Author's Note:
This story is based on the 2012 movie as well as the comics (storyline "The Cursed Earth", 2000AD progs 61-85, 1978; reprinted in Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files, vol. 2), though of course it is not simply a merging of those two sources. Many of the characters appearing here are from the comics, in some way or another, some are my own. It occurred to me that the storyline might work well adapted as a TV series... and then suddenly I couldn't resist writing such an adapted version. You know how it is, don't you? ;-)

Reviews are appreciated, they speed up my writing massively. :D

1. Fargo Stock

The landscape blurred from sharp lines into a sickening hue of beige and ochre streaked with grey. The roar of the engines was the only sound in an empty wasteland that stretched as far as the eye could see, flat and dry, the ground cracked and parched like broken plaster. Toward a sky of bright, dazzling blue, the occasional blackened ruin reared up, many more buried beneath the sand or ground to dust by the storms in the course of time.

The two men on their bikes had very little time to take in their surroundings.

Briefly throttling the engine, Dredd swerved around a scorched boulder looming out of the sand. What seemed to be part of an empty window frame cracked under the wheels as he accelerated once more. He was gaining on the man ahead. The Lawmaster might be a heavy bike, much heavier than the other man's, but underestimating its speed had proved a lethal mistake plenty of times in the past already. By now he was in sure firing range, yet a fall at this speed might well be deadly, and he wanted the man alive. Eyes on the ground ahead, he pushed the engine to maximum speed. One tiny mistake could kill him now, just one… but he made no mistakes.

The man ahead cast a glance over his shoulder, a risky move at this speed. But Harvey Rutten, better known as Spikes Rotten, had an infamous habit of taking much greater risks. Four times already he had escaped justice, and each time the escape had been spectacular. He would not escape again.

Spikes must have realised this as well. Very suddenly he turned left past a bristly thicket that could have been either alive or dead, skidding in the sand, but he caught himself just in time. Gritting his teeth, Dredd copied the move straight away, attempting to gain more ground by cutting the curve and very narrowly avoiding a slender finger of solid rock slanting from the sand in a slight angle. His hind wheel tore a thorny branch from the bristly thicket as he raced past it. Spikes was crouched on his bike, forcing it to its very limits, but Dredd was still gaining.

They were crossing what must have been a small settlement once, passing a pattern of scorched foundations. Crumbling walls rushed by to either side as they crossed the remains of a large building, and when they left its weak shadow heading out towards the open wasteland once more, Dredd was almost beside Spikes. Closing the gap between them, he forced him off course, towards a charred hill of unrecognisable debris. Spikes's features, or what was visible of them beneath his large black goggles, were twisted, his teeth slightly bared. A vein throbbed at the side of his neck, above the frayed collar of his jeans vest. He apparently was not wearing a shirt beneath it; Dredd could see the sinews in his arms twitching under his skin. Braking, he tried to slip past Dredd's hind wheel and away from the obstacle, yet Dredd had anticipated the move and braked along with him, steering his own bike yet closer. Yelling something that was swallowed completely by the rushing wind, Spikes dodged a bent and corroded piece of plumbing. He was careening to both sides already, losing control. Veering off course, he vainly tried to avoid a patch of gravel, skidding toward the debris. Dredd could only admire how he managed not to fall for so long. As he pulled his Lawmaster into a curve, he estimated speed and direction of his target, saw where the flight would end...

Somehow Spikes had not lost his precarious balance, but then hit a rock instead. He was thrown off the saddle into the air, flailing wildly, before he landed on the dusty ground, rolled several times and then lay still. The bike slithered away sideways, it wheels still turning, though one of them was twisted into an odd shape, sheets of dust rising up around it. Parts of metal fell off and exposed smoking engine components.

Muttering a curse, Dredd circled around and brought his Lawmaster to a stop. He leapt off and approached the fallen man warily. Spikes was lying flat on his stomach, face down in the sand, his bare arms covered in scratches and abrasions interspersed with larger bleeding gashes. The back of his jeans vest had a wide tear across it; blood was welling up from underneath. Dust coated his black-dyed hair, colouring it grey, yet somehow it more or less retained its style, the short spikes that had earned him his nickname.

As he had come as close as four or five paces, Spikes stirred and groaned audibly, and Dredd let go of a breath he had not quite realised he was holding. He was taking him alive after all.

