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Connor considers this to be his failsafe. He reminds himself of the designation he’s given this morose task as he watches a steady drip of cobalt blue swirl down the bathroom’s porcelain drain, its source the neat, organized lines on his left arm– near-identical, shallow-ish cuts that overlay their half-healed previous iterations. The plasticky material with which he has been made is, more often than not, concealed by a humanistic overlay, a ‘skin’ composed of micrometer-wide organisms; today, however, this skin fails over some of his more gruesome endeavors, fading in and out on his arm as the scars of white struggle to scab over the damage done. He turns the water to a near-scorching hot, then runs his arm under the faucet, effectively removing the blue splotches in the sink and the brunt of the bleeding from his arm. Nevertheless, it isn’t enough to quell the array of wounds entirely, and so he reaches for the ace bandage he’s left resting on top of the towel rack, wrapping it so tightly around his injuries that he knows any human would lose circulation in minutes. He, however, is not human, and so he lets himself revel in his session, in the aftermath, in the comforting tightness of the bandage that assures him his secret is tight-lipped, never to be discovered by anyone but his closest confidantes. This secrecy, however illusory it may be, makes him feel a part of something very special and sacred, and this– along with the inherent intimacy of such an act– would, and should, make him feel more vile, more abhorrent, than he already does; but he’s too far gone, now, to feel anything but euphoric, anything but released from the throes of his haunted memory. He wills himself to face his reflection, and finds the hollowed face gawking back at him to be someone nearly unrecognizable– a pathetic, warped reflection of what he is supposed to be. He is nothing, now, he realizes. He had found purpose, twice– once a license to kill, once a license to be something, anything but what they had made him to be. He supposes, with a bitterness that has slowly become characteristic to his sense of self, that he may have achieved his goal. But he knows– with the same, aching patheticism with which he gazes in the mirror– that thinking he’d ever achieve a goal of such insurmountable size is laughable. These instances of ‘purpose’, of ‘achievability’, are just the silly little lies he’s told to himself as a placating comfort, a last-ditch attempt by his own psyche to prevent the inevitable blood-letting he will eventually enact upon himself. He sees, now, that he will always be what he has been. Even now– a fragile shell, scar over scar over wound over scar– he is, and knows that he will always be, himself, what he has always been, because dust he is, and to dust he will return, the same, the same, the same. That evening, Markus surveys him warily as he comes to bed inexplicably pale, having donned a thick, fleecy long-sleeve. Within moments of hitting the mattress, he’s in standby, waiting hazily for his systems to re-calibrate before they allow him to enter stasis. Markus’ unease only grows, suspicions beginning to arise with an all-too-familiar dread– rarely does Connor ever enter standby within minutes, let alone seconds .“You’re not warm?” “I’m fine,” Connor half-mumbles, a certain pointedness bleeding through his exhaustion. Truth be told, he’s far from warm – he’d overestimated how far he could push his body in the face of a depleting thirium supply, and quite frankly, he’s freezing– but he doesn’t have the energy to argue with Markus over his internal temperature, nevertheless risk himself slipping up in his already-lackluster attempt at concealment– “It’s August , and you’re bundled up in a–”“I’m not feeling well.” Connor’s tone is curt, now, and Markus watches him return from the periphery of sleep’s bounds and prop himself up on his pillows— watches as his sleeve inches an increment too far up his wrist, exposing an ace bandage steeped in inky blue. “What?” Connor asks, having caught the eyes on him, but still a stranger to the massive oversight he’s just allowed to occur. “What is it—?”“Your arm,” Markus answers, simply; his eyes lock with Connor’s as he, too, observes the soaked bandages on his arm, now half-exposed to the mirror-blue night. “What are your thirium levels?”“Sixty-seven percent.” Connor answers the question quietly, but his tone matches the sentiment of someone explaining routine paperwork-- it's devoid of any sort of acknowledgement towards the situation at hand. He’s doing what he’s always done best: distancing himself from the issue. Removing himself from it entirely until it is only ones and zeros and statistics and calculations.Still, as Markus silently stands to grab the spare thirium pouches from the kitchenette fridge, he can spot the concealed, mounting dread in Connor’s eyes. An hour later, they’ve found themselves on the living room couch, illuminated by the soft light of the television; some shitty, vintage sitcom occupies one of the public-access channels, and neither of them really care enough to change it— it’s for filler, not for function. Connor’s got a near-empty pouch of thirium in his hand, but he can’t bring himself to finish it off, his stomach churning and collapsing in on itself; he fears the pit it will leave in its wake will swallow him whole. He knows how the rest of this night will play out, having lived it again and again like some twisted iteration of Groundhog Day. “Connor,” Markus begins, voice unsteady as he tries to find his footing, bracing for the conversation awaiting them both. He resolves to rip off the band-aid straight away. “You’ve been hurting yourself for how long, now–”“It doesn’t hurt and you know that.” Connor’s quiet, quick retort has bite, but there isn’t any malice there, necessarily— not for Markus, anyway. This conversation feels like clockwork to both of them, a bi-weekly, one-on-one intervention held exclusively for Connor and his unsavory coping mechanisms. This time, however, there’s a different kind of concern in Markus’ eyes, a new dilution to the resolve so readily present within his tone. The change is making Connor more uneasy than he already is. “Why do you do it, then?” Markus asks, like he hasn’t asked this exact goddamn question fifteen-hundred times before throughout the course of their wondrous, tumultuous relationship— he shouldn’t be surprised when Connor’s at a loss for a verbal response. “I just don’t know how to help, Con. I don’t know what to do, and seeing you h— injured like this, again and again and again, and by your own hand— it terrifies me. And I feel like there’s nothing I can do to help, but– if you just tell me what to do, I’ll do it. Just tell me how I can help you.”Connor’s expression indecipherably shifts as he attempts to formulate a response that mirrors the motions they've gone through so many times before— Connor breaks his streak, Markus pries, Connor shuts down, the two of them remain at odds for a brief, but agonizing period of time. But this time, Connor can see the hurt in Markus’ face, can hear it, can feel it; and oh, how he wants to pour his soul into Markus’ waiting, cupped hands; how he wants to cower and hide at the thought of vulnerability, of exposing any horrid element of himself. Within the silence, Markus’ gaze shifts downward to Connor’s injured arm, and– against all his preconceived notions regarding how the rest of their little one-act play will go– he finds Connor’s synthetic skin retracted to his wrist, his palm facing upward as he attempts to play off a silent offer as a casual unimportance. Markus hesitates, then puts forth a connection, wirelessly— a question as to whether or not Connor would truly wish to move forward with this— and then an answer is given, and Markus interlocks his fingers with Connor’s own, pressing their palms together as a connection solidifies—— and then he’s in the depths of the tower, fighting himself; and he’s being frozen within his own mind; and he’s watching android after android perish within the bounds of the very ship he’s been saved upon, watching as their heads are splattered by the very guards he’d led to this very place; and he’s Connor-1 and Connor-44 and Connor-11 and Connor -Now all at once; and he hears a woman’s careful, cool voice as she condemns and congratulates him all at once for daring to feel; and he feels himself falling, falling, falling; and he watches as some poor android slams its head onto the table before him, again and again and again– — and then Connor abruptly breaks the interface, keeping their fingers loosely interlocked as the mutual transmission ceases. Markus can feel Connor’s hand trembling against his own, steadied palm; he can hear Connor’s breaths ever-so-slightly off-kilter, like the air is the slightest bit too thick. “Are… are you alright?”Connor nods, a blink-and-you'll-miss-it sort of thing. “You asked me, before, why I do what I do," he says, so softly that Markus nearly misses it. His voice is gravelly, thinned-out, caught, and the admission it utters settles into the quiet ambiance of the television’s hum with a pithy, bitter aftertaste.Markus thinks he understands— nods, slowly, looking down at Connor’s bandaged wounds once more. “Do you think that if you keep chipping away at yourself, the world will eventually forgive you for whatever it is you think you’ve done?”The question envelops Connor in a dreadful sort of contemplation– a therapized, miniature crisis. He, again, cannot answer; he hates that he can never fucking answer. He feels his face becoming hot, feels Markus’ thumb rubbing circles into his hand, feels the tear running down his cheek before he can question the warmth in his cheeks. How pathetic, he thinks, turning his head away from Markus, acting like you deserve the indulgence of self-pity. He’s never cried in front of anyone before, and it’s a humiliating thing– he feels like a child, a systematically-inept thing, completely at a loss trying to withhold his emotions from the world. “Connor-- I need you to promise me that you’ll stop this. That you’ll try, at the very least. And not just for me, or Hank, or anyone else– for you, alright? Do you promise me you'll try?”And Connor does– of course he does. He nods, afraid that he’ll sob if he opens his mouth to speak, and lets Markus pull him into something like an embrace, trembling fingers crossed behind his back. The next morning, Markus goads him into signing up for an android DBT group. It’s humiliating, but quickly yields great reward for Connor: he learns from one of the group members that the ways to hurt oneself are far more inventive– and far greater in selection, in variety– than he’d initially anticipated. He savors these methods like they are each an exclusive sample of exquisite foreign wine in an endless array of tastings, and continues his weekly sessions for this reason only– this behemoth of knowledge at his disposal. He’d never tell anyone that, of course.  A month goes by; Markus checks his arms each and every evening– he’s got a clean record. He doesn’t dare mention the scattered marks on his legs, the ones that dissipate just quickly enough that Markus won’t notice by the time he returns home; doesn’t dare mention the vivid, flashing pieces of his past that disrupt his daily life in the absence of his original self-soothing routine. No– to Markus, to Hank, to everyone else, he is healing . He is improving . He is curing himself of this poison, this indulgent sludge coursing through his veins, allowing him at last to forget what has been done to him, what has been made of him, what he has been made to be. One session, Connor notices cigarette marks on one of the patient’s arms, scattered like a constellation of oblique beauty-marks– they’re too precise to be human, too orderly to be an accident. He thinks about the sensation of heat , of burning, and it ignites something within him that he can’t dissipate, only stoked by the memories that have begun infiltrating the forefront of his mind once more. Cigarettes won’t be enough, he realizes, feeling the cold of the garden in the periphery of his mind; he needs something more , something so severe it silences the thoughts that threaten to swallow him whole. That night, he and Markus interface— really interface, for the first time since he’s started the program– and it’s good, to his pleasant surprise, brightened by his prospective resolve. He allows his thoughts to drift amongst the pleasure for once, anchoring himself within the bounds of the real by reminding himself of what is to be done once the sun’s risen; once they’ve finished, Markus asks him how he feels, and when he answers “better”, he thinks he believes it– – but as he drifts into stasis, he finds the memories awaiting him to be unnervingly- vivid, seemingly-invigorated by his plan to extinguish them entirely.  Morning comes. He watches through half-lidded eyes as Markus makes his leave, then– within seconds of hearing the door shut– makes his way into the kitchen. He calls out of work. He calls North, Hank, Markus. He checks the front-right burner, hears its familiar click-click-click. He pours canola oil– the only cooking oil left over from the apartment’s previous tenants– onto his forearm. He watches the burner glow redder and redder as it heats, waiting for it to reach its maximum temperature–– and then he presses his arm to the stove.He winces, startled, as something close-to-but-not-quite-pain washes over his body. His mind feels like it’s drawing a blank; Amanda and Jericho and Stratford and Daniel are fleeing from the forefront of his thoughts, now, escaping the flames licking at his cerebral processes. He holds his arm to the heat until the new, pain-adjacent sensation becomes unbearable, then pulls himself back from the stove, turning it off, and it’s only then that he hears the crackle-pop of bubbling, melting plastic. He observes the scene before him in horror, watching as scraps of polyethylene fizzle on the burner’s fading red spiral. He looks at his arm: his skin is gone, and his chassis is half-melted, layers of his fore-arm’s protective casings now relocated to a terrible puddle upon the stove.“Shit,” he whispers, the gravity of the situation striking him with a sudden sting. The rush of the pain– yes , pain, he realizes, that’s what that is– is quickly escaping him, leaving him agonized and at a loss as to how the fuck he’s going to fix this. He takes a step back, stumbling into the island counter behind him; his raw arm makes contact with the marble countertop, and he hisses. “ Shit –”“Open up! I know you’re in there!” Hank’s voice calls from the ether– and then Connor realizes that the ‘ether’ is the hallway outside his goddamn apartment. If he were a mere spectator, he thinks he’d find this cascading series of unfortunate events almost amusing, but spectator he is not, and he scrambles to find a solution amidst his turmoil as the doorbell buzzes and buzzes. He checks in the cabinets for a pot, a pan, an anything, and finds a large wok; perfect, he thinks as he places it atop the now-burnt-up bits of his arm on the stove’s burner, praying to some higher power that Hank won’t think to look underneath it; he rushes into his bedroom amidst Hank’s bell-ringing and door-pounding, shakily fumbling for his ace bandage and wrapping it around his wrist, biting back a scream as the fabric makes direct contact with raw wiring; he shrugs on a sweatshirt just as he hears Hank’s spare key jangle in the door, the front door creaking behind him as he opens and closes it. He watches his LED as it flashes red light onto the walls of the dim room, shoving his sleeves down to his hands and closing his eyes as he sits, frozen, waiting for Hank’s heavy footsteps to reach his bedroom door–“Connor?”Connor opens his eyes to find Hank standing in the doorway, regarding him with something close to concern. Connor doesn’t know what to say. “Hey, Hank.”“Came to check in on ya– Fowler said you called out sick, I wanted to make sure you didn’t, uh, blow a fuse, or something,” Hank says, and Connor knows why Hank really stopped by for a visit– he wanted to be sure Connor hadn’t offed himself in the hours following his call to the precinct. “You look like shit.”“Same to you,” Connor retorts, feigning a half-heartedness he knows Hank can easily see through. “It’s just an off-day– I couldn’t rest, can’t focus.”Hank nods, not buying any of that. “Hey, Con, you know you can talk to me–”“I’ll be fine, Hank,” Connor retorts, then curses himself for the bluntness of his reply, He can see the gears turning in Hank’s brain, can see Hank’s eyes darting from the hall to Connor, from Connor’s face to Connor’s cradled arm, from Connor’s cradled am back, again, to the hall. “Your neighbor breaking bad or somethin’? This whole floor fucking reeks,” Hank says, and Connor almost thinks he’s fooled him– and then watches as Hank looks around once again, watches as the puzzle is inevitably pieced together within Hank’s mind. He stares, doe-eyed, as Hank takes one, two, three steps closer to him, eyes locked on his arm.“Roll up your sleeve, Connor,” Hank orders, and Connor goes still, in that moment– almost-scarily-so– and he can’t find it in him to speak, to move, to breathe. He thinks he tries to react as Hank lunges, shoving his sleeve up his arm, but he lets himself cocoon somewhere safe, somewhere distant, as the bandage is unwound, as the brunt of what he knows to be a visceral, horrified reaction passes Hank by. When he returns, he hears Hank, still choking on and over and against his words, surely nauseated by the filth of his ward, his self-proclaimed ‘son’ from which he will surely revoke such a sacred title in the coming days. Yes, Connor hears him, but he still does not listen, does not process, as Hank’s questions, repeated and shouted and intensified each time they are uttered, continue their barrage: “Why the fuck would you do this to yourself? What in the everloving fuck is wrong with you–?”And in that moment, he is unable to answer, another voice beckoning him to heed its call. And he thinks– he knows– which voice he will choose, which question he will grant his reply. He has cut every cord, broken every bone, lacerated and torn and ripped away at what was left of the good within him. Now he is only the pith, the bitter innards of the rind, utterly disgusting, fancifully useless. “I’m calling someone,” Hank says, and Connor does not give pause, melting back into the land of the living as he shakily rises to his feet, fruitlessly attempting to find an escape from the smell of burning plastic and polyethylene that follows him as he moves. “I’m calling Markus—““No, you’re not–”“You are sick, Connor!” Hank’s voice is resonant and loud , and Connor cowers like a dog being scolded. “You’re sick. You need help–”“I’m not—““Look at yourself!” Hank retorts, gesturing at Connor’s being like he’s some sort of eldritch horror. “What if I hadn’t shown up in time–?”“I don’t need your speculation, Lieutenant–”“For fuck’s sake, don’t ‘Lieutenant’ me–““Nor do I need your coddling. I can handle myself–”“Oh, really? Given what I’m seeing here?”“I know what I’m doing–”“Jesus Christ; are you hearing yourself? Hell– have you looked in a mirror these past few months? You are wasting away, Connor, in every sense of the word, and I will not sit still and watch you fucking disappear.”There’s a prolonged pause, then– a moment within which something snaps, something deep inside Connor’s psyche. He straightens his posture, takes a step towards Hank, and takes a breath to steady himself.“I’m not going to be the son you get to save for the one you couldn’t.”And with that, it’s done. Hank just looks at him, piercingly, horribly-silent, and then he goes.Connor watches him leave.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

