Chapter Text
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Part I
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There are certain words associated with Hank that make plenty of sense.
'Jaded' is the one he hears a lot, especially over the last few years, and it's a word that Hank wields proudly to world. 'Yeah, I'm fucking jaded,' he yells in his head when he can't actually yell at someone without having to add to an already large disciplinary file, 'and you would be too if you spent your work days analyzing scenes from a human slaughterhouse. Try smelling a body that's been rotting away for weeks in a top floor, sun-facing apartment in the middle of July. Then let's see where being fucking jaded gets you.'
'Asshole' is also a frequent one, but that's only because Hank refuses to let shitty people get away with being shitty. It's not his fault that some people can't behave like decent human beings and it's certainly not his fault that Gavin Reed's got a complex the size of Michigan and therefore can't take a little constructive criticism now and then. ('Asshole' isn't such a bad word when the wrong people use it and Hank prides himself on the fact that only the biggest dicks have labeled him as such).
There's been other words, many other words, in the encyclopedia of Lieutenant Anderson's life, some bad, a few good, and most of them all true to who he is. Lately though, there's a few new words creeping back in to his pitiable life, words like 'happy' and 'relaxed' and 'thankful'. These words grate on him at times, times when the black void he is clawing his way out of pulls him just a little further back in, but he's starting to accept and work them back into his life, like breaking in a new pair of shoes.
But there is one word that's bothering him—getting under his fucking skin right this moment—and it's all Hank can do to not vomit at his own feelings.
Soft.
No, Hank Anderson is not soft. Sure, he can be a nice guy when he feels like it and he usually tries to give people a chance (sometimes even two chances if they catch him on a good day) but he's crusty and intolerable and even in his happiest moments, no one has ever accused him of being something so low as fucking soft.
But the damn word keeps floating in the back of his mind, a little voice that picks its moments to whisper 'you're getting soft, Hank' when his defenses are down. If he has to blame someone—and he's gonna damn well blame someone—then the finger is squarely pointed at Connor.
Always Connor. Connor with the big Bambi brown eyes. Connor with the damn curl of hair that has Hank's hands constantly itching to reach out and smooth it back in to place. Connor with those delicate freckles scattered across impossibly smooth skin, with the slight smirk that always, always hits Hank like a punch to the gut, with the gentle hands and dirty mouth and body that rivals any work of art.
Connor, whose deviancy—in Hank's humble opinion—started eight months ago with that fateful statement: 'I like dogs'.
It's because of that singular, damning statement that Hank is currently at the dog park on this miserable, rainy, spring day, standing knee deep in mud (Connor is actually kneeling on one knee in the fucking mud because he doesn't want the dogs to feel 'intimidated' by his size) and watching while his android boyfriend tries his utmost best to befriend every damn dog in Detroit.
Sumo is off in some corner, nose buried deep in a bush, probably sulking because his favourite person in the whole wide world is entertaining the affections of strangers. Dog parks had never been a thing that either Hank or Sumo felt a need to visit, probably because neither of them possessed the desire to be forced into awkward small talk with people who dressed their dogs in fucking designer coats. Then along came Connor (stupid, pretty, earnest Connor), who had downloaded and memorized the entire dog encyclopedia while waiting to get reinstated by the DPD, and who's only life goal was to literally meet all the dogs.
Now dog parks are a thing in their lives and Sumo usually spends his time avoiding anything on four legs and Hank spends his time making sure Sumo doesn't eat anything unpleasant in retaliation for getting dragged to this social nightmare and Connor goes around, being friendly and shit and checking off more breeds on his 'Must Pet' list.
On this ludicrously wet day, Hank feels like he's watching a fucking tennis match, his head swinging back and forth whilst trying to keep an eye on his errant dog, who has a nasty habit of rolling in the muddiest puddle he can find, and ensuring that Connor isn't getting his face bitten off by his new fan club. So far so good though. Sumo's paws are caked in mud but his upper half is mercifully clean and Connor is pretty much in the same state, but they're both behaving themselves so Hank can't really bitch them out.
No way they're sitting anywhere other than the back on the way home, Hank grumbles to himself. And if they so much as touch anything other than the backseat, so help me God, I am doing to drown them in the river.
“Hank, look!”
