Kingdom of the Blind

by David Bishop

  "Yes, ma'am," the auxiliary Judge replied. Balding and over fifty, Auburn had never cut it as a law enforcer on the streets. Transferred to the Justice Department's administrative section, he had discovered a talent for strategic planning and implementation that more than compensated for his other failings. Auburn's reforming zeal had streamlined the department's systems and freed up valuable resources for upholding the Law.

  "Well, make a bit more noise, for the love of grud. Then at least I'll know you're still in the room!"

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "Have you tabulated the numbers yet?" Hershey asked grumpily. She hated being blind, hated being so dependent upon others. The Chief Judge hadn't felt this out of her depth since that first day as a cadet. She could still recall bursting into tears as a five year-old when her mother left her with the Judge-Tutors at the Academy. Helpless and alone, that was how Hershey had felt then. Well, at least she wasn't alone this time.

  "Pulling them together now. They'll be ready in time for the conference call," Auburn assured her.

  "And how long until that?"

  "A little over a minute, ma'am."

  "Good." A knock at the office door startled Hershey. "Who's there?"

  "Dredd."

  The Chief Judge smiled despite herself. No, she wasn't alone anymore. Hershey swivelled her chair round to the desk and switched off the wall of Tri-D screens. "Come in and shut the door after you. I don't want to be disturbed for the next fifteen minutes." She listened intently to the sounds approaching her. There were two sets of footsteps: one heavy and shuffling, the other awkward and staggering slightly. "How do you feel?"

  "I've been better," Dredd replied.

  Hershey gestured to where the nearest chair should be. "Have a seat." Someone lowered into the chair, grunting in pain.

  "I'll be getting back to the medical bay, ma'am," a woman's voice said.

  "Can you stay, Med-Judge...?"

  "Callaghan, ma'am. If you wish."

  "I do. Your input may be of value."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  The Chief Judge smiled. Callaghan sounded nervous. Probably never been in this room before. "I understand your prompt actions outside the Grand Hall saved Dredd's life."

  "Just doing my job, ma'am."

  "Nevertheless, you Med-Judges will bear the brunt of our difficulties in the coming hours and days. I'm glad to have the chance of thanking you. I may be needing you-" Hershey was interrupted by Auburn clearing his throat.

  "Excuse me, ma'am. The Council of Five is ready for your call."

  "Put them on audio only," she responded. No need for the other council members to see their leader blind and helpless. There was a click and the five council members announced their presence online. Hershey summarised what had happened since midnight. "I've asked Auburn to join this meeting. He has compiled statistics for the status of each division that will be useful in determining the way forward. Auburn?"

  "Thank you, ma'am. The blindness has afflicted different departments to varying degrees. Med-Division has about half its Judges affected. They were either out in the open on duty when the lights first appeared in the sky or else responded to medical emergency calls before the danger was realised. Tek-Division got off lightly, only one in eight affected. Psi-Division's Judges were still recovering from the sudden shock of what happened at Joe Chill, so most escaped the blindness - only one in five are blind. These ratios are all rough estimates, I must stress. We won't know exact numbers for some days."

  "What about street Judges?" Hollister asked. "I caught a dose of whatever this stomm is, but how many others are out of action?"

  "Nearly eighty per cent have been blinded. Only one in five street Judges can still see. Most of them were asleep in dormitories or on sleep machines when this began. But they are trapped indoors until the all-clear is given. As of this moment the only Judges out on patrol are those with bionic eyes as they were not hurt by the light storm. Instead of more than ten thousand Judges on the streets, we currently have only a few hundred."

  "Sweet Jovus," a voice whispered. Hershey recognised it as Buell, head of the SJS. "It must be anarchy out there!"

  "Of a sort," Niles agreed. "Fortunately the PSU's cameras were not affected, so we've been keeping a close watch on the skedways and pedways. There's no looting or rioting yet as potential perps have seen what happened to anyone who went out in the light storm. But there are tens of thousands of blind citizens wandering the streets, lost and panicking, not knowing what's happened to them. Fires are raging out of control in dozens of sectors where hoverpods collided with buildings. Three stratbats crashed within the city after the pilots went blind. Robotic emergency services have been sent to deal with the aftermath of those incidents, but they can't cope for long."