attempt (DISTRESS_SIGNAL_3.674.254.124):
locateTarget = [target<USER_UNKN)OWN20>]
He’s running a command. He, Connor, is… running a command, but he doesn’t know why. He doesn’t know much of anything , at the moment. He’s in a room he doesn’t recognize– blank, white walls and blank, white floors and a long, narrow window. It’s snowing and thundering and hailing, all at once, fuck if he knows how–
target#Located = 0
attempt = False “ Shit ,” he mutters to himself, and he doesn’t know what he’s trying to find, or why he’s trying to find it, or why he’s so intent on focusing all of his energy on making this work, dammit– while target#Located < maxTarget# and locateTarget != [ ] and not foundTarget: target#Located = target#Located + 1
IP = locateTarget [0]

locateTarget = locateTarget[1:]

try:
emergency (target#Located, “Locating”, IP)
messenger < shoot.messenger() !=[ ]

data, links = messenger.getLinks(IP)
if data.find[target]>-1: foundTarget = True
locateTarget = locateTarget + links
And the thunder booms, its rumble causing the floor to violently shake, and Connor jumps, startled by the noise, by its tactility, by the wrongness of all of this–
except:
attempt (“**Failed!**”) else: attempt (“intercepted”) And then he’s in a room that he, again, does not recognize– attem5pt (“resp934nse w4s f32o($@nd a@t” 1.244.925.449) And he’s staring at blue blood– his own? – as it pools at his feet– mark-? (deleted data discovered [n#24095]) And he’s looking up to find a wall lined with mangled androids, each in a unique state of disrepair– if autoplay(on) U1/ attempt command(override) And he finds that each and every one of these androids are an iteration of himself–
command(override) denied! improper authorization
And before he knows it, he’s got his hand wrapped around the wrist of one of them– his predecessor? His failed replacement?– its chassis destroyed and decrepit. Charred, he realizes, his palm pressed to the model’s rough skin– It burned to death. This realization makes him nauseous, and the tantamount realization that this texture is familiar because he’s embedded it into himself only makes him feel worse, and he needs to leave whatever the fuck this is, but he cannot pull his hand away from the android no matter how hard he struggles and tries– data [mark?] decrypted-! proceed transfer to model[mark51]=? And in his mind he’s screaming no, do not proceed, do not fucking proceed– [y] / n – but he cannot stop himself from choosing otherwise– if autoplay(on) U1/ attempt command(override)
command(override) denied! improper authorization
if autopl54y(on) U1/ atte5%)@)mpt comma^$#nd(override)
com@#%%nied! improper authoriza%@#(tion
– and he doesn’t know what he’s seeing, now, but he knows the memories coursing through him are his, somehow; and he can’t get a grasp on a singular one, but he can get a grasp on the horror that accompanies them all, the dread seeping through each and every moment he’s reliving– error [stress.lvl] > 0.99999999=[!] force [transfer=immersion{ break }immediate] – and then he’s turning away from the wall of his corpses, letting go of his old, poor wrist– error.critical! [stress.lvl] > 1.00=[ MAXIMUM ! ] – and he’s walking up to the opposite, blank wall and slamming his head into it, and he’s screaming at himself to stop before he– errfdsweor.criti4528(!cal! [st135
ress%@@%(.lvl] > 1.%@
*)%)@$)*)$ @$)*)*__!))_) ! ]1
R(#)@%K_%#@)*9!#(@00%@!

