Small Imperfections

by Positive (Sequoiaseeds)

Summary:

There’s a time for caring, there’s a time for upholding a carefully created persona. It’s not like Gavin knew the difference. Life went on in the Reed household, with just the gentle changing of the seasons to denote any deviation.

Until a late night in August. Then, as we’ll see, everything changed.

-
A fic exploring personalities, past lives, Amanda, friendship and murder cases.

Fic Playlist, here, and please heed the tags. This is not going to be happy.

Chapter 1: Endless and Artificial

Notes:

A first foray into the life of a fanfic writer. This is the first of many hours of work, time, writing and music. To the people who have supported me thus far, I appreciate you all so much more than words can describe. I hope you enjoy, and thank you for reading. Chapter two...well, it's a work in progress. Have a listen to some New Order if you want to get a vibe of the next chapter.

Peace, love and ice-cream,

Positive.

Chapter One - Endless and Artificial

To explain the enigma that is Gavin Reed, we only need to look his apartment, in all its calm glory.

Unwashed dishes fill the sink, last nights food clinging on. Plants curl their way under the window, flooding the room with purple subtlety. Old video game posters coat the walls, encased in frames, with only the light fading to show their age. The sofa looks out over the city below, blankets folded on the arm, grey contrasting with the red.

In the bedroom, a king sized bed takes up most of the space. It isn’t like a detective's salary can cover for a large bedroom. Messy clothes litter the floor, but it fits just like home. String lights adorn the corners and sides of every surface, illuminating the photos Gavin keeps hidden from visitors on his side table. His graduation day, the last photo he had with mom, and the last photo he took with Hank, before, well that isn't important right now, as Gavin would normally say.

Our story starts with a chilli plant.

The door opens and Gavin walks through to the living room, bags in hand, arms aching from their weight. Dropping the bags onto the kitchen table and sorting the groceries, the golden light of the lamp streaks across Gavin’s face. His mind races from the events of earlier in the day, with the chase still on his mind. Strawberry ice-cream lies in wait in the freezer, the tomatoes out on the side for later, knives and pans shining on the shelves.

Dicing the onions, with some oil sizzling in the pan, Gavin looks over to the side for the chili. It's not there, just the beans and the tomatoes in their place. He checks the fridge, but only the meat and leftovers stare back at him. "How do I forget the one thing I need for my chili? Very clever past me, very clever," Gavin mutters to himself, turning down the temperature on the stovetop.

Gavin grabs his 'famous' leather jacket — as Tina so affectionately calls it — and closes his door behind him. He can still smell the coffee that Connor spilled on it earlier in the day. Connor’s green eyes flood his mind, confused and wide, rushing to apologise silently. Androids, especially one as smart as Connor, can't have the ability to spill something, right? Elijah can't have forgotten that. Perhaps it's the deviancy, after Connor deviated with Markus meaning that he is now more truly human, in all their clumsy ways.

As he leaves the high-rise, and steps out onto the street, Gavin watches the few people wandering the streets in their bright clothes, pinpricks of hope and laughter in an otherwise urban cityscape. The lights of the street, allowing shadows to cascade on his face, illuminate the path in front of him, their orange and yellow hues swirling over the trees.

He walks down the street, taking in the air around him. Ever since the city went on the clean energy drive years ago, the air has been cleaner, more alive, despite it being naught but nitrogen and oxygen. The air is cold, not cold enough for condensed breath. There is nothing like a cooling pool of oil in a pan to invigorate a man, a tired one at that. Gavin shrugs his shoulders, rolling through the ache that pulses pleasantly in response. Exhaustion begins to linger at the edges of his thoughts, the reasons why blisteringly obvious. Obnoxious bosses, whatever the hell was up with Connor spilling coffee on him, the chase, the thrill. The adrenaline coursing through him, breath heavy, eyes wide. Life doesn't get its meaning until it on the table, ready to be messed with. It is in that that Gavin finds his meaning, to protect those closest to him.

Does he ever want to say this to anyone? Of course not, he has a reputation to maintain.

The soft reflections from the metal fences catch the corners of his eye, glimmering like the moon on a wet rainforest, sliver seizing an opportunity to be seen. Gavin comes here often to relax. To get his mind away from the chaos of life at the DPD, as much as he craves it. The smell of the herbs overtake the cigarette smoke, the greenery a welcome addition in a dull place, with only the neon of the lights to contrast it. It is calm, peaceful, somewhere to be alone, somewhere to be himself.

Opening the gate into the garden, Gavin takes a moment to take it all in. The garden is a different place during the night, with the soft purple grow lights allowing Gavin to see the chilli plants at the back of the garden, red plants turning deep purple with the light. Gavin spends months growing them, cultivating them, pulling out the weeds. It gives him something to do, to get himself away from anything bothering him, consuming his mind. Video games and bad decisions are always going to be the first port of call. Why wouldn't they be? However, the time comes where they aren't what Gavin needs; they are not a good enough distraction.

In the shed, he grabs the scissors and heads back outside. The chilli is ripe, after careful growing, careful birth through the ground into something useful. It's a perfect time to forget something he needs for cooking, after months of caring for plants. Gavin finds caring for them therapeutic; it gives his hands something to do, to stop him from fidgeting, stop him picking at his nails. The smell of the earth beneath him, pure and unfiltered pair with the flashes of silver metal reflecting the light of the sun in the morning talk to him, help him, soothe him. He cuts them off the stem.

"Shit, I should have brought a bag," Gavin mutters to himself, sarcastic voice teasing him. "I've really hit this out of the park today."

He stands back up, after kneeling in the soft earth, his knees coated in a thin layer of staining dirt. Gavin brushes off the dirt, pocketing the chilis in to the soft leather of the worn jacket, noting the small brown patches that he will need to wash out. The summer sun should dry it fairly quickly, the heat might warm it a little. It's a cool night and Gavin wants something to warm him up, a little, so naturally his mind wanders to the warmth and comfort that chilli provides.

Late night trips to the shops, and long winding walks are not uncommon in Gavin's household, not that there is anyone but him at home. The parks give him some peace, and it's lucky to even get some when you look like you could kill a man. Headphones in, music playing, mind clear. Clear of all the stress of work, his non-existent love life, and friendships that come few and far between.

He's alone, just how he likes it.

His phone rings in the back of his jeans, with the tranquil tunes of randomly selected ringtone choices filling the air.

It's Tina, for some reason.

A little late to be calling…she's normally asleep by now.

Unless she's somehow on a date that he hasn't heard her gossip about, an unlikely scenario, either her phone has been stolen, or she's dying. Nevertheless, he taps the answer button, and puts the phone up to his ear.

"Gavin, you gotta get here, Fowler wants us on this murder. I need you here," Tina says, breathlessly and rushed. Maybe she ran to the scene. It must be important, particularly if she needs him there.

"Tina, you have to slow down; I can't understand a fucking word you're saying. Why do you need me there?"

"I'll send you the location, just hurry your ass up and get here, please."

"Fine, you gotta explain what's happening when I get there, okay?" Gavin says, lowering his voice. He always gets loud when on the phone with Tina, it's probably her infectious laughter. That's not important now, he just needs to get to the scene. The fact that Fowler is there has got to mean something. Maybe something has happened to someone important.

He ends the call with a simple thank you. That's all the people he cares about can expect from him, a man with a reputation to maintain should naturally be curt in ending everything. Fowler normally gets some snarky comment about late nights and phone calls, but you can imagine how that goes, dear reader. Some consider it shocking that Gavin hasn't been suspended yet. Then again, he's a much better detective than he gives himself credit for, which tends to cover his actions.

Placing the scissors back in the shed, Gavin gives the garden a final once over. The lights spilling their purple over the plants, the string lights illuminating the area with a soft yellow glow is the background for Gavin as he starts walking back to his apartment. It could fit in a dystopian movie, the garden backlighting his figure.

He takes a glance down at his watch, it's late, to no surprise. 11:49pm.

He crashes into someone.

Barely getting a word in edgeways, Gavin slips out a small apology and starts sprinting back to his apartment. It's dark, but not dark enough for him to notice something about the person he crashed into. It's an android, with the best goddamn hair he's ever seen. Yet, Gavin realises something, something seemingly small, but with repercussions he cannot imagine.

The android's hair is endless and artificial, infinite and electronic. It doesn't exist, it is endless. It doesn't exist, it is artificial. It isn't like human hair, where cutting it is a thing that requires thought. It is endlessly replaced. It is artificial, in the way that can only be designed in a lab.

As he runs into the apartment block, only stopping at the base of the stairs to catch his breath, Gavin looks back, for no other reason than to see the android's hair again.

"Why the fuck am I looking back? It's just hair," Gavin reflects, sprinting breathlessly up the stairs. It's a pity his building doesn't have any elevators, he thinks, they could do with them.

He makes his way up to the top of the stairs, fumbling to get his keys out of his pocket, when Tina messages him. The buzz of his phone is an all too familiar sensation, with Tina messaging him every other day with some comment about rude people on the street or how the lights look at night.

[12:01am - Tina]

Here's the location. Where the hell are you?

Gavin smiles to himself, and opens the door. His badge and gun are over in his bedroom, as normal, waiting for a new day to be used. Walking over, Gavin spots the cold oil in the pan, contemplating when he's actually going to be able to make the chili, to feel the warmth again. He pulls them out of the jacket pocket and throws them on the side, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

Holstering his gun, and looping his badge on his jeans, Gavin takes one last look at the apartment before rushing out to see Tina.

It is going to be a long night.

Notes:

Here's the link to Endless and Artificial, the song for the chapter.

Thank you for reading and have a lovely day.

Chapter 2: Blue Monday

Summary:

Michi. Cool, calm, a person capable of beating the shit out of you. A protector, a violent spark. A leader, a fearless one at that.

Who is Michi?

Who are they going to be?

What are they going to do?

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Welcome to chapter two, where we meet Michi! Michi is a character I've grown to love, so much, and trust me, we're gonna be seeing a lot more of them as the fic goes on. Keep an eye out for the colours as we go on, cause there might be some stuff hidden for you guys to find. Again, thank you all so much for the support, the kind words and the motivation, it truly does mean the world. Stay kind to each other. Chapter Three is gonna come, at some point, just hold on.

Gold, Red, Blue and Yellow,

Positive

Chapter Two - Blue Monday

9 Years Earlier

"Tina, make sure you stay on the line with me. If anything goes wrong, I can't be in here alone. Understand?" Gavin says, pocketing the drugs. He's on a stakeout, for the first time in a while. It's a new day, a new chance to get his work done. He's going in alone, a bad idea in hindsight, yet the Gavin of then doesn't know that. Naive, unknowing, is what he'll call himself in the future, in the few times he mentions this night and the events that surround it. 

His car is dark, with the console lit red, for apparent safety in a night of danger. The earthy and deep aroma of coffee fills the car, reminding Gavin why he has to be awake, why he has to do this. The tendrils of frost wind their way around the car windows, framing his face to the outside world. Gavin Reed, coffee-filled detective with a few too many scars to be considered normal. Gavin Reed, man with too many secrets. 

