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  Judge Dredd

  Dredd vs. Death

  "Very well then,' Chief Judge Hershey concluded. 'If there's no other business to be discussed..."

  "Just one item," interrupted a new voice from the other end of the room. All heads turned to see Judge Dredd standing in the council chamber doorway. The Council of Five meetings were supposed to take place in closed session, with no one permitted to enter without the Chief Judge's permission. Dredd, however, was always a special case.

  When Dredd spoke, Hershey knew from long experience, it paid for Chief Judges to pay attention to what he had to say. She sat back in her chair, signalling for her old street patrol partner to continue.

  "What's the official Department policy on vampires?" he asked.

  JUDGE DREDD

  #1: DREDD VS DEATH

  Gordon Rennie

  #2: BAD MOON RISING

  David Bishop

  #3: BLACK ATLANTIC

  Simon Jowett & Peter J Evans

  #4: ECLIPSE

  James Swallow

  #5: KINGDOM OF THE BLIND

  David Bishop

  #6: THE FINAL CUT

  Matthew Smith

  #7: SWINE FEVER

  Andrew Cartmel

  #8: WHITEOUT

  James Swallow

  #9: PSYKOGEDDON

  Dave Stone

  MORE 2000 AD ACTION

  JUDGE ANDERSON

  #1: FEAR THE DARKNESS - Mitchel Scanlon

  #2: RED SHADOWS - Mitchel Scanlon

  #3: SINS OF THE FATHER - Mitchel Scanlon

  THE ABC WARRIORS

  #1: THE MEDUSA WAR - Pat Mills & Alan Mitchell

  DURHAM RED

  #1: THE UNQUIET GRAVE - Peter J Evans

  ROGUE TROOPER

  #1: CRUCIBLE - Gordon Rennie

  STRONTIUM DOG

  #1: BAD TIMING - Rebecca Levene

  FIENDS OF THE EASTERN FRONT - David Bishop

  #1: OPERATION VAMPYR

  #2: THE BLOOD RED ARMY

  #3: TWILIGHT OF THE DEAD

  A 2000 AD PUBLICATION

  www.abaddonbooks.com

  www.2000adonline.com

  1098 7 65 4321

  Copyright © 2003 Rebellion A/S. All rights reserved.

  All 2000 AD characters and logos © and TM Rebellion A/S."Judge Dredd" is a registered trade mark in the United States and other jurisdictions."2000 AD" is a registered trade mark in certain jurisdictions. All rights reserved. Used under licence.

  ISBN(.epub): 978-1-84997-052-5

  ISBN(.mobi): 978-1-84997-093-8

  A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  JUDGE DREDD

  DREDD vs. DEATH

  Gordon Rennie

  Judge Dredd, Judge Giant and Galen De Marco created by John Wagner & Carlos Ezquerra.

  Psi-Judge Anderson, Chief Judge Hershey and the Four Dark Judges created by John Wagner & Brian Bolland.

  Novelization based on the PC/PS2/Xbox game "Judge Dredd: Dredd Vs Death". Script by Tim Jones, Kevin Floyer-Lea & Paul Mackman.

  MEGA-CITY ONE, 2112

  It was the smell from the rotting corpses of his wife and daughter which finally forced Vernon out of the apartment he had shared with them for the last five years.

  He wasn't sure how long he had been in there with them. Time seemed to have altered its flow in the days since the whole of Mega-City One had fallen into this place which must surely be something close to Hell. The perpetual gloom that cloaked the city and enveloped the tops of the highest city blocks made it difficult to tell day from night, but by his reckoning it could only have been a few days since reality, as the citizens of Mega-City One had known it, had simply ceased to exist.

  Just a few days. Not long enough to account for the rapidity with which the city had fallen apart. Not long enough to account for the overwhelming stench of weeks-long decay emanating from behind the closed door leading to the small apartment's bedrooms. But more than long enough to account for the growing sensation of gnawing hunger in his stomach.

  The city's power supply was intermittent now, but even that couldn't account for the speed at which the food in the icebox had rotted away. There was something in the air which seemed to seep into absolutely everything, bringing festering decay in its wake. Even the contents of the packets of synthi-stuff in the kitchen cupboards had become mouldy and rotten, and Vernon hadn't been able to keep down more than a few mouthfuls of the raw synthi-noodle flakes he had tried to eat.

  All he could do was sit there in the semi-darkness of the apartment, shivering against the unnatural cold that seemed to creep right into his very bones, listening to the terrible sounds that echoed through the deserted street-canyons outside - and wonder when it would be his turn to meet the awful, shapeless source of those sounds.

  The stench got worse every day. It touched something deep inside Vernon, something dark and growing. Finally, he found the courage to flee the apartment and venture into the terrible, frightening world outside before his sanity finally gave way, before the terrible, groaning hunger within him caused him to look at that closed door and think of the bodies festering away behind it with something other than revulsion and a distant, mournful despair.

