We attended a briefing for the upcoming night shift held by Judge Jude who raised the following items:

End of briefing.

We had 20 minutes rest in the sleep machines before resuming a night patrol at 23:00, shift no. 7. We received a report of possible illegal activity near Bob Dillion and Bob Geldof blocks and we headed there immediately. The Megway led onto a Pedway and using the Judges path we came to overlook a plaza ten meters below us where a crowd of a hundred or so civilians had gathered to take part in illicit gambling. Our surveillance revealed a man in a brown coat running a card game whilst twelve others kept a look out. The keen-eyed amongst use also noticed a group of taller men attempting to obscure a Justice Department holding post. It looked like we had found those responsible for freeing perps.

By the time we rode down the crowd had dispersed and the perps had driven off. We found a note by the holding post which read “never gonna catch us judges!” I noticed some additional indentations in the paper and, after tracing over them in pencil, found lots of numbered dots at various points in the sector and came to the conclusion they must be the location of holding posts. The one we were at was labelled no 57. We informed central.

At approximately 23:30, whilst continuing our patrol, we encountered a citizen running across a pedway performing a somersault. Another citizen was close behind him. While Judges Trump and Klyment set off on foot after the first perp I pulled over and arrested his colleague for jaywalking. Turned out they were both members of the “Peter Powell Parkour Possie”, obviously some new craze citizens were pursuing to take their minds off the harsh reality of living in the Big Meg. Unfortunately the other perp managed to elude capture. We continued our patrol.

It wasn't long before we came across a group of thirty or so citizens congregated in the street, some of whom were armed, we issued a challenge which was meet with a volley of gunfire so we had no alternative but to use lethal force. A judicial use of bike cannons and stumm gas soon took the fight out of them. I recommended they undergo psych evaluation prior to imprisonment in kook cubes.

At 00:00 the Crudbury marketing gimmick took place, several H-wagons unleashed millions of boxes of their umpty candy on the expectant crowds formed below. We made sure that order was maintained. I retrieved a sample and ran a contaminant test which proved negative. [J. Trump: After being warned not to eat it] At 00:10 central informed all Judges that the recent spate of “lemming syndrome” had been identified as a chemical substance in the bloodstream.

After witnessing the ugly display of gluttony at the umpty candy gathering we resumed our patrol which led us to the city bottom. A burglar alarm caught our attention and, after securing our Lawmasters, we ran off to investigate. We came into an alleyway, near a rundown shopping arcade, where we witnessed two more robot Kleegs. I immediately shouted out the deactivation phrase as given by Russell Kirk and to my relief it worked. A robed figure next to the robots surrendered and seemed in awe that I had “defeated” the Kleegs so easily. He was clearly out of his mind. Under interrogation he confessed that he belonged to the “Order of the Kleegs” and could take us to see their grandmaster. I humoured him and we set off for the cults meeting place.

[J. Trump: On route to their meeting J. Klyment was badly injured when a griblig suffering from lemming syndrome landed on him]

Busting in on their little shindig we faced a group of cultists, their “grandmaster”accompanied by three robot Kleeg’s, imagine my surprise when one of them turned out to be the real thing! [J. Trump: J.Stotz has taken to exhibiting a degree of overconfidence. He charged in assuming the deactivation command would work. Hopefully he learned a lesson when it did not work and the real Kleeg shot him]

I had read about the terrifying Kleeg’s at the Academy but to face a live one was a whole different proposition. The alien proved to be a fearsome opponent, fast and accurate with it's huge gun. I was badly injured in the firefight but managed to kill it with a well-placed AP round to the chest. This took the fight out of the cultists who were arrested and sentenced. After the clean-up squad patched me up we continued our patrol.

Central informed us that, as their first umpty drop had been so successful, Crudbury planned another for 02:00 and to be prepared.

Back on patrol a lone figure underneath a street light waved us over, it was wally squad Judge Graham who said needed our help. During his undercover operation into umpty-baggers he’d learned that the gang planned to retaliate against Crudbury by killing their distribution manager, a Greg Peppard, who lived in Jeff Minter block. We were to rendezvous with senior Judge Abbot outside the block at 01:00 who would provide further instructions.