Slowly, very slowly, Spikes rolled over and yanked his goggles off. Pushing himself up with one hand and groaning all the while – the other hand seemed to be injured – he gingerly examined a possibly deep cut across his bare stomach that was coated in a mixture of blood and dirt, then resignedly looked up at Dredd. "You fucking bastard. I applaud you."

Dredd answered with a mock inclination of his head, hinting at a bow. Spikes Rotten, another well-known name to add to the list of notorious lawbreakers he had brought down. He very much hoped that it would earn him a long night's sleep after a hot bath. Or a cold bath, maybe. The sun burned down remorselessly, and he was sweating under his uniform.

Spikes squinted at his badge, and his narrow face contorted into a grimace. "It's you, isn't it? Joe Dredd? Why, that's funny. Fancy that." He wiped the sweat from his forehead, smearing it with blood instead. "It's been a long time, Joey."

"Yes, it has," Dredd confirmed. "You're under arrest for theft, vandalism and several traffic violations. Three years, eligible for parole after two if you behave. Don't call me Joey."

Spikes shrugged and then immediately yelped and clutched his shoulder. "Not even for old times' sake? Nah, you're a big bad Judge now, aren't you?" He chuckled, a strangely throaty sound. "Aren't you gonna cuff me?"

"And you haven't changed one bit in all that time," Dredd remarked dryly. Gazing back in the direction he had come from, to the sheer boundary wall in the distance, towering blocks and structures rearing up above it barely discernible from where he stood, he did not have to wait long. A dark speck in the sky was coming towards them, growing bigger. "I'll leave the cuffing to them."

Spikes followed his gaze. "Here to pick us up, eh?" he observed. "Was wondering how you'd get me back, Judgey."

Dredd saw no need to reply to that comment. He watched the glider approach, all the while keeping half an eye on Spikes's slender frame. The man was examining his injuries again, muttering and from time to time hissing or groaning. Eventually they would be taken care of, of course, but not before he had been delivered to a secure facility.

When the glider landed, it was in a swirling dust cloud. Spikes covered his face with his arm, while Dredd simply lowered his head and held his breath for a moment. The ramp was lowered with the familiar hiss and whine of hydraulics, and out rushed two broad-shouldered men in the bland grey uniforms of the auxiliaries employed by the penitentiary system. Possibly failed Judges, both of them. Dredd gripped Spikes by the collar of his torn vest and hauled him up roughly, ignoring the captive's loud protests. One warden snatched him up and twisted his arms behind his back while the other patted him down quickly, producing a knife, but nothing more, as Dredd had expected, then they took one arm each and marched him up the ramp. There was no need to instruct them about further searching and securing the man, they both looked like they had spent more years serving the Hall of Justice than he had, having performed countless arrests in their time. Not a particularly tall man, Spikes looked small and skinny between his much bulkier guards. Mildly amused, Dredd turned away to get his bike. On his way, he contacted control to report he had apprehended his target. He felt rather smug.

The pilot appeared at the top of the ramp as he slowly rode up into the glider's cargo hold, a short, dark-skinned man with thinning black hair and a nose that was a bit too long for his face. "Welcome on board," he said cheerfully.

"Camarra." Dredd greeted him with a nod. The man might not look like much, but he was said to be one of the best pilots in the corps. He, too, had originally aimed to be a Judge, apparently, but failed his final exam. Climbing off his bike, Dredd secured it against the hull. The ramp was closing, allowing him one last glance at Spikes's abandoned bike, the wheels still spinning gently. There was no point in taking it along, it had not looked particularly good before and probably was little better than scrap metal by now, anyway. The goggles lay in the sand beside it; Spikes was not going to need them for a long time.

He followed the pilot forward into the cockpit, where the co-pilot, a bony blond woman Dredd had never seen before, was already preparing for lift-off. Spikes had been firmly strapped into one of the seats and was still complaining, with the wardens sitting behind him. That left only one free, the one next to Spikes. Dredd sat down and fastened his seatbelt, and as soon as the buckle clicked, the glider was climbing back into the hazy desert air already.

"Red sends his regards," Camarra said once they were off the ground.

Dredd allowed himself the luxury of briefly taking off his helmet to brush his sweaty hair away from his forehead. The air in the cockpit was stuffy and smelled of kerosene and new plastic seat covers, but it still felt refreshing. "He's back after all, then? I was wondering where he was when he didn't respond earlier on. Figured he wasn't back yet. He was supposed to be on duty."