  He stepped out into the corridor, closing the apartment door silently behind him, leaving behind forever the life he had lived there. The flickering corridor lights illuminated a scene of derelict decay. Slime dripped down cracked walls onto mildewed floors. Strange patterns of mould and moss crawled across walls and ceilings, finding nourishment from ultra-synthetic surfaces which should have provided none.

  Just a few days, Vernon reminded himself. All this has happened in just a few days.

  Most of the apartment doors which lined the corridor were closed. From behind some, he heard a few faint sounds of life: sobbing or weeping, or disjointed, mumbling words which may have been snatches of some half-remembered prayer. From behind one - 78/34, the Kirschmayers, he remembered, and Mr Kirschmayer was a deputy lieutenant in the block's Cit-Def unit - he heard a broken, maniacal cackle. From another, a few doors along - 78/42, Mr and Mrs Voogel, who had been friendly with him and his wife - he heard eager, hungry, scratching sounds.

  One door at the end of the corridor stood open, with the welcome, reassuring sound of a voice on a tri-d coming from within. Vernon found himself running eagerly towards it. Tri-d at least meant some kind of normality, a reminder of what had until recently been a huge part of everyday life in Mega-City One, when the city's thousands of media outlets poured out a brain-numbing torrent of game shows, vidverts, chat shows, info-blips, newscasts and shock jock tirades into the over-saturated minds of the citizens. Someone talking on a tri-d meant that maybe someone was explaining to them the cause of the madness that had engulfed the city - and that maybe, just maybe, someone somewhere was doing something about bringing an end to it all.

  'Good morning, citizens,' hissed the eerie, sibilant voice on the tri-d. 'Once again, a sinister black pall has settled over the entire city, blocking out all light and hope, while the temperature will be somewhere round about zero, meaning that you can leave the corpses of your friends and loved ones to fester for a while longer yet. If you are foolish or brave enough to venture outside, remember that the curfew is still in force and that you will be shot on sight... which would be a real pity, since we have provided so many other
more interesting and painful ways for you to die.'

  Vernon was at the door now, staring in at the figure suspended from the ceiling, hanging from the synthi-leather belt wrapped round its neck, the other end attached to the lighting fixture in the ceiling, and at the figures - a woman and two children - all dead from single gunshots, lying sprawled on the floor beneath its dangling feet. But it was the ghoulish, cackling apparition on the apartment's tri-d screen that monopolised his attention.

  'Although, really, we should be grateful to you all,' it continued to hiss in its monstrous voice. 'Many of you have already given up hope and lost the will to live. Some have already begun to starve, and disease is spreading rapidly throughout all parts of the city. Faced with this, many of you have already chosen to take your own lives rather than await your fate at the hands of my brothers and their servants.'

  The creature broke off, laughing shrilly to reveal an animal-like mouth crammed with sharp-fanged incisors. With a start, Vernon realised that the thing on the tri-d screen was actually female.

  'All this pleases us very much,' the monstrosity continued. 'Your help in achieving our great work is very much appreciated. Even now, our brothers work tirelessly to bring justice to you all, but they are few, and you are so many. Be patient, remain in your homes and they will get to you in time.'

  The creature's voice was rising, moving swiftly towards a shrieking crescendo: 'It is a momentous task we have set ourselves. To purge this city, to cleanse all of you, its teeming millions. To grant you eternal absolution from the greatest crime of all... life itself!'

  Vernon started to run, fleeing from that voice and from the terrible, awful things it was telling him. Even as he fled down a stairwell choked with corpses, climbing over the bodies of neighbours and strangers, he could still hear the final words of the inhuman, mocking creature on the tri-d pursuing after him.

  'With your help, we will turn this city into a monument to justice, a home fit only for the innocent. Where the only sound will be the blessed silence of the grave, and where the only sign of life will be the flies crawling amongst the vast mounds of your rot-bloated corpses. With your help, all this will soon come to pass... TOGETHER, SINNERS, WE WILL BUILD OUR GLORIOUS NECROPOLIS!'

  He never could remember how long he had wandered the city for, or how he had managed to survive. He imagined he must have found food from somewhere, scavenged from the many derelict city blocks or shopping precincts, for the hunger pangs were not such a problem anymore. Deep down, he knew he had probably gone mad. But what did it matter, he reasoned to himself, when the whole city had also gone mad?

  He glimpsed other wanderers like himself, other survivors and scavengers, but warily stayed clear of them. Several times, he saw larger groups of survivors, on one occasion several hundred strong, but always he hid until they had passed by. One of these groups spotted him and called out to him, urging him to come back and join them, but he kept on running. They were doomed, he knew. They had the invisible mark of death upon them - he had seen it clearly in the faces of the nearest of them - and he had no wish to join their fate.

  On another occasion, a Judge patrol spotted him. Vernon didn't know why, but he knew that the Judges were part of what was going on in the city. He had taken off running as soon as he saw them. The Judges had chased after him, firing at him with their Lawgivers, but Vernon had managed to lose them somewhere in the darkness of the Hel Shapiro Underway. Bored with the chase, the Judges had given up and gone into the nearest building, looking for easier targets. Even from several kilometres away, Vernon had heard the gunfire from their weapons as they roamed at whim from apartment to apartment and level to level within the massive city block.

