Suicide Watch

"Number 6 receiving?" The unfamiliar voice blared out of my radio.

Whilst it is true that I am not a number, that wasn't going to get me out of answering. So I keyed the radio and made a noise like paper being screwed into a ball.

"You're R1," the voice said, meaning I sounded like I was trapped down a cave.

I did my impression of static again. It seemed to settle the matter.

They were looking for me. The control room. The sinister bald footsoldiers of Number 2 scanned the airwaves, trawling for any trace of my existence.

I knew why. A man had been arrested in the Village High Street attempting to cling to the bonnets of moving cars. We knew who that was. Citizen 57019 was always trying out new and interesting ways of killing himself.

Number 2 had decreed a 'constant watch.' They were seeking me for my eyes.

I had performed the duty some months ago. Citizen 57019 had been arrested for trying to jump in front of a truck on that occassion. He had been provided with a cell. The door was left open. I stood in the corridor.

Watching him.

Constantly.

Citizen 57019 stripped naked. He wrapped his trousers round his neck. I wasn't to be foiled that easily. I stole his clothes.

Citizen 57019 lay down and started to bite the narrow tiled platform that functions as a bed. I wasn't worried about this. The bed was indestructable and Citizen 57019 had no teeth. They tend to break off on solid objects.

Citizen 57019 went quiet. It was a ruse. The calm before the storm.

Citizen 57019 ran to the toilet in the corner of the cell. He shoved his head down the bowl. I pulled him out. Sat him down.

He did it again. I repeated my lifeguard act.

He did it again. This was getting scary. I had never seen anyone try to drown themselves in a toilet before. I thought for a moment. I turned the water off. Flushed. That was better. There was only a shallow puddle left in the bowl. To drown in that, he would have to...

Oh...

Citizen 57019 stuck his head down the bowl and performed a tottering handstand. All the better to shove his head down the pipes, to get to that last bit of water.

I pulled him out. He tried again. This went on for a while.

Six hours.

We didn't speak much.

"Number 6 receiving?" my radio sniggered. "We've got a job for you. Have you finished at Harmony Street?"

Damn, they had found me. I looked suspiciously at the police car. It bleeped a signal into the sky. I tried to disguise it. I put a boot polish tin lid over the GPS antenna.

I am not an expert in stealth technology. I can tell you that boot polish lids are next to useless. They found me again.

"There is no escape, Number 6."

I changed cars. I remembered that scene in Casino where Joe Pesci is being hunted by the FBI. He threw them with six or seven vehicle swaps. I went one better. Each time I changed, I got a new vehicle callsign. They would never find me now.

The control room aren't lax like the FBI. They're no bunch of amateurs. No sooner had I stepped into my eighth different car than they sent the call to me down the on-board computer. I stared in horror. NUMBER 6 - PLEASE RETURN TO CUSTODY TO PROVIDE A CONSTANT WATCH.

This called for desperate measures.

I had to do something unthinkable.

Something beyond reason.

I was going to arrest someone.

"Any units to deal?" the radio wondered. "We've got a shoplifter at the Village store."

I didn't care who it was. I didn't care if the shoplifter was an eighty year old amnesiac or a pregnant homeless woman stealing for her unborn child. No sob story would melt my icy heart. They were coming in.

"Show Number 6."