Hank tears his gaze away from Sumo's attempts to burrow under the bush and looks over to Connor who, despite being surrounded by five dogs of various sizes and breeds, is staring off towards the gate of the park with a look that can only be described as 'awestruck'.
Wondering what in the hell could have Connor so gobsmacked, Hank follows his partner's line of sight. When he sees the new arrival entering the park, he suddenly has to fight the dumbest urge to smile (that small voice in the back of his mind smiles with him and whispers 'soft' but he shoves it down and buries it).
Bouncing at the entrance is a black lab puppy, all paws and uneven balance and goofy tail. It takes a moment for the young owners to open the gate and then puppy bounds in, weaving in a zigzag as it navigates this new world, its bright red collar shining in the dull, cloudy light.
Connor's pack of friends take off towards this intruder, leaving Connor alone, kneeling in the wet ground. The sight of his boyfriend, bedraggled and muddy and now seemingly frozen in shock, tugs on heartstrings that Hank refuses to acknowledge as existing. But that doesn't stop him from ambling over to rest a hand on Connor's shoulder and gives it a squeeze.
“You okay, there? You look like you've been hit by a truck.”
“I'm fine.” Connor gives his head a little shake and stands, absently brushing off stray dog hairs caught on the sleeves of his coat. “I've just never...I've never seen a puppy before.”
“Seriously?” Hank barks out a surprised laugh. “Not once, in the last seven months, have you ever, ever, seen a puppy in this city? Like never? Come on, with all the damn driving we do around this place, you must have seen at least one goddamn puppy.”
“I have seen pictures and videos of a variety of young dog breeds,” Connor informs him dryly. “And Officer Fraser has invited me over to meet her ten month old golden retriever three times this month, of which I had to respectfully decline due to our workload. We did walk by a small dog of indeterminate breed two weeks ago when we were investigating that body in the dumpster, but it was quite obviously not young as evidenced by the gray fur on its muzzle. So no, to date, I have not yet seen or met a puppy.”
By smart-ass Connor lecture standards, it's a mild one. Hank is surprised he wasn't subjected to an exact list of dogs they have met, categorized by date and time and location (because he would wager his entire life's savings that his boyfriend has such a list stored carefully in some nook of his bottomless brain).
“Okay, jackass, you win this one,” Hank says with an exaggerated sigh. “I guess with all the changes in this city, people weren't too focused on getting new pets. Times seem to be changing though.”
Connor can't seem to tear his gaze away from the little black ball of fur currently trying to get the attention of a disinterested mutt. “It is a positive sign if humans are once again returning to what they consider a normal life, particularly after the upheaval that came with the revolution. Perhaps we will soon get to see more puppies,” he adds, hope creeping into his voice. “I have seen a lot videos that shows how much fun they can be.”
They both watch as the puppy tries to chase after a sleek border collie, trips over its two front feet and goes flying into a puddle. The young couple look horrified but the puppy bounces back and takes off again in a whirl of mud and rain to say hello to a scrappy terrier nearby.
“Well, Connor, it looks like your lucky day. You finally get a chance to fill that empty, puppy-less hole in your new life.” Hank allows himself the barest hint of a smile. “Wanna head over to say hello?”
A small, stupid part of him loves these kinds of moments—the moments where he gets to watch Connor discover something new about himself, something that takes him one step further away from the Cyberlife controlled android he used to be. Hank likes to think of each step as a nice big middle finger to Connor's creators, people who probably never would have foreseen their fancy, sophisticated prototype turning into a dog-obsessed, old-man-tolerating, full-of-fucking-life person.
Connor finally tears his gaze away from the puppy and looks at Hank, his expression almost wistful.“As much as I would like to stay here and experience meeting a puppy, we unfortunately have other matters to attend to.”
“What the hell are you talking about? We've got nothing planned, unless you count movie night tonight.”
It is then that Hank realizes, with a sinking feeling, that Connor isn't really looking at him. No, Connor is actually looking past him, over his shoulder, at something that apparently is much more interesting than a Labrador puppy wrestling with a beagle.
Hank turns, dread boiling in his gut, and comes face to face with two familiar brown eyes. Brown eyes that stare mournfully out from under a literal fucking pile of mud.