"That he was," Camarra agreed, never taking his eyes off the consoles, "but they placed him under quarantine. I went to visit when I heard, but they called me away to take his shift, so all I know is…" He hesitated, clearly he did not know very much. "There's been an outbreak of some plague in Mega-City Two. Something that turns people into raving lunatics. Pretty bad."

For a moment everyone was quiet, contemplating this, wondering. The gentle drone of the glider's engine was the only sound in the cockpit. Then Spikes's cackling laughter broke the silence. "Zombie virus, eh? Like in the movies?" He rolled his eyes up into his head and hissed, "Brainssssss…" One of the wardens rapped the back of his head with his knuckles, and he gave a yelp and grumbled about mistreating prisoners.

"Like I said, I don't know much," Camarra continued, ignoring the interruption. "But the line's down at the moment. No way in and out of the city. Sounds a lot like back in the Germ War." The boundary wall filled the viewport, a hulking moloch of concrete and steel. Camarra pulled up, already heading for the incoming express route. "Let's hope it won't bother any of us, eh?"

"Not me, anyway," Dredd stated. "I come off in half an hour." After a thirty-six-hour shift. Bath, and then bed. It would be a blessing.

"Lucky bastard," Camarra grumbled, then laughed out loud. "Wouldn't be your problem even if you didn't. Nothing to concern a street Judge."

"Let the Council worry about it," Dredd agreed. And no way in hell would he ever be anything but a street Judge. In the day-to-day struggle with a society devouring itself, life was so much more simple than on the Council's murky heights.

"You're tense enough as it is, my boy," Spikes put in with a sneer. "You know what you really need? A nice long vacation. Ever had one? Yeah, thought so. I'll explain it to you, it means –"

"Shut it, perp, or I'll knock your teeth out," Dredd growled.

Spikes put on an expression of mock dismay. "Perp, is it, now? That's rude. You might at least..." As Dredd slowly raised a fist, he faltered and closed his mouth quickly.

The rest of the trip was spent in silence. Dredd watched the plumes of smoke rising over the structures to the east; they told him the riots were not over yet. Unless something decisive was done, and soon, this threatened to turn into a fully blown civil war. Nobody said anything, but from the drawn faces around him, most seemed to be thinking the same. Even Spikes was unusually quiet.

Soon Camarra put the glider down on the main landing pad of the Hall of Justice. According to Mega-City One's procedural law, any prisoner apprehended outside the city walls was the responsibility of Sector 1 and therefore to be delivered to the Hall of Justice directly, no matter which sector the Judge performing the arrest was assigned to. Dredd curtly said his good-byes and headed off towards the vehicle elevator with his bike. He had quite a distance to travel back to his own sector, and then to write a quick report before he turned in.

"You know what, Judgey?" Spikes called after him. "Do yourself a favour and get laid some time. It might really – OW!"

Returning to the Academy made Cassandra Anderson mildly uneasy, especially when summoned by the Chief Judge. Was she to take her exams again? Or take additional classes, and apply herself harder? She had applied herself as hard as she could once already, but it had been no use. She still had failed.

Yet despite that, she had earned her badge. She was a Judge. No, she would not be sent back to the Academy!

It helped that she did not have to go there alone, though.

Her very first duty shift as a Judge had started out quite marvellously. Not yet assigned to any sector house, she had been handed over to a Senior Judge at the Hall of Justice itself, a somewhat cool-mannered, though not unfriendly man by the name of Gibson, who, as it turned out when he took off his helmet, was not only tall and athletic, but also blond and rather strikingly handsome like a Norse hero from the tales she dimly remembered from her childhood. At the last minute they were joined by a slim, rather small woman who introduced herself as Barbara Hershey. She and Gibson seemed to know each other very well, merry banter flying back and forth between them, but especially Hershey did her best not to make Anderson feel excluded. Together they broke up a large-scale bar fight, destroyed a narcotics manufacturing lab hidden in the basement of a clothing store catering to the rich and decadent, stopped a burglary and dealt with several traffic violations. Anderson performed three arrests herself, but no executions this time, thankfully; killing was something she did not like at all, though she knew now that she would not hesitate if it became necessary. Eventually she would be sent out on her own, of course, but for now she was glad for the company.

There even was time for a little talk while Gibson handled an affair of illegal tuning, along with a man Hershey had called in from Tek Division. It turned out that Hershey – and Gibson, as it happened – had not only been cadets with Dredd, but also that Hershey only spent part of her duty shifts in Sector 1; she and Dredd belonged to the same sector and even shared an office at Sector House 13. Not that he used it much, according to Hershey; if he came in at all, he apparently in all haste typed a report that was as short as legally possible and then left again, or, as Hershey claimed, he tried to dump his paperwork on someone else. Anderson laughed in disbelief at that.

