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Hank grimaced, stepping around a large pile of shit to head toward the weathered barn. It wasn’t often that he and Connor had to go so far out of city limits for a case, but the responsible precinct had been swamped with cases and so here they were.
The owner of this farm had called in, reporting a suspicious figure lurking around her property. A lot of these calls usually ended up as nothing, but they still had to check them out. Connor trailed behind him, looking around as they approached the barn.
Hank did his own preliminary look, stopping just outside the doors. There were no footprints, the ground too dry. Nothing outside of the barn looked disrupted as far as Hank could tell. It was mostly just overgrown weeds that the property owner hadn’t bothered to cut back when mowing the grass.
“There are signs of forced entry,” Connor said, his voice low.
“Huh,” Hank looked back at his partner. Connor pointed to the slightly open barn door.
“The paint here is missing more than in other areas, and some of the wood around the lock is chipped,” he explained. To Hank, the door looked the same amount of worn-down as the rest of the building, but he trusted Connor’s judgment.
“You think they’re still here?” Hank asked, also keeping his voice low.
“It’s possible,” Connor nodded.
“Alright. Behind me then,” Hank said. Even though androids were now permitted to carry firearms and Connor could easily defend himself, it was habit. And Connor didn’t complain, stepping behind the lieutenant. Hank drew his gun, keeping it pointed low.
He pushed on the door. It opened with a creak and outside light pierced the relative darkness of the structure. There was one other window on the top level - a second floor that stretched a third of the way across the room - but with the current angle of the sun not much light was coming through there. Hank’s eyes darted around the barn. It appeared empty, but he still stepped forward with caution. He could hear Connor following in behind him, sticking close.
“Detroit police! Come out with your hands up!” he called out. There was no response aside from his own words echoing back at him. The lack of response alone didn’t necessarily mean someone wasn’t still here, but there wasn’t the sound of someone making a break for it either. Hank relaxed his posture a little but left his gun out.
“Notice anything?” he asked Connor. The android's eyebrows were furrowed, LED circling a slow yellow.
“No. Nothing at the moment,” he said, but pointed to a spot on the ground. There were footprints in the dust. They tracked from the door toward the center of the barn where they disappeared. They weren’t from him or Connor either. Someone had definitely come in recently, and unless they’d jumped out the second-story window, they were probably still here. Probably listening to everything they said. Connor was giving him a pointed look and Hank nodded his understanding.
“Well, we might as well take a quick look around. You take the left side and I’ll look over here,” he said, gesturing for Connor to follow him. Connor matched Hank’s steps perfectly, barely making a sound as he trailed behind him. They approached the right corner of the barn where several bales of hay were haphazardly stacked.
Hank could feel the adrenaline building up, his heart thumping in his ears as they crept around the stack. He adjusted his grip on his gun, raising it to chest level as they rounded the corner. In a single fluid motion, he stepped around the corner. But nothing was there except for a small pile of loose hay. Not nearly enough to conceal a person. Hank let out a quiet breath, allowing his gun to fall back to its lowered position.
He glanced back at Connor who was standing a few feet back, eyes roaming over the rest of the large area. Almost as if feeling Hank’s gaze, he looked back, then gestured towards the other side of the room. It didn’t seem like he’d seen anything exactly, but Hank couldn’t be sure through the silent communication. So he just stepped out from behind the hay and repositioned himself in front of Connor.
They were met with the same results on the other side. Nothing. No more footprints, nothing of note disrupted. That only left one more area. Connor was already ahead of him, standing at the base of the stairs to the second level, looking up.
“I’ll go up. You should wait down here in case they try to run,” Connor said, no longer bothering to be secretive. There was no point anymore really; if someone was up there then they were cornered.
“Don’t you think I should go up then? You have a better chance of catching them if they run,” Hank said. Connor considered him and then the ladder.
“This ladder looks quite old. I am not certain it’s structurally sound enough to support your weight,” Connor responded. Hank gaped.
“Did you just call me fat?”
“No. I merely concluded that the ladder is not likely to support more than two hundred pounds,” Connor said, expression perfectly neutral. Hank didn’t believe that face for a second, but he would deal with that little comment later.
“Yeah, sure, whatever. Just be careful,” Hank said.
“Of course, lieutenant. When am I not?” Connor smirked. Cheeky little shit.
“All the fuckin’ time,” Hank muttered. Connor ignored him, choosing instead to begin climbing the ladder. Hank backed up a few steps to try to better see over the edge. It didn’t take long for Connor to get up there and Hank watched as he stood near the top of the ladder, looking around for a few seconds.
He took a couple of steps forward, and then a figure burst out from somewhere towards the far wall. Hank couldn’t see where the person had been hiding, but they’d caught Connor off guard. They swung a long metal stick at him and Connor stumbled back a step, barely avoiding being hit.
