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A/n : Detailed author's notes for this story appear at the end of each chapter. General notes about my "Dredd" fanon setting (and links to inspiration pictures etc.) appear on my profile.
This story takes place in early September, shortly after "Shakedown the Dream".
This story can stand on its own without knowing much about my fanon – Aegis is the mobile command center for the nascent Psi Division, with Anderson commanding and investigating psychic crimes all over Mega City One (and elsewhere). Some references might make more sense with you being familiar with the rest of my stories.
If you enjoyed this story (and even if you didn't) please review – even if it is just a "good fic / bad fic" review (although more detail is nice). Without reviews, I don't know if I am writing things people want to read, or what needs to be changed or have more of / less of for future stories.
I have a very simple rule – if you leave a review for me, I will leave a review for you. I don't care what sort of stories you write, or even if I am familiar with the fandom – I will leave a review.
Bee-Movie
Prog 1 : Nightsting
"You can't expect me to sign off on this."
Cornelius, dressed for breakfast on Aegis in Street-fatigue pants and a justice-blue T-shirt, looked over his coffee cup at Anderson. "I'm afraid you're going to have to," he remarked dryly. "You were, technically, my commanding officer at the time. What do you want me to do?" he asked reasonably when her expression remained obdurate. "Pretend I transferred a day later and get Giant to sign it?" He shook his head. "That would be misrepresenting the facts, and misrepresenting the facts would be unethical, Judge Anderson."
"Unethical," Anderson repeated tonelessly. "Unethical. This," she waved the after-action report of his actions on the Big Tri highway and in the Cursed Earth, "is why I told you to fly; I was afraid this would happen."
"That," opined Cornelius, "is an awfully specific fear. Are you certain only Jackie's a precog?"
Anderson narrowed her butcher-blue eyes, but her generous mouth was smiling despite herself. Drokk the man! He was dreadfully cute in the Judge-Tutor's T-shirt, the material stretched so tight the screen-printed yellow design actually flexed and cracked a little when he breathed. It was a nice view when you rolled out of bed in the morning. Not that she would ever let him know, nor order him to dress differently when off-duty. "You aren't helping," was all she said.
He raised a single eyebrow. "I wasn't aware I was supposed to help before breakfast," he said. "Which reminds me – didn't Jackie promise huevos rancheros?"
"She did," agreed Anderson. "She's still asleep."
Cornelius sighed – despite his best efforts, Quartermain could be tardy enough to earn an induction's worth of demerits. "I was looking forward to it," he said. "I'll admit – it's not the first thing I'd have thought she'd cook." Anderson shook her head.
"No, no," she said, "you've got no idea. Near the Radhattan boundary, all her people's pubs do Mex for breakfast. It's, like, a thing with them." She shook her head. "No idea why, but it is. Crazy."
"'Her people'?" asked Cornelius. "She's not some exotic native girl, Cassie – she's from Boston, for Grud's sake." He got up from the table, rolling his neck and flexing powerful shoulders. "Well," he said, "I'm not waiting on her – shift begins in thirty. I'll scramble some ecks in the microwave – that and some toast good for you?" Anderson nodded as Cornelius got up from the table in the squad room and moved to the cramped galley station tucked into a bulkhead.
There was an unspoken agreement between Anderson and Cornelius to make life on Aegis as structured as was humanly possible, because life off it – or, even, duty on it – was doomed to be entirely unpredictable and quite unlike any other assignment in the Department. Floating high above Mega City One, the HULA's patrol area was the whole city – and perhaps beyond. Psi Division's remit was defined by type of crime rather than geographic area and, while no genre of criminality respected Judges' sleep-cycles, at least other perps had multiple shifts to handle them.
Active-duty shift for Anderson, Cornelius and Quartermain started at oh-eight-hundred, continuing until eighteen-hundred, with formal sleep-cycle beginning at twenty-three-hundred. Betancourt and Brufen retained a more flexible cycle while Aegis was fresh out of shakedown and still undergoing bluesky trials, but the commanders liked to have everyone assembled together for at least the evening meal – usually takeout – in the squad room (Anderson would invariably push for noodles – she seemed to know the best curry-joint in every sector of the city – but never pulled rank to get her way). Evenings were spent writing reports, going over the data from the day's trials, and – for Quartermain – studying the parts of being a Judge she couldn't learn on the job.
Anderson sat herself down at the table, brushing her still-damp hair behind her ears and scrolling through the daily-briefing on a datapad. Nothing leaped out at her as particularly requiring her team's attention – she'd let Cornelius decide; he usually chose with a view to Quartermain's training. "Any coffee left in the pot?" she asked.
