6pm

E L

“St Kilda Police unit to attend Ripponlea train station for report of a suicide, male unconscious, not breathing, trapped under the train”.

Fucking hell cunt. 6pm on a Friday night, there will be cunts everywhere. I got Jamie with me and it is his first day as a probationary police officer.

I turn my police sirens on and drive 120km per hour to the train station. People are so stupid whenever a police car is behind them. They either freeze, don’t move out of the way or do something incredibly stupid like slam their brakes so I will have to slam my brakes.

I find myself praying that he is alive, please please be alive. I had a drug overdose only a few days ago and I am not yet recovered from that death let alone going to a train death. I have never met this guy but I am already praying that he is alive. I am not even religious yet I am praying that he is alive.

Actually you know what, I think I am religious. I am not a hardcore Christian but I do believe there is something powerful beyond us. All these Atheists and non-believers. My challenge to them is if they have ever faced a life and death situation, I am interested to see who gets on their knees and prays to the Almighty. Life and death situations equalise the human, the arrogance of humanity that we are it and there is no one above us. Fucking bullshit. I thought I was a non believer until I did this job and I often find myself praying to the Almighty either I don’t die or the cunt I am trying to save does not die. I don’t know why, but I find myself instinctively just doing it.

All you Atheists and non believers have been insulated and cushioned in your little marshmallow lives. You have never had the barrel of a gun pointed in your precious little mouth, nor had a serial sex offender and rapist corner you, drug you and whilst you are in and out of consciousness, his evil face looms over your blurry eyes and violate your soul. Yes you have never felt your soul, spirit and human body at the mercy of another so you never had to call upon the Almighty to save you. Makes me sick to think of these ignorant and narrow-minded cunts know better, how even dare we suggest we are it?

I am praying it is a hoax call. I have never been to a train fatality. I have attended another train suicide incident where some local crackhead jumped in front of a train and I thought shit here we go. Same situation, I was with a new guy. I am really cursed. They call me Dr Death at my station because of how many deaths I have been to. But turns out by some miracle she survived although her hips were fractured. Cockroaches are hard to kill. The good die young yet these scumbags can even survive being hit by a train.

Anyways, I am flying down the road to get to Ripponlea station. I get to the station and I see the train stop just short of the train station. 

Not fucking good. 

I jump out of the car and there are just motherfucking cunts everywhere. Nothing makes me more angry than all these passersby watching, standing and filming. Why do people fucking stop and film whenever there is something bad happening? I do not have social media and exactly for this reason? Is your petty life on social media that important? You think people give a fuck about what picture you post or how many likes they give you? I yell at them, get back, get back from the fucking scene.

I hear people screaming and pointing towards the train tracks. I hear people crying. I see a woman standing at the tracks, frozen. There is nothing so terrifying as seeing another person freeze, eyes open and unable to move. I ask her what happened. No response. I yell at her what happened. 

She does not hear me, she cannot hear me. 

Fuck her.

I walk fast and break into a run. Fucking hell cunt. I see a dark figure under the train tracks.

I run towards the train and the dark shape is a human figure. Thankfully his face is turned away from me. I never look at the face if I can. I had a dream once where all the dead bodies I went to, I was at the dinner table and they were all seated around me and all their faces were looking at me.  

I turn my light on him and I will always remember seeing a wedding ring on his finger. He has been run over by the train wheel and I can see his body cut in half. Can you fucking believe that. 

I go on my belly, I continue to hear people screaming, cars have come to a stop, beeping their horn wondering why there is a delay. I see a crowd gather around me, all filming me. I am so short from pulling out my pistol and firing a warning shot to just get everyone to fucking get back. I hear some people whooping and excited to see police in action. But a fucking cunt is stuck under the wheel and you are filming me?

I would love for one of these people filming to suffer a horrific injury, crushed in a car crash, perhaps they were screaming for help. Then I will walk over very casually to them, film them whilst they are screaming for their life and I will get my phone out and I will film so I can show all my friends and get the likes. I think that would satisfy me.

You think I am a jaded, angry, cynical police officer don’t you? You think I need help don’t you? That I need religion, psychotherapy. No I don’t want any of that, I just want people to own up to their fucking mistakes and have some respect for human life and dignity. I have never felt more distrust, contempt and utter disgust for the same society I took an oath to serve and protect. These very people laughing and whooping at me under a train and filming me on TikTok, I am expected to give my life for them?

I get on my belly but it is hard as this body armour is thick and gets in the way. I can't breathe in this fucking vest. Some higher up had the idea we should all wear heavy body armour and he got a promotion out of it but it fucks my lower back and inhibits my mobility. 

I crawl to the bottom of the train and stick my head under the wheel. It is a strange feeling when you are on your stomach and stick your head under the wheel. I wonder if the train will roll forward. It is counter intuitive to lie on your stomach and place your head under the train wheel yet I found myself in this exact position.

I grab a hold of the guy’s arm. This man I have never met before and start to pull him. I tell him, “My name is Emerson, I am from the St Kilda Police Station. Don’t worry, I am here with you. I am here for you. Stay with me”. His chest is rising and falling. I keep telling him, hi I am emerson. I am here to help you, just stay with me. I am also begging. I am begging him to stay alive. I am begging God to keep this fucker alive. Alive so I don’t have the trauma of him dying, I don’t have to remember his face for the rest of my life. 