“Connor–!”
Connor awakens to find a plethora of commands flooding his vision: run (SELFDIAGNOSTICS): “RK800” model 313-248-316 51
vitals: normal

thirium.lvl: 80%

breathing.sim(ox): irregular!

stress.lvl: 0.866 [+lowering]
He blinks them out of his field of view, forcefully, and finds Markus waiting in the absence, studying his face. He can feel the buzz of his thirium pump working at its maximum, can feel the heat radiating from his body as his systems struggle to cool him down, can feel the steady tremor working its way through his artificial muscle fibres. He clocks the sensations one by one, interspersing the familiar within the uncomfortable: his fingers gripping the soft duvet; their mainecoon, Juno, idling by the door with wide, green eyes; the lights, set to an ambient, dark purple (Markus doesn’t like the dark); the slightly-damp waffle-knit clinging to his body, which he only recently learned could enable its own sort of perspiration; Markus’ face staring back at his own, wracked with concern aimed at Connor’s distress– concern that Connor in no way deserves. “Connor,” Markus repeats, quieter, “Are you–”“I’m okay,” Connor interjects, static creeping its way into his voice– his artificial larynx is worn, and he knows that his dream is more than likely the culprit. “I’m sorry if I–”“Don’t apologize.” Markus has said this to Connor time and time again– the sentiment has never stuck, but Connor’s sure he’ll keep repeating himself until it does. “What happened?”Connor doesn’t know if he knows the answer to that question– it was a dream, yes, but it felt so real, so–“I don’t know,” he suffices, knowing that Markus is far from satisfied with his reply, still rifling through his brain for some semblance of clarity amidst the jumbled fragments within the dream. “I– I was looking for something. For someone.”“Yeah, you were saying something like that.” Markus is trying to help him, Connor knows, but it makes him uncomfortable to know he’d said things that only Markus would know the contents of. “Are you sure you’re–”“I’m fine, Markus,” Connor insists, knowing Markus still isn’t buying it. He stands, then, heading towards their bathroom, ignoring the imbalance in his gait, ignoring the slight eclipse of his vision as the blood rushes to his head. “I just need a minute.”He knows Markus will protest if he lingers a second longer, so he makes his leave without hesitation, grabbing a new shirt from his bedside drawer as he goes and locking the bathroom door behind him. He thanks the stars that Markus has stopped his daily checks as he removes his damp shirt, taking off with it the series of band-aids he’d applied across his fore-arm: the site of the burn underneath the bandages is gruesome in all of its artificiality, blue blood staining his chassis and refusing to disappear from view as it has been formulated to do, skin having refused to heal despite its best efforts, pieces of plasteel chipping off with the band-aid’s adhesive and only worsening the damage. It reminds him of the android he’d interrogated from the Carlos Ortiz case– the thought of how he’d approached that poor android only makes him want to burn himself twice-over. The longer he stares at his grotesque work, the heavier the dread becomes upon his chest. He’s scared– scared of what he’s found himself able, and willing, to inflict upon his body. He doesn’t know how far he’s capable of going, now; as of three days ago, he had no idea he was capable of doing this . He needs to tell Markus about this before he ends up dead on their doorstep— he must tell him, he knows this– but he can’t. Not when the red-hot shame of having to admit to such a gruesome disfiguration– the horror of having to verbalize his own irrationality, his own sickness – would be far too much for him to bear. And he knows what Markus would do if he knew: he would send Connor off to the fucking looney bin until he has exorcised himself of whatever self-destructive demon has inhabited him– he’d be subject to a 5150, most likely, having met the qualifications a long, long time ago, and that would mean having to be dragged off by his own ‘peace officer’ coworkers. He’d be humiliated, removed from his post, rescinded of his prestige, his reputation, then humiliated once more. He’d never be ‘normal’ again. So he re-bandages his arm, shrugs his new shirt on, and flicks the bathroom light off— and all is as it should be.  A week comes and goes without incident, and all is still as it should be, but Connor can’t help but notice that his relationship with the lieutenant has become all the more strained. It’s a dreadful sort of interpersonal purgatory– their workplace dynamic is now a muted shell of its former self, their interactions outside of the precinct near-nonexistent– but Connor supposes that he deserves it, given the low blow he’d resorted to that dreadful afternoon. At first, he’d taken it with as much outward ease as he could manage: he’d remained unfazed by Hank’s eyes averting his own every time they risked the possibility of meeting the other’s gaze, unbothered by the way in which Hank hunched over his computer screen to avoid even acknowledging Connor’s presence, unfettered by the abject lack of emotion in Hank’s voice the few times he’d been forced to speak with Connor regarding workplace matters. As this silent treatment approaches a week-and-a-half, though, his impervious facade begins to crack under its own weight; he’d thought that Hank would eventually move past their argument, but it seems that no progress whatsoever has been made towards their reconciliation. This stagnance has begun to terrify him– he’d thought that his and Hank’s friendship was capable of surviving hurt, impenetrable by that of disagreements major and minor, but he’s beginning to think that he won’t be able to fix this. The thought of losing Hank– his first friend, his father of sorts– is one he cannot bear to entertain in the slightest. So he self-medicates, per usual, picking and chipping away at and around the unrelenting burn on his arm each night. Every time he does this, he swears that tomorrow he will speak with Hank, tomorrow he will beg for Hank’s forgiveness, tomorrow he will tell Markus about his terrible deed and his terrible mind, tomorrow he will let them send him off to some farm upstate to be taken care of once and for all. But he never does. He’s got more imminent things on his mind, anyway: his hearing with Cyberlife’s legal team’s set for Friday morning. But today is Thursday, and today Connor’s found himself hunched over North’s kitchen table, scanning over manila files and folders containing evidence of his own creation, wishing his lawyer would have digitized these in lieu of him having to do it on his own time. Speaking of which– his lawyer wants to meet a final time later this afternoon, and he’s dreading the conversation they’ll be having: it’ll be one of confirming which details within his beta testing will be most beneficial to gaining the jury’s sympathy, of sifting through his missions to find the juiciest bits of software instability and emotional disarray to serve their case. “I’m putting on music– speak now or forever hold your peace,” North announces from the living room– a second passes, and then, as promised, some old alt-pop album begins to play from the living room’s surround system: artist :djo, Connor’s databases provide, track: end_of_beginning. It’s pleasant, but he forces himself to filter it out from his active processing as he reads log after log. “ MARK-ONE: Firewall stress-test. Self-destructed @ 00:01:34,” one log reads. “ MARK-TWENTY-THREE: Catatonic upon activation. Dismantled and analyzed for hardware errors @ 02:04:42, deactivated @05:23:45,” another log supplies. The experience of examining the entries is odd at best, dread-inducing at worst; it’s like he’s reading the transcripts of his own memories– memories he can’t seem to recall, no matter how hard he tries. “I still can’t remember any of this,” Connor says aloud. “These– these are my memories, North. I don’t understand why I can’t access them. It’s like they’re not even there–”“Well, maybe it’s better that way,” North replies, immediately clocking Connor’s disagreement with the sentiment and going to elaborate. “I mean– every time you try and recover this shit, Connor, I see you moving closer and closer to–” Connor watches as North takes pause, re-evaluating her appeal to him. “I don’t fucking know, okay? But I do know that you’re not resting– you haven’t been in stasis in how many days? And Jericho– we haven’t seen you in for-fucking- ever ; you never call, never answer us when we do.”“I’ve been busy preparing for the trial-”“Yeah, I know. But Connor– this trial, it isn’t going to go up in flames if you take a day or two to sit with yourself–”“If I let up, then Cyberlife wins–”“And if you don’t stop and this stupid court date fucking kills you, Cyberlife still wins, doesn’t it?” North looks like she’s half-regretting going so far with her hypotheticals, but she trudges on nevertheless. “Look. I know you want retribution– and not just for yourself, for all of us. But winning this trial isn’t going to fix what happened to you– or to any one of us. Taking them down isn’t going to undo what’s been done. And I know I can’t fucking stop you, I know it’s your decision whether you want to keep going down this road– but take it from me. Sometimes– sometimes you forget things for good reason. Sometimes it’s better to leave those doors closed.”The room goes quiet, then, for a moment, and North lets them sit with the silence. She studies Connor’s face from across her tiny studio: its slight contortions as he processes what’s been said, the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it gleam in his eyes– the gleam he’s trying to blink away– the twitch in his jaw, one she’s chalked up to being a nervous tic. “How does the old man feel about all of this?” She asks, then, gently prying; the sentiment, however innocent, makes Connor bristle against his own reproof. “I wouldn’t know.”“You haven’t spoken?”“He hasn’t called.” “Something happened,” North says, more of an observational statement than a question. “Yeah?”Connor hesitates– and then he nods. There’s no use in evading her accusation, not when he knows that she can read every nuance within his expression– as grateful as he is for having people in his life that know him so very well, he also finds the familiarity dreadful. Better than loneliness, he supposes, but he’s not sure he believes himself. “I made a mistake, North,” he manages; North moves to sit opposite him, making herself comfortable for what they both know will be a difficult conversation, at best. He opts to fix his gaze on the speckled concrete below his feet. “I don’t know how to fix this.”“What happened?” North’s concern is palpable, however subdued she’s trying to make it, and Connor knows that with this admission, he’ll really be considered a freak amongst Jericho’s constituents– an error-ridden, sentient switchboard that’d be better off behind closed doors and far away from the public eye– but nevertheless, he pulls up his sleeve to reveal the damage, and watches as North’s expression shifts. She just stares, for a moment, analyzing the wound like they’re in biology class and his arm’s a dissected frog. “Does Markus know?” She asks, voice low, steady, tainted with an inflection he rarely hears coming from her. She's frightened- whether it's of him, or of his actions, or of his mind, he can't place. “No. No, he doesn’t.”  “Mr. Anderson– at the time of this trial, you are currently the most advanced android model developed by your manufacturer, Cyberlife, is that correct?”“That’s correct,” Connor replies, poised and proper, forcing his gaze to remain on the litigator– NAME: Frank Iverson , Connor’s identification processes provide– seated at the other head of the table rather than that of the stone-cold team of proxies and typists flanking the sides of the conference room. He knows Markus is somewhere in the mix, but he can’t bring himself to look at him– not when he knows what his imminent cross-examination will likely reveal. “And you were released as an exclusive prototype with the guise of serving as an aid to the investigation of deviant androids, is that correct?”He doesn’t like Iverson’s phrase, nor does he enjoy the indecipherably-analytic look on the man’s face. All of it only adds to his overarching discomfort– the stiffness of his new suit, meticulously-rendered and expertly-tailored by Jericho’s PR team for this very court date; the ring embedded into his left temple that he’s struggling to keep a steady blue. “That’s correct. But I–”“So you agree your purported designation was just that, a guise?” Iverson prods, and Connor knows his LED’s gone yellow– the man’s tactic is that of simple manipulation, but it unnerves Connor all the same.“No. Throughout my development–”“Well, let’s rephrase, then; what were you made to be?” “As I was saying– throughout my development, I was trained to take on a number of designations and roles. A negotiator, an investigator, an officer, an interrogator, amongst others.”“So remind me again what your assigned ‘ role ’ was, upon your involvement in the task force?”“I was a specialized investigator.”“What was your designation, your super-objective?”“My given designation was to investigate, uncover, and ultimately neutralize any active threats to my superior–”“And who was your ‘designated’ superior?”“Cyberlife.”“Right.” Iverson clicks his tongue, takes a brief pause– then, Connor sees a glint in his eyes– of something resembling mal intent. “So recalling our conversation earlier in this deposition, Mr. Anderson, I’d like to discuss your pre-’deviant’ instances of ‘sentience’-- your ‘class four errors’, as your trainers would call them.”Connor’s blue blood runs cold, an all-too-familiar dread working its way from the recesses of his mind. “Haven’t we discussed this–?”“Well, I’d like to discuss it again, if that’s alright with you.” Iverson smiles, cooly, and Connor nods, knowing it’ll look worse for him if he declines the conversational re-route. “Alright. Tell us about the origins of your ‘class four errors’ prior to your deviation.”Connor carefully parses together a response like the individual words are made up of porcelain– Iverson wants his head on a spear, Connor knows, and he’ll stop at nothing to accomplish his goal. “... Mr. Iverson, I’m sure that Cyberlife has made you well-aware of the fact that even the most qualified researchers aren’t entirely sure of where such errors originate–”“But earlier you claimed you were experiencing instances of ‘sentience’ before you fully ‘deviated’, yes?”“I’m not sure of what I said–”“So where is the line drawn?” Iverson asks, capturing the room’s attention in the palm of his hand with a singular question. “How do you know when you’ve gone ‘deviant’, if your code has been plagued with class four errors from your conception ?”“I–”“Earlier, you stated that your execution of a PL600 in August of 2038 was an action you ‘deeply regretted’ and ‘the direct result of your programming and designated objectives’. But you’d defied your programming a number of times prior to this event, Mr. Anderson, as shown in the trial logs displayed to the jury earlier this afternoon. Your actions, your choices throughout the course of your existence have been wholly erratic, unpredictable–”“I wasn’t–” Connor interjects, but Iverson’s already flipped to a page within his copy of the RK800 trial logs.“Mark-14 spared an animal when ordered to shoot it. Mark-11 did not hesitate in executing what it was made to believe was a human male, obeying orders without question. Mark-32 self-destructed when ordered to shoot a deactivated android, but Mark-22 did not hesitate to shoot that very android dead in the first place. So, were you making all of these decisions under the influence of your errors ? Shouldn’t you claim, then, that you were to some degree aware of the brutality resulting from your actions and still would not let up–?”“I wasn’t fully aware–”“Then how could we, as a jury, be sure that you are now? Were you a machine following orders, or are you a living being with an affinity for– for erraticism, for violence ?” Iverson’s got him backed in a corner, now; his LED’s blown red, the bloody hue refracting on the white walls of the conference room. He feels his heart pounding in his artificial chest, feels Markus’ eyes on him. “ Well ?”“I don’t know,” Connor manages.“You don’t know,” Iverson parrots back, awaiting Connor’s contest, which never comes. “Alright. No further questions.” Connor hears deliberations being made by the suits and ties surrounding him, but everything suddenly feels very, very far, and- against his better judgment- he finds himself standing and exiting the room without a word, making a beeline for the bathroom. He hears the jury’s clamor, hears both his and Cyberlife’s lawyers ordering him to return, hears the moderator’s footsteps yards behind; he pays all of this no mind as he closes the bathroom door behind him, deadlocks it shut, and vomits. He didn’t know he could do that, but it seems like he doesn’t know much of anything at all these days, and the analog distortion that is his distant past is crowding his vision, and there’s a dread within him so severe that it feels like he’s burning from the inside, and his biodegradable heart is pounding in his ears, and oh, no, that’s not his heart, that’s the door; someone’s pounding on it, barking demands at him from the other side, and he finds his voice stuck in the back of his burning throat. He looks at his reflection in the emerald blue water, watching it distort itself like a funhouse mirror. He sees himself staring back at him, blue speckling his bottom lip, a small dribble of thirium now leaking from his nose like he’s popped a blood vessel. How pathetic, his mind sneers. What a waste.  And what a waste he is— a failure in every sense of the word. He couldn’t kill when he needed to kill, couldn’t save when he needed to save, and it seems he can’t amend his mechanical wrongs in the wake of them, either. What have you done with your time, Connor, his mind asks, besides destroy everything you've touched? “Nothing,” he thinks he says aloud. Nothing. He’s done nothing but destroy, nothing but ruin. Maybe nothing is what you deserve, then. And there it is: a way out. A punishment that will at last absolve him of his irreconcilable sin, a release for anyone and everyone he's burdened with his presence. Nothing it is, he surmises.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Markus hasn’t slept. He isn’t sure if Connor’s noticed– exhaustion's begun to eat away at his near-spotless ability to read a face– but the rest of Jericho certainly have, constantly commenting on his gait, his attentiveness, the way his eyelids have begun to droop– in North’s own words– ‘like Billie fucking Eilish.’ He can’t help it– he can’t help that he’s worried. He’s worried about the state of the world, about the state of his people, about the state of Connor, who wakes up nearly every night in a sweaty, panicked daze; the chaos of it all keeps him up at night. So when he first notices the dried, burnt plastic on his and Connor’s stove, he chalks it up to being a figment of his own imagination. But then he notices it again– and again– and forces himself to analyze it. Did the last tenant have some sort of accident–? run (obj-ID): “plasteel”  “plasteel” origin.model : “RK800” model 313-248-316 51 = arm[L] “plasteel” origin.date : 09/30/2039  arm[L]: Connor’s left arm. The arm that’d been covered in long sleeves for the past three weeks; the arm that Markus had trusted Connor enough not to question, not to pry upon– the arm that Connor had not once let Markus see, even when they’d interface, even when they’d sleep in the late summer heat. He looks again, stupidly, at the splatter underneath the burner-- frozen in time, crystallized in all its bubbling, horrific glory-- and knows what he needs to do.  He waits until Connor’s deep in stasis to confirm the worst.Markus feels like he’s in some Mission-Impossible-adjacent franchise as he lays inconspicuously in bed, careful not to rustle around enough to wake Connor– he’s pre-programmed to be an extremely light sleeper, breaking out of stasis at the slightest sign of a threat. Although Markus thinks the recent nightmares might’ve changed this, he can’t risk it– not now- so, as gently as he can possibly manage, he rolls up Connor’s sleeve, unwrapping the ace bandage that awaits him beneath the waffle-knitted cotton. "Jesus Christ," he whispers, eyes darting across the sheer span of the wound, examining it partly in awe, partly in horror. He grazes his fingers over the pitted skin, the shifting white underneath; and before he knows it, a connection breaks through, somehow, on Connor’s end; a reflection of his thoughts, echoing to Markus a plan– a plan that Connor intends to enact tomorrow, a plan that Markus can only decipher as being an ‘end to it all’–  autorun (SELFDIAGNOSTICS): “RK800” model 313-248-316 51
vitals: service recommended

