Kowalski dropped the clutch on her Lawmaster and twisted the throttle savagely, causing a squealing howl from the engine that would have the Teks back at the Sector House wringing their hands in horror. But it had the desired effect, and she shot forward across a crowded intersection scattering citizens who’d not been paying attention to the approaching siren. As she weaved between towering juggernauts, she replayed Wily’s urgent request for back up, his matter of fact delivery as though he were still on the Academy street sims rather than in a fight for his life. ‘Control, this is Wily. Currently heavily engaged with perps at the Bathory Street Med Storage facility. Citizen casualties on site, Judges wounded. Requesting a meat wagon, med wagon and assistance from any available units. Be advised, perps are enhanced and have been assessed as threat level gamma. Wily out.’ Perhaps more telling than his words were the sounds of gunfire and terse battlefield communication from Muller and Kowalski. But it was the otherwordly screams and growls coming from their opponents that really set her teeth on edge. Although they were reminiscent of the sounds she’d heard coming from the members of Radley’s Coven they’d faced at Kimi Kardashian Block, there was something else there, some quality of otherness that set her psi senses on edge.
As Kowalski screeched to a halt outside the Bathory Street facility, she took in the situation in one glance. The armoured doors to the facility had been ripped apart by something unpleasantly resembling claws, and the darkness beyond was lit by flashes of gunfire and explosions. She could also see the shadowed form of what appeared to be a Lawmaster just within the entrance, and from the terse exchanges on her Tac-Team’s comm channel, she could tell her team-mates were in trouble. ‘I hope there’s room for more than one of these in there’ she breathed, as she aimed her Lawmaster squarely at the ruined doors.
Inside the building, Wily was entirely focused on stopping the twisted drokker in front of him ripping his throat out. Despite the fiend’s relatively short stature, it was incredibly strong, and it had far too many teeth in a jaw that opened far too wide. Weakened as he was already by wounds, it was only a matter of time before he was unable to hold the thing’s jaws from his throat and he knew it. Sensing this, the creature hissed with pleasure and leaned in further, the steaming saliva dripping from its fangs onto the front of his body suit. As Wily turned his head away, he caught sight of Muller astride his Lawmaster off to his left. Above the din of battle, Muller’s gravelly voice sounded over the comm; ‘Move…’.
Summoning a reserve of energy, Wily heaved the creature backwards and fell to one side. Instantly, the perp was shredded by high-velocity shells from Muller’s bike cannon and it was thrown towards the wall at the rear of the storage room. To Wily’s horror, however, the thing clawed its way upright once more, its body torn by huge rents, its eyes glowing a dull green as it moved towards him again...only to be turned into paste as Muller’s Lawmaster followed up by ramming into it at speed, its front wheel connecting firmly with its head and smearing its bloody remains across the wall. Reaching down, Muller pulled Wily to his feet to which Wily gave a simple nod of thanks.
Meanwhile, Kowalski had entered the fight on her own bike, spraying bike cannon shells at another freak that was creeping up on Muller as he assisted Wily. Looking around for Hart’s location, she could hear the tell-tale sound of hi-ex shells coming from the far left corner of the facility, accompanied over the comm by Hart’s attempts at pithy one-liners. Suppressing a sigh, she drew her Lawgiver, snatched her Lawrod and raced to Hart’s assistance.