But additional paperwork or not, she would very much have liked to share an office with Dredd.

When she and Hershey were recalled to the Hall of Justice, Anderson felt a little disappointed. Gibson laughed and suggested she might have been singled out to be, as he called it, "groomed for command" like Hershey, but Anderson decidedly shook her head. It might have to do with her status as a mutant, but she did not want to say that out loud. Hershey had seemingly dropped a hint at it once, so she might know about her, but Gibson did not, and she feared that his opinion of mutants was less than favourable. He had taken off his helmet, and she was glad that she was wearing hers for once, because she could feel her cheeks grow hot under it as he smiled down at her, despite his sweaty face and hair. Would he still smile if he knew what she was?

Silly girl, she told herself angrily as Hershey headed out of the maze of streets to the highway, leading the way back to the Hall of Justice. You're both Judges. Dating is for civilians.

And you might stop dreaming about getting teamed up with Dredd as well. He wouldn't appreciate it if you tagged behind him like a puppy, staring at him in wide-eyed admiration while he performed his duty. He probably has little patience for a newly-made Judge's hero-worship. He was far from happy when he was named your assessment officer, too, after all. He's glad to be rid of you. So be grateful you got Hershey, she's a great Judge, too, and really nice. Ask her if she'll take you on for the week, how about that? Because Dredd certainly won't.

And if Hershey were to oversee her first week, they would most likely spend considerable time in Sector 13, where Dredd was. Maybe she could at least see him. If she was lucky.

They parked their bikes in the huge vehicle garage deep in the Hall of Justice's bowels and headed for the correct elevator, Anderson growing more nervous by the minute. Luckily Hershey was to see the Chief Judge too and therefore stay with her... or was she just there for another assessment?

If so, Anderson tried to calm herself, you have nothing to fear, you did fine today. If she had found anything wrong with what you did, she would have told you so. Anderson felt tempted to take a look into Hershey's mind, but hesitated. What if her probing was detectable for others? It was a question that had bothered her for some time, but since she had always kept her ability a secret from her fellow cadets, she had never yet had a chance to experiment. What if the other Judge somehow felt her mental touch? Hershey seemed to know about her, so she might come to the right conclusion. And if she was caught reading fellow Judges' minds, it would mean trouble for her, no doubt. This way, all she could pick up was what emotions Hershey clearly radiated.

"Nervous?" Hershey asked with a sympathetic little smile. She held her helmet under her arm; her tangled dark brown hair was about as long as Anderson's.

"A little," Anderson admitted. From what she felt beside her, Hershey certainly wasn't; had Anderson closed her eyes, she would have seen Hershey in her mind as an icy blue spot of calm. She wanted to ask her why they were summoned, but that might make her look too anxious and silly, and she did not want to spoil the impression she had made with the older Judge until now.

The girl did seem rather jumpy, Hershey thought to herself, especially when the Chief Judge awaited them at the entrance to the Academy's training simulation and gym facilities. There surely was no reason, she had done well enough today, and even Dredd seemed to have a fairly good opinion of her, which was saying something. But she was a new Judge, and new Judges tended to be overawed by any high-ranking officer and generally nervous at being summoned anywhere, so it was nothing out of the ordinary.

Chief Judge Goodman greeted them and even inquired after the girl's health. They had allowed her an entire week to recover from the injury she had suffered at Peach Trees. Dredd had been back on duty earlier on already, but not cleared for the street, which had resulted in a lot of grumbling and scowling at the office she shared with him and two others. When he had finally gotten permission to return to regular duty two days previously, she had been glad to see him go and unleash his foul mood on someone else, for a change. She was rather fond of the man, but there were certain limits to her patience. The whole Sector House had heaved a sigh of relief, probably.

"Hershey," the Chief Judge said, giving her the kind of smile a proud teacher might reserve for her favourite student, "why don't you accompany us while I set young Anderson here to her task? It won't take long."