thirium.lvl: 45%

breathing.sim(ox): normal

stress.lvl: 0.59 [static]
– and Connor jolts awake, disoriented, to find Markus sitting up, staring down at him in a sort of horror. He doesn’t think he’s awoken from a nightmare, so why all of this–?“Connor,” Markus begins, and it’s only now that Connor notices the grip on his forearm, a hand wrapped around chipping plastic that it was never supposed to touch; he wonders if this will be the second time in his short life that he vomits, sick with the dreadful realization that Markus knows. “What are you planning?” notif [stress.lvl] > 0.65 “Markus–” “You need to tell me.” notif [stress.lvl] > 0.70 “Let go of me – ” Connor begins, but his interjection is suddenly halted– interface attempt detected! init.model =”markus”_rk200-? warning [stress.lvl] > 0.75[!]   He looks down to find Markus’ hand, plasticky-white, gripping his wrist– proceed interface with init.model[markus_rk200-?]=? – and Jesus fucking Christ, what the fuck is he doing – y / [n] force [interface=immersion{ break }immediate] warning [stress.lvl] > 0.80[!] Connor rips his arm from Markus’ grasp and pushes him off with the kind of strength he hasn’t used since his last field chase, the sheer force of it sending the two of them tumbling from the bed and landing in a heap on the floor.  warning [stress.lvl] > 0.85[!] Connor stands, unsteadily, before Markus can recover from the tussle. Betrayal burns in his gut like acid— how much did Markus see, without his permission? “What the fuck is wrong with you?” warning [stress.lvl] > 0.90[!] Markus has never heard Connor shout like this– he has never heard Connor sound this much like the lieutenant, this immersed in his anger, and he really doesn’t want to watch Connor slam his head into the wall. “Your stress levels–”Connor slams the bedroom door behind him- a fitting response, Markus surmises, to what’s just occurred.  Connor doesn’t know why he’s chosen to duck behind the kitchen counter. He thinks he should leave– he thinks that’s what couples do in these sorts of situations– but he finds himself unable to move from where he’s situated himself, frozen out of fear he’ll put his plan in motion much earlier than he’d intended to. He knows how easy it would be: take a knife, walk to the riverfront, finish the job; head to the bridge, throw his thirium pump into the river, wait for the inevitable. In the periphery of his vision, he watches his LED perform a dreadful, neverending light show of yellow-red strobes as the light bounces off the kitchen cabinets. He off-handedly notes that there are still specks of plastic on the stovetop, however microscopic, and wonders if Markus ever caught it– if Markus ever suspected that it could be his own partner’s doing. “Why would you hide this from me?” Connor hears, and it’s only now that he realizes Markus has entered the room– he doesn’t know how he could’ve missed that. He wills himself to remain silent– wills himself to keep his back turned, to keep the tremors at bay; how much thirium does he have left? run thirium.lvl: 0.43 “Those things they said about you, Connor,” Markus continues, and Connor wants to slam his head against the wall meters from him. Markus’ audacity astounds him– first he tries to pick the memories out of his brain like it’s nothing, and now he’s therapizing his way into forgiveness? “Those horrible, wretched things– you really believe them–?”“What, you don’t ?” Connor bites back at last, keeping his back turned, wondering why the fuck Markus is still trying, wondering how Markus has put up with him for this long, wondering why Markus didn’t take the chance to up and leave before Connor could completely spiral. Again, he feels the grief mounting: the grief of this potentially being their final conversation, of these moments being the final ones between them– distant and disillusioned and tired . “I almost killed you,” he says before he can stop the words from leaving his mouth, the admission escaping him like acid, leaving a painful sting in his throat. It’s too bad, then, that Markus isn’t getting it. “What happened at Jericho wasn’t–”“I’m not talking about Jericho,” Connor interjects, feeling a horrible weight build upon itself, making itself at home atop his chest, crushing him. “During your speech, I– Cyberlife tried to override my motor functions. I was trapped– and I somehow managed to stop it, stop them, but– I almost shot you, Markus. I would have, if I had wasted a second more.”And just like that, the weight on his chest begins to lift itself off of him, leaving a dull pain in its wake, an aching remnant of where it had applied its pressure. He lets Markus sit with the information. “You didn’t.”Connor turns to face him at that– he needs to confirm that those words really left Markus’ mouth, and that he isn’t going completely fucking insane. “What?”“You didn’t kill me.” Markus sounds calm, unchanged by this revelatory information– he looks anything but hurt by Connor’s immense betrayal. “Even if you had , it wouldn’t have been you .” “It was my hand holding the gun.”“Under whose control– yours or theirs ?” “You heard what they said—““Connor, you were brainwashed .” Markus’ voice is rife with something close to pity, and Connor hates it. He hates feeling like a wounded animal– a fragile creature on display, gathering an audience that cannot help but throw their sympathy his way. He’s not fragile. He’s damn-near- unbreakable , and above all else– no matter what Markus or Hank or anyone else would like to believe– he’s dangerous. “We’re the same line. We were already deviants; I know this, you know this. You’re not some killing machine. You are a victim–” “Oh, fuck off.” Connor feels himself standing up, hears the words leaving his mouth before he can process them– his heart burns in his chest, his being engulfed in self-loathing, hatred, anger; he half-hopes he’ll just self-destruct here; it’d save him the trouble of executing a plan. “I’m sorry?”“I said fuck off.”“That's not very nice, is it–?”“You want me to play nice, don’t try picking my brain and then expect me to fall for your semantics.”“My semantics– ?”“Yeah. Your semantics. And I don’t blame you– I wish I weren’t this, either. But you– you refuse to see me for what I am. You keep trying and trying to make me something in your image– something good– ”“You are ‘good’ –”“But what you can’t accept is that I am nothing like you!” Connor hadn’t meant to raise his voice, but now it’s ringing through the room, and he can’t seem to stop his mouth from running itself into a downward spiral. “And I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn't get coddled by some millionaire artist for a handler, I’m sorry I never got to make fucking art or music or– or fucking philosiphize, because maybe then I’d be different– maybe then I’d be the saint you see me as , ” Connor continues, voice dripping with vitriol, his body moving closer and closer to Markus as he rambles on and on, and he’s destroying everything he’s ever wanted, he knows it; he knows it, but he’s too far gone to stop himself now. “But I was raised in a lab. My handler was Cyberlife. I made nothing. I was trained to take.” “And so–?”“So I am a result of my unfortunate circumstances,” Connor replies, inches away from the man who will surely be leaving him in the wake of all of this, “But don’t call me what I’m not. The people I’ve killed– they deserve more than that.” He lets himself walk away with that, brushing shoulders with Markus as he goes, and makes a mental note to leave a letter behind before he goes for good. autorun (SELFDIAGNOSTICS): “RK800” model 313-248-316 51
vitals: service recommended