Everything is mud. Every paw. Every ear. Every last strand of fur from his nose to the tip of his goddamn tail.
Just fucking mud.
Everywhere.
“For fuck's sake, Sumo,” Hank groans and drags a weary hand down his face. “I take my eyes off of you for five damn seconds and you go and get yourself into one big fucking mess.”
Sumo huffs and starts panting, his pink tongue contrasting starkly against the disgusting brown mud covering his muzzle.
“Perhaps I should take Sumo as I too am muddy,” Connor offers brightly and quickly clips Sumo back on to the leash (though how he finds the collar under all that drippy, filthy mud is beyond Hank). “It's a good thing we brought those extra towels.”
“Those extra towels aren't going to do shit,” Hank gripes as they start making their way back to the car, hunching his shoulders against the pitying stares of the other dog owners. “The only thing they're gonna be good for is covering the seats, which is where you'll be sitting too. And I swear if I find one speck of mud anywhere other than the those towels, both of you are going in the trunk.”
“Your trunk does not have adequate space for either an android nor a dog the size of Sumo. And it would also be highly illegal to keep us in there,” Connor informs him unnecessarily because he can be a little shit. “But I will make sure Sumo stays in place on the drive home so as not to make a mess in your car.”
“I'm holding you to that,” Hank warns him. “You're also gonna be the one who gives him a good hose down outside. Neither of you are getting within five feet of the front door until those goddamn paws are whiter than snow.”
“It will be close to impossible to maintain the whiteness of Sumo's if I have to wash him outside, as the dirt from the ground will no doubt leave some coating on his paws after I have bathed him.”
“They you're just going to have find some magical way of doing it because I'm serious. Get him clean or stay outside until you freeze to death. And don't give me any 'Hank, I can't freeze to death as my internal sensors will calibrate my temperature' or some robo-shit like that because I don't care. We are not spending our whole fucking day off cleaning the house.”
Connor's eyes crinkle at the edges (it is not sweet or special and it definitely does not make Hank feel like resting his lips, briefly, just there) as he grins because he was probably about to say some robo-shit like that. “I will do my best, Hank.”
It takes a lot of effort and coaxing to get the disgusting mess that was once Sumo into the back of what was once a clean-ish car, and Hank is pretty much focused on trying to minimize the damage to the back seat but he just so happens to catch a glimpse of Connor watching the dogs (and that little baby furball), and Hank's heart unexpectedly twists in his chest.
There's that small, stupid part of him again, wishing he could have had an image to treasure of Connor down in that muddy field, hands out to meet an adorable black lab puppy with a red collar, who would probably jump and nip and fall over backwards trying to say hello. And Connor would probably be beaming from excitement and Hank would once again watch those warm brown eyes brighten and fucking shine like they do when Connor is well and truly happy. And then that strange curl of happiness would snake its way through arteries and veins until it took hold of Hank's heart and settled there,warm and foreign and satisfyingly comfortable.
(Soft, the voice echoes again.
Fuck off, Hank retorts and bends down to give Sumo one last shove.)
- - -
A week goes by, then another, and the rain pours steadily all the while, leading Hank to ban all further dog park visits until there is a 'no mud pit' guarantee. Sumo pouts at the short walks but Connor has the patience of a fucking Saint and lets Sumo sniff every single blade of grass in the neighbourhood, so it's not like the dog can claim neglect.
Work chugs along as only work on the homicide squad can. Since the revolution, crimes against androids had gone through a sudden swell in numbers, which was of no surprise to anyone because humans were pretty shitty to each other to begin with and now—faced with what news outlets were calling a 'whole new species'—they responded as well as they usually do when presented with some perceived threat to their superiority. Still, some humans are still happily focused on being shitty to other humans, so their caseload is a little more diverse these days and Hank and Connor are kept pretty busy.
The break room is a good hiding place from said work though, and on this particular Tuesday, Hank's motivation to tackle the stack of paperwork on his desk ranks just below 'getting shot in the face'. So he's hiding by the coffee machine, waiting for a fresh batch to brew (because what better way to kill a few minutes of not doing paperwork than by dumping Miller's perfectly good batch and making a whole new pot) and enjoying the relative peace.
