The Cold Light of Day Page 11

  SEAMUS “SHOCK” O’SHAUGHNESSY saw nothing but the road ahead and the back of Napoleon Neapolitan’s bike.

  He was only dimly aware of the pedestrians scattering before them, of the vehicles skidding to a stop as they blazed through junctions, of the Lawmasters’ sirens trailing them and the H-wagon dogging their path behind them.

  His mind was filled with fury at the Mutants, and Napoleon in particular. Whichever way this ended, Napoleon was going to die.

  Shock didn’t know this part of the city too well. He’d studied the race’s route carefully in the previous months, but now they were off-track, and if he hadn’t been following Napoleon, he’d be lost, especially since his Blenderbike’s on-line map was no longer functioning. All communications were down, and he was certain that Judges had ordered a full block on the networks.

  But that didn’t matter. All he had to do was stick close to Napoleon until the finish-line was in sight, and then they’d see who was the better rider.

  The wheels of his bike rumbled over the inlaid rails of the sector’s old-style tram system, slowing him a little, and ahead he saw that Napoleon’s larger wheels were not suffering as much. Shock nudged the bike over to the rail-free side of the road, and his speed picked up a little.

  He wished he’d brought a gun. He was a good shot: even at top speed on the bike, racing through unfamiliar streets and dodging panicking pedestrians and swerving vehicles, he’d have had no trouble blasting off the top of his opponent’s head. And no qualms.

  Ahead, at the massive Discount of Monte Cristo outlet store, a full-scale riot was in progress as citizens took advantage of the chaos to swarm through the store and help themselves to last season’s fashions. Shock saw Napoleon collide with a woman staggering under the weight of so many rat-fur coats she could neither see nor hear him coming. As the stolen and now blood-spattered merchandise scattered through the air, the Mutie clipped another woman, this one laden with armfuls of shoulder-bags and purses.

  Shock’s bike, only half the width of Napoleon’s, made it through the throng unscathed, and he gained a few metres on his rival.

  “SET ME DOWN on the plaza,” Dredd said.

  “In the middle of the crowd?” the H-wagon’s pilot asked. “Are you nuts? There’s got to be twenty thousand citizens still down there, and they’re all looking for trouble.”

  “They’re always looking for trouble,” Dredd said. “Today it’s the race, tomorrow it’ll be something else.” He turned back toward the engineer. “How’s my bike?”

  “Refuelled,” the engineer said. “Checked the tyres, re-sprung the rear suspension. Not much else I can do for it here. You could call for a replacement.”

  “No time,” Dredd said. He got out of the co-pilot’s seat. “Chalk?”

  “Still on this vector,” the pilot said. “About eleven minutes behind us. The wagons in pursuit still have their weapons locked on.”

  “And they still can’t risk shooting,” Dredd said. “That’s what Chalk’s counting on.”

  The co-pilot asked, “You reckon he’s going to land and try to lose himself in the crowd?”

  “That’s my guess,” Dredd said. “Only one way to find out for sure.” He climbed onto the bike. “Take us down fast but steady, pilot. Make sure the citizens below know we’re coming—don’t want to squash any if we can help it.”

  The H-wagon shuddered and lurched a little as the pilot adjusted its course, then began to descend.

  “Faster. Set down just long enough for me to get clear,” Dredd said. “Then take off and vacate the area.” To the engineer, he added, “Prep the ramp.”

  Less than a minute later, Dredd was back on the ground with the shadow of the H-wagon passing over him.

  He glanced around the litter-strewn plaza. In front of him, the large podium erected for the winner was being attacked by a gang of juves, and on all sides the rioters were giving him a wide berth, those who had seen him having dropped their wares before running for the relative safety of the surrounding blocks.

  An angry voice behind him yelled “Judge! Let’s get him!” and Dredd turned to see a man bearing down on him, wielding a hardball bat. The man was huge, a head taller than Dredd, with a face so pitted with acne scars that he looked like he’d have to shave with a potato peeler.

  “There’s only one of him—there’s thousands of us!” the man snarled.

  The circle around Dredd widened as he climbed off his bike. “Drop the bat, creep.”