Cornelius didn't quite drop the cup when the shriek came from Quartermain's bunk, but liquid sloshed on the counter and dripped to the lattice-work floor as he tossed it down. Anderson jumped up, reaching the dormitory alcove just as Cornelius tore the curtain to the side.
Quartermain was lying tangled in her sheets, her back arched and limbs flailing, the breath gasping in her throat. Anderson caught her wrists, trying to stop her struggling. Her green eyes were open, staring anguished at nothing. She gave another scream – a weak, choked thing. The hands in Anderson's grasp were going white at the fingertips, her lips blue. "She can't breathe," Anderson realized.
"Brufen!" yelled Cornelius, shouldering Anderson out of the way and slipping his arms under Quartermain's shoulders and knees. He lifted her as easily as a doll, lying her down on the table, her kicking feet knocking his coffee off. The Tek-Judge burst through the cockpit door. "Medikit, now!" Cornelius ordered.
Quartermain's thrashing was weaker, her breath a wheezing gasp. Her skin was pale but blotching to red. Her hands were swelling, the joints stiff and squishy. "What's wrong with her?" Anderson asked frantically.
Brufen stepped forward, pressing a probe against her skin. "Hypotension, blood oxygen level is way down," he reported tightly. He massaged her throat. "Anaphylaxis," he diagnosed grimly.
"Do I need to find a medbay?" yelled Betancourt from the cockpit.
"Set a course," Brufen said grimly. The engines howled, their tone shifting, and everyone swayed as Aegis accelerated. Brufen fumbled in the medikit, pulling a dispenser. "Hold her," he ordered Cornelius. Quartermain had no strength left – the mere weight of his arms immobilized her. Brufen stabbed her thigh, injecting the epinephrine, antihistamine and steroid cocktail. She gasped and drew a ragged, but functional, breath as Brufen capped the syringe. "Belay that heading change, Betancourt," he said, thankfully. Aegis, and everyone aboard, relaxed.
"Knew she shouldn't have had the shrimp last night," Anderson quipped, but her voice was trembling. "Jackie?" she asked, reaching out with a shaking hand.
Brufen shook his head. "Ingestion-caused anaphylaxis has a much faster onset time," he said.
"Something bit her?" asked Cornelius. Anderson swept her hands and eyes over Quartermain's body, searching for a sting, as Brufen shrugged and studied the readout on the probe.
"She has all the symptoms – including sudden-onset angiodema," he explained, "but no detectible cause; no known allergen." He reached for the datapad, tabbing it to connect to the Aegis personnel medical files. "She's allergic to hymenoptera venom," he read. He glanced upward. "Bees and wasps," he glossed, a little sheepishly.
Brufen wasn't a medi-tek – or a biologist or chemist, for that matter. He was an exceptionally-gifted aeronautical engineer with a specialization in transonic aerodynamics, and more-than-accomplished when it came to related disciplines such as materials science, programming and electronics. But he had enough general scientific knowledge – not to mention a rating in field- and triage-station first-aid – to function as a medic, as well as talk over-the-heads of the rest of the team. Most of the time, the later was accidental.
"Nothing I can see," said Anderson. Quartermain had previously had a habit of sleeping in the buff – something Cornelius had put a sharp stop to the morning after the Dream Cruise when she'd flopped half-asleep and fully-naked out of bed, pulling the curtain to her dormitory alcove down around her voluptuous nudity with an embarrassed shriek when she found her superior officers drinking coffee at the table. Now, she wore a baggy, over-sized T-shirt – Anderson noted with a smile it was one of Cornelius' cast-offs; faded purple-blue with the logo of a blunt-beaked bird and golden 'B' chipped and scuffed. It fit her like a nightdress – the hem almost to her knees, the sleeves reaching her elbows. Anderson swept the curves of her shapely limbs once more, running her hands under the material to check her hourglass torso. "No, nothing," she confirmed.
Cornelius had brought the blanket from Quartermain's bunk and, as Anderson helped her to sit up and perch on the edge of the table, wrapped it around her shoulders. "You okay, Jackie?" he asked. She gulped and nodded, still not trusting her voice. Her eyes were squinting, the lids puffed halfway closed. "You gave us quite the scare."
"Wasps . . ." she croaked. She was looking at something none of them could see, starting past Anderson's shoulder. "A swarm of them . . . buzzing, biting . . . everywhere. Chasing a man . . . they'll sting him to death." She gasped and choked, clutching at her throat. Brufen reached for another dispenser, but she recovered with an effort.
"Precognition," Anderson realized. "She wasn't really stung, but her body doesn't know that – it reacts like it was."