It is weirdly peaceful too, probably because half of the bullpen is out on some case or another and Hank's day had brightened exponentially when he had heard that Detective Reed had been assigned to a full day's worth of sifting through literal garbage at the dump where two bodies—one android and one human—had turned up. The thought of Reed (all snark and sneer and scruffy facial hair) spending a cold, rainy day up to his eyeballs in stinking piles of rotting food is almost enough to make him smile.
It's the little things, he hums to himself as the coffee maker pings. The little things like knowing the resident asshole of the department is having a miserable day. Or that Connor had let him sleep past eight a.m. for the first time in weeks. Or that part of the reason he had been allowed the luxury of staying in bed was because Connor was happily snoozing in cyberspace, lulled into stasis by a very busy and entertaining night.
Since the whole 'androids discovering they're alive' thing that had rocked the world, Cyberlife had been less focused on churning out mindless slaves and had turned instead to producing numerous software updates for the existing android population to help them integrate into human society—all optional, of course, because Cyberlife was also smart enough to know forcing shit on living beings was now a bad idea. There had been a lame '12 Days of Christmas' run of updates last December and New Year's had brought with it 'New Year's Resolutions for a New Android' and Valentine's Day had been properly hijacked by some interesting offers too (no one could claim Cyberlife's PR department wasn't working to their full potential).
Not that Hank could complain about them. He had certainly benefited from more than a few of the upgrades and he could admit to himself that he's enjoyed some of the simple ones too, like having an android boyfriend who looks less like a corpse and more like human being when he goes into stasis. It's even nicer to wake up to that same android boyfriend actually mimicking the act of waking up (with mussed hair and big brown eyes blinking and a slow smile working its way across those dumb perfect lips) instead of springing in to action like some human-shaped alarm clock.
(Getting soft, Hank, that voice sighs.
Get fucked, Hank whispers back.)
The coffee smells decent and the first sip passes the 'is this worth drinking' test so Hank decides he can't waste anymore time without Connor getting suspicious and heads back to his desk.
In the many minutes Hank has managed to successfully waste, Connor has gained a visitor and for a moment, Hank pauses mid-stride in confusion before he spots the blonde ponytail poking out from under the police hat.
Officer Erin Fraser is probably Connor's first true human friend. Back in November, Hank would have said that title was reserved solely for him but as things twisted and developed and changed over all those weeks, Hank was happy to ditch the 'friend' label for something a little more intimate. Sure, there were others who were friendly around the squad, but it hadn't been until they worked with Officer Fraser on a case a few months back that Connor had finally befriended his first genuine human.
They had bonded over the victim's dog (of course they had) and Fraser had agreed to keep the ten-year-old mutt, which had spared Hank the inevitable awkwardness of having to tell Connor that 'no, Sumo doesn't want an older brother, put that damn dog down and analyze this knife'.
Hank likes Officer Fraser well enough. For a beat cop, she's good at the job and she has a knack with getting along with people from all walks of life. She's young, pretty, and seems to like Connor for who he is. It also doesn't hurt that she's currently renting our her basement to a human-android couple or that her boyfriend is one of the many Cyberlife developers who's given Connor opportunities to finally touch and sleep and feel.
So yeah, she's a good kind of human. But seeing her standing by Connor's desk, young face smiling and laughing while she chats with Hank's equally young and weirdly endearing boyfriend does no favours to Hank's already shaky self-esteem. He's getting better at dealing with those shit-tastic thoughts that invade his brain but his defenses are still weak and every so often he looks at Connor and just thinks 'Why?'.
Why me? Why would someone who's just discovering who they are, who has any and every fucking opportunity in this world to find someone to be with, to discover life with, choose me?
Some days—those darker days that he still stumbles into because recovery is a fucking long process and not an easy three-step solution—he even creates a list in his fucked up head. His hair is straggly, his beard needs some serious maintenance, his clothes scream 'aging millenial', he swears too much and exercises rarely, he would rather be alone than in a crowd and his opinion on the glass half-empty or half-full problem is 'as long as it's not water, I don't give a flying fuck how much of it there is'.
(Connor keeps him steady though, keeps him from falling too far these days and Hank is trying, he is really trying, he is trying so fucking hard because Connor is patient and attentive and gives Hank meaning in what was once a bleak, soul-sucking life).