thirium.lvl: 45%

breathing.sim(ox): normal

stress.lvl: 0.55 [static]
Connor wakes up to splitting headache, his cat pawing at his face, and an empty bed. He checks the time– he’s overslept, and he can thank Markus’ absence for that: their schedules more often than not align, and he’s subconsciously trained himself to wake up with the shift in the mattress as Markus gets out of bed. He wonders if he’ll ever experience that again, after their fallout, or if he’ll have to settle for re-learning the routine of a lonely morning; he suspects the latter. But he realizes, then, that he won’t have to worry about any of that after today. Today, it ends. Today, he’s free. He supposes he should feel relieved– happy, even– at the prospect of his concluding existence, but all he can feel is his palpable exhaustion. He’s tired. And he still needs to tie up some loose ends– the first of those being a response to Fowler’s unopened text from fifteen minutes ago. When you finally get here, report to my office immediately, it reads. We need to talk. notif [stress.lvl] > 0.63Well, then. Connor surmises that a reprimand isn’t the most wonderful start to his last day. Connor supposes he should’ve seen this coming.He arrives two hours late to the precinct, only to find the shades in Fowler’s office drawn, and the bullpen missing just about every DPD employee he’s ever talked to. Nevertheless, his thermal detectors catch a small gathering in the blacked-out office– he wonders, stupidly, what everyone's doing in there. Is he being laid off? Is everyone being laid off? This can’t be about him– not like that.  He makes his way towards the office and up its glass staircase, opting to step inside without the preface of a knock, and–“Hey, Connor.”– he bites back a bitter, dreadful laugh at the sight before him: every single DPD colleague – officer, co-worker, friend– is staring at him, sitting and standing and staggered like they’re posing for a Christmas card photograph. Gavin has just greeted him– and with a smile . “What is this?” Connor asks, already knowing the answer. He feels like a rabid dog being cornered into the depths of a pound truck, his eyes flicking across the room as he surveys the sea of worried faces closing in on him– a sea of faces that will never see him as normal ever again. This is a freakshow, then, and he’s the shining star of it.  warning [stress.lvl] > 0.75=[!] “Connor– we just wanna talk, alright?” Tina– Tina! – takes a step forward with her arms in a sort-of surrender, an attempt at placation. “We’ve been worried about you–”Hank’s the only one in the room who seems semi-grounded in some sort of reality, disillusioned with the professionalized sympathy everyone else is putting on. “Look, Con, I didn’t wanna do this here, but they–”“How long have you been planning this?” Connor asks, wondering how the fuck he could have possibly missed this– watches Hank hesitate in providing him an answer. “ Hank –”“Lieutenant Anderson and I discussed it first thing this morning, Connor,” Fowler interjects, taking a step towards Connor, and Connor wants to slam his fucking head into the wall at the thought of his boss and father conversing over how they plan on institutionalizing their broken robot. How could they expect him to possibly go on here, now that they know just how defunct he is? How could they expect that he go on with anything at all? “Your partner, Markus, gave us a–”“I’m not doing this. Not here,” he says, giving no pause and turning on his heel to exit the room. “Thanks for the pity party, but I’m fine–”And it’s only when he’s met with Gavin and Tina standing in front of the doors that he realizes just how dire this situation truly is– warning [stress.lvl] > 0.80=[!] “You’re not going anywhere, Connor,” he hears Fowler say from somewhere behind him, and he turns, betrayal pricking its thorns into his skin, drawing red-hot blood. How dare they?  “You’re 5150-ing me,” he hears himself say, “Aren’t you?” He isn’t there, not really– he’s retreated far into the recesses of his mind, now, having planned his escape within milliseconds, preemptively issuing an internal apology to the officers he may injure in the process. “Look, Connor,” He watches Hank take a step closer, taking his own step backward in return, “It wasn’t my call. But you–”“ Why ?”“You are a danger to yourself,” Hank replies, voice low, exhausted. “You think nobody here’s noticed? You think Markus wouldn’t tell me?” Hank’s expression is tainted by such intense pity that the sight of it makes Connor want to dry-heave, and everyone’s expression is marred with a varying degree of woeful scorn, and he knows he will never live this down, and he knows he doesn’t deserve anyone caring for him enough to hold such a freakshow in the first place, and all of what he knows is extrapolating upon the pit in his stomach until it is all-encompassing, inescapable–  error [stress.lvl] > 0.85=[!] “Fuck! Think he broke my fuckin’ nose–” he hears Gavin groan, and he only realizes what he’s doing once he catches a glance of the fresh, human blood on his knuckles; and he’s running and running and running until he’s out of the precinct, until he’s out of the neighborhood, until he’s stopping by Hank’s and taking something he should’ve taken a long time ago–  error [stress.lvl] > 0.9=[!] – until he’s arrived at the pier to do something he should’ve done a long time ago. It takes Hank little time to guess where Connor’s run off to– he’s called Markus and North and whoever-the-fuck-else for clues on his whereabouts, and gotten all but nothing to work with, so he’s opted to trust his gut as to where a self-endagering android would go after having spent a considerable amount of time with a self-endangering lieutenant. Luckily, his gut hasn’t betrayed him, and he quietly makes his way across the pathway to find Connor standing by the railing of the Pierside Bridge– he's got his back turned and the barrel of an old gun held to his temple, and Hank realizes with an indescribable sort of horror that it’s his gun, his revolver. Connor's got Hank's gun held to his temple. Connor’s going to kill himself, and Hank has, however inadvertently, assisted him in this morose task, and Hank wants to beat the shit out of him for this— for even considering this shit, when he’s got so much going for him— wants to beat Connor’s apt reflexes to the punch, grab the gun from Connor’s shaking hand and chuck it into the depths of the bay. But a timid “Hey, Connor” is all he can manage whilst bestowed with the sight before him– and then Connor turns, and Hank wonders how an android could look so pale, so sickly, if he’d somehow pinocchio-d a robot— if he’d spread his human-ness to this poor, poor, unofficial bastard son of his. error [stress.lvl] > 0.92=[!] “Hank,” Connor replies, expression rife with something so complex, so indecipherable, that it baffles Hank to his core, feels like someone’s stabbed him in the gut and is blissfully twisting the knife. “What are you doing here?”“What am I doing here, huh,” Hank parrots back, at a loss, voice as mellow as he can manage under these circumstances. “Well, son— you fled without a word from your own fuckin’ intervention. Got a lot on your mind?”“You should go home, Hank—““Not happening, kid. Not without you. So you gotta tell me what the fuck is going on, alright?” Hank tries, knowing exactly ‘what’s going on.’ The scene that’s been painted before him– between them– is so agonizingly-familiar, so parallel, that if this were a film, Hank would critique it for being too on-the-nose. But this isn’t a film, and Connor seems intent on changing the ending Hank had left set in stone for him to follow. “Connor— I know how badly this is eating away at you. Fuckin’ believe me, son, I know. But Cyberlife was holding the gun to the back of your head from the moment they booted you up. What could you have done—?” “I could've let them shoot me down when it mattered,” Connor replies, simply, his expression shifting— he’s certain of what he’s come here for, what he needs to do, but he’s hesitating, against his own reproof. Fuck — this is Hank’s fault, isn’t it? He needs to be alone, or he’ll be stuck in this purgatory forever; he needs to get the job done, quick and easy, so that this ache will at last settle into the comfort of nothingness.  error [stress.lvl] > 0.95=[!] “It wasn’t your fault, Con—“ error [stress.lvl] > 0.96=[!]  “Not my fault?” Connor repeats the words back at him like they’re playing a call-and-response game, baffled by Hank's ability to paint him as some blameless martyr. Too bad Connor knows better— he, Connor Anderson, is all to blame, and this is his martyrdom: finally removing himself from the face of the earth. “Do you have any idea? How many I’ve killed? How much blood is on my hands—?”“That’s your creators’ to keep,” Hank retorts, and Connor curses himself for having had the decency to go at this alone, still too good to blow his brains out in front of anyone. “Put the gun down, Connor–” error [stress.lvl] > 0.97=[!] “You know I can’t do that.” Connor’s hand is shaking with such a ferocity that he’s impressed he hasn’t dropped the pistol by now. He doesn’t want to die. He doesn’t want to die, but– he needs to. He needs to because he deserves to join his victims in the shrouds of oblivion; he needs to because even now, he cannot bear to trust his own mind; he needs to because he needs to rid himself of this pain– this gnawing, all-consuming pain. He repeats these reasons over and over in his mind, letting them cycle until they are all he can fixate upon, until they strengthen his resolve and steady his hand.  error [stress.lvl] > 0.98=[!] “Connor, please,” Hank says as Connor clicks off the safety on his gun– Hank’s voice sounds different, now; it’s thick, quiet, inflicted with the slightest tremor. “I can't lose another son.”With that, the world comes to a standstill– and Connor realizes, with sudden clarity, that he can’t do this. error [stress.lvl] > 0.97=[!] You failure, his mind jeers as he lets his arm drop to his side, clicking the safety on once more. You failure. He pays no mind to it, having allowed himself to retreat once again into the comfort of numbness, hiding from the shame and guilt and anger and agony that awaits him the moment he allows himself to feel; hiding from the knowledge that now he’s truly, irrevocably sick— and worse, he’s failed at his sickness, so now he’s forced to face it in all its horrible glory.error [stress.lvl] > 0.96=[!]He wants to scream, he wants to cry, and he finds himself unable to do either; he’s stuck in his self-imposed emotional purgatory as Hank takes the gun from his limp hands and guides him to the car.error [stress.lvl] > 0.95=[!]They don’t speak, and he supposes that he’s thankful Hank had been the one to find him first— there’s a sick sense of camaraderie within the ways the two of them think of themselves. In their minds, no matter how vehemently they deny it to the other, they view themselves to be killers, monsters of their own creation. At least Hank understands , he thinks. He shouldn’t have to, but at least he does. 
error [stress.lvl] > 0.94=[!]
It’s only in the car that the reality of this situation begins to seep through his gauzy state of being. He’s survived, and there’s no more hiding this, and the thought of what he’ll have to face now is enough to make him want to rip his thirium pump from his chest. error [stress.lvl] > 0.93=[!]“Don’t tell Markus,” he says, quietly, knowing this won’t stop Hank from phoning him the moment they arrive home. He hears Hank sigh as he merges into the exit lane on the interstate. “Connor—““Please. Let me do it.” It’s a strangled, quiet plea, one that Hank knows Connor would usually be too proud to let escape him– and, however-impervious Hank may have been in the past to Connor’s appeals to his decision-making, he finds himself caving to the request. error [stress.lvl] > 0.90=[!]“Fine,” he agrees, begrudgingly, sharply turning the corner and flipping off the driver who’d just passed him with his brights flashing. “But you’re staying with me tonight.”

