He paused again, distracted by a series of metallic clicks coming from the locks on the doors to the holding pens. Then, incredibly, as Sykes and the other Judge-Warders watched it in mounting horror, the pen doors slid open as though of their own volition.
"The doors!" He heard another voice raised in panic. It was Murcheson this time. "The electronic locks are operating all by themselves!"
"Form up on me," Sykes shouted, fighting to make himself heard above the din as maddened perps poured through the opening doors and charged towards them. "Form up. Shockprods on full. Anything that moves is a target. Raise shields and forward!"
Adopting a wedge formation, the Judge-Warders advanced and counter-charged the onrushing perps. As the two groups met and tore into each other, things quickly became confused. Striking one man in the groin with his shockprod as he hit another in the face with his shield edge, Sykes found himself surrounded by chaos. He heard the sounds of men screaming and the crack of breaking bones, saw brief blue flashes flare in the darkness as his men used their shockprods. Then, it was as though everything was frozen as he heard someone calling his name, quiet and indistinct. A voice whispering in the darkness. Listening to it, Sykes felt a dark certainty take root inside him that become stronger by the second.
"Form up on me," he yelled. In the heat of the melee, his men had lost their formation and were in danger of being overwhelmed. "Form up. Lethal force permitted! Let's show this scum we mean business." He felt the certainty grow yet stronger and more compelling. He could not resist it. "Kill them," he screamed. "Kill the perps. Kill them all."
"They are sinners. They must be judged!"
It was only afterwards, picking himself up off the floor in the wake of the explosion, that it occurred to Whitby that the unfortunate incident earlier in the morning when he had brained Judge Brophy with his daystick had probably saved his life. If not for that, Whitby would not have had to endure hours of questioning before SJS Judge Hass had finally seen fit to release him. And, if not for Hass's questioning, Whitby would no doubt have been on time for his appointment in med-bay for a second speedheal session to finish treating his fractured shoulder. All of which, it now seemed, would have put him at ground zero when the whole of med-bay went up in flames.
As it was, he had just emerged from the elevator and was walking down the corridor toward med-bay when the explosion ripped it apart and threw him off his feet. Whitby stood up slowly and inspected himself for damage. Much to his surprise, he found he was none the worse for wear. Either somebody up there was looking out for him, or he was the luckiest drokker alive.
Stop standing around like some dumb drokking rubbernecker, he told himself. People are dying in there. You're a Judge, get moving. It's your duty to try and save them!
The sliding doors of med-bay had been blown away from their runners and smoke poured from inside into the corridor. Moving closer, Whitby felt a stifling wave of heat from the fires still burning inside. There must be oxygen tanks, surgical alcohol and other inflammables in there, he thought. The entire place is a powder keg. It could blow again at any time. For a moment Whitby stood uncertainly where he was. He thought of the victims who could still be alive inside, unconscious or too injured to move, helpless to escape the fire. He made a decision. Pulling down his helmet respirator and grabbing a fire extinguisher from among the debris lying on the floor, he steeled himself and moved forward into the heat, the smoke blinding as it closed around him like a shroud.
That's it, he thought as he stumbled onwards through the smoke. If I survive this, the first thing I'm doing is buying myself a Megalot ticket.
If I get out of this mess alive, you've got to figure I'm on such a lucky streak I might just end up winning the Billion Cred Bonanza.
A conspiracy of rogue Judges, a Sov-Block plot, mass hysteria, some kind of pre-emptive strike by an unknown crime group; as Judge Hass hurried up the emergency stairwell towards the Sector Command offices on the twentieth floor of the Sector House, he found his mind filled with a mass of conflicting theories to explain the bedlam that had erupted all around him. Chaos reigned in Sector House 12. First, the lights had gone out, then, Judges everywhere had turned on each other in a sudden mad orgy of bloodletting. Men and women who had served side-by-side together on the mean streets of the Big Meg for years had abruptly been overcome by a strange communal psychosis, raving about sin and damnation as they attacked former friends and comrades with Lawgivers, daysticks, boot knives and even their bare hands.