Hart was what Academy Judge-Tutors would term ‘heavily engaged’. That is, he was face to face with a snarling mutie perp that was trying to bite his throat out with teeth that were altogether too large for comfort. From behind him, he could hear the screams of the citizens he’d been tasked with rescuing. With a growled ‘eat this’, he fired a hi-ex round into the open maw of his opponent; he’d seen how resilient to damage these things were, so he was banking that this would be enough to shield him from the worst of a blast inside the creature at this close range. The creature staggered back, and in the moment’s delay before the shell exploded Hart saw what the thought was human fear in it’s inhuman eyes...and then it simply exploded. Although he had been spared the worst of the blast, he was still thrown backwards by the chunks and body parts that flew across the room. Over the comm, Hart heard Kowalski coming to provide back up, to which he was about to reply with a characteristically terse ‘unnecessary’, but the word died in his throat. Through the bloody mist that smeared his vision, Hart could see another of the creatures moving forward, a half-empty blood bag hanging from its toothy maw. As Kowalski entered the room at a run, Hart raised his Lawgiver just as the beast lunged forward, thrusting his gun deep into the it’s mouth. Hurriedly, Hart snatched his hand back, leaving his gun caught in the fiend’s inhumanly wide gullet. Sizing up the situation instantly, Kowalski reached out with her trained mind and sent waves of psionic force pulsing through the creature’s synapses. Blood and ichor bursting from it’s mouth, the thing staggered back momentarily but still it came on. Tossing her Lawrod to Hart, the pair of them beat down the creature with grim efficiency until, suddenly, it too exploded messily. Each Lawgiver was programmed to explode if the DNA of its wielder was not that of its owning Judge; apparently, it’s simple robot brain had decided that being surrounded by stomach tissue counted as being ‘wielded’.
All immediate threats having been suppressed, Hart barked a simple ‘leave!’ to the citizens he’d been defending whilst he and Kowalski escorted them, weapons at the ready. They joined up with Wily and Muller in the main storage area just as the remainder of their back-up arrived, sirens howling. As fresh Street Judges dashed in to secure the area, Justice Department robo-docs tended to the citizens, injecting them with anxiety suppressants and uttering robotic ‘there-there’s as the citizens crumpled to the ground; much easier to deal with that way. Meanwhile, Justice Department auxiliaries set about the grim task of piecing together their less-fortunate colleagues and bagging them up for Resyk. As Med-Judges tended the team’s wounds, specialist Med-Teks bagged up the remains of the perps and took them back to the Sector House for further analysis. Wearily, Wily allowed himself to be helped into a waiting Med-Wagon; a spell in the Speed-Heal machine beckoned...
Once the team had been debriefed and had their wounds patched up, they were summoned to the Tek-Labs, situated near the command levels of the fortress-like facility. Leaving the turbo lift, they were directed through a heavily-reinforced series of doors bearing increasingly shrill biohazard warnings until they arrived in an observation room. Thick plexisteel glass looked over a sterile med-bay, occupied by a figure wearing an armoured biohazard suit. Strapped to an autopsy slab in the centre of the room was the body of one of the creatures they’d put down at the Bathory Street crime scene. Even when clearly dead, it seemed to exude a palpable threat, although this didn’t stop the mortician-droids that surrounded it from doing their work. The figure in the biohazard suit turned to the viewing chamber and a tinny speaker crackled into life. As the figure came closer to the window, the gathered Judges could see a thin, bespectacled face peering at them over the armoured chin of his helmet. Clearly approaching the end of his active service life, grey hair swept back from his temples and a network of lines surrounded sharp, inquisitive eyes. The eagle on the front of his suit identified him as one Judge Helsing. Abruptly, he began to speak in a thin, querulous voice. ‘Ah, Tac Team Wily. I assume I have you to thank for procuring this rather magnificent specimen. I’ve been following your work closely since you bought in the Radley specimens. They were fascinating in themselves, but these are something else entirely; almost as though the earlier specimens were prototypes.’ He turned away from the glass and began to point out unsightly protuberances on the twisted corpse. ‘These aren’t surgical alterations’ he said, ‘they’re the result of some kind of massively accelerated bio-evolutionary change. The human base organism has had its body chemistry altered to a massive degree by massive infusions of a gene-reprogramming retrovirus. Their systems are saturated with the stuff, although we haven’t yet been able to identify it I’m afraid.’ Turning back to the viewing pane, he went on, answering the team’s questions in turn. The changes appeared to result in increased strength and almost superhuman resistance to injury. Compared to the Radley specimens, there were also significantly increased levels of thanaton particles present, the deadly residue of the Dark Dimensions where the Dark Judges had originated. During the period of Necropolis some decades before, the Dark Judges had almost succeeded in destroying Mega-City One before being defeated and imprisoned by Dredd and Anderson. As a result, large quantities of material contaminated with thanaton energy had been left behind. Huge efforts had been made to cleanse the city, although clearly some had been left behind.