  On that occasion, he had been fleeing from gunfire, but it would be the same kind of sound which ultimately led him to the moment of glorious rebirth, when he was to discover where his own new destiny lay.

  He heard them from afar: rippling bursts of gunfire, tight and coordinated. There were always plenty of gunfire sounds in the city, but something about these seemed different in a way he could not explain. Carefully, going against every new instinct he had developed surviving on his own on the city's devastated streets, he crept towards the sound, drawn in by something invisible yet undeniable.

  He found his destiny in Whitman Plaza. The surface of the square had been violently ripped up, transformed into a series of giant craters which were now being used as mass graves. There were Judges everywhere, herding in groups of citizens in their hundreds, barking harsh orders at them, lining them up in neat rows at the lips of the craters and then sending their lifeless corpses tumbling down into the burial pits amidst crashing volleys of Lawgiver fire. Some of the people in the mass graves were still alive, and an occasional laughing Judge would fire into the pits with rippling bursts, making the corpses piled down there dance and jerk as the high-velocity Lawgiver bullets tore through them. Those they missed were left to die, suffocating beneath the weight of the new layers of corpses that soon fell down to join them.

  Vernon picked a path across these burial pits, drawn inexorably towards something in the centre of the square. Judges were all around him, but none saw him. Death was everywhere around him too - in the dismal, tainted air he breathed, in the lifeless, bloodied mass of flesh he crept across - but something or someone had decided that he was to be spared from it all. Taking up a position at the edge of one of the craters, crouching down to stifle the dying moans of one of the bodies he was standing on, he looked upon the figures that had drawn him on to this place.

  They were standing in the centre of the square, surrounded by their Judge servants. Hover vehicles known as h-wagons, restless and lethal, circled overhead, standing guard over the new masters of Mega-City One.

  There were four of them, and Vernon knew instantly who - what - they were, as soon as he saw them.

  Death. Fear. Fire. Mortis.

  The four Dark Judges. Creatures from another dimension, the news-vid reporters had said, with a thrill of fear in their voices. Twisted, evil entities who had decided that all crime was committed by the living, and that, hence, the greatest crime of all was life itself. They had wiped out all life on their own world and had then discovered a means to cross the dimensions to find Mega-City One. Twice before, the city had come under attack from them, with thousands of citizens losing their lives, but each time the human Judges of the Justice Department had fought back and defeated them, seemingly destroying them for ever.

  But, like some creature from an old horror-vid, the Dark Judges refused to die and would return again, each time seemingly more deadly than ever. Now they were back once more, and this time killing not thousands but millions. The entire city was theirs, and they would not rest until they had killed every living thing in it.

  Judges, seemingly under some kind of twisted mind control, were moving amongst the columns of captured citizens, randomly pulling people aside and herding them forward to be personally judged by the four creatures. Terrified citizens were herded in groups of a hundred or more into a smouldering crater, where Judge Fire immolated them en masse with blasts of lethal, supernatural fire from his burning trident.

  His three brothers stood waiting as their Judge servants brought their unwilling subjects forward to them. The creatures had been busy, Vernon could see. Pairs of Judges carried off the lifeless remains of those who had been selected to be personally judged by the Dark Judges, and the pits set aside for each of the Dark Judge's victims were all nearly full.

  Pleading and sobbing, each citizen was brought forward in turn to meet their fate at the hands of one of the Dark Judges. The Judges attending Mortis wore their helmet respirators down, Vernon noticed, to fend off the decayed stench from the rot-corrupted flesh of his victims, while even from this distance he could clearly see the frozen looks of sheer terror on the unnaturally twisted features of the victims of Judge Fear.

  But it was Judge Death above all who captured Vernon's attention.

  He stood l
ike some regal overlord, his Judge servants making his victims kneel on their knees before him as they were brought forward to be judged.

  'Rejoice, sinners! Soon you will be free from the crime of life, and the burden of your terrible guilt will be gone!' he hissed as each was made to kneel before him, before reaching down almost as if to bestow a blessing upon them. His claw-like hands melted seamlessly through flesh and bone, passing mysteriously through organs and innards until they unerringly found the heart, before those same long, inhuman fingers closed around the vital organ and squeezed all life from it.

  The victims fell dead at his feet, the same look of horror and fear stamped into all their faces. Instantly, each corpse was picked up and tossed into the nearby pit, before the next victim was dragged forward to meet the same fate.

  Vernon was awestruck by what he saw. Here was something far more than a supernatural bogeyman, the extra-dimensional fiend of the old news-vid reports. Here was a creature beyond life and death, an unholy, blasphemous god; terrible in his glory, undying, immortal, a taker of lives and guardian of the secrets of what lay beyond death. Had Vernon been one of those the Judges were bringing before Death, he would have fallen to his knees willingly and without being forced, in voluntary submission to this most glorious and terrible of creatures.