Hershey nodded curtly and followed the other two women. Otherwise she would have suggested that she might run down to the locker room and change into her indoor uniform in the meantime. It was not mandatory to wear the traditional midnight blue when doing duty indoors, but it was more or less expected, especially if one intended to rise up the ranks eventually and performed aide functions part of the time, like she did. Dredd very pointedly ignored this half-official rule, always wearing his street gear inside. She wondered if his locker at the Sector House even held one of those uniforms, or if he had let the one issued to him disappear discreetly into a box of old computer parts at the very back of a maintenance closet or similar. She wouldn't put it past him. Sometimes he even walked into their office with his helmet still on – in contrast to Gibson, who took his helmet off on duty far too often, probably to spread the tan evenly on his pretty face. As much as she liked those two, they could be plain ridiculous at times.

They entered a narrow stairwell Hershey could not recall ever using before, and soon she found herself on a balcony overlooking one of the spacious gyms. Below them, cadets somewhere in their teenage years were exercising in their charcoal-coloured T-shirts and shorts, with instructors patrolling between them.

She would not have needed Chief Judge Goodman pointing out the boys in question; they had caught her attention straight away: a pair of twins, their dark hair cut very short like all the younger cadets wore it, one pummelling the practice mitts the other was holding for him with a zealous fierceness that was just as familiar to her as the boys' faces. "They're Fargo stock." It was not a question.

"They are," the Chief Judge confirmed, turning towards her briefly. "Andrin and Thiago Tobler. Fifteen years old. A pair of fine specimens, altogether, though the tampering has inadvertently made them smaller than they were supposed to be. Since it's the only ill effect that's been noticed, we've decided to live with it."

Hershey shrugged. "There are plenty of short Judges." She was not particularly tall herself, after all, and, to be honest, neither was Goodman. "What tampering, exactly?"

"Even if I knew any detail, I wouldn't be at liberty to say." Her tone was not exactly sharp, but close to it. "Anderson." The girl jumped to attention; her obvious eagerness brought a smile to Hershey's face. "The twins. Anderson, I would like you to assess them, read them, whatever you want to call it. But stay up here, do you hear? Don't make any contact. In the physical sense, that is; you get my meaning. Take your time, and report back to me afterwards."

Anderson nodded emphatically. "Yes, sir. Understood."

At a sharp command from Instructor Kelly, a lean, grey-haired man who had worked hard to make Hershey's life as well as that of many, many other cadets miserable in his time, the cadets changed their drill. Even after many years, Hershey was very close to jumping at his voice; he taught his students well, she had to give him that, yet wavering attention or repeated mistakes could make one's life very unpleasant indeed during his training lessons. From the way the boys and girls below her reacted, she did not need Anderson's convenient, though somewhat unsettling psychic ability to know that more than one lived in fear of the man.

"Good. I will see you in around half an hour, at my office." The Chief Judge motioned Hershey to follow her. Below, the other brother attacked the mitts with the same furious enthusiasm, egged on by his sweating, yet grinning twin. In their identical training clothes, they were impossible to tell apart. They might be smaller, yes, but otherwise... she could see them before her inner eye as if it had been yesterday, her friends, those other Fargo clones, having just as much fun as the boys below, moving just like them, even that manner of kicking they had shown on occasion, letting their legs snap forward from the knee downward. If one looked very, very closely, one might be able to spot tiny differences between these boys, but it would most likely take hours of study... unless...

A last glance over her shoulder showed Hershey the girl Anderson leaning on the balustrade, smiling to herself. It must feel good to someone as newly raised to the Judges' ranks as she was to be in the watcher's position, for a change. She seemed to be concentrating on the clone boys, seemingly having forgotten even about the Chief Judge. "They aren't simply slightly altered Fargo clones, are they?" she asked softly. Had there been any of those at all, since back then? "They were created to mirror the –"

The Chief Judge raised a slim dark hand pre-emptively without turning around as she walked down the stairs in a firm gait. "Not now."

Hershey bit her tongue, but the question bothered her very much. "Sir, just one thing, if I may," she finally tried as they stepped into an empty elevator. "Does one usually score higher than the other?"

Goodman raised her thin black eyebrows up towards her close-cropped black curls. Clearly she knew perfectly well where this was going; after all, she had taught Constitutional Law and Political Science in their earlier years, before she had been raised to the Council. "Thiago," she replied promptly.

Hershey sighed inaudibly. Another tragedy in the making? "You might want to keep a close eye on him."

The Chief Judge laughed mirthlessly. "Believe me, Hershey, we are doing just that. We do remember Rico Dredd, after all." She paused, looking pensive. "I believe you were close to him?"

Hershey nodded sadly. "Yes, sir. I was."