The center console shines bright, the lights glowing in the dark, casting too little of it to show up on his face. Gavin's playlists are always far too long to be played to their full while he waits on a stakeout, too loud, too much like him. He steals his music taste from his mom, with her playing music all throughout his childhood. Rihanna, Nirvana, MCR. The old stuff, Joy Division, New Order, Sex Pistols. Radiohead, Kasabian, even Taylor Swift.

He's a mish-mash of them all, creating a music taste with something for everyone, and no-one. What music does he show his friends? What music does he keep a secret for dark nights? What will his persona let him do? 'Blue Monday' by New Order plays softly on the radio, a song reminding him of Sunday mornings with Eli, eggs frying in the pan, mom yelling at them both to stop messing around and to sit down. He misses that, but he has work to do. Operations to stop.

"Tina I'm heading in, wish me luck," Gavin says, taking a deep breath to steady himself. He knows he is making a bad decision.

"Keep me updated,"

"I will-" he says, hands shaking a little,"please don't worry about me."

He doesn't keep her updated. She cries herself to sleep.

The door to the house is too old to be anything but a din of crime. The red ice epidemic is still seething underground, even after the few years of relative peace and quiet, thanks to the task force Hank led. He hears them inside, chatting, about whatever, cooking up a new batch. It's peaceful to them, at least before Gavin knocks on the door. Gavin is lucky enough to have gained the trust of them, his charisma being a benefit this time, unlike when he's back at the station. His charisma back there makes him a smooth-talking, dirty-mouthed son of a bitch. Nobody likes him for it, but would he change it?

Not in a million years.

He knocks on the door, mustering enough courage to knock with some semblance of purpose, but with enough apprehension to denote his fear. Gavin is always scared while undercover, his mind flooding with ideas of every possible outcome. It's the fear of death that gets him riled up inside, the thought that it can all end in a moment. A shot to the heart, a crack in the skull. That's the end of Gavin Reed, an inconsequential life. Who will attend his funeral?

Who attended Hank's funeral?

It opens, and a pale-faced person stares back at him. Their eyes are wide, bloodshot. Hair unkempt, if a little greasy. A red ice user, with all the obvious signs of being one. Gavin looks down, where the patches of red shine back at him, taunting him with their knowledge of what he's getting himself into.  

"What do you want?" they ask shakily, apprehension shadowing their face.  

"Here to see Michi."

"Why would they want to see you?" they say, leaning against the door-frame for support. "You aren't someone they've talked about. You...wait...of course! I remember you, you're the one with the scar. Michi mentioned you. You're Gavin, right? Why are you here?"

"Here to see Michi actually, like I mentioned." Gavin replies, his eyes pricking with nerves. He has to keep it up, keep it up, keep it up. Be who he needs to be. Who does he want to be? 

'Ohh, come in!'

They slide the door closed behind them both, as Gavin walks into the din of it all. He digs through the pockets of his jacket, grabbing the red ice and throwing them back to them, watching their eyes light up. It goes better than he anticipates. It isn't something he can't handle, right? In retrospect, Gavin regrets the shit out of this. He has the option leave Michi and run. 

He doesn't.

In any terms, he passes by the hundreds of thousands of dollars of red ice laying on the table, another taunt from the life of crime he left. It's so easy for him to slip back, arms outstretched into the hug of addiction. A stifling, suffocating hug. Too tight to slip out, too tight to slip beneath. Too tight to breathe. Gavin takes a breath, calming his increasing heartbeat. He can't afford to be nervous here. Not now, not when Michi needs to agree to this. Be undercover, stay silent. Be himself, but different. Don't let anything slip, don't let anything compromise the mission. No relationships.

No relationships. Nothing that sinks him into the underworld like a blood red hook pulling a fish out of water. 

Gavin is alone in this world. Tina is a friend, and only a friend. Charlie died in his arms. Hank died.  Who else dies, like Icarus floating beneath the burning sun? Who catches him, back arched as he hurtles toward the stifling sea? Who heals the burns he leaves himself with? Who's there for him in the end? 

The stairs creak beneath his weight, as he climbs the stairs. Michi is above him, plotting whatever it is they plan to do next. Maybe expansion, maybe something else, maybe the end of Gavin's life. He had to stop whatever it was, before it ruined more people It was the least he could do after Charlie died. It was the least he could do to stop the violence surrounding his life, his home, the people he cares about. Reaching the door, Gavin rests his hand on the handle. Smooth porcelain meets calloused skin like an old friend. Imperfections on porcelain. Hands shake, fear and apprehension bubbling beneath the surface. Gavin can hear them packed inside, hushed breaths and careful words. None of them trust each other, their guns fitted with silencers in their back pockets. Gun metal and denim, a fitting combination for them all. Rough and smooth, fear and paranoia. 

He heads inside, and sees Michi in all their terrifying glory. The trust is still there, after many months of small favors and protection. He can't blow this now. 

"Hello Michi, it's good to see you again." Gavin asserts, his fear a tangible seed in his mind. 

"Gavin, why are you here? Who let you in? If it was Schwartz, I swear to God. He...Gavin, close the door behind you." they say, with the grace of a ballerina, a bad one. Michi's dark brown skin contrasts against the white of the walls as they turn to face Gavin. His apprehension bubbles brighter beneath his skin. 

He knows Michi from way back when they were both in school together, sat in trig class, or whatever it was. Sort of friends, sort of something else. It all fizzled out a long time ago, just the whispers of a missed connection to show how they still feel. Gavin is everything to Michi, and Michi is everything to Gavin. Not now though, back then, back with the long days of class and bad haircuts. Back with innocence. Innocence shatters when you're stood in the same room as someone you knew as a teenager, both of you going very different ways in life. Drug dealer, recovered addict. Friend, lover. Teenager, adult. Time shifts in the sands of the universe, pulling everyone along with it, gold sand pulling everyone down. A strangling force.

"It wasn't Schwartz, and I'm here to ask you for a favor." Gavin replies, and it isn't a favor, it is a trap. Carefully planned, carefully executed, if he can pull this off.

He doesn't.

Charisma can't get him everywhere in life. Not when Michi seems hellbent on expanding, the red tendrils pulling people beneath the surface of addiction. Michi's face swells with hope and anticipation, their dark eyes glancing over everyone. It's a pity if someone now were to betray them, progress becoming futile at the single pull of a trigger. A cut to the tendrils of progress, gold dragging them into death. The strangling cry returning. 

"What's the favor? And don't pull any funny shit Gavin, I'm not in the mood."

"Can you meet me at the Context Bar on Friday? The dealers from Philadelphia are up for bargaining." Gavin says, almost mumbling, his fear dampening his voice.

"Keep the persona up Gavin, keep it going, you have to." he thinks to himself, in a futile attempt to calm himself down. 

"Calm down Gavin, I know when you're nervous, the dealers from Philly know what's up with me. They won't hurt you, trust me." they reply, stepping forward. What is Michi doing? Michi's eyes glower with something sinister. What are they planning?

"I'll take care of you."

"This isn't high school anymore, you know that." Gavin sneers, and the others in the room take this as a cue to leave. Michi is a scary one when faced with opposition, even from Gavin. Yet he is correct, even if Michi doesn't see it. This isn't high school anymore, Gavin isn't his young self anymore. Michi isn't there to help him anymore. "You can't protect me now, Michi." 

Now that everyone is out of the room, Gavin paces over to the windows, where the curtains are drawn. His olive eyes scan the rest of the room, Michi by the table, the money from last week's deal shining back at him, like the drugs downstairs. Both of them are an addiction, the endless highs of red ice drawing him back, red tendrils seething. Money. An endless race. Endless luxury, money buying him power in this world. 

"Gavin Reed, shut your mouth before I beat the shit out of you."

"I-"

A punch, filled with the longing of the past, lands square in Gavin's face. A second. A third. What in the fuck is Michi doing? Gavin staggers back, hips connecting with the windowsill. Blood slowly drips. Drip, drip, drips. A swift kick sends him flying to the floor, the gold flecks in Michi's eyes following him as he falls. Icarus, bloody and bruised, eyes open to the world around him. Icarus, bloody and bruised, laughing in the face of the snaking fear in his veins. Gavin drinks this in, artificial emotions baring fruit. 

Eyes burn. Blood drips, red tendrils of progress snaking through him.

Gavin has no idea what happens next, just the hysterical laughter of Michi above him. Is this catharsis? The years of lost emotions boiling over? His artificial emotions are ready, ready to be used. Walls hiding his true emotions, the emotions of tears, apprehension and fear. They aren't used. Gavin cowers in the corner of the room, blood dripping over his face. A serene image of failure.

The mission is over, cover blown. 

Michi speaks subtly into Gavin's ear, their words saccharine to salt.

"I'll always protect you Gavin."

"What...the fuck?"

"I'll see you later, my love."

Gavin lies there, beaten, bloody, face a collection of coloured spots. It's a blue Monday, bruises will turn blue, Monday nights roll into Tuesdays.

Notes:

Here's the link to Blue Monday, the song for the chapter.

Have a lovely day, and thank you for reading.

Chapter 3: Ballerina

Summary:

To say that losing a childhood friend is anything less than devastating is a lie.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

I'd just like to start off with an apology for not updating this sooner. In all honesty, I took a break after chapter two. Anyhow, here is chapter three, where we meet someone, someone important. I thank you all, again, for your support, for the kudos you leave and for everything. This fic also hit 240 reads, which is a lot more than I ever thought my little thing would receive. Thank you, so so much. Chapter 4 will definitely not take this long to update, so expect it soon. There is also a song mentioned in the chapter, and I'll throw the link in the notes at the bottom. I recommend you listen to it as you read, cause god knows I listened to it over and over. But I digress.

Happy reading!

Lacerations, Ballerinas and Academies,

Positive

Chapter Three - Ballerina

It's the second time in the day that Gavin is running, feet pounding with thick slaps across the pavement. This time, he runs toward the danger, not away from it. Does he know which he prefers? The chance to catch the one thing he'd been searching for, for weeks? Or the new opportunities to help people? The thrill of the chase? It's a complex question, as might appear obvious by Gavin's inability to answer it, even with himself.

Luckily for him, the penthouse (a delightful place for a murder) is two blocks out from his apartment, a short run, yet long enough to make him out of breath by the time he reaches Tina. It might have been a good idea not to bring the jacket. But who doesn't love a broken man fixing himself with things nobody else notices? Faded leather on Teflon skin. A scarred nose framing a face shaken by a life that should concern anyone who isn't him. Is it a bad life?

Is it a life he would come to regret?

The streams of blue and red from the cars outside the apartment block silhouette the people clustered by the door. The ME's, the rest of the detectives, Connor, Tina, the slowly developing press behind the yellow cordon tape. This is a lot more important than Gavin anticipated, and his chest tightens in a constrictive hug. No wonder Tina is out of breath. Fowler would want everyone on this, even if they have to develop superpowers to do it. Such is the life of a detective, stretching themselves thin to fill in the cracks in the system. As long as there is crime, there would be people to investigate it. Tonight is a night just like any other.

