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Connor knocked on the manor's door and shifted in the cold air. After the Amanda incident, Cyberlife had to face Hank and his multiples evidences, leading to eventually deleting the AI from Connor's hard-drive. The company and the government were then pressured by New Jericho, forcing them to finally, finally give the deviants some freedom. If they were already free before, now they were virtually on the same levels as humans.
And now, Connor was on his first solo case. The case he asked to lead, the case he asked to be opened. His case. Not in his Cyberlife uniform, but in human clothing with a heavy jacket Hank insisted he wear because "it's freezing outside, Con". Connor smiled fondly. With the heavy leather, and the inner pockets, Flapjack could curl up in them and be right by Connor's chest, protected.
Connor exhaled and focused back on his case. He chased Kara before the revolution, and now he wanted to find her again. To apologize, mostly, but now he had another target in mind.
Zlatko Andronikov. Apparently, Kara visited him before going to Jericho, and he never reported her. He could have protected her, yes, but there was multiples cases of deviants going missing in the past few years, and all their trails leaded to Zlatko. That was why Connor was now standing, in the freezing October air, in front of this mansion, with a warrant tucked in his pocket. He sighed and knocked again.
He had other leads, like the Chapman family living near the Canada border and who went missing during the revolution, last seen at the border with Kara, Alice and another deviant. He could go inspect their house, and find out where they went. He also had—
The door opened on a AP700 android, in casual clothing but still wearing her LED.
"What can I do for you, officer ?" Right, now that he had his own badge, he could be called officer. That made him feel warm inside, probably the emotion he wrote down as "happiness". At Hank's suggestion, he started writing down the emotions he couldn't quite name. He already knew some by heart, but some were still new for him to experience. Hank helped a lot. He felt guilty from the Amanda incident, and how he had to restraint Connor to protect them both from more harm. Connor didn't blame him though.
He cleared his throat. "I'm here to see Mr. Andronikov, Zlatko Andronikov."
A man appeared behind the android, cleaning his hands in a dirty cloth, a large black wolf daemon by his side. "That's me. Can I help ?"
"I'd need to talk to you. "
"Of course, come inside."
Zlatko's eyes lingered on Connor's LED as he walked past the man, making him feel uneasy. Zlatko invited him to sit down at the living room table.
"I'd suggest a coffee, but I don't think you drink those."
Connor smiled. He was getting good at faking emotions. "That is correct, sir."
Zlatko sipped on his own coffee — brought by the AP700 from earlier, he didn't see her daemon yet, probably one who liked to be small and stay hidden like Flapjack— and sighed.
"So, how can I help, officer ?"
Connor laid a picture of Kara and Alice on the table. "Do you know those deviants ?"
The man sighs and shakes his head. "No, no… There's not a lot of androids passing by here."
Connor's LED remained blue despite his rising doubt. "Do you mind showing me around ?"
"No, not at all."
The man did show him around, the vast living room and entry area next to the set of stairs upwards, and one set of stairs to some basement. Zlatko stopped him from taking them. "Just some old dusty storage room, officer, nothing worth your time."
Connor frowned, and was about to protest when the AP700 called Zlatko from upstairs.
"Excuse me, officer."
He watched the man disappear in one of the room, and glanced at the way to the basement. Something akin to what Hank would call "a bad feeling" coiled in his guts, but he still had to look. Something was odd here. As he walked down the stairs, he quickly sent a text to Hank, just to remind him when he was supposed to be back at the station and where he was. Nothing much, not enough to worry the older man, but at least he'd be found if something went wrong. Just in case.
The walls were covered by a curtain that, when Connor pushed it aside, revealed only empty dark rooms. Scanning the surrounding didn't reveal much more, a few crates here and there.
But behind the door at the end of the corridor was something he recognized immediately as an illegal maintenance machine. The floor around was covered in long dried and evaporated thirium, a sickening amount of blue all over the stone. Connor exhaled shakily and walked to the nearby computers. There, a list of models and dates, most of them coinciding with the deviants who went missing and the dates they went missing.
He needed to get back to the station, now.
"Oh, Connor."
Connor whipped around to face Zlatko shaking his head.
"You should have stayed out of this."
The moment the wolf stepped forward, Connor started running. He dashed past Zlatko and rushed to the door, took the turn in the corridor and up the stai—
Something heavy tackled him against the floor before fangs dug in his shoulders. An alert popped up in his vision as he tried to throw the heavy wolf off of him. The daemon didn't back away from his touch, even when he managed to twist around and grabbed handfuls of her fur. The wolf only growled and bit down harder on his shoulder.
"She doesn't mind touching humans, so soulless androids… Sarka, find his daemon."
"No !"
The wolf ignored Connor's feeble attempts to push her away and pressed down with all her weight where Flapjack was hidden under the jacket. Connor screamed and clawed at her paws as his whole body flared up in pain.
"Stop !"