Hearing the distant sounds of shots and screams, Hass emerged from his office to investigate the source of the disturbance, only to find himself the victim of an attempted murderous assault by a Street Judge. Forced to shoot the man and at first unsure whether the cabal of rogue Judges he suspected to be at work in Sector 12 had decided to move against him, Hass had looked about him and seen a scene from hell. He saw a Street Judge screaming on the ground, hands raised weakly to ward off the blows from the daysticks of two fellow Judges, while beside them a handcuffed perp stamped repeatedly at the fallen Judge's torso.
Another Judge lay dead nearby, while the man who had apparently killed him scrawled the word Judged on the wall beside him in the victim's blood. He saw a gang of civilian auxiliaries hold a Judge down while a crazed Tek-Judge tore the helmet from the man's head and took his boot knife to his face. It was the same all across the Sector House. The normal divisions between Judge and perp, perp and citizen, citizen and Judge had been wiped away. Instead, the Sector House seemed divided into two separate camps: those who were affected by the psychosis and those who were not. As far as Hass could see, the unaffected Judges were in the majority, but it made little difference. Caught by surprise at the ferocity of their insane colleagues' unexpected descent into violence, the sane Judges were in danger of being overwhelmed.
I have to get to the comm terminal, Hass thought, his breathing laboured as he stumbled up another flight of stairs. Finding the elevators out of order, he climbed nineteen storeys via the emergency stairwell, exhausted. I have to call this in to SJS and tell them the entire Sector House has gone crazy. They'll send reinforcements.
He had already tried to contact SJS via his helmet radio and the comm-link on his own desk, to no avail. Finding every channel full of empty static, Hass realised that something must have knocked out the comms-array and broadcast relays on top of the Sector House roof. He headed towards the twentieth floor and Sector Chief Franklin's office to try to use the comm terminal there - by virtue of his position, Franklin's terminal was equipped with a hard line direct to Justice Department in case of emergencies.
It had not been an easy journey. Not only had Hass been forced to face the exhausting climb up twenty flights of stairs, but he had been attacked twice on the way - once by a shrieking Judge-auxiliary who had attempted to decapitate him with a fire-axe, and once by a screaming Acc-Judge from Accounts Division who had tried to club him to death with a swivel-chair. Abruptly, Hass found himself feeling a twinge of guilt at the fact that he had been forced to kill them both, but they'd left him no choice.
Whatever insanity had descended on the Sector House, it turned its victims into glassy-eyed madmen consumed by a homicidal rage against those they saw as sinners. There was no reasoning with them. It had been a matter of survival which had left him with no other option than to kill them or be killed himself. It was a tragedy, but once order had been restored to the Sector House, he was sure his superiors at SJS would concur that they had been righteous shootings. Granted, procedure said he should have called out a warning to them to surrender before he fired, but in the heat of the moment there had been no time for such niceties. Anyway, they had all been crazy; it was not as though they would have listened. Hass had been forced to act in defence of his life. No matter what had happened after that, his conscience was not troubled.
Level twenty. Reaching the end of another flight of stairs, Hass saw the number stencilled in large letters on the wall beside the access door and b
reathed a sigh of relief. Finally, he had reached his destination.
Vernon Hass.
As he opened the door and stepped into the dark hallway, it seemed to Hass that he heard a voice whispering his name. The voice was low and quiet, barely audible. Tightening his grip on his Lawgiver as he advanced down the corridor, Hass moved the beam of his torch from side to side as he attempted to see whether anyone was hiding in the office doorways. Nothing. Shaking his head to clear it, he told himself he was hearing things. A stress reaction, no doubt; quite understandable given the ordeal he had been through in the last few minutes. Moving on, Hass advanced towards the sector chief's office. Finding Franklin's door ajar, he pushed it open and stepped cautiously inside.