Attempts to identify the humans who had turned into these creatures had been in vain, however. ‘The massive genetic changes caused by the retrovirus has made DNA matching impossible, and the physical changes to faces, hands and teeth is making it slow going. If they’re on the citizens register, we’ll find out who they are eventually, but it’ll take time’. Satisfied that they knew as much as anyone at that point, the team turned to leave. ‘One more thing’ said Helsing. ‘It would help us immensely in our research if you could restrain your destructive impulses and bring in a live specimen next time’. Turning back to his work, Helsing missed the sour looks on the team’s faces and the growls that came from Hart and Muller.
As they returned to the A-Watch ready room, the team discussed their next move. They were split on what to do, either returning to the rad zone where Agnes Radley had gone missing as a child or following up on the former members of the Black Spug band ‘Eternal Master’. As they exited the turbo lift, a figure hurtled out of a side corridor and collided with the immovable object of Hart’s form. The slight figure staggered back and mumbled an apology as he looked up into Hart’s humourless face. Kowalski recognised the reddening face of Tek-Judge Klop, who they’d last encountered in the search of the mo-pad they’d brought in whilst taking down the pirate-vidders ‘Dark Demon’ and ‘Death Angel’. Overcoming his discomfiture under Hart’s stare, Klop began to speak too quickly for them to understand his message. Grinding his teeth, Muller stepped forward to calm him in approved Department fashion by administering a sharp slap, only for Wily to interpose himself. ‘Take a breath, Klop, and start again’. Reassured by Wily’s tone, Klop did just that. ‘You remember that data you pulled from the mo-pad? Well, you asked me to analyse the location and timings of the crimes being encouraged by the vidders’ mysterious backer. I couldn’t identify the backer, but I did find something else. Once you combine the perp’s schedule with our own Justice Department deployments and model our likely responses according to standard strategic doctrines, it appears that everything has been planned to draw our forces away from and isolate Nixon Penitentiary!’ Seeing the blank expressions of all but Kowalski, Klop looked mutely at her for support. Turning to her team-mates, she said ‘you know, where the Dark Judges are being contained?’. Seeing comprehension dawn on their faces, Kowalski turned back to Klop. ‘When is this supposed to go down, Klop?’ Now it was Klop’s turn to go pale. ‘Tonight’, he said quietly.
The quiet, efficient hum of Sector Control was shattered as the team burst through the doors, trailed by Klop. ‘Get Nixon Pen’s Chief Warder on the screen, now!’ yelled Muller. He knew the Judge-Warder there, a dour, stiff-necked Judge from immigrant Cal-Hab stock by the name of McKay. Within moments, the pinched features of McKay filled the screen, wearing an expression of peevish annoyance that Muller knew so well. Cutting off McKay’s complaints at being distracted from his duties, Muller explained the situation in stark terms as the Chief Warder’s expression became more and more disbelieving. ‘Are you telling me we’re going to come under a concerted attack? Preposterous! Let me tell you, Muller...’ McKay trailed off as his attention was drawn to something happening off-screen. ‘What do you mean, an impact?’ he yelled at an unseen speaker. The whole picture shuddered momentarily, and a dull rumbling echoed across the audio link. McKay looked back into the vid and managed ‘Sector 13 Control, hold on...’ before the screen suddenly dissolved into static. The Control Room was momentarily silent with shock before everyone began to speak at once, trying to gain a clearer picture of what was happening at Nixon Pen.