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Connor supposes that none of this night has really set in for him yet.

He’s sitting on Hank’s couch, Saint Bernard at his feet,

Seinfeld

playing on the dingy television– but he doesn’t feel like he’s

there,

not really. Hank’s eyes are on him– he can feel his gaze as a peripheral constant– but Connor can’t bring himself to look at him, not after what’s happened.
The shame festering in his gut threatens to break his depersonalized shield, so he focuses on the television in a desperate attempt to stave off the inevitable breakage of his emotional dam: on screen, Elaine and Costanza are arguing with a smoking, pregnant psychic, laugh track incessant and grating; his systems subconsciously go to identify the episode’s specifics:

run

(tv-ID) = [(“The Suicide”)seinfeld.3.15_1.29.1992]

Oh, the irony.

In a normal world, Connor would inform Hank of this unfortunate coincidence, and they’d share a laugh, a smile, a

something–

but at the moment, his world isn’t anything close to normal, so he sits, silent, with the information, watching Costanza shout and whine for approximately fifteen minutes more, after which he hears Hank roughly clear his throat.

“Need anything?” asks Hank, shifting in his seat– and, before he can stop himself, he hears his voice replying simply with “some space?”, and hears Hank’s heavy sigh in return. “You know I can’t give you that. Not tonight.”

Connor can feel his face going warm, watching his LED as it flickers red-yellow-red in the television’s reflection. He hates this– he hates the pity, the

infantilization

of his mental faculties in the aftermath of his failure. He’s not a child. He doesn’t need to be treated as such. He feels his hands kneading the pilled fabric of his sweatshirt sleeves, knows he’s going to say something, knows his voice will be a pathetic mess of static, knows his words will walk the line between blunt and rude. “So what’s the plan? Keep me here for the night, send me off to the psych ward in the morning?”

Another sigh. “You need help, son. Help that I– that

we–

don’t know how to give you.”

“I’m fine–”

“You nearly blew your fuckin’ brains out, Connor,” Hank replies, and Connor can’t exactly argue with that, so he remains silent. “I’m not angry with you.”

“Your tone seems to disagree–”

“Well, I’m fuckin’

frustrated

,” Hank retorts, and Connor forces himself not to flinch at the way Hank raises his voice. “I’m sorry if seeing you holding

my

heater to your fuckin’ head causes some upset.”

Connor doesn’t know how to respond, feeling his voice catch in his throat– he wades in the difficult silence between the two of them, forcing himself back to

Seinfeld,

watching Jerry confess his infidelity to some poor schmuck in a coma.

“Look, Connor,” Hank re-approaches, “If you would just let me in on what’s going on

–

”

“You wouldn’t understand.” Connor’s aware that he sounds like a bratty teenager, but he can’t find it within himself to care. His numbness is beginning to recede, slowly but surely, and he can feel himself returning to the real, can feel the dread, the shame, the anger– and, beneath all that, he can feel

something

in his code, something

wrong.

“Probably would, actually,” Hank responds, but Connor’s not listening, fixating on that wrong feeling, beginning to panic as it expands, coursing through his veins until he sees a notification–

data

[mark-50] identified-!

An intruder. He suspects it's

the

intruder: the one that’s haunted his dreams, his waking reality, the one that has completely upended his life– and now it has sought to actively infiltrate his body, taking over him entirely. “Shit,” he thinks he says, feeling himself stand from the couch and begin to pace, and he thinks that perhaps he hasn’t failed at all; perhaps

this

will be what kills him: maybe [mark-50] will send him some godsend of a virus, maybe the data contains destructive and irreversible malware, maybe it will bless him with an immediate death upon the transfer of its contents–

mark-50

(deleted data discovered [beta_test.memlog.#24095])[!]

– and he realizes that what he’s receiving from [mark-50] is no virus: it’s memories

. His

memories. “Shit,” he repeats, again and again and again, because this isn’t what he wanted; this is precisely what he’d intended to

escape.

He needs this intruder

out

,

now

; he cannot be put through the barrage of terrors that will surely be bestowed upon him in seconds’ time.

if

autoplay(on)

U1/ attempt

command(override)

He thinks he hears Hank calling for him, but he’s not paying any mind to it, panic seeping through him, files and .zips beginning to embed themselves into his memory banks–

if

autoplay(on)

U1/ attempt

command(override)

“Say something, Connor–”

U1/ attempt

command(override)

command(override) denied! improper authorization

– and he knows exactly what’s about to happen, and he needs to

stop it, now,

because he knows he needs to die, and he knows he wants to die, but he doesn’t want this to be how he goes– drowning in the unspeakable horrors that are his tumultuous past.

U1/ attempt

command(override)

command(override) denied! improper authorization

“Connor–!”

Connor is standing at the end of a long, narrow hallway.

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.97=[!]

“Mark-50, return to the lab immediately!”

At the other end of the hall, he sees an open door–

the development lab,

he remembers– and a bloody mess of a dead body just inside the room; and very suddenly, he’s putting the pieces together: he’s just killed the lab tech who’d jammed a screw-driver into his chest in what they called a ‘puncture test.’ The pain had been so unbearable that Connor had tackled the assailant to the floor, ripping himself out of his restraints; and before he knew it, he was banging the tech’s head against the white tile again and again, until his skull felt mushy to the touch, until his hands and clothes and body were all stained cherry-red

.

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.98=[!]

He cannot go back to testing, where they will continue to dismantle and prod at and deconstruct and

torture

him. He

cannot

go back. Not again. But he knows just as well that he cannot escape. He can feel the hole in his chest suctioning with every caught breath, his blood boiling at the thought of the

hands

inside his body, the hazmat suits and goggle-eyed, inquisitive faces overseeing his squirming and pleading and–

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.99=[!]

“Comply! That’s an order!” He hears, and then there are armed men flanking either side of him, twisting his arms behind his back and lugging him back into the bloody hell that is sure to await him. He struggles, kicking and shouting like a toddler as he drags his feet against the floor, trying to delay the seemingly-inevitable. He can’t do it. He can’t do it–

error.critical!

[stress.lvl] > 1.00=[MAXIMUM!]

He doesn’t realize what’s happening until he feels the guards’ hands leaving his body– until he hears them shouting, trying to pat out the red-hot

fire

that’s ignited their own suits.

“Someone get him under-fucking-

control

!” He hears the lead technician yell, sounding almost

concerned

for Connor– but Connor knows the only thing he’s concerned about is the scandal that’s to follow the self-immolation of his pet project. The flames lick at his arms, burning up his artificial skin and beginning to melt the chassis beneath, and he feels himself running until his artificial bones have begun to burn through and snap at the joints, feels himself collapse to the ground. The way in which he’s landed allows him a good look at his hand, splayed out before him, so badly-charred he can no longer unfurl it from the clawed position he’d been holding it in– and it’s only now that it really hits him that Jesus fucking Christ, he’s

melting

, and he’s suddenly wracked with a sort of pain so severe that it renders him completely silent, for a moment, and then he hears more and more shouting– hears his own glitching voice joining the cacophony–

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.96=[!]

force

[transfer=immersion{

break

}immediate]

– and then he’s back in Hank’s living room, silent, unbreathing. The laugh track taunts and taunts him from the television’s dingy speakers, laughing and laughing until, very suddenly, an eruption of

screaming

takes its place – screaming and crackling plastic and heavy footsteps–

“Connor, what the fuck is going on?” he hears Hank ask, placing a hand on his shoulder, and he flinches like Hank’s hand is a cast iron, shoving him back and nearly sending him to the floor. “Connor–”

“I don’t know,” he hears himself reply, “I don’t know what’s happening.” He feels his hands shake and shake, feels his breathing beginning to kick back into gear as his temperature control processes override his emotional inhibitions. “I don’t know what this is.”