Inside, he no longer needed the torch - the large window set into one side of the office wall meant the office was bathed in daylight from the sun outside. Then, Hass saw the body lying face-down on the floor behind the desk, blood seeping from a head wound to soak into the carpet. Hurrying towards the body and turning it over, Hass saw it was Franklin. The old man was dead, the bloody marks of what looked like a dozen different stab wounds gouged into his face and chest. Appalled, Hass glanced up from the body and noticed that the comm terminal on the Sector Chief's desk had been smashed to pieces. So much for his idea of calling Justice Department. Suddenly, looking back down at the body, Hass saw there was something clutched in Franklin's hand and realised the killer must have inadvertently left evidence identifying himself behind. It was a Judge's badge - presumably pulled from the killer's uniform in the course of the struggle. As Hass levered open the dead man's fingers and revealed the name on the badge, he realised the murderous chaos engulfing in the Sector House was perhaps even worse than he thought.
The badge belonged to Deputy Sector Chief Grimes.
"We heard shots." Standing on the other side of the inner cage door that led into the Sector House Armoury, Quartermaster Judge Stein motioned to his men to open it. "And what sounded like an explosion. But with all the comms down, we had no way of finding out what was going on."
"The Sector House is under attack by terrorists," Deputy Sector Chief Grimes said. Waiting until the door was opened, he stepped swiftly inside the Armoury. "It's not entirely clear how many of them there are yet, but effective immediately I want the Armoury sealed and put on lockdown until the crisis is over."
"The power's out," Stein said. "Until it comes back on again, the electronic locks are out along with it." He nodded towards the Armoury's heavy plastisteel outer doors. "The only reason we were even able to let you in was because we already had the blast doors open to move some ordnance. If they had been shut when the power went out, we'd have been trapped in here. Anyway, even if the power comes back on again, I need a direct order from Chief Franklin before I can go to lockdown."
"Franklin's dead." Grimes's face was impassive. "I'm in command now."
"Dead?" Stein seemed shocked. "How?"
"Right now that's hardly the issue, Stein." Grimes's voice was stern, severe. "Have your men lock the cage door and barricade it. As of this moment, we are under siege - it is imperative the Armoury does not fall into enemy hands. And tell your men to be careful. Some of the terrorists are dressed as Judges."
"Yes, Deputy Chief."
Watching as Stein turned away to bark orders to his men, Grimes made a careful and surreptitious headcount of the total number of Judges inside the Armoury with him. Including Stein, Grimes counted six men in all - the usual complement for the time of day. For several minutes he watched their labours in silence as they began to stack crates of spare body armour, daysticks and other non-explosive equipment behind the cage door as a makeshift barricade. Then, once he was satisfied that the barricade was sturdy enough for his purposes, he called to Stein and beckoned for the Quartermaster to come over and join him.
"I notice you and your men seem to be equipped with non-standard sidearms," Grimes said, nodding down towards the pistol in Stein's boot holster.
"It's a safety measure." From Stein's expression, it was clear he was surprised to hear Grimes focussing on such minutiae at a time of crisis. "When the men are on Armoury duty, we replace their Lawgiver Mark Twos with Berredas - semi-autos modified to fire plastic ammo designed to expand and remain within the target. It means if we have to discharge our weapons inside the Armoury there's less chance of a stray shot hitting munitions crates and setting off an explosion."
"I see," Grimes said. "In that case, let me see your weapon." When Stein seemed hesitant, he added, "There are an unknown number of hostiles inside the building, Stein. If we're going to be facing a fire fight, I want to be reassured you and your men's guns are up to the task."
"Actually, Deputy Chief, I was just about to order the men to break out the Lawgiver Mark Twos and Widowmakers." Complying with Grimes's instruction through the long habit of following orders, Stein pulled his gun from its holster and handed it to his superior grip-first. "As long as we can keep any attackers outside the Armoury, over-penetration shouldn't be a problem."
"Good thinking," Grimes said. Taking the proffered weapon and inspecting it, he noticed it lacked a self-destruct charge. He pointed the gun at Stein's face. "Oh, and Stein? That's twice you've called me 'Deputy Chief'. I told you, I'm the Sector Chief now."