‘Silence!’ roared a booming voice. All heads turned towards the back of the room, where an imposing figure stood backlit by a bank of monitors. Sector Chief Hal DiMaggio stood, arms folded, flanked by all the Sector House’s Senior Judges. As the voices faded away, DiMaggio barked a rapid series of commands, bringing order once more to the gathered personnel. Satisfied that all was once more proceeding according to Departmental procedures, DiMaggio turned his gaze upon the members of Tac-Team Wily, standing to attention in the centre of the ops centre. ‘Wily! What are you waiting for, a written invitation? Get your team airborne and en route to Nixon Pen at once! Your team has shown some promise in dealing with difficult situations, let’s see how you handle this’. Giving them a nod, he turned away to brief his senior officers.
Within minutes, the team charged out of the turbo lift on the top floor of the Sector House and leapt aboard the waiting H-Wagon. As they made to take off, a slim figure raced towards them, hair flying in the downblast from the H-Wagon’s powerful jets. As Wily held out his hand, Anderson grabbed it and pulled herself aboard. As the vehicle surged airborne and towards the distant bulk of Nixon Penitentiary, Anderson looked around the assembled Judges, weighing them carefully. ‘Are you ready? You’d better be, ‘cos this is going to get dirty as drokk before we’re through’.
As the H-Wagon hurtled through the Mega-City night sky, civilian vehicles seemed to melt out of its path as their robotic brains were overridden by Justice Department emergency protocols and shunted aside. Far below, bursts of flame and explosions became more frequent as they approached their destination, testimony to the truth of Klop’s dire warnings. The team clustered around a monitor showing the full picture of what was unfolding. A circle of violent incidents surrounded the Nixon facility, each of which had been designed to draw in Judges until the available resources were committed and Nixon was effectively cut off. As they watched the situation unfold on the screens before them, the life of the city continued unabated. As before, the H-Wagon passed through and over a gamut of holographic advertisements for products to distract the citizens from their pointless lives. One city-block sized vid-screen showed a dour, long-faced man slumped in a chair, his head in his hands as he stared miserably out at the passing H-Wagon. Above his head, in blocky lettering, viewers were asked to join the Apathy League without any apparent sense of irony. Their catch phrase said it all: ‘The Apathy League; if you don’t care, we don’t care either’. The next advert was much more in keeping with the expectations of most citizens. It showed a jolly robo-chef in a large white chef’s hat, pushing singing mutant pigs into a meat grinder, with the resulting meatish products coming dancing out of the other end, singing an annoyingly catchy ditty with the refrain ‘Lipsundsnouts Hottie Burgers; come on, you’ve had wurst!’.
As Nixon Pen loomed ahead of them against the night sky, a final advert for Everpet played on the side of a city-block, the green-eyed mascot Spot staring out into the night. Wily eyed this last advert suspiciously, feeling that a product that promised to reanimate dead pets could have all sorts of nefarious uses. Still, as the H-Wagon approached its target, he put this to the back of his mind as he prepared to address his team. Suddenly, the background hum of status reports was cut off with a squeal of static. A gravelly, authoritative voice cut across the static and the Judges stiffened as though they had been slapped. ‘All Justice Department units in the vicinity of Nixon, this is Judge Dredd. By authority of the Chief Judge, I’m taking over here.’ Every member of the team stood a little taller as they heard the legendary tones of Dredd’s voice reaching out to them. Hart in particular felt a thrill of excitement. Although he shared most of Dredd’s genetic make-up, he knew that in reality he was an imitation of the living embodiment of The Law that was Dredd. The next words from the speakers heightened the tension even more. ‘Tac-Team Wily, this is Dredd. You’re the team on the spot according to the strategic sims. Justice Department assets are inbound, but aerial units are being held off by perps with air defence capability. The matter of how this drokk-fest slipped under our radar will be investigated thoroughly, but for now you’re it, Wily. I need your team to oversee the defence of Nixon Pen. Are you ready?’ Almost too stunned to speak, Wily replied in the affirmative. ‘You don’t sound ready’ snapped back Dredd, but Anderson leaned in. ‘Dredd, this is Anderson. Wily’s team was the one that kicked over this particular stone in the first place. If it wasn’t for them, we’d really be in the stomm. As it is we’ve got a chance.’ Hearing Dredd’s grudging assent, Anderson held out her hand in a fist to Wily, held level with her chest. Confusion playing across his features, Wily held out his own fist and touched it to Anderson’s. Grinning crookedly, Anderson quipped ‘I guess you are ready’.
