Title: Firing Line [Part 3] Series: Dredd 2012

Type: Fanfiction Pairing: Dredd/Anderson Rating: 15

Summary: After destroying the slow-mo manufacturing plant in Peach Trees, Judge Joseph Dredd has the chance to present Cassandra Anderson with her badge. Both street judges need healing; physically and emotionally… but where do they start?

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Judge Dredd characters or anything from the universe of Dredd. I am just taking the characters and playing with them a while – promising to restore them whole and unblemished! Thanks to the makers of Judge Dredd films and comics for creating these toys for me to enjoy. Please don't take any of my playing as having any bearing on the comics or films. Enjoy.

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It was all thanks to Peach Trees...

Dredd felt his lip tremor in frustration.

He held a great respect for Chief Justice Hershy; in his humble opinion as a Street Judge, there had been no better successor to Chief Justice Fargo when he took his long walk into the waste lands.

Hershy had been a fellow Street Judge; she knew the score. She stood for all the things Dredd believed in... Honour, justice, protection of the innocent... even if their methods differed from time to time.

Since she had taken the oaths and vows of the hallowed halls, there was not one order he felt inclined to disobey. Until now...

"So which treatment shall we go for first, sir?" The two-tonic blonde asked as he twizzled his hair and smoothed his skinny, black uniform, "Full body exfoliation or, maybe, a complete aromatherapy, hot stone massage?"

Dredd couldn't contain the growl...

"Or... I could just light the candles and give you a little more time to think?"

He didn't need to answer... the masseuse scuttled away quickly as light laughter sounded from his side.

"At least pretend you might enjoy yourself..."

Anderson had found the enforced R&R a welcome break... Dredd, on the other hand...

"Try to smile..." the younger Judge continued, taking an offered cocktail from the drinks-server... "And take that helmet off."

"I'm here on assignment," Dredd insisted.

"You were ordered to take this leave," Anderson corrected, "it was the only way you would come."

Dredd huffed; he had been ordered...

"The helmet stays on."

"You aren't wearing your uniform..." She pointed out.

Dredd looked at his casual dress; the tropical shirt and jeans... "It's warm in here."

Anderson gave him a long-look, "You know, you could just take the opportunity to relax..."

The thought settled uneasily in his stomach, "I don't relax, Rookie."

"Sure you do," Anderson smiled and leaned forward on her sun lounger. "You have to... you are human."

A thought he didn't like to dwell on; given the sides of humanity he had seen during his years of service.

"So why not take off the helmet?"

The thought jarred through him.

"Would it be so bad?" The kid asked, her small, pale face contorting into a frown. "The world, finally seeing Joseph Dredd..."

"Drink the rest of your Mohito, Rookie," he dismissed, she had had a few since they arrived, "enjoy the local ambiance while you can."

Anderson observed him, "You know that when you said that your face sneered."

He couldn't help it. Alcohol wasn't something that appealed to him; it dulled the senses. And a Judge without his senses was nothing.

"Is there some reason you don't want people to see your face?" Anderson continued as Dredd moved his gaze across the room; taking in the lounging elite of Mega City One... these people had no idea of the horrors that he had witnessed... they lived for pleasure facilities such as this.

"Are you scarred?" Anderson continued, unaware of her surroundings, "or is it the other way around? You're too handsome to let me lay eyes on you..."

Dredd bit down on his lip as her laughter rang through the warmth of the simulated, purified air about them.

"Or is it because you're trying to cultivate a secret identity?"

The kid went from one extreme to the other!

"Like Batman... or Spiderman..." the spark in her eye bloomed with light, "... or Superman?"

His jaw tightened, "I am not some comic-book hero, kid..."

"Pretty depressing read," Anderson snorted over her cocktail, "can't imagine it would have much of a fan-base."

"You'd be surprised."

"Come on, Dredd..." she smiled, finishing her drink, "We've earned this break... enjoy it before it's over."

He couldn't help but snort at the kid as she moved her eyes toward him, "You think that we are given time off because of a case like Peach Trees?"

Anderson rolled her eyes, "Even you need to take time off on occasion..."

Dredd thought about this... part of the job meant that the pay sucked and the perks were few... he couldn't recall his last bought of R&R...

From his side, he heard a sigh as his young partner leaned forward with curiosity... "What do you do to relax?"

"I sleep." It was the truth.

Anderson threw a sloppy slap across his arm, "Sleep doesn't count."

"It's relaxing..." he reasoned.