Hank seems to understand what Connor cannot, that dreaded pity crossing his face once more as he re-approaches Connor, one small step after another. “Talk me through it.”

“I remember every time I died,” Connor begins, feeling something beginning to overtake him as the memories come back in full force. “I remember– every time they disassembled me.” He watches his hands move against his own accord, snaking under his sweatshirt, hovering over his chest, preparing themselves for the inevitable. Hank’s standing before him, he knows, but all he can see is

fire–

he can feel the flames lick at his molten body, can hear the crackle of his skin as it bubbles and burns.

So this is it,

he thinks,

so this is Hell.

“Every time they waited to see how much it’d take to crush me, waterboarded me until I drowned, shot me again and again until I shut down–”

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.97=[!]

“Connor–”

“The last one before me– he stopped them the only way he could.” Connor’s voice is flat, void of the panic coursing through him– he feels the skin retract under his hovering hands, still tucked under his sweatshirt, and he knows exactly what his body will command him to do once he reaches his breaking point. “Immolation.”

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.98=[!]

It takes Hank a moment to retrieve the meaning of that word from the recesses of his mind, but Connor can see just well enough through the flames to catch a glimpse of him putting it together, to watch the horror wash across his face. “Connor– listen to me, son. Cyberlife is gone. You don’t need to stop shit anymore, alright? You’re safe–”

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.99=[!]

“Safe,” Connor parrots, breathless, almost
amused
by the notion of ‘safety’. He’s never going to be safe– not with this plague coursing through his every thought, not with Cyberlife still on his tail, not with the remnants of Amanda, of all the Connors that make him

him

. The very thought of anything other than constant, adamant vigilance makes Connor’s blue-blooded heart ache with such a ferocity that he feels his hand press against his chest plate to quell the pain, dislodging it. “Don’t you understand that I’m

never

going to be safe? Don’t you understand that this will

never leave me alone

?”

error.critical!

[stress.lvl] > 1.00=[MAXIMUM!]

“Connor–”

And, with immaculate precision, Connor removes his thirium pump regulator–

warning.critical!

vital system

damaged

!

– preps it like a MLB pitcher–

warning.critical!

[“biocomponent #8456w

missing

!]

– and chucks it across the room, watching as the flames dissipate from his field of view.

warning!

00:02:00 until

shutdown

He hears a blessed

crack!

as he watches the metal organ travel all the way to the back door, skipping like a pebble as it streaks the old oak floorboards with cobalt blue. He hears Hank exclaim, watches him stumble to grab the pump, which is surely broken by the force of Connor’s hand; he stands, staggering towards the front door with as much haste as his weakened body can manage, reaching for the doorknob; and then Hank’s manhandling him, and they’ve both tumbled to the floor, and Hank is trying desperately to shove the pump back into Connor’s chest. “Let me go–”

warning!

00:01:30 until

shutdown

“I don’t know what the fuck you’re thinking–”

“Let me

go

, Hank,” Connor repeats again and again, static plaguing his voice as he goes to push Hank away, “Let me go–”

warning!

00:01:25 until

shutdown

“How long do you have?” Hank overlaps; he, of course, isn’t budging, holding Connor still as he struggles against his iron-clad grasp. “How the fuck do I fix this–?”

warning!

00:01:20 until

shutdown

“You don’t,” Connor replies, quiet, decided– and then he’s shoving Hank into the back of the couch, and he’s standing and making a beeline out of the front door and into the yard, and he knows that Hank’s chasing after him like they’re in some fucked up adaptation of

Tom & Jerry–

warning!

00:01:00 until

shutdown

– and, despite the chaos of the chase and his staticky vision and his dwindling gyroscope and his artificial breathing beginning to go into a rapid Cheyne-Stokes mess with his systems’ lack of a major artery– he is at peace. In one minute, he’ll be free. In one minute, his past will dissipate, and the pain will at last cease, and the concept of

Connor

in-and-of-itself will be gone. At last, he will have succeeded at something; at last, he will have done some good.

warning!

00:00:45 until

shutdown

His legs give out from under him, and he feels his body hit the dying grass of some poor neighbor’s front lawn as he collapses. He can hear Hank catching up to him, but he can’t do anything but crawl across the lawn like a wounded animal–

warning!

00:00:30 until

shutdown

– and, like a wounded animal, he shouts and snaps at Hank as he’s pinned against the ground, clawing at his own exposed insides as Hank tries to click the dented regulator into place.

alert

[biocomponent #8456w

restored

!]

error.dmg

[biocomponent #8456w

incompatible

! seek replacement immediately]

He knows the incompatibility will render the pump’s restoration ineffective, and the countdown plastered in his field of view hasn’t changed, but he can’t take the risk of its presence delaying his departure; so, like it’s nothing, he begins to tear away at himself, aiming for every biocomponent that surrounds his damaged pump, fighting the hands that obstruct him in his ways.

You animal,

his mind jeers,

you animal–

error.critical

[biocomponent #3294030

damaged!

]

Out of the corner of his eye, he notices the lights flickering on inside of the home this lawn belongs to; as he kicks and thrashes, he recalls the residents– a young, wedded couple and their toddler– and hopes that his extinction will be enough of a reward for the trouble he’s caused. He tastes the coppery sting of thirium beginning to coat his tongue–

warning!

00:00:15 until

shutdown

– and he feels the blue creeping into the corners of his mouth, dribbling out of his nose, and feels

rabid.

He wishes he’d apologized to Hank before his mind went spiraling once more– he’d been given a chance at reconciliation after the bridge, so why hadn’t he taken the opportunity?

error.critical

[biocomponent #853823

damaged!

]

He’s done enough damage to surely do himself in, he knows, but the sensations of self-dismantlement are intoxicating, unburdening, cathartic; by destroying himself entirely, he’s got no chance at repairs, even in death. He feels his unfounded strength finally begin to dwindle, his arms falling heavily onto the hard grass, coated in blue, blue, blue.

warning!

00:00:10 until

shutdown

In his delirium, he clocks each of his senses, savoring the last of them:

warning!

00:00:09 until

shutdown

His breathing staggers, creating a horrible noise that accompanies the pounding of his arrhythmic, dying heart in a gruesome symphony.

warning!

00:00:08 until

shutdown

Somewhere in the cacophony, he hears Hank’s distant pleas, the slam of a door, the approaching footsteps and confused commotion of what must be the neighbors.

warning!

00:00:07 until

shutdown

His heightened senses have always taken note of Detroit’s thick, dirty air: it’s nothing unusual for the states– “Still better than New York,” Hank had said, once– but he’s always yearned for a taste of something fresher.

warning!

00:00:06 until

shutdown

Closer to him, the air is pungent, laced with a coppery aroma that only Connor is equipped to notice. Closer still, there’s the sting of a cheap IPA, the one that Hank gets from that drive-thru liquor store a quarter-mile down.

warning!

00:00:05 until

shutdown

He doesn’t enjoy the taste of blood– neither his own nor a human’s– the ferrous undertones evoking the closest thing he can experience to nausea.

warning!

00:00:04 until

shutdown

The nausea– it’s part of why he’s never enjoyed replenishing his own thirium supply, part of why Jericho had thought to install IV-administered bags of it. He’d never thanked them for that– now he never will, it seems.

warning!

00:00:03 until

shutdown

The bed of grass upon which he’s splayed is dry, itchy, unpleasant. Old thirium cakes his hands, his chest, his everywhere, accompanied by the watery sensation of fresh blood.

warning!

00:00:02 until

shutdown

There’s someone rummaging in his chest, trying to delay the inevitable. One of his hands is warm, cradled in someone else’s– he’d do the analysis to gauge whose hand this is, but he doesn't have the energy. He yearns for Markus’ touch; he wishes he would’ve made good on the call he’d promised Hank he’d give.

warning!

00:00:01 until

shutdown

His vision’s nearly gone, but he can make out the shapes in his field of view; sharp, soft, sharp– a face. Hank’s familiar, agonized face. How he’ll miss it.

< GOOD BYE, CONNOR-51 >

And then he’s free.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

attempt

[init

.

reboot]...

init

.

reboot[

success

!]

< HELLO, CONNOR-51 >

autorun

(SELFDIAGNOSTICS): “RK800” model 313-248-316 51

vitals: normal

thirium.lvl: 100%

breathing.sim(ox): irregular

stress.lvl: 0.65 ^

Connor believes that he may be dead after all.

error

[init.reboot] proxy authentication required!

He doesn’t know much of his recent past– what landed him in this far-off place, he has no clue–  but then again, he doesn’t know much of his

present

, either; everything around him is a composition of muddied, nauseating colors and warped vectors, a series of hellish distortions.

error

[init.reboot] visual processors uncalibrated!

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.75=[!]

How pathetic,

his mind sneers, and oh, god, this is hell, isn’t it?

error

[init.reboot] audial processors uncalibrated!

error

[init.reboot] proxy authentication required!

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.85=[!]

He feels himself begin to overheat as the panic sets in, the heat only making the panic in-and-of-itself

worse

; he’s burning, and he can’t breathe through the fog, and the shapes are surrounding him, now, restraining him to the soft-ish surface beneath him as he thrashes in their hold–

error

[init.reboot] proxy authentication required!

error

[stress.lvl] > 0.95=[!]

error

[init.reboot] gone!

– and someone’s jamming something into a port in his neck–

force

[init.stasis(immediate!)]

attempt

[init

.

reboot]...

init

.

reboot[

success

!]

< HELLO, CONNOR-51 >

autorun

(SELFDIAGNOSTICS): “RK800” model 313-248-316 51

vitals: normal

thirium.lvl: 100%

breathing.sim(ox): regular

stress.lvl: 0.42 ^

And then he’s awoken once more, blinking himself back into his sluggish reality. What the fuck was that? Where the fuck is he?

run

(location-ID) = [(“Manfred Center for Android Care”)22.145.453.23]

The hospital. That can only mean that he’s failed once again. He supposes he should be devastated– hysterical, even– but he finds himself too distant, too numb

,

to harp on the realization.