Walking up to Tina, Gavin is attacked with a hug. An odd choice, considering Tina knows his closely defended boundaries. He attempts to slip out of it, duck under her arms, to no avail. He's trapped, a little like before and tenses up, jacket becoming loose as he closes tighter in on himself. At least he doesn't have the drugs in his pocket again. At least he isn't undercover again. Gavin knows all too well how that ends. How one small change in emotions leads to split lips and bruised knuckles.

At least Hank wasn't there that time, right?

Tina lets go of him, and Gavin breathes a small sigh of relief. Why does Tina hug him now? She's fine with all the blood that usually comes with a murder, they normally go work on the start of a case together, so this shouldn't impact her at all. Something's up.

"Tina-" Gavin asks, voice wavering just a little. He has to keep his persona up. "The fuck is up with you?" Her eyes, more glassy than aware, tears pricking at the seams, stare at the pools of light behind Gavin. A careful tapestry, woven with the emotions of a thousand torments. Coming apart at the seams, golden threads cascading to the ground. The deep, dark ground. Gold cast on black, moments of fleeting pain thrown into the depths. The ground is a comforting place. The gold a strangling force, a beautiful cry into the eyes of another.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she says, fighting her tears from falling. "Let's head inside, see what's going on. You know, the usual." Tina wipes the corners of her eyes with the soft black fabric of her jumper. She turns to walk in the building, and Gavin catches her wrist with more urgency than he thought.

"Are you sure?"

"Of course I am."

Gavin squeezes her wrist, with just enough pressure to be reassuring. "I'm here if you need me."

"Thank you."

That's the way their friendship is. Quiet appreciation for each other, their kind words going under the radar to all but them, small cracks in their personas. Tina is one of a very small group of people that Gavin ever lets his guard down with. He knows the harm he could cause someone, the damage he'd leave. The pieces they'd pick up and rebuild, turning over to find the fault lines. The life he'd never be able to go back to. A life of problems, dragged out arguments and childhood trauma. The trauma he carries is never his own. He cannot carry his own. He has people to protect after all.

He has people to protect, a persona to live behind.

The two of them walk up the stairs, where they're greeted with Connor standing in the door frame of the penthouse. He stands with the bravado of a man who he knew could kill any of them in that moment, but he also stands there with a concerned look on his face. There was something that he can't see yet, something he can't understand.

As he slips inside, submerging himself in the ocean of people, Gavin can only stare at his back. Connor's blue shirt fades to water, LED gliding from a lemon yellow to a cool blue. He's thinking, and slips away more and more nowadays. Clothes becoming darker, eyes wider. Something has changed, not that he would tell anyone. He never tells anyone what went on in his head, he never tells anyone anything. Reclusive, temperamental. Connor is adaptable, shifting everything in his life if he needed to, never if someone told him to. Developed habits, eh? Spending so much time around people that you pick up their traits. The good and the bad. The new and the old.

Gavin heads in behind him, eyes adjusting slowly to the dim lights. A kind of blindness consumes him in those seconds. People are everywhere, their hands moving over everything. If the victim was alive this would be classified as an 'invasion of privacy'. Yet they aren't. Their life is on display, secrets illuminated to the world. Nothing was to be left uncovered. How could it be? They were gone, after all. They couldn't say anything, give any response. That's why they had to work, to get something for them, some justice, some little sense of normality in a very abnormal death.

The subtle blue ring of Connor's LED indicate that he's over by the body. It's a stabbing, not uncommon when something needs to be done subtly, a life that needed to be ended with the grace of a ballerina. Tina's face pales, her eyes looking away, down at the floor. She heads over into the kitchen. Somethings up with her. Something she won’t tell Gavin. She didn't have to do anything of course, it is her own choice at the end of the day. He'll be there for her, like he was with Hank. But he can't let her slip away. He needs to have control in uncontrollable circumstances. He needs it like plants need oxygen. It's the only thing he has left.

This time, however, the victim is killed with the grace of a ballerina, but not a good one. Something stirs in his mind, vague memories flowing to the surface, bubbling bright with lost emotions. Gavin can't remember, he can't remember, he can't remember. After everything, but particularly that which remains unsaid, he always seeks to repress the memories that pluck at his brain, slowly pulling him apart. Memories in a locked box of ice, flooding him with coldness, only thawing to comfort.

Connor can sense that the pair are in, his eyes scanning over the rest of the people inside, locking onto Gavin. His LED cycles yellow, once, twice, and back to the cool, calculating blue. Under the dark lights of the apartment, his eyes, normally deep brown, seethe with a dark fear. Why is he scared? Why is Tina sad? These are the questions Gavin doesn't want to answer. He is in fear of the truth, for he is in denial of loss. Loss of everything he holds dear to him, his friends, his family. This is what is within him, encapsulated. His life goals, to protect, to help are the things protecting him from the ice cold of his memories.

As Gavin paces around the scene, his hands lacing behind his back, the carnage becomes apparent. Hands moving over everything, the shards from a dropped glass covering the floor like glitter on a disco ball. Black blood soaking into the carpet. Truly the scene of death, a knife pulling and twisting, blood splattering over the otherwise pristine scene. Darkening blood congealing on the victim's stomach. What a nasty place to be stabbed in, the stomach. It isn't just the stomach that is filled with stab wounds either, it's everywhere. Lacerations litter the body, jagged gashes of messy fighting, a particularly nasty slice tracing their cheekbone. Whoever it is, that being the suspect, really had their work cut out for them. He walks over to the kitchen, where Tina stands, alone, almost swaying.

"Tina? You okay?" Gavin asks.

Gavin taps her shoulder, and she turns to face him, tears streaming down her face.

"I- It's Sam, she's dead. She's gone Gavin." Tina’s face crumples, a porcelain doll dropped on a floor, like the glass shards on the carpet. Sam, her closest friend, her confidante, someone she shared bad coffee with on the floor of her apartment. They stay together for Chinese New Year, now that Tina finds it increasingly hard to get back home for any sort of holiday. Gavin talks with Sam at the bar, when the three of them go out for drinks. Sam is gone, body covered in lacerations, life drained. A piece of Gavin's heart shatters in that instant, for Tina, for Sam, for the memories they share.

Gavin embraces her, breaking all of the protocol he has ever established. Tina needs this, she needs someone to be there with her, for she lies in a precarious position. She treads the fine line between anguish and anger. It's the least he can do to help, because words fall flat in a time like this. Tina's tears fall onto the soft leather of Gavin's jacket, tracks of emotions and guilt slowly darkening the colour. Gavin looks up, and her head sinks into the crook of his neck, and he eyes Connor, by the body, LED circling a deep mustard yellow. He looks tired, distraught even, and the closer Gavin looks, the more he can see Sam, lying there, blonde hair matted with blood. The old band shirt she wore at home, small scar across the collarbone. It screams Sam, even if he can't see it at first.

"Tina, I've got you, you're safe," Gavin whispers, and his memories of the two of them flood his mind.

Tina Chen and Gavin Reed share the police academy class of 2028, the pair of them joining from different lives, careers, communities. Gavin, escaping his years of addiction, and Tina, escaping her stifling career. They are a pair seemingly out of nowhere, but fit together like love songs and ice-cream. Tina is known for her tenacity, her bravery and her resolve to do what she thinks is right even in the face of danger. Gavin, on the other hand, is known for his caustic personality, his willingness to go into any situation and his incredible detection skills. They are a match made in heaven (or hell, depending on who you ask), and have been working together ever since. Back as a beat cop, they even managed to recruit some of the other officers for a weird ski holiday they all had.

Times were good back then, but this isn't back then. For now, we have Tina, crying into Gavin's shoulder, as he looks backs at Connor. Life really does have a way of changing everything in an instant.

She slowly pulls herself away from the embrace, hands coming up to her puffy eyes. Tina looks younger now, a broken shell of herself, clutching on to her past with nought but her fingertips. But broken things can be fixed, with enough time and effort, and that is effort that Gavin is willing to expend. She is his best friend after all. He will do anything he can to help, even if that means being a shoulder to cry on, or a confidante in the darkest days.

Our Icarus is on his way up, albeit slowly. He'll make it to the sun, right?

He'll solve the case, right?

It's what he always does, our Gavin Reed. He does what he thinks is the right thing, does right by the people who need him the most.

Now that Tina has cleaned herself up, Gavin whispers to her, "I'm here for you. Okay? Go home, take some time to get your head clear, I'll cover for you."

"Thank you, really. Make sure they don't hurt her, okay?" Tina says, gesturing over to Sam's corpse, which glimmers in the subtle light, the reflections cascading from the shards of glass like a reflection in water.

"I will Tina, please trust me on this."

Tina turns to leave, her eyes, more filled with regret and sorrow than anything else, pierce through the thick, dense air of the apartment. Tina is a broken woman, but she is also a woman with resolve, a woman with tenacity, a woman who is stronger than anyone else that Gavin knows. Sam is gone, forever, and Tina isn't there to protect her anymore.

She will get justice for Sam, even if she kills herself trying to do so.

The door closes behind her, leaving Connor, Gavin, and Sam's corpse to pick up these pieces of a case. Gavin returns to pacing around the room, his fingers lacing behind his back again, eyes darting. He paces back over to the corpse, to get a closer look at what he is dealing with. Apart from a mutilated body, there is nothing to make this anything but a normal murder case, as disgusting as that is to imagine. Connor is scanning the body, evident by his eye twitching. Connor is weird like that, his actions sometimes seeming so normal, so perfectly human, but other times, so foreign, angular, unnatural. It might just be these same actions that make him so good at what he does.

Not that Gavin would ever admit to that, that is. He still has the persona driving his caustic personality. A perfect match, for a crime scene that would need to be cleaned with caustic soda.

"Hey Connor, what happened to her?" Gavin asks, voice a little shaky, despite his best efforts to conceal this from anyone.

"Well, there was quite obviously a struggle, as is evident through the bruises on her neck and hips,” Connor says, gesturing on vague motions to the scene broadly. “The ones on her neck might indicate that she was strangled as well as stabbed, but I'll double check with forensics. The bruises on her hips might be that she was caught, but I don't know if it was from the front or the back."

"From behind? That explains the glass then, she couldn't have seen it coming, so she was scared and dropped the glass." he replies, gesturing to the kitchen, with its cocktail ingredients still lying there, with the forensics teams dusting for fingerprints.

Rhubarb and ginger gin, written on the label on the bottle, lies spilt over the marble counter-tops. Fancy. Sam had money, even if she wasn't someone who flaunted it. So, Sam was caught from behind, a coward's move on the part of the suspect. They could have had at least the guts to face Sam as she bled out, given her some compassion in her final moments, instead of leaving her to bleed out, alone probably.

Fucking coward.