Flapjack shifted to snake and managed to slip out of Connor's jacket, only to be picked up bare handed by Zlatko. Connor's LED was bright red now, he could barely breathe through the wolf weighting down on his chest and the sheer disgust of having human hands on his soul. Flapjack squirmed and tried to shift his way out of it, but he was as exhausted as Connor. They were trapped here.
Sarka dragged Connor to the maintenance machine, her fangs dug deep in his nape, narrowly avoiding vital cables. She still severed his spinal cord, not something that couldn't be fixed or replaced, but for now he was paralyzed from the neck down. Zlatko still help Flapjack in his hand. The daemon didn't struggle anymore ; even if he did manage to escape, Connor wasn't going anywhere, and so was he.
The daemon was thrown in a crate while Connor was hooked to the maintenance machine, his body hauled up by its clamps around his wrists and throat, and a cable plugged into his neck. His voice was glitchy, probably because of the damage sustained when dragged across the floor.
"Y͈o̝ͬu'r͍ͤe gȏnna͕ pa̗̿ẙ f̰or ťhȉs͔͂.͚̇"
Zlatko scoffed. "Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna pay this, but you know what tin can ? I actually need to get caught ! And you can't contact anyone now, can you ?"
Connor clenched his jaw. The computer plugged in the back of his neck, directly into his hardware and totally controlled by Zlatko, was set to override any command he could have. No scanning, no analyses, no contacting anyone.
"That's what I thought." Zlatko sighed and petted Sarka's head. "I have business to do, so stay here and be quiet. I'll be back to you soon enough."
Connor watched as Zlatko left the room, leaving him alone with Flapjack still in the crate.
"F̒l̥ap͇j͈͓aͬ̒ĉ̣ͣk͈ͯ ? Ar̜͂̆e ÿ͎̰́ȏu̮̮͐̌ o̓k̤͋a̠y ?"
The snout of the daemon, now a dog, pushed the top of the crate enough to be able to look at Connor. Flapjack never talked a lot, he and Connor were used to just sit in silence and be together before the revolution, and it didn't change much now.
"I'ͧm s͈o̓rͧry.ͣ.̙.͗ W̑e're g͉̽onn̆a̜ b͉̈́ẽ ā̻lr͎͊iͧgh̠̊t̲, I prͫom̙̔iͬs̰̀e̟.̟̅ Hͮan̠k i͎s g̣o̚ń̘na fin̉d̼ u͕s," Connor whispered. Hopefully, Hank will notice soon that he isn't home, and that he's not in the police station. Hopefully his text has gone through and Hank will be more alert. Hopefully.
Flapjack whined softly, and Connor's heart cracked. He just wanted to hold his daemon right now, to squeeze him so tight they'd fuse and no one would ever hurt him again, and never move from here. But he couldn't move. Flapjack had the phantom touch of Zlatko on his skin, and Connor was the helpless one here, he couldn't even comfort his soul.
"Ḭ̡ͮͯͨ̽'̨̹̳̞ͤm͘҉̯̖͖ s͙͇̺ͨͭ̃ő̴̦͇r͚̦͔̮͉̐̌̆̇r͓̩̻͆ͥͧy," he choked out, "İ̡̭̩̬'̦͓͇̙m̗̳͕̄͋͆ s̷̗̑̀o̺̯͖̰̞ͥ s̺̣͖͖̈̇o͎̰̔ͮ̎r̪̞̒̓̒̚r͎͎͕̾̒̉͌̚y̬ͬ."
With his internal clock shut down, Connor had no way to know how much time has passed until Zlatko came back. He doubted it was very long, because Hank would've noticed if he was hours late, right ? Or maybe the man was passed out drunk in his living room and wouldn't notice anything was wrong until the morning.
"So, tin can… Usually, I'd take the time to stretch the bond properly, but you're a cop, and I need to do quickly."
"Wh̚a͔̒t͓… ?"
The crate where Flapjack laid was properly locked and dragged to a corner, then surrounded by some sort of Faraday cage. Connor's LED was flickering red now, and he would've shifted in unease if he could move.
"W̺h̪͊a̼t̓… W͑hͪȧt͆ ar̽ẽ y̞ouͣ d̞ͪõin̋g… ?"
"You aren't familiar with the concept of severance, are you ?" Connor's heart dropped in his stomach. Zlatko chuckled and patted the cage.
"You see, deviants go back to their machine state when severed from their daemons. Traditionally, it's supposed to physically 'cut' the bond between person and daemon with something like a guillotine, but that would need to be able to completely lock both person and daemon in hermetic boxes, and only then but the bond between them. With this method…" He knocked the cage again," I just need to isolate the daemon. And then run a bit of current through this cage, and it burns the bond. It works quicker is the bond was stretched beforehand, but I don't have the time to do that. I'll just crank up the current. It might hurt a bit."
Zlatko flicked a switch, and white hot pain washed over Connor. His body twitched in reflex. He couldn't even scream, he couldn't think, he just wanted this to stop stop stopstopstop. Flapjack howled and threw himself against the side of the crate, and that snapped him out of it.