Brufen nodded, understanding – Anderson could psynse and Cornelius could see the gears turning in his mind as he contemplated how that might work. "Fascinating . . ." he muttered. "I mean, the physiological impact of the precognitive dream is fascinating," he quickly explained. "The future event is interesting – that is, tragic, of course. But . . . an insect infestation?" He glanced at Anderson and Cornelius. "That sounds like a job for animal control, not us. Unless that a metaphor, of course," he added with a glance at Quartermain.
She eyed him with withering disdain. "Precogs don't do metaphors, Brufen," she said archly.
"Regardless of that," said Cornelius sharply, with a glare warning the Cadet to show more respect that she acknowledged with a deferential dip of the head, "I'm inclined to agree. I trust your prediction implicitly, Jackie," he assured her, "but it doesn't sound like a job for Psi-Division. We knew there were going to be things like this – warnings we'd pass to other departments rather than . . ."
"No," Anderson said abruptly. She shook her head, her shoulders shivering. "This is ours. We take it."
"Why?" Brufen blurted.
"Because she's in command, Brufen," Cornelius reminded him firmly.
The Tek colored and stiffened. "I understand that, XO," he said icily. "My question was inquiry, not insubordination – what motivates the decision?"
"Gut," said Anderson shortly.
"With respect," said Brufen, "that isn't a way to apportion assignments."
"It is for Psi-Division," Cornelius said reasonably. Brufen looked at him as if wanting support. Cornelius spread his hands. "We're just along for the ride, man," he reminded him. "Psis call the shots. Let's get time and location, advise animal control en route. Report, Cadet," he ordered.
Quartermain nodded, her upper body stiffening into attention even as her bare legs swung back and forth, her toes wiggling nervously. "Caucasian male, five-nine, one-eighty, brown and blue, late thirties early forties. Well-dressed, pin-stripe kneepads, briefcase, cup of sythi-caf, screamsheet," she said crisply; whatever other skills she might have, her reporting was second-to-none. "Using the slidewalk. Swarm of wasps attacks him – just him, no-one else. Everyone's screaming, panicking – but he's the only one getting stung. He runs, the swarm follows him down an alley. It's too much – he collapses, dead. And then . . ." She swallowed, her voice starting to choke again. "And then they attack me – stinging me. I can feel . . ." She reached for her neck, gasping and gulping. Brufen stepped forward again, but she shook her head. "I'm good," she croaked. She swallowed once again, drawing herself together, visibly reminding herself it wasn't real. "That's all I've got, Sir," she told Cornelius. He nodded.
"They attacked you?" he asked. "But you weren't there." He turned to Anderson "Unless she was doing some astral projection spug . . ."
"Hey," exclaimed Anderson, "less of that; astral projection is a perfectly valid technique." Cornelius ignored her and continued.
". . . then that ain't normal," he finished. "Is it?" he asked.
Anderson flung up her hands. "In case you hadn't noticed," she said, "there's not a lot normal about psis. But you're right – there's something else. It could be another future event conflated with this one, psionic interference, her subconscious trying to interpret some detail . . ." She shrugged. "Could be almost anything – but I don't have a warm fuzzy."
"Which is more than enough reason for us to take it," said Cornelius. "You got a location?" he asked Quartermain. She shook her head.
"Not exactly, Sir," she said. "It doesn't work like that – unless I see something I or someone else recognizes . . ." Her voice trailed off. "Get me a pen and a bit of paper, can you, Sir?" she asked.
Cornelius turned, but Brufen had already gone to her locker and come back with a spiral-bound notebook. Closing her eyes to gather her memories she flipped through the pages; most of them were filled with well-organized notes in her loopy handwriting, but there were more than a few doodles, sketches and even fully-rendered drawings carefully planned, finalized and colored with bold marker strokes. Cornelius caught glimpses of them as they flipped by – they were cartoony caricatures with oversized eyes, small mouths and exaggerated figures in the style of the KT-pop artwork she had pinned to the inside of her locker. He reached down and stopped her at a particular full-page illustration.
It was the same style as the others, but executed with more care and a better eye to composition. It showed five anthropomorphic cats complete with tails and whiskers. Four wore stylized judicial-fatigues, the other – a golden-winged homo-feline with a grin that would put the Cheshire Cat to shame – a red flightsuit. The biggest of the cats – a muscular tom in black-and-bronze with hands the size of his head – loomed gigantically over and behind the others, his disproportionate torso framing the picture and a gleaming widowmaker resting on one shoulder. In front of him, barely coming up to his chest, a golden cat-queen in skintight sentencing-black fired her lawgiver at something off the page, front-paw at her temple, a look of concentration on her beautiful face and shimmering lines of force radiating from her head. A tall, thin, gray tom in justice-blue was weighed down with tools, his hands busy with nuts and bolts. His expression was serious, glowering at the diminutive crimson kitty-princess wearing cadet-blue tucked, playful and protected, in the crook of the big tom's elbow.