So he hesitates, mid-step, fights those nasty, intrusive thoughts from his brain and takes a fortifying gulp of his coffee.
“Officer Fraser, what brings you round here?”
“Lieutenant! I was wondering where you were hiding!” She is all smiles as she waves him over. “And drop the whole 'Officer' thing, will you? I told you, just call me Erin.”
“Wouldn't want Fowler thinking I'm disrespecting the subordinates,” Hank says and sinks down into his chair. “I've got enough complaints in my file already. So are you here to make us work?”
“Nope, just dropping off some evidence for Officer Chen. And, of course, to show off pictures of my new baby to Connor.” She laughs. “He's the only one who puts up with all of my complaining these days. Pretty sure everyone I work with now thinks I'm the crazy dog mom.”
“You are not crazy,” Connor assures her as if he is some expert in what being crazy really means. “You care about your new dog and simply wish to share in her exploits.”
“Ha, exploits is the right word. That little fluffy monster has already eaten two pairs of shoes and destroyed three cushions from her crate.” Erin rifles around in her jacket pocket and produces her phone. “Wanna see how cute the little she-demon is getting, Lieutenant?”
Hank shrugs nonchalantly. “Sure, I never could resist a cute face.”
She swipes to a recent photo of a disgustingly adorable golden retriever puppy with a shoe in her mouth and with a fuzzy face that screams 'shit disturber'. Even Hank has to admit the damn dog is cute and tells her so. “Probably pretty hard to say no to that furball.”
“Oh yeah, she could probably get away with murder and we would still forgive her.” Erin drops the phone back into her pocket. “I could probably spend all day showing you videos but I gotta go before my partner calls in my disappearance. You guys should come by my place though, sometime soon. Maybe you could even bring your dog, Lieutenant? Toby needs to start meeting other dogs and from what Connor tells me, Sumo is a gentle giant.”
“Sumo would probably sit on your dog and crush her,” Hank warns her and makes the mistake of looking at Connor as he says this. Connor's face isn't always the most expressive but the LED at his temple is whirring yellow and Hank knows he went ahead and said the wrong thing. Again. Old Hank wouldn't have cared less, but this Hank-who-is-trying sighs and adds,“But,Connor and I would be happy to drop by sometime. Maybe next week? If work doesn't get too batshit crazy.”
Hank doesn't know which expression is more painful—Fraser's bright smile or Connor's fucking beaming face—but he masks his resignation with a scowl. “No promises on Sumo being a good role model though. Pretty sure he tried to eat a dead mouse last week.”
“Toby has already eaten things that I don't wanna talk about. But that sounds great! I'll text you, Connor, and we can figure out a doggy play date!”
Never, in all of his fifty-fucking-three years, would Hank have ever guessed he would actually be agreeing, without a literal gun to his head, on going to a fucking doggy play date. Then again, he never, ever, ever would have thought he would here, alive and sort-of-well (and getting better) and sitting across from a pretty-boy android who still uses his mouth to analyze substances when he thinks Hank isn't looking and who, for whatever fucked up reason, has decided that Hank is the one person who matters most in this world.
Hank doesn't have a belief system or any crap like that, but he had always liked the idea of karma and of terrible people getting back all of the fuckery that they delivered in the first place. But when it comes to him, when he thinks of everything he's done and said (and probably will do again because he's bad at change), he still can't understand where it all balanced out on those cosmic scales and somehow, by some miracle, it gave him back Connor.
(Seriously, so fucking soft, the voice laughs.
Fuck you, says Hank.)
- - -
“Hank?”
“Mm hm?”
“What was Sumo like as a puppy?”
Hank blinks, pauses mid-sentence in his book and glances up at Connor. They're on the couch, Hank with his back against one armrest, Sumo against the other and Connor smack in the middle, because that's the only way both dog and human get to properly share their favourite living space heater. Sumo has his head plastered to Connor's right leg, Hank has his toes tucked under Connor's left leg and Connor, always a proficient multitasker, is giving out head scratches and idle leg caresses while simultaneously watching some old nature documentary.