Quickly, Dredd laid out the mission parameters. One of the team would be needed to coordinate assets on-site to defend the iso-block, retaking it from the rioting prisoners whilst keeping the Dark Judges containment measures intact as far as possible. To support this effort, Anderson and Hart were tasked with heading down to the Dark Judge containment level, known as the Crypt, and physically retaking it to prevent any further release attempts. For their part, Muller and Kowalski were to locate, hunt down and take a live vampire specimen from within the building. The evil mastermind behind the assault on Nixon had caused a civilian hover vehicle to crash through the side of the iso-block. A collision of this scale would have killed human passengers, but early reports had indicated that creatures of the type that had attacked the Bathory facility had flooded out of the wreckage and were wreaking bloody havoc amongst the escaped inmates and warders alike. Dredd felt that Tek-Judge Helsing’s theories had merit, but a live specimen was needed.
As Anderson and Hart grabbed grav-harnesses and leapt from the open hatch of the H-Wagon, Wily donned a sophisticated VR helmet that controlled an advanced onboard strategic and tactical sensorium. Instantly, his mind was flooded with data that quicly coalesced into a real-time representation of what was happening in Nixon Pen. For the first time in what seemed like forever, Wily was truly in his element. He’d always amazed the Judge-Tutors at the Academy with his capacity to co-ordinate complex operations using sims such as this. As the H-Wagon touched down momentarily on Nixon’s rooftop pad to allow Kowalski and Muller to disembark, Wily began redirecting available forces to head off inmate movements and break up concentrations of perps. Simultaneously, he reset the security interlock protocols on the Vault, slowing down whatever was down there attempting to free the supernatural fiends within. He was beginning to enjoy himself...
As Anderson and Hart reached ground level, they could already see running battles taking place between warders and inmates who’d managed to overpower their guards and leave the building. Ignoring this flagrant law-breaking in favour of their mission, Hart led Anderson into the block’s ground floor through a ruined door. Within, the corridor was dimly lit, sparking wires hanging from dislodged ceiling tile whilst damaged lighting pods flickered intermittently. Switching to infrared, Hart gripped his Lawgiver and went on without hesitation.
Entering Nixon’s topmost levels, Kowalski and Muller soon found themselves in a control centre staffed by panicking Judge-Auxiliaries. Seeing the Street Judge and Psi Judge seemed to calm jittery nerves and Muller rapidly began to assess where their quarry was likely to be found using surveillance camera footage. Where cameras were not enough, Kowalski reached out with her powerful mind, searching for the location of the sour sensation she had felt when dealing with Radley’s Coven and again at Bathory Street. Between them, they found a likely starting point for their search, mainly due to the number of body parts lying around.
As his team carried out their missions, Wily remained airborne in the H-Wagon, coordinating Departmental responses as best he could. There were surprisingly large numbers of warders still combat-worthy, but the key was to keep them in the fight. Keying in to the block’s comms system, his voice echoed along corridors throughout the facility. ‘Nixon inmates, this is the Justice Department. Lawlessness will not be tolerated. Return to your cells immediately, or your sentences will be doubled!’. Incredibly, this seemed to work, and the balance began to tip in his favour.
Meanwhile, Kowalski and Muller had found what they were looking for. A grossly distorted mockery of a human form was crouching in a blood-soaked corridor, gnawing on what appeared to be an unfortunate warder’s leg. Seeing that the beast could not be contained sufficiently to take it alive, the Judges decided to take it down with Hi-Ex. As the resulting chunks rained down around them, Muller stepped back on one of the unfortunates that had been eviscerated by the vampire...only for it to reach up at him with a snarl, a green glow in its eyes! Crushing its head with his boot, Muller radioed the glad tidings to Wily that he had a new challenge on his hands; containing a zombie outbreak...
