Follow That Car

The course over and done with and I returned to 'normal' work.

We'd left camp and arrived at the police station where we'd meet the men we'd be escorting for the day.

The team commander went and met up with them. We followed them to another police station.

"Just go and chill out in the NAAFI, we'll give you a shout if we need you lads."

Didn't sound like much was going on.

50p later and I had a cup of something scalding hot that could vaguely be described as tea. There were 20 or so lads from the resident Scottish unit waiting around in the NAAFI canteen.

"Been here long lads?"

"Aye, been waiting here all bloody night. Something big is going to happen."

Looks like we'd be sat around while they had all the fun.

5 minutes later and our copper came running in.

"Quick lads we're off to the ****** Estate."

A collective groan went up from the Scottish lads. I tried to swallow a mouthful of tea and burnt my mouth.

I was the driver for the day and as we followed the police out of the gate I was determined to keep up. No chance. Their vehicles were half the weight and twice as powerful as ours. We lost sight of them after half a mile. We followed the sound of the sirens and eventually caught up.

We were just in time to see a man in handcuffs being led out of a house and put in the back of a car. Our copper came over.

"He's the f***er who blew up *********," we were told.

Suddenly we felt all important. We'd had absolutely nothing to do with the arrest. We'd had absolutely nothing to do with the operation leading up to the arrest. I didn't even recognise the terrorist I'd seen. We stood around for a half an hour looking important and keeping the public back from the house. Our chests were suitably puffed out when the Scottish unit arrived to relieve us. We departed with our policemen for more fun............