Why you selfish cunt die now and now I have to suffer for the rest of my life? Because of your own misery, now all of us here, we are eternally fucked because you have passed from this world yet we are now on the world holding the torrent of trauma from the rest of the public. I get why people suicide, but in a place so public is so incredibly selfish and now you have died, but now my life is traumatized and I will forever be impacted by your death. Yes you have left this world, BUT I still have to live in this world. I hate him already.

It is an intimate feeling to come with death. I touch you, I smell you, I see you, I hear your shallow breathing. The death and trauma goes into my pores, my DNA. I am intimately connected to you more than you ever will with your parents, your partner and your children. All the orgasms you have reached in your life does not even compare to the transcendental connection that I have when you die and I am the first contact with you. I was not there with you when you were born, but I was there when you passed from this Earth and I am trying to traverse into death, a foolish task to try to bring you back to life. In my case, trying to drag this fucker off the train tracks.

I continue to pull him and try to get him off the tracks but the fucker won’t move. Fucking hell, I take my body armour off, fuck policy, I don’t give a fuck if I get in trouble. This motherfucker, it is never easy. I see why it is so hard to drag him off the tracks. The 50 ton train is on top of his legs still. He is crushed under the train and pinned under. The adrenaline got me so fucked up I can’t even think or see properly, my tunnel vision just see him, his shallow breathing and the wedding ring. His family is still somewhere and thinking where is dad. I pull and pull and say come on man. Why am I talking to a dead guy? Can he even hear me?

I can’t think straight, I can’t believe this is happening. This doesn’t look real to me. And people are filming me. Watching me, all wanting to see the police fall.

This fucking cunt won’t budge and I remember he is trapped under the wheel. The paramedics come and touch him and say he is dead. I was still trying to pull this fucker out and he is dead.

I decide to leave him. I can’t drag him without ripping his body. I tell Jamie to clear out all the fuckers filming, yelling and screaming. I see this one blonde woman standing there looking at me. Her eyes are wide open, horrified and she is in shock. Not shock like you see a rat in your house or a shock where you realise you have been sacked from your job. Shock as in seeing a man jump in front of a fucking train and his life suddenly snatched away as he is crushed and rolled under the train.

Okay, this guy is dead. But I have a problem where there are 2 opposing sides of traffic banked up. It is peak hour and the trains have stopped with hundreds of people stuck on the train still. I yell at Jamie, “Get the crime scene tape up and get all these fucking cunts back NOW”.

Jamie, it is his first job runs off and tries his best to use his police powers to tell people to get back. I climb up to the train and see the train driver. She is young, Latina looking and her eyes are horrified and eyes open.

She was still looking ahead, frozen in her seat and unable to move. I had to shake her for her to look at me. She keeps saying, “I didn’t…I didn’t have time…”

I say to her, how do I unlock these fucking doors? She keeps saying, “I didn’t have time”. I tell her to give me the emergency key, NOW. She looks at me finally. She starts to laugh as she is crying. Her mouth is open but she is not laughing from happiness, she is laughing at the surreal out of body experience she is having. I have never heard a laugh where I had goosebumps and fear. This laugh imprinted in my soul.

When people jump in front of trains, train drivers are trained to duck to avoid seeing the death. Yet she didn’t have time to duck and saw this man jump out of nowhere and jump under the wheel. She just had time to slam the emergency brakes. But when you do that, all the doors suddenly lock and only one key unlocks it.

It is 6pm and all the commuters are coming home. I grab the master key. The fire brigade have turned up with a ladder. I drag this fucking heavy ladder to the first carriage, unlock it and force the doors open.

I see all these commuters sitting there, some have figured out what has happened. But lo and fucking be hold there were these 2 rough looking guys that were smoking on the train and smoking a joint. The anger, the adrenaline, the injustice, the casualness. One of these rats say to me, “What happened” in the most condescending tone. I march right up to his gaunt face, his ugly, drug ridden face and I stared into what shred of soul he had left and whilst gritting my teeth I told him, ‘Put that fucking joint out, you fucking smoking on the train?” He sees the look in my eye and quickly stubs out the joint and lowers his eyes.

I turn to the commuters and tell everyone this is an emergency and to assemble in a single line and hop off the train. Everyone sits up at once and line up. There is no talking, no laughing. I tell them if you haven’t guessed already, we have a train suicide.

Some quietly say to me that you don’t get paid for what you do, another say thank you for your service. They are all meekly staring at me. I look at myself in the glass. I got the 1000 yard stare. I just had someone die in my fucking arms I want to scream, yell, hurt someone and I am expected to repress my emotions, my feelings under this body armour, this fucking body armour and this badge.

All the people exfil out of the train. I run back and the detectives have turn up with more police units. The scene is locked down.  

Three hours of crime scene went by. The jack comes to lift the train up and they peeled this dead guy off the tracks. I turned my body away not wanting to look at it.

The scene is closed down, we are released to go and the other police units will slowly refurbish the scene.

I get back into my car and the radio dispatcher gives me another job, “St Kilda Police to attend address of 5 Ruskin St in Elwood for a domestic dispute”. The train driver has 3 days off, mandatory recovery. Yet I have seen 50 deaths and I never remember taking 3 days off after each one.

I drive to 5 Ruskin St in Elwood. Neither of us say a word in the car. I walk slowly up to the house door, my feet are dragging. I still cannot believe I just had some cunt die in my arms. My body is on autopilot. I knock on the door, the door opens and the woman opens the door. She looks me up and down and says, “What the fuck took you guys so long to get here?”