  "We need to get back out on the streets," Hershey said. "Suggestions?"

  "Bring offworld Judges back," Buell urged.

  "Already set in motion," Auburn replied. "Most are days away from Earth."

  "Mobilise cadets from the Academy along with all their Judge-Tutors," Hollister said. "We'll lose some but most will gain from the experience."

  "Feasible but risky," Hershey conceded. "That might solve our short-term problem but putting the next generation of law enforcers in harm's way too soon could cripple the department for decades. What else?"

  "All auxiliary Judges can be put on patrol along with specialists from the various divisions. That would significantly swell our numbers." The suggestion came from Ramos, the other street Judge representative on the council. "They're more experienced than the cadets, too."

  "Blind Judges could be fitted with bionic replacements," Tek-Division McTighe said. "We will need to institute a massive programme of surgery."

  "I have a Med-Judge with me," Hershey announced. "Callaghan, what's the feasibility of that last suggestion?"

  "It won't work - at least, not in the short-term," she replied.

  "Why not?" McTighe demanded. Hershey could sense his umbrage at having the idea dismissed so summarily. Pompous ass, she thought.

  "The operation takes six hours, with another eighteen for recovery. You need another six days for the subject to get used to their new eyes. That's a week before any of the subjects would be of any use. Plus the department does not have an unlimited supply of bionic eyes and the replacement optical devices are expensive. Not to mention many of the surgeons skilled in fitting them have probably been blinded since midnight. To get ten thousand blind street Judges back on patrol could take months or even years. It's a long-term solution, at best."

  "Any other suggestions?" Hershey asked. "Comments?"

  "Until the streets are safe, few of those suggestions do you any good," Dredd said sourly. "There's no point sending cadets, auxiliaries or anyone else outside until you know they won't be blinded too."

  "Then what do you suggest?" McTighe asked huffily.

  "Reactivate the Mechanismo programme," Dredd replied. "I'm no great supporter of using Robo-Judges to dispense justice, but in this situation it's the only feasible solution for the short-term."

  Hershey was amused by Dredd's power of understatement. He had been utterly opposed to the plans of a previous Chief Judge to introduce mechanical lawmen to the Big Meg, even falsifying evidence to get the Mechanismo programme shut down. Dredd was sentenced to twenty years on Titan for his crime but that was commuted after flaws in the Robo-Judge technology were revealed. Hershey had revived the programme since becoming Chief Judge, but most of the units were used offworld on department spaceships. A few hundred remained in storage on Earth, deactivated.

  "Dredd's is right," Hershey said. "You should have thought of that, McTighe. The Mechanismo programme falls under the jurisdiction of Tek-Division. Get those robots active and out on the streets now. That's an order!"

  "Yes, ma'am!" McTighe replied, going offline to do her bidding.

  "Chief Judge, I may have our first piece of good news tonight," Niles said. "My analysts report looting has just begun i
n Southside Sector 41."

  "They're never slow to start trouble there," Hershey noted dryly. "And how is this good news?"

  "The looters are going outside but not going blind, and none of them appears to have bionic eyes or any other optical protection we can see."

  "So the blinding seems to have stopped with the light storm," the Chief Judge deduced. "Hollister and Ramos, mobilise the sighted street Judges and get them out on patrol. Buell, your duties as head of the SJS will be temporarily suspended. I'm putting you in charge of drafting the auxiliaries and cadets on to the streets. We can count ourselves lucky the majority of citizens are asleep and unaware of any of this, but that won't last long come sunrise. The curfew officially starts in a few minutes and it's your job to help enforce that."

  "Yes, ma'am!" Buell responded before he and the others disconnected.

  "Niles, you still with us?" Hershey asked.