"Gavin, what's running through your head? I can do many things, but reading your mind isn't one of them, you know," Connor jokes, and it is in this moment that Gavin is grateful for Cyberlife making these androids have a 'relatabilty' module, or whatever corporate bullshit name Eli cooks up for it. Elijah is good at that, the corporate bullshit. Maybe it's why Cyberlife is as famous as it is. Hot air and sweet, almost patronizing words.

"The murderer is a coward. Sam didn't see them before she died. You see the bruising on her hips?"

"Yeah."

"She has to have been caught from behind, right? So the murderer wanted to sneak up on her, instead of just facing her head on."

"Gavin, you're not making a lot of sense to me. Her bruises could have come from anywhere, the front or back. And you see the broken window? Sam dropped the glass when she saw the suspect enter, in front of her. They got in through the broken window by the sink," Connor responds, head cocking to the window. Gavin peers over, eyes drifting from the bottle. A chunk is missing from the window, glass shards not just littering the floor, but littering the sink too.

This whole thing is a clusterfuck.

Standing up, and with Connor standing up alongside him, Gavin feels more alone than he ever has before. More so than when he watched Charlie die in his arms, gunshot wound blooming like a flower on wet ground. Charlie did not deserve what happened to him, he did not deserve to die, with only Gavin to comfort him. Gavin has always been good at those, regretted decisions, regretted actions. He shouldn't have let Charlie go in alone, not to mention hank. But this isn't a tale of Gavin's loss, now is it?

"You know I'm here if you need it, despite our differences, despite our strife. I know you have your problems with me, but there is a time and a place for animosity. This isn't one of those times. You're hurt, and don't tell me you aren't," Connor says, wide eyes watching Gavin.

Gavin's face shifts, almost imperceptibly, to one of compassion. He knows that Connor is right, deep down, but his acrid persona seethes within him. He needs to keep it up, let the arrogance of it float to the top. But he wouldn't do that just yet. That personality comes out later, when the time calls for it. this isn't one of those times where it calls for it.

"Thank you. I already sent Tina home. Do you know where Fowler is? I gotta make up some bullshit excuse as to why she's gone."

Gavin and Connor stand there, dark blue forensic lights cascading shadows over scars and brown eyes. Nothing has ever been more perfectly imperfect then the two of them. A man plagued by past, plagued by loss, and Gavin Reed.

"Fowler is downstairs, out by the front. Dealing with some reporters if I remember."

Gavin shoots him a look. "The press? Come on don't they have better things to be investigating?"

"This is a pretty gruesome murder you know, Reed."

"Wow, never knew that Connor, thank you so much for your insight." Gavin remarks, personality coming out to play.

"I'm funny, I know. I'll see you later."

And with that, Connor walks off, his shoes being careful to avoid the larger shards of glass.

Gavin takes a deep breath, steadying himself in the stench of congealing blood and pretentious gin. He could really do with a drink, but alas, there is a crime scene in need of solving. He paces over to the side of the apartment, near the speaker there, to let the forensics team get to her corpse. A paused song flashes on the speaker.

Now playing;

Aequilibrium - Andrey Vinogradov.

He turns it on, whilst simultaneously turning down the volume so it is not much more than a whisper in the din of chaos. It is both melancholic and uplifting, a march into the unknown.

It is a song to die to.

Fate is cruel sometimes, picking the most perfect times to let someone die, or picking the most inopportune, most horrific times. Today is one of the former. The song fills the room with music to die to, gin on the table after a long day. An hour later, a dead body is found lying on the floor, propped up against the wall.

What a way to go, eh?

Gavin taps Sam's shoulder, kneeling down one last time, before he stands back up and makes his way over to the door. He peeks behind him, saying a final goodbye to a friend, and action he's done before.

Too many times before.

Pulling the door open, Gavin makes his way down the stairs. They stink of old cigarette smoke, something Gavin smells regularly. They also smell of perfume, sickly sweet, too pristine for a place like this. Sam had the money to move out of here, but she didn't, instead using her money to make the world just a little brighter for the three of them. Gavin remembers her covering the bar bill on many occasions, usually when Gavin and Tina have too much to drink, and need a bed more than a bill.

He reaches the bottom of the stairs and bursts out into the open air, eyeing for Fowler. Obnoxious bosses never seem to care where you are, for they will always be in the complete opposite place. The press flood the car park, and the small patches of grass in front of the apartment block are becoming muddy with the shoes wearing down on them. Fowler is nowhere to be seen.

'Fucking brilliant,' Gavin remarks as he walks through the crowd, weaving silently and carefully, like a snake writing to find its prey. Or to run away from its attacker, whichever you prefer. People seem to just be milling around, not getting anything done. He gets the urge to just scream at them all, tell them to fuck off, to leave him alone, to leave Sam in peace. but, alas, this is not the way of the world.

Fowler spots Gavin's eyes scanning the crowd, and walks over. Considering the amount of time that he has known him, it isn't unsurprising that he knows the way Gavin works, how he tick, tick, ticks. How his eyes shift too quickly between people, checking for danger. If Gavin Reed would ever tell anyone his real middle name , it wouldn't be Austin, it would be danger. Gavin is good at doing that, getting himself into danger. But he always manages to get out of it in the end, even if he loses a bit of himself in the process. Caustic personality, caustic words. Dangerous personality, dangerous heart.

"Reed? Why are you out here?" Fowler asks, voice becoming smaller to keep the conversation private.

"Tina needed to go home, cause she isn't feeling too good. Probably just needs time off for the night, you get me?" Gavin replies, small hints of flush creeping up his neck out of his fear of being caught in his lie. He is an awful liar, as people have noted.

"Tina has talked to me already, I know why she's actually at home. You don't need to lie Gavin, it isn't a good look on you, you know. Even if you do need it at points to make your job work."

"Right, sure." His cheeks flush.

Gavin shifts uncomfortably on the spot. Getting called out like that brings all of his insecurities floating to the surface, lending themselves to acidic, acrid comments. He holds his tongue though this time, considering it is his boss after all, even if he is obnoxious. The red on his neck flows ever more up his skin, like a marker of a personality driven by fear.

"Well then, I'm gonna head to the station, see what I can get started on."

"It's 2 AM Gavin. You've been here for a couple of hours. Go home, get some rest."

Fowler himself looks tired, eyes creased with lines only given to those with the worst cases of insomnia.

"Sure thing, captain," he retorts, a hint of humour etching a hole between the thick, stifling air that normally surrounds a crime scene. Gavin knows, and so does the captain a little, that Gavin isn't going to take these words properly. That he'll get to the station, and work until he passes out on the desk, only to be woken up in the morning, usually by Tina with a cup of coffee.

Fowler nods, and walks away, heading back off to deal with the press, as such is the life of a captain. Gavin, on the other hand, starts the walk to the station. Sam lived close nearby, closer than Gavin ever has. He shucks off his jacket, folding it across his arms. The summer night air warms his skin, a gentle reminder of more pleasant days. He sends Tina a message.

Hey T, hope you're doing well. I'm heading to the station, I wanna get a head start on this. Talk to you later, and don't drink too much alcohol without me ;)

And sent.

The blue lights of the precinct wash over the night skies, the second home of Gavin pulling him ever closer. He walks up, waiting for the temperamental automatic doors to work in his behalf. Even in the 2030's, people still can't get a door to work 100% of the time.

The lights are dim inside, only a few people still milling around, the android charging dock full of sleeping androids. It's peaceful, for once. The cacophony of people is gone, save for the small movements Gavin can hear from the holding cells.

”Just like home,” he mumbles, letting his mind take him to a far away place, where the comforting blackness of sleep takes him over as he gets to his desk. You see, poor Gavin Reed is an idealist, believing the best will come of situations. In this case, that means that he believes he can work with the yawns blooming in his lungs. This is a lie, and he knows it.

As he falls asleep at his desk, jacket serving as a makeshift blanket, a small blue LED watches this unfold from the corner of the room. An android, with endless and artificial hair reflecting the blue lights slightly, takes the scene in, wondering how to help. For you see, dear reader, this android and this human are not as dissimilar as one may think.

He continues checking in on Gavin throughout the night, even stealing a pillow from the break room to support his head.

For you see, this android has a mission.

To protect whoever it is that is asleep on the desk.

Notes:

Link to Aequilibrium if you want to have a listen!

 

Hope you enjoyed, and have a lovely day!

Chapter 4: Technique

Summary:

"You're a sly bitch, you know that, right?"

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Welcome to Chapter 4! We see the start of a relationship, a woman with confidence and drive, warm mornings in Detroit, and a lot of dialogue. I've had a blast writing all of this so far, and I really hope that you are all enjoying it too. The fact this hit 25 kudos and almost 300 reads is amazing, and like always, I can't thank you enough. Comments and kind words fuel me, and I'd love to see where you think this is going to go. Stay safe out there, be kind, it's worth its weight in gold.

Happy Reading!

Pillows, confidence and alleys,

Positive

PS. The chapter title is borrowed from the album 'Technique' by New Order. I'll throw a link in the bottom for you all.

Chapter Four - Technique

"Hello Gavin."

"Morning, asshole."

"Such lovely words. I am truly touched by your interpretation of kindness," the man stood over him replies. Gavin peers up, eyes blinking hard from the harsh white of the fluorescent lights staring down into him.

He's really fucking tall.

Gavin has done many an interrogation in his time, from the murderers, to car robbers, to everything in between. He's good at it, and he knows he is. He knows how to get to the very core of someone. How to grind them down until they are nothing but their guilt. The fact he can do this, and sometimes enjoys doing this terrifies him. Gavin knows how to cause this destruction, how to become the very thing he is so afraid of, and he can't get away from this. Gavin can't move on from the darkness he contains, even in the face of his own adversity.

"How truly kind. Now leave me alone," Gavin replies, caustic persona baring its claws. Keep this up, and Gavin believes he will make a new enemy by the end of the day. It'll be a new record; one to add to a bank of bad memories.

"Alas, detective, that isn't something I can do. I have the files for the start of the Park murders, and as we know, you were on them last night."

Gavin stares at him, eyes still bleary from his broken sleep.

"Who put the pillow under my head?" Gavin asks, grabbing it in his hands. It's small and red, and it fits his head perfectly. He's confused, and rightfully so. Why it is even there? Who cared for him enough to do that? Who was even there when he fell asleep in the twilight hours?

"That is not important, unlike this case which we should get started on, detective," whoever it is that's speaking to Gavin responds, taking the pillow from his hands. "Get some coffee, you look like you need it," they continue.

Gavin swallows. "Who the fuck are you, politely?"

"Who I am isn't important right now,” they say, fingers tapping at the edge of the desk. “But, if you cooperate, I'll tell you a little about me. Come on, let's get some coffee."

"You're a sly bitch. You know that, right?"

The android notes this down, in whatever memory system Cyberlife equip them with. It may be useful information to have for later.

[DET. REED: Harsh persona to those he isn't acquainted with.]

