Chapter Text
Hank made it onto the deck, somehow. He was pacing on it, it fact, unwilling to go below in case the deviants inside reacted in one of many ways they could to his presence --- violently. Grumbling under his breath, he tried to pass the time, think about anything to get his mind off of the android risking his life beneath his very feet for a revolution he'd once been trying so hard to stop. But it was futile, and he knew it.
He could only keep remembering his many nightmares. The ones he'd been keeping quiet about, the ones he'd been having since Connor had shown up in his life. It always happened this way, ever since Cole had passed. When someone came into his life, started playing some big part in it, his dreams became tormenting nightmares, flaunting all the ways a person could perish. But Connor’s case was different. He wasn't a human, he was a machine, and Hank had been more than a little surprised when he had his first nightmare about him. Regarding their first crime scene together. The interrogation that hadn't gone wrong in reality.
The android in the interrogation room resembled nothing of the Connor that had pulled Hank from the bar, innocently and with friendliness enough to buy him a drink for the road. No, this android was cold, heartless.
“Twenty-eight stab wounds!” It's hand hit the desk as if in anger, though Hank knew, rationally, this was all a ploy. It berated the other, demanded to know why the deviant killed Ortiz. Using a scaring tactic to get the answers it wanted.
And then it softened. It sympathized, pressed it gently for more, and finally, finally , the deviant spilled. It confessed, right then and there to the crime it had committed. It had been … traumatized, for lack of a better word. Hank stood, vaguely impressed, watching Connor make his way to the door. Hank, Gavin, and the other officer filed in then, moving to detain the deviant.
It began banging it's head on the table. Blue blood burst from the wound forming, and the other officer tried to hold it back from destroying itself. Hank watched in dismay, knowing what would likely come next.
And then the deviant pushed up, grabbing the officer's gun. Without hesitation, it shot once, and then turned the gun up against the underside of it's own jaw, and pulled the trigger once more. It fell to the ground in a heap.
“Jesus Christ,” Hank muttered. And then he glanced over, and there was Connor, bullet hole in his forehead, thirium seeping out, destroyed. His heart clenched alongside his jaw, and he tried not to retch …
This had been the night ater the interrogation. He hadn't been surprised, really, but he couldn't shake the way it affected him. He hadn't liked the thought of having to handle his partner’s death, android or otherwise. His surprise wasn't in the scene, it was in the care, in the way heart had dropped, the way he woke with a shout that didn't make sense. He wasn't close to it.
But the nightmares didn't stop after that. It seemed like every time he closed his eyes, dozed off for a second, he was having a nightmare. Connor, falling from a roof. Connor, being run over by some machine. Connor, being shot, or beaten, or impaled or …
And then it had started lining up. The tower should not have been in his dreams, he'd had no knowledge of what was to come. And yet, he'd dreamed of the shooting deviant on the roof. And he assumed his dream of the kitchen would have been correct, if he had allowed the android to go. But fear had stopped him.
Why?
Connor was still a machine. Connor was no human, try as Hank might to project his own humanity on him. But something whispered in the back of his mind that he'd changed. That Connor wasn't the same as when they'd first met, so set as he'd been on accomplishing a mission. He'd seen him get angry, seen him irritated and apologetic and remorseful. He'd felt the intuition telling him that, in those moments, Connor had been sincere. He was more than what people thought. He was someone.
God, someone he'd hugged. Even now, with a potential war rising, he had the humility to flush with some sense of embarrassment. Fear had been the overwhelming factor when he'd realized Connor would be going into Jericho as a deviant hunter, into a place filled with deviants demanding rights. Demanding equality. He'd felt the need to tell him no , to order him to stand down, to let what might happen, happen. He had some idea that if Connor died, if he was replaced as Connor boasted he would be, he wouldn't be the same. It wouldn't be Connor . It'd be a half-baked replica of the original and Hank wouldn't be able to look at him.
He was scared for him, but he couldn't convince him against it. Connor was stubborn, set in his paths even if it meant disobeying. Maybe he'd been deviant all along. So he'd done the one thing he could think of.
He'd hugged him. He'd hugged him close, tight against his chest, though the android was freezing. He'd indulged himself , been selfish and greedy, and he'd run his fingers through those soft brown locks and he'd told him to come back. That'd he'd better come back.
He was far too old to be having these kinds of emotions about a machine. A complex, now-deviant machine, sure, but still. He was hitting the age of retirement, he was hitting the time where he should be spending his days at home, collecting off of that fund, getting government money and, at best, maybe a more relaxed job, if he really felt motivated at that point. He could be a burger flipper, go back to college days of job hunting for minimum wage.