We arrived at Jeff Minter block, meet with Judge Abbot, who told us to keep an eye on Peppard’s apartment whilst he chased down a lead to his location. Inside the block we found the apartment empty. We stayed inside on the assumption that his would-be assassins would show themselves and sure enough we weren’t disappointed – six gunmen with Judge Graham in front entered the doorway. I issued a challenge which prompted them to open fire, immediately killing Judge Graham in a volley of bullets. [J. Trump: Again J. Stotz acted in haste. Waiting a couple of seconds would have allowed J. Graham to get clear] The gunmen were determined but unskilled and some well-placed grenade rounds subdued them up. We called in an H-wagon to remove the bodies after sentencing the surviving perps. I mentioned my regret at Judge Graham’s demise, but he died performing his duty which is the highest honour a Judge can achieve.

Back on patrol a message from central alerted us to a stream of pesky Gribligs which has been seen jumping to their deaths out of the 82nd floor of a nearby block. The source of their suicidal tendencies turned out to be a contaminated batch of Crudbury’s umpty candy in a block shop entitled “Happy Bob’s Smiling Sweet Emporium”. We had found the surge of the Lemming Syndrome blighting the sector. [J. Trump: I advised the clean up squad to wait a bit before clearing the contaminated umpty candy from Happy Bobs. Let the griblig problem fall off] We called up central who tried to have Crudbury cancel their second drop, but it was too late, their H-wagons were already in the air, all we could hope for now was the citizens of the sector to heed a Justice department warning not to eat the free candy, some hope there! [J. Trump: Actually Crudbury had not organised the second drop so had no way of stopping it. Peppard had organised it on his own]

We learned Greg Peppard was behind the umpty candy plot and he had been seen at the Crudbury distribution factory. What he thought was the sweet taste of success would soon turn bitter...

As Judges we made the cardinal error of assuming all perps are idiots [J. Trump: Well those that rushed in blindly at least], George Peppard nearly proved us fatally wrong by setting up deadly traps to greet us as we entered the Crudbury distribution centre.

When we arrived on-site the distribution centre consisted of a large central building surrounded by several smaller ones. We drove up to the main building only to have the huge entrance doors come crashing down on us. Fortunately both myself and Judge Bullet made it inside unscathed, but Judge Klyment was less lucky as the barrier crushed his Lawmaster and narrowly missed killing him. We soon noticed that Judge Trump had been too slow and was still outside. We dismounted from our remaining Lawmasters and began to search the building interior. Our IR scopes were useless as there were numerous power sources giving off heat signatures.

Having noticed both a light going off in the control room on the far side of the building and the movement of some crates to our immediate right we decided to spilt up, Judges Bullet and Klyment made their way over to the control room while I went to investigate the crates.

Peppard had laid another trap, this time a trap door immediately in-front of the control room fell open under my fellow judges feet and plunged them into a huge vat of umpty candy in the basement below. They sank like stones and were in danger drowning. I went to retrieve the cling net from my bike when a figure who I can only assume was Peppard shot and stunned me long enough for him to run to the control room.

During this Judge Trump used bike cannons to blow a way inside and together we rescued our sinking squad members. [J. Trump: I entered to found J. Stotz struggling ineffectually to pull the others from the vat and had to pull them out myself. The umpty candy made a real mess of my uniform.] We chased Peppard, but it was too late, a ladder to the roof allowed him to escape using a jet pack he placed there for just this contingency. It riled me to know he had not only led us into a deadly trap but escaped justice as well. We had no option but to continue our patrol then return to sector house.

Our debriefing took place in room 101 and to my surprise a SJS judge was present as well as a civilian who turned out to be from Wally squad along with Sector Chief Judge Curran. What happened next was a severe grilling over my conduct in the Judge Graham case (who's unfortunate demise was mentioned previously). I felt persecuted, especially by my squad leader, who said I was a liability. I wasn’t prepared to take it lying down so in my defence I stated how, in my opinion, Judge Trumps leadership had been sorely lacking. [J. Trump: J. Stotz is a leap before you look type of Judge. I hope this will make here think a bit more before she gets her squad killed] Unfortunately I let my emotions get the better of me at this point and offered my resignation after throwing my badge across the room. Cooler heads prevailed and Judge Curran made me see the error of my ways and the SJS Judge surprised me by taking my side to some degree. It was decided that I would remain with squad Trump and try to “look before I leap”.