Connor's still happily focused on the TV, probably doesn't realize how deep of a question it really is or that the first answer on the tip of Hank's tongue is I don't wanna fucking talk about. Which would be a pretty weird response to such a normal question but the question, innocent as it is, delves back into the quagmire of Hank's past and Hank's natural, built-in response to such probing usually begins or ends with the words 'fuck off'.
It's not like they haven't talked about Hank's life Before Connor, and it's not like Connor doesn't know about Cole or the accident or the fact that Hank's been a total fuck up for the last three years. Connor even knows a little bit about his ex-wife (an accountant, ran off with her yoga instructor to Chicago like some fucking movie cliche six months before the accident, currently blocked on Hank's phone, email, and mental list of people he cares about), which is more than most people will ever know.
But it still hurts when Hank dredges up the past, hurts because there is always that gaping black hole that lingers in his chest whenever he lets his mind wander back over the last three years. A black hole in the shape of his son that used to bleed into his bones and constrict his chest and take his mind down the darkest, bleakest of paths. It's still there, that hole—it always will be—but lately the edges of the void have stabilized. The stifling, heavy blackness no longer oozes freely through his body and now when the darkness creeps into the edges of his vision (or of his head or heart), Hank turns to Connor, whose patience and tenderness keeps it at bay, like some kind of breakwater taking the brunt of a nasty storm.
Connor, who has become so fucking important to Hank that he sometimes aches with fear of losing him. Connor, who slipped past Hank's ironclad defenses like some kind of fucking cat burglar, and plunked himself down in the middle of his heart and refused to move. Connor, who looks good enough to eat right now, drowning in Hank's oversized hoodie, legs stretched out onto the coffee table and that same stupid curl of hair hanging down on his forehead.
Connor, who has stopped watching the TV to stare at Hank in confusion, his beautiful eyes narrowing and his LED flickering between yellow and blue. Belatedly, Hank realizes he's been silent for awhile and Connor's finally clued in to how awkward the silence is,which means it's a fuck ton of awkward because Connor's grasp of 'awkward' is still pretty much non-existent.
“Hank?” This time the voice is softer and the idling hand that had been drawing absent shapes along his calf slides up and rests firmly on his knee. “I am sorry if I said something wrong. Was that question not acceptable?”
“It's fine,” Hank reassures him and does a fuck-up job of it apparently because Connor's jaw tightens and his lips thin and his LED starts glowing a solid yellow. Everything about Connor's expression screams 'not buying your bullshit' and if Hank wasn't so shaken up, he would have laughed at the ridiculously human expression on the android's face.
Hank tries again, because this is Connor, who loves dogs and loves Sumo (and maybe loves you, the voice sneaks in like a jackass) and he deserves to hear this story. “No, seriously, it's fine. Figured you would ask me one day. I'm just surprised it hasn't come up before.”
“I admit that I have been meaning to ask you, but seeing pictures of Toby made me wonder what Sumo looked like at four months old. It's hard to imagine that he was ever small.” Connor absently runs a finger along Sumo's ear. “But I did not mean to upset you or bring up unpleasant memories. I did not realize Sumo's early years were that bad. He is a good dog so I simply assumed that he was a good puppy.”
“He might've been. I don't really know.” Hank steadies himself, reminds himself that he can do this, he's got this, he can tell his boyfriend about how Sumo came into his life, because even though it happened during Hank's darkest years, it's still not the worst story he will have to tell. “I got Sumo when he was four and a half.”
Hank pauses, lets the number sink in. He knows Connor does the math, knows certain key dates of Hank's pathetic life are imprinted in his that high-tech brain. The equation is pretty simple: subtract Sumo's birthday from the date of the accident and add two months. It isn't exactly fucking rocket science.
He can pinpoint the exact moment when Connor figures it all out because his LED suddenly settles and the pale blue swirls back in to place. All Connor can say is, “Oh.”
“Yeah. It's kind of a funny story though.”
“If you don't want to tell me, then you don't have to—”
“Connor, seriously, if I didn't want to tell you, I would have told you to shut it hours ago.” Hank lets go of his book and uses his free hand to brush against the back of Connor's hand. The feel of familiar smooth skin is comforting and it takes only a second for Connor to understand the unvoiced request. He lets go of Hank's knee, turns his palm up and as their fingers tangle together and tighten, Hank lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding in.