He was at the age where marriage was all he was supposed to have left, and a legacy left behind. But instead, he was crushing after a three-month long existing android, whose physical age was probably something from late twenties to early thirties. One that wouldn't age after the fact.
He was really in the hole, wasn't he? He hadn't offered his home to the other for nothing. He hadn't just felt some concern, he felt concern for other officers all the time, but you didn't see him nearly offering his own bed up to them. In his defense to … himself, apparently, Connor made it a point to be everywhere . He'd broken into his home twice to save him from a drunken death, and though one had been to chase after his mission, there'd been concern. He could remember it. Connor followed him everywhere, and he made it a point to reconcile with him when he had to. Going through more effort to make it work between them as friends than anyone else had ever really tried. More than even he tended to bother to try with other people. It was something that, when he looked back at it, amazed him, left this warm feeling in his chest that he knew he hadn't felt in a very long time. It was good.
But now the android responsible for such backwards feelings was facing possibly the fight of his life. If anything went wrong down there, he'd have to find a way out on his own. Just the mental image alone of Connor being ganged up on, cornered and deactivated with skillful, knowing hands that would render him unfixable. And then down the road the replacement would come.
Before he could explore much more of his own thoughts, though, he could hear the whirring of helicopter blades and there was the sudden sound of footsteps behind him. A sigh escaped his lips as he turned to face the culprit. Perkins and the rest of them, of course. Here was his one goal, to hopefully change their mind. Sway them.
The likelihood of it was less than ten percent, Connor had told him so before they got here. But he had to try. And he would.
“Lieutenant Anderson. Odd that you're here before us. Aren't you off the case? It's in our hands now,” the man said. He didn't hold any sounds of contempt, or necessarily even triumph. His tone was indifferent, for the most part.
“Yeah, sure, but I'm a free man, you know. Stand where I want.”
“Of course. But you're here for more than just contemplation in the night, yeah?”
Hank smiled a little --- it wasn't as if he thought Perkins would be stupid. He was sure he knew a negotiation appearance when he saw one.
“You're right. Look, Perkins, I'm gonna be real with you for a second.” Hank sighed, hand running over his beard as he sought to string together his words as best he could. “These androids, you gotta see they're more. I mean, come on, we've gunned 'em down once and they didn't fight back. This is all peaceful protest, they're not fuckin’ usurping anybody.”
“That doesn't mean much. They could be in a long-con, surely you know how sticky that can be.”
“Maybe. But why risk so many lives? Why claim to be after freedom as a front, and then let a good portion of their force be eliminated? They'd be more likely to bide time, convert others to their views and have the big numbers, and attack from inside. But no, they're standing and marching in the streets, not fighting back, just taking it. That's gotta strike a cord in there somewhere.”
Perkins looked almost thoughtful, considering Hank's words. He seemed to weigh them for a moment, before he turned a small smile to the elder.
“Even if I did, there's nothing to do about it. I've got a job to do, in the end, Anderson. My personal views don't fit into the equation.”
“What do you want, Connor?”
“My thoughts and desires on this do not matter. I am here to accomplish a mission, and that is what I'll do.”
“Well, that's what you're programmed to say.”
Hank shook aside the reminder, coming back to the present. Perkins was watching him, bullet vest on, gun in hand. He looked ready to do his job, whatever the consequences were. He looked like Connor had, with the gun aimed at that Chloe, staring down the barrel, determined against his own feelings, whatever they were.
The difference was, Perkins was human .
“Now, if you'll excuse me, I have deviants to destroy.”
He reached for his radio, and Hank made a snap decision. He lunged forward, hand clenching into a fist, and he slammed it into the other man's jaw. Effective in toppling him over, but nothing more, as there was an abrupt slamming into his abdomen, knocking the breath from his lungs. He dropped to his knees as Perkins straightened back up, rubbing at his jaw. The skin was red, and there was a small cut on his chin --- he’d hit him that hard, and it sent a thrill of pride through him, triumph.
“You’ve screwed yourself, Anderson. Get him off. And call his boss. I’m sure he’ll love to hear about this.”
“Fuck you.”
Perkins ignored his last spoken words, as Hank was hauled up from the floor forced onto his feet. He made a last-ditch effort to fight back --- not much worked. He got an elbow on the guy pinning his hands, but he was hit from behind, and everything went black.