He pulled the trigger, blood splatter hitting him as the bullet struck home. As Stein's body collapsed before him, Grimes turned the gun on the other Judges and cut them down before they could react. Then, as the last Judge fell to the floor, Grimes advanced over to them and began to kick the bodies to make sure they were dead. Coming to the last man, he heard a low groan.
"Why...?" The dying Judge whispered a faltering and despairing question.
"The man who controls the Armoury controls the Sector House," Grimes said as he squatted down beside him. "It's a truism they teach at the Academy, though I doubt any more than one in a hundred cadets ever really gives much thought to what it means. I knew I would face opposition once I decided it was time to take up my rightful position as Sector Chief. Justice Department, the Council of Five, Chief Judge Hershey: I see now they are all against me. Especially Hershey. Bitch probably realised if she didn't destroy my career I'd end up taking her job off her one day - that's why she appointed that hatchet-faced dyke Meryl Coolidge to steal the position that should have been rightfully mine. It's a conspiracy, you see. Hershey, Franklin, Coolidge, Anderson, SJS Judge Hass: they are all in it together. Or, at least, Franklin used to be in it. He's not anymore. Not since I killed him."
Seeing the wounded Judge staring up at him in dumb incomprehension as though he thought he was crazy, Grimes sighed and pressed his pistol against the man's head.
"Never mind," he said, carefully extending the open palm of his left hand and placing it beside the barrel to make sure this time he would not be hit by any more spatter. "Let's just say I found myself forced to make a command decision. A Sector Chief needs to be decisive."
He pulled the trigger again, watching as the frightened look in the Judge's eyes gave way to blank emptiness as the bullet tore into his brain. Now he was Sector Chief, it seemed almost a shame to Grimes that he was forced to kill the men under his command. But he had to do it. He had known from the first that Stein and his men would be unlikely to support him. And anyway, they had all been sinners. Even now, Grimes was not quite certain how he knew that, but he was sure it was true all the same.
"They should have just made me Sector Chief years ago," he said to himself wistfully. "If they had only done that, none of this unpleasantness would have been necessary."
Standing, Grimes took one last glance at the bodies of the men lying around him. He felt a sudden sadness at what he had been forced to do. His reign as Sector Chief was barely fifteen minutes old, yet - including his predecessor, Franklin - he had been forced to kill seven men already. Shaking his head, he dismissed the emotion. As he turned to begin dragging the corpses of the dead Quartermaster Judges out of the way, it occurred to him, someti
mes the old adages were true. You could not make an omelette without breaking open a packet of synthi-egg. Besides, to be a Sector Chief you needed to be strong. And really, there was no difference between having the inner strength to order men to their deaths and shooting them yourself.
Sometimes, killing people was what being in command was all about.
FIFTEEN
IN THE MIDST OF CRISIS
Souls. Screaming. Terrified. They flowed towards him from every part of the Sector House. Feeding him. Giving him sustenance. From his hiding place in the darkness Uriel could feel himself growing stronger as second by second, minute by minute, more souls came to him in shrieking, frightened waves. He felt his powers wax ever more broadly, escaping the narrow confines of the building around him to extend out into the wider city nearby, claiming the adjoining areas on the periphery of the Sector House block by block and street by street. He no longer needed to sit in the head of a single proxy. He had dozens, even hundreds of followers now - the number grew larger every minute - united to do his bidding in a crusade against sin.
Growing fat and bloated on stolen souls, Uriel's influence could now be felt across the entire sector. And with every act of retribution, every instant of judgement, every death, another soul was made ripe and ready for him. Each one of his followers, his agents, served as a collector. With every death of a sinner at the agent's hands, another soul was gathered. Then, when the agent himself died - whether through the action of other sinners defending themselves, or simply because Uriel had told the agent to end his own life - the soul of the agent and every other soul he had gathered came rushing toward Uriel in a surge of power. It was a virtuous cycle. He invaded minds and made men his puppets, then through the deaths of those puppets he accumulated the power to make yet more puppets to kill for him in their turn. And more, and more, and more.
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