"Really, Cadet?" asked Cornelius through gritted teeth.
Quartermain blushed and looked abashed, but didn't say a word. Brufen cocked his head and peered at the picture. "Excellent technique, Cadet," he said seriously, "but your anatomy needs work."
"Yeah," said Anderson dryly. She tapped her doppleganger's chest with a fingernail. "Thanks for the upgrade, Jackie, but your breasts are bigger than mine." Quartermain's blush deepened.
"Actually, Judge Anderson," Brufen said brightly, "that's the style. As the adult female your, erm, that is . . ." He started to blush himself. "Your feminine attributes," he settled on, "are shown larger than the juvenile's regardless of actual size. The dominant male's physique is also highly exaggerated – but I think, Cadet," he said, "the proportions of his hands are wrong."
Quartermain tried to hide her surprise – of course if anyone could discourse intelligently on SoAz anime, it would be Brufen. "I was inspired by the hands of Michelangelo's David, Sir," she explained quietly. "As the instruments of justice and . . ."
"Uh-hum!" coughed Cornelius. He tapped his finger on the waist of the golden female – the big tom's tail was curled around it, pulling her towards him. Quartermain screwed up her face and winced. Without a word, Cornelius tore the picture out of her notebook and gestured meaningfully at the blank page beneath.
She set her shoulders and breathed in, centering herself. Her hand moved over the paper almost of its own volition. It took her barely a minute, the strokes of the pen assured and confident. She finished and handed the notebook to Cornelius. "The best I can do, Sir," she said sheepishly. Anderson stood on tip-toes to peer over his shoulder.
"Is that enough for Control to match, Brufen?" she asked. The drawing was a good sketch of an alley, with a bloated and stung corpse lying on the ground surrounded by the haze of the swarm. Quartermain's drawing showed a few key features – an awning, a particular style of streetlight – and she'd made notes here and there as to color or sounds and smells, but it still could have been any one of thousands of places in Mega City One. Brufen started to answer, not looking particularly confident, but Cornelius interrupted him.
"That's sector two, CapZone," he said. "Three-blocks south of the Sector House."
Anderson nodded slowly; it wasn't that she didn't trust her XO, but . . . "You recognize it because . . . ?" she asked.
Cornelius' face was unreadable. "Daz seconded me to Hershey's team to handle a block war. Knelt there for ten minutes holding a wound closed," he said shortly. "Some perp gutted a Rookie with a butcher knife. Medi-Teks didn't get there in time. Bled out in my arms."
Anderson felt his delicate grief, not pushing beyond his words to learn what had happened to the perp – something told her he'd bled out too, faster and more mercifully than the Rookie. "I'm sorry, John," she began – she wanted to tell him it was never easy to lose someone, that she knew – but he interrupted her.
"Took his oath before the end," he said tightly. "He died a Judge. Nick!" he snapped, turning away before anyone could say anything. "Sector two, corner of Five and Ryan. You got a time?" he asked Quartermain as the tone of the engines changed and the light from the portholes swung across the floor as Aegis lifted and turned. The Cadet shrugged.
"I don't know, Sir," she said apologetically. "The sun was up, but at street level it was hard to see how high. Not long, though," she added. "I mean, I know that much – today, definitely. This morning. Like . . . now?" she suggested.
Cornelius nodded. He opened his locker and grabbed his jacket. "Brufen, you're with us, " he ordered. The Tek saluted smartly and started to gather his gear. Quartermain hopped off the table and coughed to attract Cornelius' attention. "Yes, Cadet?" he asked, fastening his armor web.
"Am I coming, Sir?" she asked. Her face and hands were puffy, her limbs pale beneath the blotching. She swayed a little, doing her very best to stop her limbs from trembling. "Please, Sir?" she asked.
Cornelius considered briefly, then nodded. "Plate up." He glanced at the drawing in his hand and shook his head before stuffing it inside his locker. "But you're heavier than you're drawn," he added with a wry grin. "I ain't carrying you."
A/n : Quartermain's cartoon doodles are imagined to be "anime" in style; her KT-pop is Japanese / Korean in style – it comes from the "South Asia" region which I have used as an expy for Korea & Vietnam (with the South Asian Conflict being an expy for the Korean / Vietnam wars).
Please review, and check out other stories if you are interested in such things. Any feedback on that or other stories gratefully received – the review box is right there!