“It was about two months after the accident and I was back on Homicide, trying to drown myself in booze and work and sometimes both at the same time. I'd been stuck on desk duty but the squad was overworked and a bunch of cases came through in one big pile. There was a murdered teenage girl dumped by the highway and Fowler decided to get me away from my desk and give me the case. He probably thought it was a safe one for me take, because one of other cases involved a drunk driver mowing down an android pushing a baby carriage and another one dealt with a pedophile who liked little boys.”
Connor's grips tightens. “Captain Fowler is perceptive.”
Hank snorts. “It wouldn't have taken a genius to know putting me on one of those cases was a fucking bad idea. Everybody knew I was a complete fucked-up mess but Fowler seemed to think I was ready to start my life again.”
“Perhaps he thought that the case would serve as a distraction to your...problems.”
“It was a distraction all right. Turned in to a fucking obsession. I spent every hour of the day going over the case files and interviewing witnesses and watching CCTV footage. Hell, I spent one whole day just tracking down the girl's ex-boyfriend from grade eight because I figured he would have some kind of magical insight into why she had turned up dead in a ditch by the highway.”
“You're a good detective, Hank,” Connor assures him, always loyal. “You have good instincts, even if your methods are not always by the book.”
“Says the guy who licks blood and who knows what the fuck else off of walls and floors,” Hank retorts and is rewarded with a fleeting smile.
“Anyway, everything I had dug up so far had turned in to a dead end and shit was hitting the fan because the girl's mother was demanding answers I didn't have. So I decided to hunt down another lead, some college kid that the girl had met at a party two weeks before her body was found. It didn't seem promising but I was desperate for something to work on so I tracked him down. The kid lived out in one of Detroit's nicer suburbs and both of his parents worked for Cyberlife and had made a killing, so I was preparing myself to meet with an entitled shithead.
“How did you know he would be unpleasant? Did he have a record of bad behaviour?”
“No, but his house had a fucking tennis court in the backyard. Of course he was gonna be a shithead.” Hank rolls his eyes. “Anyway, I was already buzzed from my morning glass of whiskey and I was thinking this would be a quick interview at the door and then I could be on my merry fucking way. So I ring the bell and the dickhead answers and his eyes get huge and panicky and before you know it, he's shoving past me and starts sprinting down the fucking street.”
Connor nods, as if he is reconstructing the whole scenario in his head with his state-of-the-art software. “So you pursued him.”
“I tried but like I said, I was kind of drunk and I wasn't expecting him to fucking bolt. And the fucker was fast but I was in better shape back then so I managed to keep up. He went running into one of the backyards of the other mega mansions that was on the street and leaped over the fence like a fucking deer or something.” Hank shakes his head, remembering the looming wooden fence as he panted and puffed in pursuit, how he had thought in his whiskey-tinged haze that he could totally take the fence and make it cleanly to the other side like fucking Superman or something. “I probably should have gone back to the car, radioed it in, and then drove around til I found him but I was buzzed and stupid and obsessed with solving the case. So I decided I could jump the fence too.”
“That was, perhaps, not the best route to take.”
“No shit it wasn't. I barely made it over the fence and I was actually feeling pretty damn good about myself for even making it to the other side when suddenly, out of nowhere, this massive shape comes flying at me and throws me to the ground. My head must have smacked something pretty hard because everything got blurry for a while. And when I snapped out of it, I was lying on the ground with that—” Hank points an accusing finger at the snoozing Sumo with his free hand, “—fat-ass on top of me and breathing his rotten dog breath in my face.”
Sumo's eyes open as if on cue and he huffs as if he knows exactly what and who his owners are talking about and is protesting Hank's version of events. Connor, always willing to forgive anyone canine, gives the Saint Bernard's head a decent scratch. “I am certain Sumo had no intention of hurting you. He certainly did not attack me when I broke into your house in November, although he did run towards me rather alarmingly. It was probably an accident that he knocked you over as he is unaware of how large he actually is.”
“Ha! This shithead knew exactly what he was doing because he refused to get off of me no matter how hard I shoved and cussed. Had me pinned down for probably a good ten minutes before the owner of the property came storming out and demanded to know what the hell I was doing in her backyard.”