“Shit!” Hank cursed, aiming his gun up at the person. But they were moving around too much, using Connor to shield themselves from Hank’s view.
They swung again and Connor took another step back but faltered, the back of his foot at the edge of the second level. The second of hesitation was all they needed, stabbing out and jamming the stick directly into the center of Connor’s chest.
It was that moment Hank realized exactly what the stick was. Bright blue sparks shot out from the cattle prod, emitting a low buzzing sound that was quickly drowned out by Connor’s pained cry. The suspect held it there for a second before giving a harsh shove, and Connor went tipping over the edge of the floor.
Hank charged forward to catch him, barely making it in time. The momentum of his fall ended up dragging them both to the ground, but Hank managed to at least stop him from hitting his head on the ground.
It didn’t matter though because less than a second later Connor’s whole body jerked, his head cracking against the hardwood floor. Another spasm quickly followed the first, sending sporadic twitching motions all across his body.
“Connor!” Hank moved to try and stop Connor from hitting his head again but was almost backhanded by one of the flailing limbs. He didn’t know what was going on, only that what was happening looked exactly like a seizure.
Hank tore off his jacket, balling it up and stuffing it under Connor’s head to give him some kind of cushion. He ended up getting smacked in the process but he didn’t care. A high-pitched metallic whine was coming from somewhere in the back of Connor’s throat, though his teeth were clenched tight together. Blue blood started leaking from his nose, running down the side of his face.
Hank stayed just far enough back to avoid being hit, hands hovering in front of him. He wanted to help, to make it stop, but he had no clue how.
A loud creak broke through his panic, and Hank whipped his head in the direction of the noise to see the man who’d attacked Connor dismounting from the ladder. He scrambled for his gun, abandoned in his rush to break Connor’s fall, and leveled it at the man.
Seeing the gun, the man had the sense to drop the cattle prod, raising his hands in surrender. It only took Hank seconds to shove the man to his knees and restrain his hands behind his back with the handcuffs hooked on his belt. With that out of the way he returned to Connor’s side.
The intensity of the convulsions had died down, enough that Hank could get closer now. He rested a shaky hand on Connor’s shoulder, not enough pressure to hold him down and risk injury, but enough to let him know that he was there.
“Come on, son. Snap out of it,” Hank said.
He didn’t know how long it took - if felt like an eternity - when the seizure finally stopped. Connor just suddenly went limp against the ground, the only indication he was even still alive the rapidly flashing red of his LED.
“Wake up Connor, I need you to wake up,” Hank said, leaning over him. Connor groaned, eyebrows furrowing but his eyes remained closed. Hank reached up and gently patted the side of his cheek.
“Come on, open your eyes,” Hank said. After a few agonizing seconds Connor complied, his eyes slowly blinking open.
“There we go,” Hank let out a relieved breath of air, and with it all of the adrenaline that had been coursing through him. He felt drained.
“Why ‘m I on the floor,” Connor asked. His voice sounded a bit muddled and his teeth were stained blue. Probably bit his tongue.
“That asshole over there,” Hank jerked his thumb to the handcuffed man sitting off to the side, “got you with a cattle prod or something. Made you have a seizure.”
Connor took a few moments to process the information before responding. “Androids don’ get seizures,” he said.
“Well sure as hell looked like one,” Hank said.
“Not a seizure. Electrical interference, locked my systems in an error,” Connor said, words stilted but his voice coming out a bit clearer. Judging by the grimace on his face though, talking wasn’t very comfortable right now. Hank decided not to argue about it any further.
Connor moved to sit up but Hank pressed a hand against his chest, keeping him down. “Just take it easy for a minute, son.”
Connor looked ready to protest but he refrained, relaxing back against the ground. Using the edge of his sleeve, Hank worked to wipe up what thirium he could from Connor’s face. “Think you’ll need to go to a repair center?” he asked while he did.
Connor closed his eyes for a moment, LED flickering yellow as he ran a diagnostic. When he opened his eyes he looked annoyed. “Mhm,” was the only response he got, Connor seemingly done with talking. Hank didn’t see just how badly the kid had bitten his tongue, but it probably didn't feel very good.
“Okay,” Hank said, “We’ll go there first then. I’ll have someone else meet us there to get the suspect.”
Connor nodded his understanding and Hank patted him once on the chest before standing up. “You’re not in danger of shutting down, are you?” he asked to be sure. Connor shook his head.
“Good,” Hank sighed. At least there was that. This kid was going to be the death of him with all the trouble he managed to get into. Hank added ‘assholes wielding weirdly high-voltage electrical devices’ to his mental list of things to watch out for. It probably wouldn’t be as common an occurrence as guns or knives, but Hank wasn’t about to watch Connor go through that again. Not if he could do anything to stop it.