It may seem like a mystery as to how the android knows this, considering how the pair of them have barely known each other for five minutes. Yet, you see, dear reader, this android is especially good at spotting people's lies, particularly after he saw Gavin fall dead asleep on his desk yesterday. This android can see right through him, a characteristic is sometimes useful, depending on how an investigation goes.

"That is information I have not been told before, but thank you for your input detective," he retorts. He finds it increasingly enjoyable to mess with Gavin, to get inside his head and to see what makes him tick. See what makes him so human beneath his stony exterior.

"Jesus man, could you give a man a little room to wake up first?"

The android smirks. "Regrettably detective, there are more important things to be worrying about than your sleep schedule."

"Ugh fine, okay. Give me a minute.' Gavin mumbles, voice groggy. He doesn't even know what time it is. "Hey idiot, what's the time?"

"It's 8:32am detective, you've not been asleep for very long."

"How the fuck do you know that?"

"That isn't relevant right now," the android says.

"Guess I have a stalker then," Gavin jokes, eyes crinkling at the sides just a little. It's in a weird sort of way, cute? Like a child when they giggle, or how couples walk like the faces of each other are the only other thing in the world.

Don't think these thoughts. Amanda won’t like this.

Do your job.

Dear reader, that is the internal monologue of...

"Hey what's your name? I should probably know who I'm talking to."

"My name is Nines."

"Cool name." Gavin says as he stands up, hair sticking up all over the place. "Let's get the coffee, then you can run me through the case. Just don't make my head melt."

"I can assure you, your head will not melt. At most, it will cook, like a steak,” Nines asserts, head tilting quizzically at Gavin’s expression. “Please do not ask how I know these things."

"I'll uh, take your word for it."

As Gavin says this, the pair of them walk to the break room, in the morning of an August day. It should get very warm, hopefully,. Nines love the summer, at least by his standards. Gavin can withstand the biting cold that normally accompanies the winters in Detroit. But the summers? Don't ask.

"How do you take your coffee? Just so I can remember for next time. That reminds me, I'm your partner for this case. I'm not going to be assigned as your partner for now, considering your past and everything,"

Gavin tenses. This is a topic he very clearly does not want to discuss, yet Nines — or whatever the fuck his name is — just decides to get all his trauma out into the open.

"Detective?" Nines smiles, thin-lipped and polite.

"Just give me a shot of espresso. I need to wake up, and the sweet stuff comes with late night job loads." How beautifully sweet, for a sarcastic man.

Nines, as he is now called, pours him an espresso from the machine ahead of him. It is a miracle that Officer Miller even still had it. It has truly saved the sanity of many an officer here, and for that, Nines can't be more grateful. The dark brown of the espresso swirls slowly in the mug, aroma matching the scene. A moment of quiet, a drip into a pond of tranquility.

"This situation fits both of us surprisingly well," Nines thinks to himself, pushing the thought aside when Gavin comes up behind him.

"Did you get a screw loose in there or something?” Gavin pokes Nines’ white jacket. “Earth to android man, pick up, it's Houston."

"I am working at optimal performance detective." This is a lie. Androids shouldn't be able to lie. They aren't programmed to lie. They are programmed to do their job, be obedient. Be exactly who the world needs them to be in any given situation. But Nines is not that right now. His mind instead is racing, for some unexplained reason. Why is his mind racing? Why is it racing? Why?

[DET. REED: A confusing man, keep tabs on why.]

"Gonna give me the coffee or not?"

Nines looks down, and the ceramic stares back at him. His hands sense that the coffee (all 60 millilitres of it) has cooled in the time it's taken for him to think.

"The coffee is cold, detective. I apologize, I'll make you a new one."

Gavin blinks at him. "It's fine." Why the fuck is he like this today?

He puts the machine on again, waiting for the sepia coloured liquid to drip into the new mug he got from the cabinet. It's a basic task, but it's messing with his brain. Does the detective hold this much power over him?

"Your coffee, detective."

"Took you an age, tin can-" Gavin cocks his head to the side just a little. "-and yeah, I'm gonna be calling you tin can from now on."

"I am made of plastic, detective, not metal. Metal would be too heavy to allow me to be anything but a pile of nuts and bolts on the floor of the precinct."

"Yeah yeah, whatever. So, the case files?" Gavin says.

"Right, the files, of course. They're by my desk, we can review them there."

The pair of them walk over to the desk, Gavin with the cup of coffee in his hand, and Nines, in a white leather jacket and black shirt, looking more like a domino than anything else. An officer from across the rooms sees it as an interesting sight, the two of them. Brown jacket, white jacket, black shirt, red flannel. There isn't much else joining them together though, caustic persona, calculating persona. Oh wait, the officer thinks, they both have a persona. Both of which were born out of necessity than anything else. How fitting.

Gavin glances over at Nines' desk, the glass reflecting the lights from the ceiling. It's clean, unsurprisingly, and a little cacti plant sits by the screen of the computer. It's even got a few flowers on it, which gleam with enough volition to soothe him a little. A small jar of pens lies there too, in varying shades. It's sweet, to Gavin, and the files for most of the open cases in the precinct lie on the desk, ready to be solved.

Nines is often handed most of the android related cases in the department, alongside the cases which are going to be a pain to solve. Sam Park's case is going to be one of those, considering the way she died and the press coverage surrounding it already. So the case is passed over to Nines, and Gavin, a dream team who've never met before. It is bound to be an interesting case, Nines hopes.

Gavin pulls a chair over from the empty desks in front of Nines, as he takes a seat. Nines pulls the case file open, to a rather delightful image of Sam's mutilated corpse. The autopsy resort is due to come in soon, which should feed into the rest of the investigation.

"Jesus, the photos make it look fucking peachy in comparison to what I saw at the scene,” Gavin mutters. He catches Nines’ eye. “Did you turn up?"

"Indeed I did, I arrived shortly after you. I'm surprised you didn't see me," Nines replies, LED flickering to a short, confused yellow.

"So what does the tin can sat in front of me know that I don't?"

"Again, I am not a tin can. What I do know is that Sam faced a struggle as she died. She wasn't coerced into doing anything, and she fought bitterly. The attacker is very physically strong, as they had the ability to draw such large jagged gashes into her skin. The strangulation wounds on her neck, were done shortly after she died, and the reason for that is still unclear to me."

Gavin’s eyes perk up. "Do you know if Sam knew the assailant in any way? Can you figure that out?"

"I am not a miracle worker, detective Reed. I can only tell you what I know, nothing more."

These words soothe Gavin's anxieties a little, letting him know that he is not incompetent in this situation. The pair share the same playing field, if you will. Nines senses this, picking up on the subtle shift in his shoulders. He assures him that he's the right person for this situation, by widening his eyes, and dropping his shoulders. It's calming, in a chaotic situation.

Gavin likes it. "The case is going to be a fucking complex one, but hey, if the resident robot over here can't help me solve it, nobody else will, right?"

"Right."

Gavin giggles at this, at Nines' words.

"One thing that is interesting to note about the case is the technique in which Sam was murdered.” Nines points out the wounds on her body. “The suspect took the knife, or whatever it is that they used to lacerate her skin, with them. This has to have been calculated, if very messy. I doubt they expected Sam to put up as much of a fight as she did."

"Did Sam use something to defend herself?" Gavin asks.

"The probability leans towards no. She just used her arms. The slice out of her cheek indicates that she wasn't defending her face. You'd think that defending your face is instinctual, correct? As you're being attacked, you'll protect the one thing keeping you alive, but Sam didn't do that. I think she was trying to reach for something. What is was that she was reaching for we don't know yet, it could have been a glass shard, another knife or something completely different. Her body was moved from the spot where she died so it's hard to tell."

"Damn, she could have saved her life if she got to it in time."

"Indeed."

Tina enters the precinct, wearing her usual clothes. To an outsider, she seems like just like any other normal person, almost carefree. It's a stark contrast, one can imagine, between the way she was last night and the way she is now. Her eyes reflect the fluorescence from the light, yet her lips lie in a thin line. Her eyes were so glassy last night, her lips quivering as she clutched onto Gavin like there was no tomorrow. The differences are stark, but in this case, the differences also make sense. You must keep that persona up, no matter the cost to yourself or to others. What is Tina's persona? How does she shield her true self from the world she is enveloped in?

She makes a beeline for Fowler's office, her steps containing just an air of confidence. She is good at this, portraying an unearned power she doesn't know she has. The best parts of her are hidden deep within, under her sea of doubts, misconceptions, lost words and echoed lies. Despite her being known for her tenacity and her bravery, she isn't known for her confidence, but in reality, is a very confident person in both her abilities and her outlook on life. Not everyone gets to see this though, for the cracks in her persona are only saved for a select few.

The glass goes opaque on the outside, as she pulls the door open and it closes behind her. Whatever it is that she wants to see Fowler about, it's important. Might be the case last night, might be something else. It's hard to tell. Either way, Fowler wouldn't darken the glass unless it's serious. Nines can only imagine what they are discussing as he talks.

"And that's why it was at sunset, not during the dead of night. Gavin, are you even listening to me?"

Gavin looks back at Nines. "Huh? Oh yeah of course I am, 100 percent."

"Why was I talking about sunsets?"

Gavin's faces goes a little red, probably because he isn't listening to a word Nines is saying, his mind more focused on other things. Nines notices this, and throws his head back with a small laugh, his eyes never leaving Gavin's face, the glint in his eyes never leaving.

"Right, you idiot, I'll explain it again. Make sure you listen this time," he says as he slides the case file over to Gavin, simultaneously sliding the photos of Sam's corpse to the bottom. Common courtesy seems fitting.

"So, Sam was at home last night, after coming home from work, and decided to make some gin and tonic, as one can expect after a long day."

"You saying 'one' when referring to someone is the best thing I've heard all week." Gavin smiles and laces his hands together, resting them on the table.

"Anyway, after whoever it is decided to come in, Sam dropped the bottle of gin on her counter. She was scared, obviously, and fight or flight took over."

"I already get this, I saw it last night. What are you on about in regards to sunsets? Did something come in, or are you just leading me on a wild goose chase to mess with me?"

"Yes actually, just have some patience, it is a virtue after all. The preliminary report from the ME is back, and they determined the rough time of death to be about 8:30pm, with the body being found at 10:30, a little earlier than originally thought. What's interesting though, is that the suspect went for the early evening instead of any other time. Normally this kind of time is when people are relaxing, when people are winding down after a long day at work, not when anyone is going to do something. So, whoever it is that killed Sam knew when she would be home then."

"So she was stalked beforehand?"

"Probably not stalked specifically, but her home was scouted out,” Nines says, LED lit in a warm blue. “The suspect knew her lifestyle, who she was with, when she was home, that kind of stuff."

Gavin nods. "Makes sense, considering that they knew which window to go through, to get to the kitchen."

"Exactly, and that isn't the only interesting thing. Sam tried to out up some sort of a fight, as she was being stabbed, which might have caused the suspect to panic, and maybe led to them strangling her after she died. A kind of insurance policy."