  He continued to advance on Dredd, thumping the bat against the palm of his free hand. “Who’s gonna make me, Judge? You?”

  “Last warning.”

  The scarred man broke into a run and bellowed with rage as he pulled his arm back, ready to strike.

  Dredd side-stepped the swing and slammed his fist into the man’s stomach. The hardball bat clattered to the ground and the giant dropped to his knees, gasping. Tears of pain spilled from his eyes and took meandering paths down his craggy face.

  Dredd patched his helmet mike into the Lawmaster’s loud-hailer, and pushed the volume up to eleven. “Attention, all citizens. Your identities have been logged—we know who you are. Disperse now, quietly and quickly, and you will not be charged. You have two minutes.” On the ground beside him, the scarred man was crawling away.

  “Walton? You got eyes on the crowd?”

  “It’s working, Dredd. They’re starting to filter out of the plaza.”

  SHOCK HAD FOLLOWED Napoleon onto the packed pedestrian concourse at Sector 115, where the race’s route looped back for the final run south to the finish-line at Sector 124. Once they knew where they were, they both began to pick up the pace.

  Now, they were half-way through Sector 122, racing on empty, open streets running parallel to the Mega-City 5000’s course.

  Can’t be more than fifty kilometres to go... I can do this. I can beat the drokker.

  Cross the line and then keep going, right out into the desert where the Jays won’t follow me.

  Ahead, a cluster of citizens scattered out of Napoleon’s way, and Shock followed in his wake. He saw a panic-stricken man throw himself flat on the ground and the oversized wheels of the Mutie’s bike pass safely either side of him. The man was not so lucky a few second later, when Shock ran over his foot and crushed his ankle.

  Then they were through the throng and Napoleon picked up speed again.

  Shock wouldn’t entertain the possibility that they weren’t going to make it. He knew the Judges were after them, but they hadn’t caught them yet, so maybe whoever it was that gunned down Travis Cannon was a higher priority.

  Napoleon shot across a busy junction without slowing, expertly weaving his bike through the dense, slow-moving cross-traffic. Shock was right behind him, his own crossing made a little easier because many of the drivers had hit their brakes when they saw Napoleon.

  A few more of those, and I’ll be close enough to touch him.

  They entered The Cobbles, a region of the sector that was popular with tourists, especially at this time of the year when the prevailing winds from the north kept the stench of the Black Atlantic to a minimum.

  On a long stretch of road, Napoleon overtook a roadtrain on the wrong side, narrowly avoiding an oncoming Resyk truck. Shock had followed him, but by the time he saw the truck it was too late to pull back. He nudge his bike to the right, mounted the wide pavement and rapidly weaved around the pavement’s trash cans, benches, plasteen statues of local celebrities and artificial palm trees.

  As they exited The Cobbles, Shock saw Napoleon glance back for a second, and then they were passing into Sector 124, the final sector of the race.

  Thirty kilometres to the line.

  Seventeen

  DESPITE DREDD’S WARNING, the citizens took more than five minutes to clear the plaza. But save for a few stragglers who were very slowly ambling out of the area and constantly looking back to see what was going on—there was always at least one citizen who didn’t grasp that the word “ever
yone” included them—there was more than enough clear space.

  Dredd waited, watching the skyline to the north. With a little over a minute to go, a trio of teenaged girls darted around from the other side of the podium, each of them wearing dozens of freshly-stolen wedding rings and so many chains around their necks that they had to run hunched over. They skidded to a stop when they saw that the plaza was now empty, save for a lone Judge on a Lawmaster, watching them.

  “Drop everything you’ve taken and get out of here,” Dredd yelled at them. “Now!”

  One of the girls froze in place, eyes and mouth wide as she stared, horrified, at Dredd. The other two grabbed an arm each and hauled her away from the plaza.

  Dredd activated his radio. “Walton.”

  “I’m here. Chalk’s still heading toward you, ETA fifty seconds. Dredd, he’s not going to set down. If he was planning to lose himself among the crowd, that option is now closed. You’ve scared them away.”

  “I know. Instruct the H-wagons to keep the pressure on him. We want him to have no choice but come in low and fast.”