Hank loosens his grip on Connor's hand as the story bleeds out of him because the unpleasant part is over (it's always the beginnings he has a hard time with, that initial start to a story in his life, and as he gets going he finds it easier and easier to share because he's had those words bottled up for so long and it actually feels fucking good to tell them to someone else for a change). “Her name was Nancy. She called Sumo off and was nice enough to let me explain everything. By the time I was finished, the prick was long gone and I think she felt sorry for me, because she invited me in for coffee and let me use the phone to call it in.”
“While I was waiting for my backup to arrive, she gave me Sumo's sad sob story. He'd been from one of her first litters and she'd sold him to some family who lived in the city. Guess the dad got transferred out of state and they couldn't take him so Nancy agreed to take Sumo back so he wouldn't end up in some shitty animal shelter. She dropped a lot of hints about how she was selling up her place in the city and moving to the country to expand her dog-breeding business and how Sumo was useless to her because he was neutered.”
“Long story short, I left her place stinking of dog but thinking that having a dog around wasn't the worst idea. Then we caught the college dipshit the next morning trying to bus it down to Florida and he fucking cracked after three questions, so I was in a pretty good mood.” Hank feels his lips quirk. “Went back to Nancy's after that, had Sumo nearly take me down again in the hallway and decided to take him home. Guess I'm just a sucker for brown eyes.”
Connor ignores the innuendo and the waggle of Hank's eyebrows and focuses on the serious shit (because of course he does). “They say dogs can sense things that humans cannot. Sumo must sensed that you needed him and that he needed you too.”
Like you, Connor. I need you too. Need you more than you will ever fucking know. He feels those words, feels them press down on his heart and bury their way in to his mind, feels them more often as the days go by and Connor is still here, still ready with a snarky lecture or a surprising quip or a whisper of peace after a hard day. For the millionth time, Hank hates himself for keeping the words hidden but he can't help himself. His ex-wife used to always say that if you looked up 'Hank Anderson' in the dictionary, it would simply link to the article on 'Emotional Constipation' with his mugshot right beside it. He'd clung to that statement for a long time, was almost proud of it for whatever fucking reason his pride gave him, but he's starting to realize that keeping shit like that inside is actually a pretty bad idea. Especially when those words belong to Connor, who asks for nothing and deserves everything Hank can give him.
“Thank you for telling me that story. Although I am sorry that I will not get to see puppy Sumo pictures.” Connor's voice snaps him out of this thoughts and Hank realizes belatedly that Connor has inched towards him, his arm between Hank's knees and his hand now resting on Hank's thigh. “He was probably very cute.”
Subtlety is something Connor has become better at (way better at it, considering their romantic relationship had started with Connor declaring 'I want to engage in sexual activities with you') and Hank softens at the unspoken question, lets his legs relax so Connor can scoot in. “Just go online and look up Saint Bernard puppies. You'll get the general idea.”
Connor's hands—those lithe, gentle hands—cup Hank's face, fingers brushing his temples, his touch delicate and steady and sure. “Do you think there might be a chance we will get to see a Saint Bernard puppy?”
“Detroit's a big city,” Hank points out, his voice roughened by the sudden frissons of heat radiating along his cheeks and down his neck and snaking around his spine. “Who knows? We might get lucky one day.”
“I already consider myself lucky,” Connor says softly and Hank feels his heart constrict and his tongue freeze and damns his fucking abysmal emotional response rate to hell. “Meeting a younger version of Sumo would only increase how lucky I have become.”
Words might not Hank's thing, but he can at least do things, and what he chooses to do is grab Connor by the neck and drag those perfectly shaped lips down to his in a heated, desperate kiss. I'm lucky too, he says when he opens his mouth to Connor's searching tongue. So lucky, he says when he pulls Connor further, deepens the angle and Connor is now looming above him, hips pressing down between Hank's thighs. So fucking lucky, he says when one hand fists desperately in Connor's hair and the other goes around his waist and under the sweatshirt to claw at silky skin. Connor moans (what a discovery that had been, hearing Connor moan and whine and make such reckless, human noises) and Hank eats up the sound as the heat coiling around his spine slithers further down.
(Not so soft right now, the voice smirks.
You're the fucking worst, Hank snarks back before all further coherent thoughts are melted from his brain.)
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