never forget that. And he would never forgive Nicholas Angel for making him do it.
Families never crumble in a day.
"I did this for you, Danny. For you and for Sandford. To keep you safe. You're still my son."
Sitting across from his father in the prison visiting room, Danny shook his head tiredly. "I don't even know who you are any more, dad."
It's a slow fade.
**
Be careful little eyes what you see/ It's the second glance that ties your hands as darkness pulls the strings./ Be careful little feet where you go/ For it's the little feet behind you that are sure to follow.
It's a slow fade, when you give yourself away./It's a slow fade, when black and white are turned to grey,/ And thoughts invade/ Choices are made/ A price will be paid/ When you give yourself away./ People never crumble in a day./ It's a slow fade; it's a slow fade.
Be careful little ears what you hear/ When flattery leads to compromise the end it always near./ Be careful little lips what you say/ For empty words and promises lead broken hearts astray.
It's a slow fade...
...The journey from your mind to your hands is shorter than you're thinking./ Be careful if you think you stand – you just might be sinking.
It's a slow fade...
..People never crumble in a day./ Daddies never crumble in a day./ Families never crumble in a day.
**
'I was like you, once. I believed in the immutable word of the Law.'
Frank Butterman, to Nicholas Angel
**