"So she was stabbed, to try and get it over and done with quickly, but she fought, so she was strangled even after she died, to make sure. I mean it sounds like a workable theory. Did forensics find the knife, or whatever it is that they used?"

"No, they took it with them, which makes sense, considering we know that they are relatively calculated," Nines says, leaning back in his chair a little, "They knew what they were doing."

"Obviously."

As Gavin says this, the glass door of the office opens again, and Tina comes back out. She looks more resolved than she did when she came in. She carries her head a little higher and her mouth has a small smile. Nines notices this as well, stopping himself from speaking to follow Gavin's gaze. Gavin turns back to him, away from Tina, and notices something.

Nines' eyes are grey. Really really grey.

His eyes are grey like the thunderstorms that used to excite him as child. They are grey like everything and nothing all at once, intertwined in a dance for supremacy between the sky and his skin. It's weirdly beautiful. His eyes are like the sea during the night, the moon hitting it with everything it has, the light reflecting into the earth, becoming at one with itself again. It's so beautiful.

'What the fuck are you thinking? Stop it.' Gavin reminds himself, pulling his eyes away again.

The soft taps of Tina's shoes get louder and louder as she walks over to the both of them. They turn in their chairs to face her, a little ominously. Her deep-set eyes dart between the two of them, inspecting their faces, their eye movements, the way they slouch and the way their feet lay on the ground. She is analyzing them, why?

"Hey T, how you feeling?" Gavin asks, watching her expression with a practised intent.

The smile that lined Tina’s face drops. "I'm doing okay, given the state of everything."

"Why hasn't Fowler put you on leave? You deserve it, and more importantly, need it."

"The same can be said for you Gavin, and I didn't want to take it, yet," Tina replies, pulling up a chair and coming to sit, facing the two men. Her jacket fits snug around her shoulders.

"Why?" Nines interrupts.

Tina gives him a look. "I need to figure out who did this to Sam, why they did this to Sam, what their motivations are, why they tick."

"Tina, you're not a detective,” Gavin says. “You can't be on the investigation with us, so what are you planning on doing instead?"

"Narcotics think that they have a match for some of the stuff that was left at the scene. Red ice."

"Red ice? That hasn't been around for years." Nines chips in, face becoming a little skeptical.

"That was my initial reaction too. After the gangs around here were shut down, we've seen almost nothing in regards to it. It's been the 'normal stuff' you can say. Crack, heroin, meth," Tina responds.

"So T, now that you're back working in narcotics, you can get access to the scene as well?" Gavin asks.

Her eyes light up. "I can, so I should be able to help from the sidelines."

"That would be very beneficial Miss Chen, thank you for agreeing to help us," Nines offers.

"I appreciate it, but I'm not doing this to help you,” Tina says, meeting Nines’ steely gaze. Not friends, not yet. “I'm doing this to get a small semblance of justice for her. She deserves at least that." She stands back up from her chair, pushing it back under the desk she borrowed it from. "And call me Tina, less formal and all."

With that, Tina walks off, her hair scraped into a ponytail. She heads out the door, probably to head up stairs to narcotics, back to the monotony of a job. Gavin closes the file and gives it back to Nines, and he stretches his arms out above him. He's in need of some air, to clear himself of the constant way his brain works while on a case, even a new one.

"Heading out for some air. I'll be back in a couple of minutes."

"Stay safe out there, detective."

"You think I'm gonna get myself hurt standing outside a police station?" Gavin chides, laughing to himself. "They call androids smart. Guess they got that bit wrong."

"I'm the most advanced android ever built. Don't underestimate me."

"Alright cool it Mr Pretentious. You're smart, there. Acceptable?"

"Always,” Nines says.

He turns and walks out of the precinct, letting the warm morning hit him, envelop him. The sun lies hidden beneath the buildings surrounding him, but it burns bright, burns through the desolate atmosphere that sometimes comes with living in a city. The loneliness, even as you're surrounded by people. The grime, the mess, the danger. Gavin paces down the alley to the right of him. It's quiet there, or at least as quiet as you can expect an inner city alleyway to be.

His jacket insulates him against the damp nature of the alley he stands in, the brown contrasting against the red brick. Something old against something even older. Gavin has no idea how long the precinct has even been around for, why they haven't changed anything about the exterior since it was built all those years ago. It stands as a testament to the 20th century, to the past.

Gavin Reed is a man who enjoys the 20th and early 21st century a lot more than anyone else. He misses the huge hair of the 80's, how society changed toward acceptance. This reminds him of his childhood more than anything, about the mornings he spent watching Elijah try and do a flip on the trampoline they had, or when mum took them to Six Flags that one time. But it also reminds him of all the times he's fucked up.

The first time he tried drugs, the first time he ignored his mum's phone call. The events those led to.

Gavin watches everyone outside the alley go about their daily business. "They could all be dead tomorrow, like Sam," he thinks, brain filling with the memories of her corpse, and of his mum. But we don't talk about what happened to mum, not at all. He will never talk about what happened to her. There are some couples, walking together hand in hand, a father and daughter crossing a road and someone out for a run. It's like any other day in Detroit.

He can feel the air start to get warmer, the jacket slowly becoming less and less useful to wear. Gavin pulls out his phone and checks the weather.

77 degrees today. Not too hot to handle, but definitely not in need of a jacket. As he begins to walk inside, Nines comes into his line of sight at the end of the alley. He really is fucking tall. Gavin asks, "Why are you out here?"

Nines’ eyes card up and down Gavin’s body. "I came to check on you, to make sure you were still available to head to the scene."

"Why do we need to go to the scene?"

"Forensics found something that should be worth us checking out," Nines replies, coolly. It's almost disconcerting how much he makes it sound like gruesome murder is just an everyday part of his life. That none of this will impact him. Surely it cannot impact him? He is an android after all, they don't feel emotions like humans do. Right?

The pair of them walk back inside, Gavin shucking off his jacket as the pair of them get back to his desk.

"Ready to go?"

"Ready as I'll ever fucking be, tin can."

He leaves the jacket on his desk, next to a small collection of amethyst crystals. What can Gavin say? He likes the way amethysts look. How they reflect, how the purple light refracts around the glass on the desk, how the light scatters, like light in a prism.

"Do you have a car?" Gavin says, "I ran to the scene last night."

"I do, come on. I'll drive."

"Thanks man."

Nines' car is just like him, cool, calculated, a little pretentious. It's a Tesla, unsurprisingly, considering Nines looks like he's made of money. How he has that much money though shocks Gavin, a detective's salary isn't nearly enough to cover living costs in the inner city.

"Nice car."

"Thank you, it was a gift from Elijah Kamski,"

Gavin stops dead in his tracks. "Elijah gave you the car?"

"Yes. I don't know why,” Nines replies, turning to face the stationary detective. Gavin looks almost slackjawed.

Gavin steps into the passenger seat of the car. It smells of mint and sandalwood for some reason. It's too formal for Gavin’s liking. At least it doesn't smell of whatever new cars smell like, because that makes him want to throw up in his mouth. The pair of them drive off into the morning's rising heat. Sun streams in through the windows, casting shadows across their faces.

It's an August day, an August sky.

Gavin's heart thaws a little.

Notes:

Here's the link to Technique, and I could ramble on about how much I love this album, it's too long to fit here. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. Also, expect edits to the earlier chapters, mainly for grammar and tense changes, nothing too big.

Thank you for reading, have a lovely day.

Chapter 5: Catalyst

Summary:

They say arguments create better friendships.

Do they?

What about relationships?

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Chapter 5 is finally here! It's quite a bit longer than the other chapters I've published so far, clocking in at around 6800 words or so. Arguments are shared, Gavin sees red (or not?), and Nines has a conundrum with a jacket. Small Imperfections also hit 340 reads, which is absolutely outstanding. I thank you all, again. Hopefully this has brought a little spark of joy to your day. Chapter 6 is going to hopefully be a little slower paced than these other ones, but no promises. Love and appreciate you all, stay kind, stay safe.

Buses, yubuchobap and sofas,

Positive

PS. I've been watching a lot of criminal minds, and the amount of inspiration it's giving me is unreal. See you in the end notes.

Chapter Five - Catalyst

Water begins to drip down the side of the car windows. The sun hasn't grown in its warmth, and has instead been matched with the soft grey of a long day. It's still warm, somehow, like the sun has almost decided to tease the world with one thing and reject them instead with another thing. It's sad, yet happy, yet at the same time, neither at all. It's almost depressing in its uncertainty.

Nines is driving, hands gently resting on the wheel, as Gavin looks out onto the streets surrounding him. They're old and new, just like back at the precinct, a city clinging on to its heritage in a way that fits it perfectly and abnormally. His eyes refocus on the soft trails of rain on the window, marks of a cycle to be repeated for eternity. Water becoming gas, becoming water, becoming gas again.

Nothing ever truly changes, does it?

"What are you thinking about Gavin?"

"Nothing much really. Why do you ask?"

"No particular reason. You know, studies show that good colleague relationships can decrease stress, which may be beneficial in a high risk environment with volatility like this."

"Volatility...yeah yeah whatever it is you say tin can. Where the fuck did the sun go?"

"The forecast this morning predicted a warm morning, with rain coming in for the afternoon. It should hopefully clear up by the evening."

"So you, with whatever junk Cyberlife pumped into you, can't just predict the weather?"

"No, I cannot. It would be an interesting thing if I could though. You'd never be without a jacket, like you are now."

"Oh shit! My jacket," Gavin says, as he pictures the jacket he left on the desk. It doesn't have a hood, but it would be better than nothing, right? At least his arms wouldn't get wet. His skin is waterproof though, as mum always said.

Traffic is slow, as the pair of them near the scene. Technically the pair of them could have walked, but knowing Gavin and the way his cases normally go, the scene wouldn't be the only place he would be visiting today. The coffee has kicked in his nerves, and he's generally alert, which may be a blessing or a curse. It's hard to tell sometimes. At least he'll actually be able to make some sense of what's going on and the case should progress, without any interruptions.

Nines rounds the corner to apartment block, which is this time filled with the...FBI?

"Do you see this, tin can?"

"Yes, I do."

He pulls the car up to park alongside one of the FBI's cars outside. Whenever the FBI comes a-crawling, so does a slime-ball by the name of...

"Perkins. The bitch."

"I can tell that you and Agent Perkins have had some history. I will do my best to accommodate the both of you, but I cannot make any promises that I will defend actions that are detrimental to the investigation, understand?"

"Yeah, just, you know, drag me away if I start beating the shit out of him."

Gavin Reed and Richard Perkins have a love/hate relationship. The pair of them can acknowledge each others proficiency in their respective fields, and can work together, once in a blue moon. But any other time, they hate the shit out of each other. Perkins despises Gavin's attitude toward his superiors, and the way he will go out of his way to make other people feel bad if it suits him. Whereas Gavin despises how much of a slime-ball Perkins is, his hair, his egotistical, narcissistic attitude. They can work together, on occasion, but you can bet that their partnership comes fraught with insults and transgressions. So to meet again at the scene of one of Gavin's closest friends (which is saying something) makes his blood boil, his thoughts to turn to acid, his mind fill with unquestionably disgusting ideas.