"It doesn't count!" She reaffirmed with a frown.

Dredd thought about his general day and shrugged, "I work-out."

The frown on the young woman's face morphed into a kooky-lopsided regard. Aside from grudgingly admitting that it was slightly adorable... Dredd realised she was trying to figure him out... again.

"What?"

"Are you telling me that all you do is work, work-out and sleep?"

He shifted, uncomfortably, in his lounger, "I also eat."

Anderson hung her head.

He didn't truly understand why she found it difficult to believe he had no other interests than dispensing law. Perhaps, a long time ago, he had indulged in the intricacies associated with the norms of life... hobbies, holidays, social events... it simply wasn't part of his life any longer.

"I'm talking friends, Dredd..." Anderson went on. "People you like."

He turned his head to look straight at her.

"Perhaps not like..." she adjusted, "but, at least, don't despise..." Anderson frowned, "Tolerate, maybe?"

Dredd thought for a moment... "There was Walter..."

"Walter?"

"Walter the Wobot..."

"A service 'droid doesn't count either!" She huffed, sliding off the side of her lounger and leaning toward him. "I'm talking about actual, human contact here… a connection…"

"I've been partnered with other judges," he thought, "like you…"

"But what about friends?"

Dredd was taken aback… wasn't being someone's partner closer or more meaningful than simply being their friend?

"Do you?" He asked, wondering if the sting he felt sounded in his words.

The young woman blinked.

He found this interesting; how easy it had been for the young psychic to dissect his life… it was a different thing when he was asking about hers…

"I have friends… from the orphanage…"

Dredd shrugged, "Enforced camaraderie," he analysed, "those people you know… would you have chosen them as friends if circumstance hadn't forced you together?"

Anderson paled; "I chose the people I am friends with…"

"Circumstance chose," Dredd said, bluntly. "Do you still talk with them…"

"No…"

"Or any of the other academy candidates you trained with to become Street Judge?"

Anderson didn't answer.

Dredd felt a familiar wither inside himself, looking at the crest-fallen expression on the young face… "Friendship is over-rated, kid. You're better off avoiding the complication."

Silence filled the air… Other patrons of the spa milled about, laughter floated toward them... the fragrance of sweet, alcohol, perfume and attraction built about them as Dredd observed the colour in his young comrades cheeks fade a little.

"You look like I just killed your dog," he said, bewildering himself as to why he was trying to lighten the doom he had brought over the young officer, "Cheer up kid, no need to get depressed about the sorry life you have let yourself in for. No need to get depressed."

"Depressed, in your presence?" Anderson questioned, lifting Dredds untouched cocktail from his gloved hand, "How is that even possible?"

And then it happened; it was in the blink of an eye... but it was there. The underhand transaction he had been sent here to find... two well dressed men in the side of his vision exchanging credit chits and slinking further into the background.

He turned to the young woman with some urgency.

"What can you sense right now?" He asked her.

Anderson blinked two, dark orbs at him as he took her arms and gave her a small, but firm shake, "Come on, Rookie... look about the room and tell me what you can hear!"

Without questioning, or even doubting him, Anderson closed her eyes in concentration and angled her head against the hundreds of voices that must have filled her head at his request to listen to the thoughts surrounding them in the well populated room.

"There's a lot of happiness, delirium, inebriation, attraction..." her eyes snapped open at the last word as she looked deeply at him.

Dredd swallowed his emotions and did his best not to cloud her with the urgency he was feeling, "What else?"

She paled... "Fear."

He felt his teeth clench, "Rat bastards," he seethed, releasing his hold on the young woman and springing up from the lounger, knowing she was at his heel.

"What are you doing?" Anderson protested, "Where are you going?"

"You aren't stupid, kid," Dredd couldn't keep the sneer out of his voice as his refusal to believe in his partners naiveté, "I'm heading up a lead on a case..."

"Dredd, we aren't here on a case!" She continued, her small hand making a grab for his arm, "We're here because we were ordered to attend by the medical division."

"We're here," he felt his teeth grind, "because Hershey thought there was something going on in the rehabilitation dome..."

"Bingo," he cheered, sarcastically, though gritted teeth. "Did you bring your side arm?"

Anderson blinked, "Yes."

Dredd stalled a moment... "Where?"

Anderson looked down to her sarong and parted it at the side...

He felt his mouth dry; pressed into the creamy skin of her thigh was pressed her Law Giver on a secure strap...

Dredd smiled.

"Where do we need to be?" Anderson asked.

"Follow me."