DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything about this except the rookie.

Lucy Grimm is a little fan reference to Doom (both games and film(and novelisation)). This is based in the 2012 film verse but I will be using the comic verse to fill in any blanks not covered by the film. I loved the film, it introduced me to 2000AD comics and Dredd properly and I'm praying for sequels, lots and lots of sequels.

Also go check out 'Aftermath: Dredd 3D' by toungetiedandterifide on here, it's great and inspired me to start up writing again (after 6 YEARS!) and on that note, please bare with me! This story is not beta-ed! I have a beta (thanks to my lovely Mooch) but the chapters I upload will not have been checked over. I will go over and fix mistakes etc. once it's finished and beta-ed.

There will be unannounced POV changes but not too many hopefully, but they shouldn't be to difficult to pick out.

Anyway, hope you like it, please R&R!

Chapter One

The world shone, everything was too sharp at the edges. No, too blurred, unfocused beyond recognition. I was flying. Soaring high over the city, pulled up by a thousand tiny hands. No, falling, too slowly but falling, through black clouds and rays of sunshine, feeling each droplet of rain freeze and then evaporate on my bare skin. I was naked. Wrapped in too many layers of silk; smooth, rough, caressing, tearing at my skin until there's only bone but still stroking across flesh like feathers or razor blades or shards of glass. Shredding. Tickling. I was frozen, chilled to the core. No, burning, melting, pouring away down rusty drain covers onto ice and embers. Floating, solidifying, taking shape then dissolving again. Over and over. Never ending. No, never beginning. Paused, trapped in a loop that wasn't there. Never was.

Who? Are? You?

No voice but every voice. Screaming and whispering and hissing and lulling. Nails gliding and dragging across no skin, through no hair, over no eyes.

What? Is? Your? Purpose?

Fingernails peeling and curling off, ripping from rotting flaking skin. No, raw and fresh and too new, still bright pink but grey and wrinkled. Open mouth, no lips, torn away, chewed off. Twisting tongue, too far and snapping, but no sound, only a flapping, hollow jaw.

'I. Don't. Can't..'

Searing flesh being grated away by millions of toothless mouths. A baby's face, hollow, bleeding eye sockets .A familiar baby, a known face. Those stolen eyes should be hazel. No green.

'Cas? ANDERSON! Lemme out!'

My eyelids shot open and my held in gasp finally broke free from my too dry lips once I'd managed to actually pry them apart. I hated being Anderson test dummy.

But I promised her I would be. Two weeks, felt like years but it had only been two weeks. Helping her train, focus, enhance her psychic prowess so that she could better use them in the field and for interrogation, still or on the move. There was a thin layer of cold sweat across my brow. My head throbbed with it all. I sat up slowly and rub my temples, turning and kicking my legs over the lab table's edge and leaning my head down into my hands more, letting myself hunch over warily.

'This is your preliminary assignment cadet, your assessment day's coming soon but this is just as important. No, more so.' So I agreed to help and now my skin was crawling and my legs shaking, thigh muscles vibrating with adrenaline and long suppressed fear made fresh, pulled into the conscious from deep inside. "I think I'm improving! That was only half the time, right?" I can just manage a jolting nod, my stomach was writhing and wanting out from its place at the back of my throat and I dared a swallow, hoping to push the bile back down. Glancing up I can see her, pacing and going through the last of her in field motions; drawing her lawgiver, aiming, checking round nonexistent corners, opening her medkit. She was smiling, proud of her progress. Smiling?!

I look back at the floor as another wave of nausea slides up my chest, following the tile edges, focusing on the ones directly below my feet, finding patterns, the tiny marks and stains in the grout in the hopes that it'll hold me together, at least until I can collapse in my own bunk. Puke in my own toilet.

Once I finally hop sheepishly off the table still intent on taking every detail of the floor to heart and get my feet planted she's staring at me, watching. I can feel her eyes on my clammy face, feel the tiny mental tendrils shyly, cautiously reaching out to my tender mind."Don't." I scrunch my face up for a second at how harsh and raw my barked voice shot out, my mouth opens to try a gentler repeat but clamps shut. "Sorry Lu. I... I didn't mean to..." her voice trails off weakly.

She knew she'd pushed too far. Gone too deep. She knew she'd left my mind a burning, aching mess and that it was taking my everything not to vomit or pass out. Or shoot her. "It's fine Cas. Just... remember I've got mental limits even if you don't." A half hurt nod as I make eye contact, fix her with a sharpness I was trying not to mean. 'This will not affect your friendship with Anderson. It could very well strengthen it.'

Finally I push myself away from the table and take a few trembled steps before gaining the confidence in my legs to walk for the door, patting her shoulder as I pass but never pausing, never slowing. I needed to move, walk, find clearer air, clearer thinking space. She walks beside me for a while, sensing my mental doors sliding back into place, closing down or barring the way for the unnecessary , the unwanted. Each step brought back my sense of stability, leading me out of the dark, cloudy abyss that was that place. I hated feeling that open, that vulnerable, that fragile. Mental locks clicked back into place, the last mental chains wrapping round anything that might wriggle free, unruly and jagged as I push the Justice Hall doors open and walk out into the blazing sunlight. Soak it up kiddo. Take a breath. A deep breath and then let it out. When I finally feel her hand on my shoulder I can look at her with a genuine smile, the mental anguish of the past two hours forgotten.

" You out on patrol now, right?"

"Yeah. Lu?" A pause. She seems almost uneasy with whatever question she has sat behind her teeth, wanting out but waiting patiently. I wait too. "Do you know who you'll have assessing you yet? Or when?"

"No and no. Chief Judge mentioned Lex awhile back but that's not exactly an option any more, is it?"

"Oh. Sorry to hear that. Maybe they've already lined someone else up but haven't had time to arrange it properly?" I shrug it off and nod blankly. It seemed such a redundant thing to say.

"He was dirty Cas. I don't want assessing by anyone that shitty. I need to know I've got an honest Judge watching me so I can get an honest pass. Or fail."

There was a long pause. I didn't expect her to declare that there was no doubt I'd pass, nor that I was already a fail waiting to be told. I wasn't special, my grades were barely above average, my prowess at best was to simple keep myself afloat amongst the other cadets. I didn't have an area of expertise, nothing that I particularly excelled in, but I wasn't useless either. Just average. We both snapped to attention at the approach of her temporary partner, although I was a little stiffer than her. After all, she knew him better, all I had was reputation to work off. She'd certainly spent more time working with him. Spent the best and worst twenty one hours of her life with him. Her assessment in fact. He came to a halt in front of them, barely acknowledging me as he nodded at Anderson. A nod to question her readiness and affirm the start of eighteen hour street shift. Just a nod, and then he's turned and walking back down the steps, Anderson slapping my arm before slipping into step behind him. Judge Dredd. Mega City One's best judge. Unbending, incorruptible, unrelenting. Formidable as fuck.