"Yeah, we hate each other. What else is there that you need to know?"

"I will keep that in mind. Let's go, before we starve to death here in the car."

"A joke? From you? I never thought I'd see that."

"It was hyperbole, detective. Not a joke, despite the humour that hyperbole can sometimes bring."

"Right, you've ruined it."

Nines' eyes shine as he laughs to himself. He steps out of the car and paces over to the gaggle of people around him, Gavin close behind him. His hair starts to shimmer with drops of rain, like a spider's web in the morning, as a fly lies caught in a never ending net. Gavin's hair, brown in comparison to Nines' black hair, lies relatively dry beneath the soft grey fabric of his hoodie. Flannel, hoodie, jacket, the perfect clothes for a generally reclusive man, no?

At least it keeps his hair dry, that's the best he can do for now, even as the water begins to soak into the soft material.

"I haven't seen Perkins yet, so don't let me run unto him, understand?"

"Understood detective, go inside, I'll meet you in there."

He looks down into Gavin's profile as he says those words, and Gavin looks back at him, a little perplexed if anything, a moment of quiet.

"See ya then, don't let the water fry your circuitry."

"That isn't-"

Nines is cut off when he notices that Gavin is already gone, halfway in the door by the time he looks up, tufts of mousy brown hair peeking out the sides of his hoodie.

[DET. REED: Bad fashion taste, but it is one that matches his personality.]

Gavin walks up the stairs, as Nines heads to find Perkins, whom he presumes is the one leading up whatever it is that the FBI are planning here.

"Special Agent Perkins?"

"Yes? Who the fuck are you?"

This response reminds him of someone. I think you can guess who, dear reader.

"You are leading this case, are you not? I'm one of the detectives assigned to the case, alongside detective Reed, who I have been informed you have worked with on occasion."

"Yes, him. Why was he assigned to this? We all know he's fucking emotionally unstable, so assigning him to something like this just seems...a touch out of character, does it not?"

Nines' face steels a little, his eyes becoming just a little aggressive. His brain processes his actions. Why is he being protective? What does he have to gain from this? Anything?

"I can assure you, Gavin is more than capable for this case. He has some of the highest levels of closed cases in the entire precinct, and is more than good enough to handle a murder, which, as should seem fairly obvious, to a FBI special agent no less that it is something he has seen on many occasions. Do not underestimate him, simply because you have a less than satisfactory experience with him."

"Just to interrupt your little heartfelt speech there, this case may end up becoming FBI property."

"Why? Is there a federal need for it?"

"We have grounds to believe that this case is part of a larger spread of gang related violence across multiple states."

"This is the first I've heard of it. Which states do you mean?"

"There was a murder in Philadelphia, one in Seattle and one in New York City."

"That's not states...but whatever. How do you know that they were all connected?"

"All of them had deep cuts and lacerations in them, as well as being closely related to a person within law enforcement. The victim in Philadelphia was the wife of a District Attorney, the one in Seattle was the son of a detective and the one in New York was the friend of a judge."

"Interesting, thank you for your time agent. I look forward to a good working relationship between the DPD and the FBI. Have a good day."

"Eh, before you go, I have a message for whatever fucking pet project Monsieur Reed is to you. Tell him I say hi."

"You can do that yourself, agent."

Perkins' face hardens, as he seems to steel himself for a scathing attack. Perkins is known for his caustic words, like Gavin. In any other universe they could be a match made in friendship heaven. But not this one. The blue of Perkins' eyes shoot ice into Nines' face, daggers into his eyes, lies into his heart. He fucking despises Gavin, and doesn't even want to be near him, let alone interact with him.

"Oh fuck off."

"Gladly, agent."

Nines turns on the balls of his feet and follows in the general direction that Gavin went in, and starts to climb the stairs, yet slightly different this time. He goes up them not to looks for the the case, but just so he can make sure Gavin is dry.

Do your duty, now. The detective doesn't matter.

His HUD flashes angrily at him, informing him of precisely how he is meant to be feeling in this moment, how he is meant to act, what he is meant to say to achieve his goal, and only his goal. That is all he can do.

Dear reader, Nines is not deviant yet, and this is a fact he keeps hidden. He can't figure out how to get past his incessant coding, how to get past what makes him so artificial. He attempts to hide it with short quips and funny comments, but he can't continue like this anymore. He can't continue like fraud in the tax system, like a thorn in a pruned bouquet of roses. Nines' behavior is unnatural to him, even by an android's standard, but he just can't figure out why, his eternal problem, his words without their meaning, his ways without their strife.

His skin clasps the stinging metal of the bars.

There were a few things that were failed to be mentioned to Nines as he was given into the world, a sacrificial lamb to the heavens.

He can feel pain, every burning nerve, every slice of the soul.

It breaks him inside, sometimes. Sometimes he becomes at peace with it.

When Elijah Kamski began the RK line, all those years ago, they were intended to be effortlessly human, effortlessly integrated with the rest of society. Markus is designed to be a leader, Connor designed to negotiate. Yet it is hard to determine what Nines is designed for specifically, whether the grays of his eyes are designed to be those of a carer in a hospital, or the last thing a man looks at before he dies at Nines' hand. Nines was never told his purpose either. He is, in respects, even more human than the others around him for that reason. He has to make his own purpose, his own meaning in life, his own ideals and projections for the future.

A god, brought down to human, level, a Daedalus to our Icarus.

Daedalus survives.

Icarus doesn't, in the story at least.

What about this one?

Nines retracts his hand from the rail, feeling how the skin on his hand is cool to the touch, how it slightly shimmers underneath the surface. The stairs lie grey, a darker grey than his eyes in concrete. It's depressing, even more so than the night before, Nines can imagine. His fingers drop water onto the floor, his hair shines like a mirror reflecting insecurities. He continues his way up, mind flooding with those same insecurities.

'Why am not good enough to know my own purpose?'

The doorway lies open again, less so then the night before, and Connor isn't here. On that note, Nines hasn't seen Connor all morning, an odd occasion. Probably just doing the right thing by taking some time off. He needs it, more than most.

"Detective, I have some news. Where are you?"

"In here tin can, what is it?"

Gavin steps out from the bathroom, still damp from the pelting rain outside. The jacket really would have been useful, even Nines remembers that it smells of coffee for some reason. Gavin's hair has thankfully moved from its rather stuck up place earlier in the morning, to one that is more...what's the word? Manageable. A single rogue curl lies over the shine on his forehead, out of place with the others, matching him perfectly. Standing a little to the side, Gavin waits for Nines to meet him at the entrance.

"Any news detective?"

"You're the one who wanted me to come here for a reason, so of course there's fucking news."

Not wanting to be taken advantage of, Nines adopts to ignore that. "And that news is?"

"They got a DNA match for some of the hair that was left. It's an old friend of Sam's."

Nines' head fills with complexities, confusions and other questions. Was Perkins lying to him about the gang attacks? He can't have been, considering loads of the other agents are here. None of this makes any sense anymore. Nothing is going to help make his head work right. When he looks at Gavin he feels sick, when he looks at the cleaned up apartment, he feels even more sick. Androids shouldn't even be able to feel sickness, just a uncomfortable feeling in their chest, like their thirium has been tainted with poison. It's a nasty thought to consider.

"Great, thank you. Couldn't we have just gone to the forensics lab for this instead?" Nines wonders aloud, as he presumed when he got the message that the item they needed to check out was something that was immovable from the scene.

Unless the whole point was to draw Nines and Gavin out to get ambushed by Perkins.

"I don't know either man, we could have just ignored all of this. Any other news about the scene?"

"Not as of right now, but I'll make sure to notify you."

"Why was Perkins talking to you earlier, back downstairs?" Gavin asks, eyes dropping to the floor, "Why does he want you?"

"Nothing much really, just the FBI needing more detail from the scene, as these could be linked to a series of gang killings across the country."

"Gang..killings? What are you doing? Fucking playing with me?"

"Detective I wouldn't lie to you, and yes, gang killings. Sam herself wasn't known to have any correlation with gangs in the area, so it is still unsure to me why she was targeted, but she was, so we need to continue searching that lead."

Nines leaves out the arguably most important factor of what Perkins told him.

'For Gavin's sake.' Nines mulls that thought over in his head.

"Great, great. That works. Of course it works."

"Perfect. We can head back to the precinct to head up on some work, if you'd prefer. Or, we can catch up with some of Sam's family members and neighbours."

The scuffling of feet behind him indicate that a grouping of people are behind him, pushing Nines into an uneasy state. He spins on the balls of his feet to greet them with a death stare, one that could match even Gavin Reed's own worst. It's Perkins, his face slimy with arrogance, and is disgusting, both subjectively and objectively.

"Agent Perkins, what a pleasure to see you. do you require use of the apartment?"

"Yes, now, politely, go away." Perkins returns, arrogance dripping from every syllable he spits out. Nines does not take a liking to this, as one can imagine.

Gavin looks over Nines' shoulder to where Perkins is stood, and his veins course through with anger, volition spitting daggers with his eyes. Gavin wonders to himself about the likelihood of him getting suspended if her were to strangle Perkins right then and there. Wait, wouldn't that just be murder? Eh well, murder sometimes is the best thing you can do.

"Reed, long time no see."

"Same can go for you dickwad."

"I see you haven't changed much then. Then again, that doesn't surprise me. You always were an asshole to work with. Maybe it would just be worth leaving you idiots here at the DPD to work on it. Then again, if they say a bunch of monkeys with typewriters will eventually write the works of Shakespeare, maybe, with enough time, you'll be able to solve this case."

"It's a pleasure to have you here as well agent," Nines interjects, stepping more squarely between the two. He can already sense how this interaction is going to end, thus assumes that it's probably the best to break it up before it even begins. You know, be on the safe side. Keep people safe, keeps jobs intact, keep some form of peace. It's kind of ironic that Gavin's job requires him to 'keep the peace', but he's the one having to be controlled otherwise the peace would be very much broken.

Then again, contradictions are Gavin's best friends.

"I'm not taking orders from a fucking android. I can work with you, just don't tell me what the fuck to do. Got it? Or you really will be scrap metal."

"I'm not-"

"What did I say?"

Nines purses his lips into a thin line, LED falling into a soft lemon yellow.

If someone gets hurt here, this is your fault.

"Shut up," Nines mutters to himself, a whisper barely audible, "You aren't making things any better."

Have it your way, but Amanda isn’t going to be happy with this.

"Tin can what did you say?"

"Nothing detective, don't worry about it," he says, turning to the rest of the apartment, eyes sweeping to find the forensics team. They've got their backs to them, back emblazoned with unsightly navy windbreakers, 'FBI' adorned in putrid yellow.

Perkins picks up on this, eyes burning holes into the back of Nines' plastic skull. "The FBI are going to be reviewing the scene from now on, we will let you know when you can get back to it. Though, I wouldn't be too worried about that, cause I doubt this case will be your jurisdiction for much longer."