"A̧͕̱ͯ̿̅̔̈́͂͘A̵̳̤̟͕̻̼̗̅͘A̶̒ͤ̔̾ͦ̉̚Ȁ̯͂ͥ̐̏ͪ͑A̴̛͒̊̎A̧̐̇̊ͯͥ̐ͤ҉A̓ͦͨ͜҉̖͖̙͎̥̭A̪̖̤͔̪̟͍̚A̧̞̖͆̃͗̓͝A̵̫̙͉͓̽̿̓͝AA̺̗̅A̛̤̞͙̯̻̻̙̋͆̔ͥͦͤ́Ȃ̻̠̃͆̚Ã̪̤̫̰̠̰͌̈͘Å̖͓̻̣̲͕ͩ͆̈͝A̒̅ͨ̈́͂ͩ͊Ä͉́ͫ̑̿̒̚ͅA̩͚̠͛̒̓͌̂A̍́͢A͔͚̬̓͒̚A̅̃͌̽̿̍̊͡A̠͓̩̘͚͗͝A̲̾͒͛̅͢Aͤͥ͑ͯͯ̾͛̕҉̖Ą̶̬̥͓͗͋̀̒̑ͣ̃A̷̮̭̟̲̬ͭ̚͘A͝A̸̴̟̯ͥ̎Å̴̬̣͍͉͕̚͞ͅA̶̭̖̣̪̥͍A͓͕͚̫͎ͧ̒ͤ̂ͣ̏A̱ͯ̈ͮ͊́͢A̿̍̒̒A͖ͬ̿͋̓̈̈́A̡͌ͮ̈́A̧̾̾͒͊Ā̢̺͖̰͒̑̾̇̚A̠̰͇͚͙̭̮ͮͫ͘͠Ą͕͚̟̯̝̜̺̔̽̊A̴̡̹̮A͚Ạ̧̨̤ͭ̊A͖̹̼͈̤͈̞ͯ͒̾ͣ́A͇͚͇̬͕͐͆A̸̿̐ͮͩ̚҉̝̦͇̞̟̠Ā̼̤̙̊ͫ̾Ä̰̣̦͇́̇ͅͅA̳̞̲̻͖̫̠̾͌̑̇̎̏̓—" His voice was brutally cut off by Zlatko from the computer.
"Much better."
Connor bit his tongue until he tasted thirium. He couldn't move, he couldn't thrash, he couldn't scream and he was burning from the inside out. He choked on a silent sob, tears running down his cheeks. Flapjack's cries died down slowly.
He vaguely heard the door open, and Zlatko's voice. It was all so distant, and he didn't care. He just wanted Flapjack back in his arms, he just needed to hold his soul before it was teared apart from him forever. But no. He was helpless, he always was, just like in the Cyberlife tower, just like when Amanda took over, just like when Hank had to help him up over and over again. Because he was useless ! He couldn't protect Hank, he couldn't protect Flapjack, he couldn't protect himself, and he had it coming for a long time now. It was all his fault, it has to be, there has to be a reason why this was happening.
The burn stopped suddenly, and he gasped. He blinked to clear the tears and warnings from his vision, without success. The cable in the back of his neck was unplugged hastily, and he was dropped to the floor. The hands helping him up were firm and familiar, the shoulder he leaned on smelled of whiskey and gunpowder, the voice in his ear was rough, tired.
"I got you, son, it's alright. It's alright."
Hank. It was Hank. Connor choked silently, and the older man tightened his grip.
"Shhh. Shhh. Where's Flapjack ?"
Where was Flapjack ? He was too far, Connor needed him tucked safely against his chest, he failed to protect him, it was too late anyways.
Hank picked him up and walked a few steps before propping him up against a wall. Connor immediately ached at the loss of contact.
"… Fuck."
"Hank, you're going to have to hold him." A softer, feminine voice. Ellena, Hank's dog daemon. "I can't pick him up when he's shifting like that…"
"I know, I know…" Hank sighed. "Con, Flap, I'm sorry, I… Just sorry."
Connor bit his tongue again when, through the oversensitive bond, he felt Hank's hands on Flapjack's f̳̰̎̑͆̿u̶̱̱ͬͣṛ̹̼͇̒f͎̗͉̦̭̔ͮ͠e̶̡̩̼̝̣̱̪ͮ̓á̠̫͘t̹͉̥̲̫h͝ȩ̵̩̭͕̏̽rͥ͆ͦ̀s̢̲̥̮̤ͦs̹̮̯̖̪̠͒k͚̳̫͊i͔̙͎͖̻̲͔̔̕n̩ͧ̋̌̄̔s̤̦̯̲̍́ͫ̃͠͞c̴̱̻͓̗̻͕̾ͤ̊̀ảͭ̾l̻̙̫͉ͩ̓̇ͧ̏͒ͦ͜͡ë̳͎̠̲͚́ͅs before the man gently set the daemon on his chest. Flapjack immediately wrapped himself around Connor, holding him tightly. Hank's hand started petting his hair, and he leaned in the touch.
"… We're going home, Con. Don't worry, I got you. We got you."