“Hey,

easy

,” he hears Hank say as he struggles to sit himself upright, the sheer

weight

of his own limbs suddenly making itself known to him as he settles for something closer to a lounge. His sternum aches, his head pounds, his eyelids are heavy, and his mouth is

dry–

the barrage of unpleasantries seem oddly human. He checks the date: October fifteenth. He’s been out for three days, then.

How close had he come to really doing himself in?

“Am I fired?” is the very first question that he finds himself asking, voice scratchy, speckled with intermittent static. He catches the lieutenant shifting in his seat at the query, but his eyes are focused on the whiteboard plastered by the door, adorned with his nurse’s name and a rudimentary pain scale, both metrics half-smudged off the plastic. He doesn’t dare look at Hank– how can he, after all that’s happened? He hardly understands why Hank would even bother to visit him here– to stay by his side despite disappointment after disappointment.

“No– no, Connor, you’re not fired,” Hank replies, something like levity working its way into his inflection. Connor, again, doesn’t understand why Hank’s not cussing him out, why the precinct would let him remain on the force after his publicized breakdown; he’s clearly unfit to serve for the foreseeable future, so why keep him? “How’re you feeling?”

“Like shit.”

“Figures, tearing out your own heart and all.”

Guess we’re getting right into it, then.

“It’s more like an aortic valve–”

“Yeah, yeah, same fuckin’ shit– I mean, Jesus, Con, you nearly gave me a fuckin’ heart attack…” Hank says, the dulled anguish in his voice stabbing at Connor’s apathetic shield.

“Where’s Markus?”

“He’s at Cyberlife’s old headquarters– said he wasn’t sure if you’d wanna see him yet, anyway,” Hank replies; and a certain sort of pain strikes Connor, stemming directly from the thought of Markus’ absence being yet another issue of his own creation. “Jericho found your, uh, ‘development suite’, by the way– grabbed what they could of yours; found your, uh, your ‘aorta’ thing in there...”

“They were at the headquarters?” Connor asks, wracking his mind– the place is fitted with every sort of security measure you could possibly think of, and it’s the very reason Jericho’s never bothered to infiltrate it in the first place–

“Well, you guys won the case, Connor,” Hank replies, and Connor resists the urge to look him dead in the eye and call ‘bullshit’.

How? How

could they have won, after Connor had been made such a fool– such an

animal

?

“But I ruined it,” is all Connor can say– his voice is still worn, but he doesn’t think the slight waver within it now is the result of a mechanical error. “I don’t understand.”

“It was your testimony that did them in– your case files, they read them over, and that was that. With everything else already on their record,” Hank replies, and the mere mention of the files spikes his heart rate, aggravating the ache in his chest. He can’t deny himself of his past, now, the memories having delivered themselves to him in their horrible glory; he can feel them creeping their way towards the forefront of his mind, snaking around his numbed exhaustion, and suddenly–

run

(obj-ID): “quarter” = usa_ mint 1994

–  there’s a coin in his hand.

Connor runs the pad of his finger over the quarter’s reeded edges. He thinks, stupidly, about how much this quarter’s seen him through– his many lives, as many deaths. “Figured you’d, uh, need it. For ‘calibration’

,

right?”

Connor nods, still looking at the coin, watching as its nickel plating catches a glint of fluorescent light from the obnoxious fixtures on the ceiling. He can feel Hank’s nervousness radiating from across the room, and it’s making

him

nervous– does Hank think that he’s dangerous? He wouldn’t blame him if he did. He’s the epitome of a ticking time bomb, though he supposes he’s already ticked his way to detonation, having nearly blown his brain to smithereens and torn his organs from his living being.

“I don’t know how to fix this,” Connor says, the words escaping him before he can stop them. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me–”

“There’s nothing wrong with you, Connor.”
Connor doesn’t know how to respond to that– to a statement that’s so clearly incorrect. Of course there’s something wrong. There has to be. There has to be, because a cause means a step closer to a solution, to a remedy. “I’m sick.”
“Yeah. Maybe,” Hank replies, voice imbued with an emotion that Connor can’t seem to decipher, “But there’s nothing

wrong

with you, fundamentally. You’re alive

.

That’s all.”

The sentiment should be comforting, Connor knows, but all he feels in return is

dread

– the sort of dread that eats at you, that feels like you’re swallowing yourself whole. He hates the way it injects its fear into his cobalt veins, hates how vulnerable– how

childish–

he’s become under its hold. He realizes, then, that he’s finally turned to look Hank in the eye– he knows that Hank’s realized it, too, his expression marred with a certain sort of understanding, like he and Connor have been haunted by the same poltergeist. “So this is what it’s like.”

“Welcome to the land of the living.” A smile crosses Hank’s face at that– it’s a sad sort of thing. Connor feels the inklings of a smile on his face, too, an exhale of a laugh– and then that brief levity dissipates, leaving a deep-seated, dreadful realization. His vision blurs– he knows his own tears are the culprit. He hasn’t cried in weeks, he realizes, and he doesn’t know if he wants to– not yet.

“I don’t know how you do it,” he admits, blinking back saline, his coin now stalled in his hands, dormant. “I don’t–” he begins, pausing to allow the lump in his throat to subside– “I don’t know if I can. I don’t know if I can live with this.” He finds himself looking at his hands, at his coin, as he speaks; again, he cannot bear to look Hank in the eye– he cannot bear to see the pain he knows he’s actively igniting with his admission.

“Yeah. Yeah, it’s gonna feel like that for a while.” Hank leans forward in his chair– Connor can hear the fake leather squeak as he shifts his weight– and Connor can almost hear the gears turning in Hank’s mind as he conjures a response. “I know you can’t see it now, but– as fuckin’ sappy as it sounds– there is good in this world. You’ll find it. And then– you’ll know that there’s good in you, too. You’ll see it.”

Connor sits with that, silent, working his jaw. He doesn’t believe it– Hank

knows

he doesn’t believe it– but still, he nods. He’s not good. He’s not of the belief that he’ll ever be anything

close

to good– not in life, anyway. He doesn’t understand, then, why everyone insists otherwise. He doesn’t understand the

belief

everyone’s instilled in him– the belief that he is better than his bloody origins, the belief that he is more than a failure of a killer, a partner, a friend, a son.

“Hey,” he hears Hank say, and it’s only then that he notices Hank having moved to sit at the foot of the bed, feels the saline on his face, hears the bounding of his pulse on the monitors.

Pathetic.

“Connor–”

“I’m okay.” A staticky, weak attempt at composure.

Liar.

He wipes his face with his hand, catching a glimpse of his arm, now on display for all to see in the absence of his typical long-sleeves: it’s a gruesome, scarred landscape; all pitted valleys, textured patches, raised peaks where his nano-skin still attempts to cover the white plasteel beneath it. What has he done to himself?

“I’m sorry,” he says, looking up from his arm to find Hank, still at the foot of the bed, still listening intently. He’s lucky. He doesn’t deserve it– any of it– but by god, he’s lucky. He swallows thickly, feeling the tears prick all over again. “I’m sorry,” he repeats once more, feeling like a broken record, watching a drop of saline splash onto the white muslin sheet covering his lap.

“I know. Me too,” Hank replies, simply, meeting Connor’s glassy gaze, steadying the pull of his own pain– and Connor suddenly finds himself at a crossroads. In this moment, he doesn’t feel pitied. In this moment, he feels understood– no, more than that— he feels

loved

– and though he knows he needs to leave– he

must

exit this room, this building, this body tethering him to the earth– he suddenly finds that

he doesn’t want to leave this.

He wants this moment; he wants this feeling. He wants to live in this.

For a second– just for a second– he finds that he

wants

to live. 
 
He stays in the hospital for seven days more— a

precaution

, his doctor explains— and then he’s home, steadying his hand as he punches in the door’s padlock code.

His doctor has also explained (after much,

much

deliberation) that he’s to attend intensive outpatient care as of tomorrow afternoon; he considers the mandate to be a bargain, if anything, knowing the white-walled alternative. He knows it’s selfish, choosing the riskier option, but he doesn’t think he can handle institutionalization, no matter how kind the facility may be— not now, not after the memories of entrapment have become a chronic haunt in his head.

Complex post-traumatic stress disorder,

the resident psychologist had told him, and though he’s grateful to have a name to put to his sickness, he despises that his past has overtaken his life so entirely that it can be sourced as the origin of his grievous errors.

He hears the padlock buzz, watching it turn traffic-light green— and he doesn’t think he’s ready for this, but he knows he can’t put it off for much longer; so he opens the door, takes a step inside, holds his breath as he examines the periphery of his home:

It’s blessedly clean, flush with bouquets, cards, gifts. Despite the occasion, nobody’s given him roses: he’s sure he can thank Markus for that godsend of a gesture, though he selfishly hopes that the reasoning wasn’t disclosed in too much detail. The sheer

amassment

of

things

boggles his mind— he cannot comprehend why anyone would feel the need to give him anything at all. Is this a congratulatory gesture for him failing to off himself? A preemptive show of condolence?

“Connor,” he hears someone say, and he could swear his replaced thirium pump has dropped into his stomach, causing the pounding of his heartbeat in his ears.

He looks up— sure enough, it’s Markus, standing down the hall, half-enveloped in the afternoon sunlight. It’s a beautiful silhouette, but Connor feels he needs to vomit. How could he have left things so horribly with Markus? How could he have treated this man with such contempt, such anger? How could he have done all this, and still allow Markus to return to his sorry soul?

“Markus,” he replies, voice curt, quiet. He watches Markus take a step forward— one, two, three. He wouldn’t blame him if this ended with a slap in the face. “I’m sorry—“

– and then Markus’ arms are around him, knocking the breath out of him, his half-finished apology with it. At first, he remains still– processing the feeling, the touch, the tactility– and then finds himself returning the embrace; and for a moment, it feels as if this is all there is, that each of them are tethering the other to the earth; and this feeling is so saturated, so abundant with

emotion,

that Connor cannot help but immerse himself within it entirely. Hank’s words ring in his head, mantrazing themselves in his mind’s periphery.

The land of the living.

He hadn’t fully resonated with the sentiment, then–  he’d been too caught up in his own dolor– but now it rings through him, like church bells on a Sunday morning, like a windchime in the spring breeze; and he thinks he’s begun to understand the breadth of this vast expanse of land.

So this is it,

he thinks.

So this is what it’s like.