At ground level, Hart and Anderson found out about this new threat the hard way. They’d finally located a locked door that would take them further underground and nearer to their target. As Hart reached out with his key card, Anderson felt a premonition surge through her. She raised her hand in warning, but it was too late. As soon as Hart opened the door, a wave of reanimated dead poured through the door. Grunting in surprise, Hart fell backwards and went down under a tide of dead flesh. Disciplined firing from Anderson freed him and drove back the zombie threat, but Hart had a wild look in his eye that Anderson found disturbing. It was one thing to study zombies in the classroom, but quite another to be buried under an avalanche of them. Still, Hart pulled himself together, and between them they fought their way further downwards towards their target.
As Kowalski moved through the mid-levels of the block, she happened upon a supply store intended for dedicated riot-suppression warders. Thinking quickly, she accessed the store and emerged moments later with a specialised riot foam grenade, designed specifically for containing inmates in confined spaces, usually without killing them too often. Meanwhile, Muller had linked with Wily, who pointed them towards a point where he’d managed to close off bulkheads and trap what appeared to be a live vampire specimen. All that was required now was to go in and secure their prize. ‘As easy as that’ grumbled Muller.
Hart and Anderson had made good progress, and now stood at the entrance of the innermost sanctum of the Vault. As they’d moved further in, Anderson had briefed Hart as to the use of Boing! (TM) in the containment of the Dark Judges. During previous incursions, the Dark Judges had been imprisoned in cells manufactured from the miracle plastic. Something in its make-up meant that discorporate fiends couldn’t pass through it unless it was breached from the outside. Hearing this, Hart made a point of equipping himself with two emergency high-volume Boing! dispensers that had been strategically placed by some cautious planner, hoping they’d never be needed. Thus equipped, and wielding one dispenser in each hand, Anderson and Hart steeled themselves to enter the Vault.
In the mid-levels, Wily had been as good as his word. Not only had he skilfully used scarce Departmental resources to maintain control of the rioting inmates, contain the intermittent zombie flare-ups and slow down the release of the Dark Judges, he’d managed to pen in a particularly bloodthirsty vampire. Luckily, Kowalski and Muller had a plan. As soon as they caught sight of the perp, Muller ran full-tilt towards it whilst Kowalski prepped the riot grenade. As the vampire leapt for Muller, he likewise launched himself into the air, boot first. With a satisfying crump, the vampire was propelled backwards and slammed into a far wall. Before it could launch itself back at Muller, Kowalski’s perfect lob landed the foam grenade squarely on its distorted head. Instantly, it was covered in restraining foam. Snarl and struggle though it may, it was held fast. With a grin of satisfaction, the pair called through to Wily; ‘mission complete’.
As they did so, Hart and Anderson entered the Vault. Coolant gases vented from short-circuited cooling devices and swirled around their feet, giving a distinctly eerie air to the place, if such were even needed. Ahead of them, two containment chambers were clearly empty, and two others contained swirling gases that behaved as though they were alive, particles of dark matter floating within them. Hearing a hiss of pure evil coming from above, Hart sprang into action. Warning Anderson to stay back, he threw himself bodily across the room, spraying vast quantities of sticky, rubbery plastic across every surface, but concentrating on the two intact containment pods. He was rewarded by a feeling of evil frustration emanating from all around him. From the containment pods as they were cheated of their longed-for freedom, and from the entities floating above them that their plans had been thwarted. Almost instantly, the feeling disappeared as the already-freed discorporate entities made their escape through the air ducts. Finally having time to read the ID plates on the empty pods, Hart and Anderson were greeted by names that filled their hearts with dread; Fear and Death were free.
As it was, by the time that Dredd arrived on scene to take command, having blasted his way past the perps with anti-air weapons, Tac-Team Wily had congregated on the roof and were taking a hard-earned synthi-synthi caff whilst they considered their next move in recapturing Fear and Death. As he stepped down from his H-Wagon, Dredd looked them over with what might have passed for mild respect. ‘I guess you were ready after all’ was all he said.
(To be continued)