  "Yes, ma'am," the head of PSU replied.

  "You never reported how badly your division was affected."

  "We escaped the worst of it. That's what comes of never going outside."

  "I was sorry to hear about Justice Seven."

  "Thank you, ma'am. Justice Four is returning from a visit to Hestia. Might I suggest you have it act as replacement until a new orbital platform is ready?"

  "Good idea," the Chief Judge said. "It's a Rumsfeld class spaceship?"

  "Yes, ma'am. Heavily armed and armoured, just itching for a fight."

  "Excellent. If we ever locate Bludd's orbital headquarters then Justice Four can blow the drokker out of the sky. More than a thousand people died in those stratbat crashes, not forgetting the thirty-three thousand who were inside Joe Chill. Bludd must be made to pay for his crimes when this is done."

  "Yes, ma'am. I'll pass on your orders to Justice Four . Niles out."

  Hershey sank back into her chair. "Med-Judge Callaghan, you can return to your station now."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "Auburn, can I ask you to leave too? I wish to speak with Dredd privately."

  "Of course, ma'am."

  Hershey waited until both Judges had departed before speaking again. "What do you think?"

  "You've made a good first response to the problem, but this is tackling the symptoms, not the cause. We still don't know why Bludd has done all of this or why he's done it now."

  "Why try to blackmail the city if he always intended to unleash a plague of blindness upon it?" Hershey said with a sigh. "Too many questions, not enough answers. Now, we've potentially a much greater threat to this city than Bludd. Unless a cure can be found for the blindness, the Big Meg is going to wake up in the morning with half its citizens permanently disabled. How are we supposed to cope with that?"

  "In the kingdom of the blind..."

  "The one-eyed man is king," Hershey said. "But what was Bludd driving at?"

  "He was teasing us, taunting us with hints of what was to come. Bludd kept saying we were fighting a losing battle against crime, that the city was only ever one step from descending into anarchy. Now he's taken that step."

  Hershey found herself nodding. "We've been reacting instead of acting. We need to take the initiative, seize control of whatever game Bludd is playing."

  They were interrupted by Hershey's comms line. "Control to Chief Judge, urgent message for you."

  "I told you, emergencies only Control!"

  "It's from Judge Giant. It's about the extradition treaty delegates..."

  "Grud," Hershey said. Amidst all of the chaos of the past few hours, she had pushed the five foreign visitors to the back of her mind. "If any of them were out in the light storm and got blinded, we'll never hear the end of it!"

  "And Jesus Bludd," Control concluded.

  Giant had regained his senses with a splitting headache, blood down the front of his uniform and broken glasseen on the floor by his face. The stench of cheap perfume hung in the air like a lynching victim, dead and repulsive. The last thing he could remember was helping Smirnoff into the bedroom of the safe house. The East-Meg Two delegate had been slurring his words, but the secrets revealed were all too clear.

  "This Jesus Bludd, I have never met him, but he calls me at treaty talks, during one of the breaks between sessions. He offers the people of East-Meg a deal," Smirnoff had said, placing one foot in front of the other with all the exaggerated care of a drunken man.

  "What kind of a deal?"

  "He calls it protection. I call it extortion, tovarisch. We have seen his like before in my state; gangsters and nogoodniks, always greedy, always wanting more from you. Blackmailers, they are all the same."

  Giant had eased Smirnoff on to the bed and stood over him, trying not to lose patience with the Sov's elliptical style of speaking. "What kind of a deal?"

  "This Bludd, he says he will protect us, keep us safe from ancient weapons that still circle the globe. All he asks is the chance to meet with us and discuss his terms. I was sceptical, at first, until I speak with Chang and the others. They, too, have been contacted by this man. All have the same doubts and worries as I, but we put aside our differences to agree on one thing. No matter what happens, we shall - oh, dear!" Smirnoff clasped a hand to his face, blushing with embarrassment. "I was forgetting our agreement."

  "You're not making sense," Giant said. "What agreement? What deal?"

