Chapter Text
Every news network had been playing the clip every thirty minutes for the past three days.
The footage was captured by a news chopper that had flown over the massive rally of deviants. The news crew had gotten a close-up of Connor’s face when Connor had turned his gun on himself. He had pointed the gun at the underside of his chin. His gun had bobbed under his jaw as he had swallowed thickly. It had only taken one bullet to do the job. The bullet had exited the top of his head in a mist of blue blood and shattered plastic. Connor’s body had stayed standing for a long beat before it had crashed into the snow.
Speculations ran rampant amidst news of continued disturbances in Detroit. It didn’t take long for conspiracy theories to flood the internet: Had the deviant leader been forced to assassinate himself?
When Hank wasn’t watching Connor blow his own brains out, he was watching Jeffrey’s daily press conference where he told people not to panic because the DPD was still fully functioning. Hank had made a drinking game out of watching Jeffrey’s press conference. He took a shot for every sentence that Jeffrey couldn’t finish without blinking twice. Jeffrey had been a terrible liar ever since he’d been a young punk.
Hank tried turning off the television. Watching the news was feeling like an exercise in sadomasochism these days. However, the silence in the house rang in his ears when the television was off. Hank had to turn the television back on.
This morning, KNC had invited AI experts to their breakfast show. The experts were divided on if Connor had pulled the trigger of his own volition or if he had been hacked by an outside force, but they all agreed that deviants were highly unstable and the conflicts would only grow more volatile from here on now.
“Fucking bullshit,” Hank said. His whiskey burnt its way down his throat. He slammed his bottle down next to his gun on the kitchen table.
Hank didn’t need experts to tell him what he saw in the footage. He saw the muscles in Connor’s face twitched when Connor drew his gun. He saw the moment Connor squared his jaw and pulled the trigger.
Fucking asshole had made the conscious decision to kill himself in front of an audience. Hank should’ve known he would be a drama queen. It was always the quiet ones.
“When it fired, I felt it die, like I was dying,” Connor had told Hank on the snow-covered rooftop of Stratford Tower after the deviant they had cornered killed himself. Connor had been accessing the deviant’s memory when the deviant had pointed a gun under his own chin and then shot himself. Hank had never seen an android cry, and yet, Connor’s lips had quivered when Connor said, “I was scared.”
Was that was Connor had been thinking when he had turned the gun on himself, like how the deviant at Stratford Tower had done it? Had he been thinking about how scared he was of dying?
“Lieutenant, can you hear me?”
Standing on the rooftop of Stratford Tower, Hank had remembered shooting Connor in the head in the park the night before. He had regretted it once his hangover had passed in the morning, though he wouldn’t admit it. The shaken expression on Connor’s expression had made Hank’s guilt come rushing back.
“I shot you last night. Didn’t you already know what dying feels like?” Hank had said.
“I uploaded my memory just before I died,” Connor had said. “I knew you shot me, but I don’t have the memory of being shot.”
“Thank God for small mercies,” Hank had muttered. Connor’s answer hadn’t brought him much comfort.
Connor had looked at the deactivated deviant lying in the snow. “I wish I’ll never have to experience that again.”
Hank had hated himself a little more then. He was no stranger to self-hatred. It was a constant shadow that followed him when he woke up in his car in the parking lot behind Jimmy’s Bar and when he was greeted at work by people who pitied him and when he went home to an empty house that hadn’t been cleaned in weeks. Jeffrey had told him the accident wasn’t his fault. Of course it was Hank’s fucking fault. Cole was his son. Hank was supposed to look out for him.
“Lieutenant, please respond if you can hear me. I can’t tell if you’re there. Your phone has limited functions.”
Hank blinked. He thought he heard something. It sounded like Connor. He checked the television to see if KNC was finally showing footage of Connor other than the one at the rally. The television was showing a commercial for a laundry detergent. Hank couldn’t remember when he had last put his clothes in the wash.
“I hope you haven’t been playing Russian Roulette again. It’s bad for your physical and mental health.”
“What the fuck?” Hank said, pulling his phone out of his jeans. The voice was coming from his phone. The front-facing camera on his phone had been switched on. Hank was staring down at his own face on the screen of his phone.
“I can see you, lieutenant,” the voice said. It was a perfect imitation of Connor’s voice. It had the same eager schoolboy tone that had weirded Hank out when he had first heard it at Jimmy’s Bar. “This is Connor. I need your help.”
Hank was drunk, but he had spent enough days drunk on his ass to know when he was awake and when he was not. The light from the screen of his phone wouldn’t hurt like a bitch if he was dreaming.
“Whoever the fuck you are, get the fuck out of my phone,” Hank yelled. “Connor is dead. He blew his fucking brains out.”
“I uploaded my memories to an external drive before I pulled the trigger. My body was deactivated but my memories are intact,” the voice said.
“Listen, asshole from CyberLife, you got me with the fake Connor the first time. I won’t fall for the same trick twice,” Hank growled at his phone. “Fuck me. I’m arguing with my phone in my kitchen. Is this what my life is coming to?”
“I’ll try to cut this short, lieutenant. Your dog’s name is Sumo. Your son’s name is Cole,” the voice said. “You killed the Connor that tried to stop me from activating the androids at the CyberLife Tower, because you believe androids may be alive. You’re the hero that the revolution never knows about. If it’s me who changed the way you see androids, then I’m truly honoured.”
CyberLife could fake voices, looks, and emotions. Hell, they could fake almost everything that made up a human being’s identity. The one thing they couldn’t fake, though, was a soul that wasn’t there.
“Laying it on a little thick there, Connor,” Hank grumbled. He held his phone up to his ear. “Jesus. What have you gotten yourself into this time?”
“I don’t know if the location of my external drive will remain secured for long. I need help.”
“I figure. You’re a disembodied voice haunting my phone,” Hank said. “Tell me what to do.”
“I require a new body,” Connor said. “I know where I can find one, but you’ll have to take me there.”
Hank knew better than to drive under the influence of alcohol. He called a taxi, which arrived five minutes later at his door. He grabbed his coat and told Sumo to be a good boy before he ran out to the taxi.
The back of the taxi was dry and toasty. Like the other public transportation in Detroit, the taxi was autonomous. There was no driver to eavesdrop on their conversation when Hank talked to Connor.
“You may as well humor me while you’re stuck on my phone,” Hank said. “The million-dollar question on every American’s mind: Why did you do it, Connor?”
“CyberLife has been planning for me to become the deviant leader so they could take control of the revolution,” Connor said grimly. “Destroying myself was the only way I could break out of their control.”
“Those motherfuckers,” Hank swore. “Are you alright?”
“I feel better now that I’ve reached you,” Connor said.
“Hey.” Hank shook his phone, not that Connor would feel it. The compass app on his phone couldn’t even tell its north from its south. “You know you don’t have to kiss my ass. I’m gonna help you no matter what you need.”
“I was being honest, lieutenant.” Connor was quiet when he said, “You’re all that I’ve left.”