  “I don’t get why he’s going to the finish-line. Why not anywhere else along the race’s route?”

  “Because this is the southernmost sector of the city. The Cursed Earth is only five kilometres behind me. He’s hoping we won’t know whether he’s stayed in the city or gone out into the desert.” Dredd glanced north; the Chameleon would be approaching over the top of Brian Alexander Robertson Block.

  “Dredd, he’ll change course the second he sees there’s no one in the plaza. He’ll head out into the Cursed Earth for sure.”

  “No,” Dredd said. “He won’t. Remind me again why we haven’t shot him down yet?”

  “Because the falling debris would likely kill thousands of...” Walton paused. “Grud. You emptied the plaza. Dredd, you’ll be in the line of fire!”

  “And if I move, the citizens will come swarming back.”

  Then there was no more time for conversation. The customised Chameleon roared up and over the roof of the apartment block in an arc that would set it down in the heart of the plaza, coming straight toward Dredd.

  He had a moment to lock eyes with Percival Chalk, the first time he’d seen the man in five years. The expression on Chalk’s face changed instantly from shock at seeing the empty plaza to resignation when he realised what it meant.

  Then the pursuing H-wagons opened fire.

  Dredd gunned his Lawmaster’s engine, its massive tyres squealing as it darted out of the Chameleon’s path.

  The H-wagons’ cannon-fire tore through the rear and roof of the vehicle, shredding its armour-plating as though it were paper.

  The Chameleon crashed nose-first into the plaza’s rockcrete slabs, rippling through them with a shockwave that almost knocked Dredd from his bike.

  Even before the perforated vehicle had scraped and ground its way to a stop, Dredd was off his bike and running toward it, Lawgiver ready.

  The passenger-side door shuddered once, then a second time, then it collapsed out onto the ground, followed by a man Dredd recognised as Winston Fierro, his body-armour pierced a dozen times by the H-wagon’s large-calibre bullets. Fierro arched his back once, groaned, then lay still.

  Dredd leaped onto the Chameleon’s buckled hood, crouched, with his Lawgiver aimed at Chalk. Inside the cab, Chalk was still held firmly in place by slowly-deflating airbags: a safety feature that clearly hadn’t been added to the passenger’s side of the vehicle.

  Weakly, barely able to turn his head among the airbags, Chalk said, “Stop him, Judge! He’ll get away!”

  “I doubt that,” Dredd said. “Not unless he’s holding the world record for crawling with broken arms and legs.”

  “Fierro kidnapped me, forced me to—”

  “Not this time, Chalk,” Dredd said. “You only get to use the fake-hostage trick once.”

  Chalk narrowed his eyes as he stared at the Judge. “I know you... You were the cadet who arrested me back in Eminence! Then this is your fault. Everything that happened today is down to you!”

  “Yeah, I’ve been hearing that one a lot. Still don’t buy it. Percival Chalk, on the charge of the premeditated murders of your former colleagues, the murders of Judges Pendleton and Collins, the attempted assassination of Judge Amber Ruiz, extensive property damage leading to the loss of countless lives, and piloting an unregistered flying vehicle without a permit, I sentence you to execution.”

  Chalk’s expression collapsed for a moment, then he shrugged—the airbags had almost fully deflated now—and broke into a wide smile. “Almost made it through, right? Well, go ahead, Judge. Pull the trigger, like you should have done five years ago.”

  “That’s not how it works, Chalk,” Dredd said. “First, there’s the interrogation.”

  There was a dull whump from somewhere beneath Dredd’s feet, and a small flame erupted from the front of the Chameleon. Keeping his gun aimed at Chalk, Dredd jumped down from the hood and wrenched open the driver’s-side door. “Out. Hands on your head, fingers interlaced.”

  Chalk started to climb out, then jerked to a stop. “My foot’s stuck.”

  Dredd glanced toward the flame. Black smoke was starting to billow out from the vehicle’s buckled hood. “Try harder.”

  “Damn it!” Chalk struggled, grabbing onto the doorframe for leverage. “Help me!”

  “Figure you’ve got a few seconds before anything explodes.” From the north, Dredd could hear engines approaching.