  The man from East-Meg Two had patted the bed beside him. "Sit, sit!"

  "Ivan, what's going on?"

  Smirnoff kept patting the bed. "Sit and I will tell you everything. I will - how do you say - spill my guts, yes?"

  Against his better judgement, Giant had sat beside the Russian and listened to what followed. It was only when Giant tried to call Control that Smirnoff's face hardened. "I'm sorry, tovarisch, but I can't allow you to tell anyone else about this yet. My new found comrades would be most upset."

  Then all was darkness until Giant regained his senses, surrounded by the fragments of a broken perfume bottle. Fortunately, his helmet radio was still working. Giant called Control while searching the safe house for Smirnoff. The East-Meg Two delegate was gone, along with all his possessions. "Control, put me through to the Chief Judge. Believe me, she'll want to hear this."

  Hershey took the call from Giant. "What's all this about the visiting delegates?"

  "During breaks in yesterday's negotiation sessions at the Grand Hall, Bludd individually contacted each of the representatives. I guess he must have hacked the secure comms lines in their private offices," Giant said.

  "When this is over we need to seriously review our security protocols," the Chief Judge observed. "What did our friend Jesus say to the delegates?"

  "That he had taken possession of a command and control system for all the US orbital weapons satellites from the late twentieth century still in the sky. He was willing to offer their cities protection from these weapons, at a price."

  "The same scam he tried to pull on us," Dredd grimaced.

  "What else?" Hershey asked.

  "Smirnoff and the others hadn't heard of Bludd and didn't believe him," Giant replied, "until the destruction of Joe Chill Block. Bludd gave them advance warning about what would happen to the building and suggested they watch local news channels to see he wasn't bluffing. Afterwards Bludd contacted all the delegates again, just before he left the city, I guess. He warned them not to go outside at midnight or look out of any windows when the light storm began."

  "So everything that Bludd has done today, it's been a demonstration of power, nothing more," Dredd said. "Mega-City One has been blinded and tens of thousands murdered so Bludd can launch a global extortion scheme."

  "That's what it sounds like," Giant agreed.

  "There's another possibility," Hershey said. "He could offer his newly acquired arsenal of orbiting weapons to the highest bidder, so they can unleash them against their enemies."

  "Either way, Bludd just stepped up from being a significant crime boss in the Big Meg to a global terrorist," Dredd snarled. "No one can d
oubt he is willing or capable of carrying out his threats. He must be stopped at any cost and by any means necessary!"

  "You're right," Hershey agreed. "This isn't a citywide problem anymore. It's about the future of everyone on the planet. Dredd, you have to find Bludd and stop him. I am authorising the use of lethal force. Do whatever it takes."

  "Yes, ma'am," he replied.

  "There was something else," Giant interjected. "All the delegates have disappeared from their respective safe houses. Before knocking me out, Smirnoff hinted Bludd wanted a face-to-face meeting with them. If they haven't already left the city, the delegates could be your lead to finding Bludd."

  "Very good, Giant," Hershey said. "That will be all." She deactivated the comms line. "Can you find the delegates, Dredd?"

  "That should be simple," he replied. "When they came through Customs yesterday I planted homing devices on several of the visitors so we could keep track of them in case of emergency. Most were found and destroyed within hours but one is still active - Brit-Cit representative Warner."

  "Why didn't he locate the homing device like the others?"

  "It was inserted during a cavity search. Warner's close encounter with that pleasure mech probably pushed it even further up inside him."

  Hershey smiled. "Maybe he was hoping the pleasure mech might dislodge it?"

  "I'll be on my way." Dredd stood slowly, unable to disguise the pain from his injuries.

  "Are you sure you're up to this?" Hershey asked.

  "I'll survive, unlike Bludd."

  "Before you go, there's something you should know about a secret weapon you can use against him. We've been keeping this in reserve, to be activated as a last resort. It will only work face-to-face. Once that happens, it cannot be reused again. You only get one chance, Dredd."

  "I understand," he said. "What is it?"