  “Help me, Grud-damn it, I’m trapped!” Chalk reached down and started to pull at his right leg with both hands.

  Dredd moved closer to Chalk. He knew that this could be a trap—was likely to be a trap—but at the Academy, the cadets were taught a simple solution to this kind of situation. Dredd pulled back his fist and slammed it into Chalk’s jaw.

  The man toppled to the side, and as he lay groaning and clutching his face, Dredd leaned in past him, peered into the Chameleon’s footwell and saw a small handgun taped to the underside of the dashboard.

  He grabbed Chalk’s arm and hauled him out of the cab, dragged him ten metres across the plaza, away from the burning vehicle.

  The roar of engines grew closer, and Dredd looked up to see an odd-looking machine approaching at speed, with a large wheel on each side and its rider suspended between them. Right behind it and gaining ground was a motorbike, its rider hunched over.

  Then something cold and hard sliced deep into Dredd’s left leg, quickly cutting through the muscle until he felt it scrape across bone. As Dredd collapsed to the ground, he saw Chalk rolling to his feet, holding a large hunting knife, its blade dripping with Dredd’s blood.

  Dredd’s Lawgiver had fallen from his grip. He made a dive for it, snatched it up—

  But Chalk was already darting around to the rear of the Chameleon.

  LAST PUSH, SHOCK thought. The finish-line was five hundred metres ahead, with nothing in the way but Napoleon Neapolitan.

  Ahead, close to the line, a man was running from a downed Judge, but that didn’t matter now. Nothing mattered but the line.

  The running man pulled open the rear of the crashed vehicle—it was only later that Shock realised it was the same craft that had blasted Travis Cannon—and removed a skysurf board.

  Napoleon was three metres in the lead now.

  Two metres.

  The line was tantalisingly close, but—just like last year—Napoleon was still ahead.

  The man clambered onto the skysurf board and hit its thruster just as the Judge fired at him.

  DREDD’S AIM WAS true. His shot ripped into the back of Percival Chalk’s skysurf board. Chalk toppled back as the board shot forward.

  Clearly an experienced surfer, Chalk had taken the extra couple of seconds to tether his ankle to the board. It was a safety precaution, lesson one for all skysurfers.

  The board streaked across the plaza, dragging Chalk screaming behind it.

  SHOCK SAW THE board coming, and i
nstinctively hit the brakes. Napoleon saw it coming too, but his own instincts told him it was safe: the board would pass directly over him.

  He turned back to grin at Shock. “You lose, Spacer. Again.”

  Ten metres from the line, the skysurf board sailed over Napoleon Neapolitan’s bike... but the screaming man it was dragging behind it was a lot closer to the ground.

  DREDD SAW PERCIVAL Chalk strike the oversized wheel of the speeding bike face-first.

  The bike flipped, out of control, spinning and tumbling at first, then shedding parts and limbs as it grated across the cracked rockcrete and came to a stop just over the finish-line.

  The other biker was only seconds behind it, but there was no doubt which of them had crossed the line first.

  Dredd pulled three medi-patches from a belt-pouch and slapped them onto the wound in his left calf, then tried to stand. He limped toward his Lawmaster, pain shooting through his entire body every time he put his left foot down.

  Over the radio, Walton said, “Damn it, stay down, Dredd! The H-wagon’s coming back to you. You need urgent medical attention.”

  “Not done yet,” Dredd said, his teeth clenched. He climbed onto the Lawmaster, and slowly rode it toward the tangled mess of metal-and-flesh that had once been a customised bike, its rider, and Percival Chalk.

  Overhead, three H-wagons were coming in to land.

  The other rider was still on his bike, its engine purring softly, looking down at the remains of his opponent. To Dredd, he said, “I won. You saw it, right? Sure, Napoleon crossed the line first, but he had to be dead by then. That was the agreement. The winner is the first one to cross the finish-line alive!”

  Dredd regarded him for a second. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re the winner. And when we examine the spycam footage of the race, we’ll be able to determine exactly what you’ve won. Reckon it’s safe to assume that a very long stretch in the cubes will be part of the package.”