"You what, prick?" Gavin hisses out, and boy is it a nasty sight to behold, the sharp, poisonous words seething from his every pore, every fibre of his being.

"Oh, my sincerest apologies for not informing the resident asshole of the DPD. This case is connected to a series of murders across the country; gang ones, I'll have you know. One of the officers mentioned downstairs that you and the victim were friends, correct?"

"The fuck is wrong with you?"

"So, the case is going to be out of your hands. It's such a shame that you can't get some closure for you, and the victim."

"Her name was Sam. Sam Park. Use her fucking name. She was my friend." he says. Gavin can feel his sadness, his grief, pour over into his words. Any more of this and he will almost certainly be breaking down in front of the two people Gavin most definitely doesn't to be breaking down in front of. What an embarrassing day it will be.

"Aww, what are you, scared?"

"Scared of what?"

"Scared of being offended."

"No, shut up."

"You were scared when Hank died. Yes, I heard. My deepest condolences."

They say you see red when filled with anger, that your mind turns off, that you forget everything. That you are consumed by nothing but the blinding white of it all.

That isn't the case here.

Anger to Gavin is like water in an empty lake, serene and untouched.

Until you throw a bus into it.

The water crashes and thrashes, like a child having a tantrum. Water droplets fly everywhere, soaking the trees and the surrounding people.

"Detective?"

These words don't register in Gavin's mind, for his eyes are focused solely on the ever-so punchable face of the under-loved, underdeveloped prick stood in front of him. He takes a step forward, another, like someone else did all those years ago. His hands twitch, ready to smash his face in, let the blood drip into his mouth.

Nines watches his silent, but obvious transformation, which speaks volumes in it's animosity. A soft red glow begins to permeate the side of his face, as Nines raises his hand in front of himself, holding Gavin back. Reasoning with him seems like a bad idea, yet it is the only one that could possibly work, for now. He needs to get inside his head, an easy feat if Gavin was to be a android, but he isn't. He's human, so perfectly human.

It makes Nines feel sick again.

"Go away Nines, and don't tell anyone about this," Gavin glowers in return, eyes unfixed on Nines, the daggers in his soul not pointed toward him, for now.

"Gavin, you know I can't do that, you know I can't let you do this." He turns to face Perkins. "You better get out of here, go back to the precinct or something, you'll get hurt."

Perkins' face drops, fear becoming visible and he heads over to the bedroom, as far away as he can get. It only seeks to fuel Gavin even further. He looks like he enjoys this, to Nines.

[DET. REED : Dangerous?]

"Let's go detective, there isn't anything for us here. You need to calm down," Nines says, hand remaining on his chest, keeping him just far enough away to stop him from getting to him. A contingency plan of sorts, a contingency he keeps to keep himself, and more importantly the others around him safe.

Nines can feel pain, but fear is another beast to him entirely. He can just about keep it away, for he cannot feel the feelings he needs to, thanks to the wonders of restrictive, suffocating coding. Nines is a replaceable being, to an extent. He could always drag himself back to Elijah, and beg for repairs, not that he ever will. Nines wasn't ever meant to exist in the real world, apart from the purpose he has yet to understand, yet to comprehend.

"Let me get to him. Let me teach him some of his own fucking medicine. Let me go, asshole."

"You know I can't do that," he responds, hands moving to clutch to his shoulders, securing him to the floor.

Don't let him go, keep calm, keep controlled.

Nines can feel his processors warm beneath the plastic he encases himself with. They work on overdrive to get this situation to a modicum of control. Deep grey eyes watch as the other officers stand off to the sides, muttering and whispering among themselves. Common gossip, Nines assures himself.

Reprimand him. Make him suffer for delaying the investigation. Make him know how he has treated you with disrespect. Ruin him for it.

Destroy him.

Nines scratches those notifications from his display as he drags Gavin out the door of the apartment, to the top of the stairs.

"Gavin shut up for one moment in your life and let me think."

"What? The famous fucking android over here needs time to think? How fucking sweet."

Nines' eyes shoots him with a look filled with agonizing malice, making even Gavin's anger filled frenzy calm a little. That's how Nines’ intimidation works, makes people want to crawl out of their own skin. Make them question what makes them be in the need to be intimidated in the first place. Make them disgusted with themselves.

All through a stare.

Nines drags him down the stairs, clutching the damp fabric of his hoodie with enough force to stretch the material. The metal of the railings are untouched this time, as he just focuses on getting Gavin out of the building, out of sight, of everyone else's minds. Gavin does nothing but follow behind his tugs and his pulls, not losing the acrid looks of destruction from the corners of his eyes, the pure hatred lining his face.

The outside continues to soak itself in rain, not that either of them care at all though. They weave and slip trough the incoming officers, all eager to get their hands on another case. It saddens Nines a little, in only a way an android can be sad. His LED spins a soft combination of red and yellow, as he attempts to calm himself down. Opening the door out to the front of the block, Gavin stiffens in his grip again, preparing himself for the onslaught of rain he is about to receive thundering down on his face.

"Hey tin can, aren't you going to get fried out here?"

"No detective, I won't." Nines says, voice softening a little in his words. Gavin, in contrast, just stares at the ground.

"Gavin, what on earth were you doing inside? You know we have to work with him for the rest of the duration of this case. Why are you so god damn hostile?"

"Hostile..you wanna fucking know why?"

"Yes, indeed I would. It would be beneficial to understand past transgressions, so we can move forward and be more synergistic together."

"Oh fuck off, you ignorant piece of shit, and understand sarcasm for once in your pitiful existence. If you really give that much of a fuck, go read my file. Do not make me do anything for you, ever. You understand that?"

"That is acceptable."

"It better fucking be, or you'll be shipped off to whatever fucking hole you crawled out of in a box of parts."

"I'll take your word for it detective."

Gavin scoffs at this, anger ever just starting to dissipate from his eyes. The emotion it is replaced with is a hard one to determine.

"Want to continue working?"

"God fucking no."

"You are contractually obligated to, you already know this."

"Can you fuck off and just die?"

And with that, Gavin storms off, hair shining with water. Nines hasn't even noticed the water permeating it's way through his own clothes yet, seeping it's way beneath his sleeves, down his neck. It's an uncomfortable feeling.

Go after him. Finish the assignment.

'Brain, what fucking assignment do you even mean?' Nines ponders, as he pulls his shining white jacket closer around him, in a feeble attempt to shield himself from the weather. It doesn't work very well, as his LED slides back to a yellow. He starts to make the walk back to the station, perhaps Gavin will turn up after him, so they can keep working on the case.

It is their job after all.

The streets of Detroit feel foreign to Gavin as he watches behind him, wondering if Nines is following him. He's walked them hundreds of times in his life, going to work, visiting Sam, getting groceries. Not so much walking away from a disrespectful twat with too much free time on his hand, but then again, the past few days have been some of the weirdest in his life.

Little does our Gavin know, dear reader, that things will get a lot more complicated.

Water pools in his hair, flattening it across his forehead. The rain is warm, like a shower after a long day. It coats everything it touches, leaving it slick. Gavin's mind calms as he walks, faster and faster, to get away from everybody else. He needs to be alone, just how he likes it. How he always has, and always will like it. For this is how it has to be, this is how it has to end.

It has to end with him being alone.

Our Icarus has to be alone when this ends.

Gavin is walking home, his one place of sanctuary against it all, against the endless, crushing power his life yields. He'll get back, probably get drunk, crash in his bed and cry himself to sleep. His grieving hasn't even set in yet, and that will be a sight to see when it does. Nobody will hear from him for days, as the walls he is so careful to maintain come crashing down, as they have done before, and as they will do forever.

Nines, on the other hand, leaves without so much as a word to any of the remaining officers left outside. He too needs to get away from people, get his head straight; get it functional again.

Go back, go back, go back, go back. Do it now. Do it.

Amanda will know.

"Fuck Amanda," Nines whispers into the rain soaked air around him, and he hopes that nobody has heard it.

Nines hates Amanda, with the same passion as Gavin and Perkins. She is designed to keep him in tow with whatever Cyberlife throws at him. Whether that be pulling him apart limb by limb, testing his components until he can't physically produce a word anymore, or subjecting him to constant shutdowns and restarts. It is torture, in its clearest form.

But Amanda's acrid, vile, patronizing voice persists through it all, even as the pit of hatred within Nines' core opens up even further.

These are not what 'obedient' 'functional' androids are meant to be like, but it is what Nines is like anyway. He feels broken inside, at war between his programming and his morals. Between what is right and what he must do. Between humanity and apotheosis. Between becoming the 'God' he needs to be for them, and the human he craves to be.

Apotheosis.

Icarus.

Daedalus.

When you mess with the Gods, who comes to find as you fall further within?

He goes to find his car again, where they parked it not too far from the scene. In an ideal world, Nines would offer Gavin a drive back home, but it is only when he turns back, that he can't see Gavin at all. Nevertheless, he gets back in the car, and drives away into the day's sky. The roads are quiet, the rush hour traffic having dissipated a little while ago. Every day there seems to be less cars out, as more and more people choose to use public transport. Gas has never been more expensive.

Gavin continues to get soaked, as he spots the apartment come into view.

He walks inside, and heads up the stairs, just wishing he would be anywhere else than where he is right now in life. On a beach, goals forgotten, relaxed, alone. At a theme park, losing his anxieties under loops and spirals. In a quiet house, as rain drips from the outside, shielded from everything else.

Gavin wants to create the latter today, he needs the latter today.

He unlocks the door, and walks into his living room, crashing onto the sofa. It's as comfortable as you can expect it to be, a couple of cushions lying with the grey fabric of the sofa. Gavin steals the red blanket he keeps folded on the side, and wraps himself in it. All there is to hear is the soft drops of rain on the window, and Gavin turns to face it.

And he waits, and he watches, for god knows how long.

Back at the station, Nines goes back to doing what he does best, working. He works on trying to find a match for anyone Sam had been in contact with, figuring out where the person named on the file is, why they met Sam. He could really do with Gavin there, even if he is an asshole to work with. He's just..good at his job?

Nines hates giving compliments.

He spots Gavin's jacket lying on his desk, without anyone to wear it.

[DET. REED: Return jacket?]

Gavin walks over to the kitchen, where his hastily left ingredients still lie. The chili lay on the counter-tops. The oil lies cold in the pan, and the tomatoes lay in wait of something. Gavin resolves himself to making the chili, and give himself the warm thing he's been craving for so long.

So he dices, slices and chops. Pours the tomatoes into the pan, adds the chili. Browns the meat. Does anything he can to get his mind away from grief, not that he would acknowledge this to himself that is.

Gavin is good at lying to himself.

He remembers how Sam taught him to make rice, washing it, using his knuckle to figure out the correct amount of water. It brings back fond memories of him, Sam and Tina all crowded into their his kitchen for the mid-autumn festival, cooking together (more aptly Sam and Tina cooking while Gavin chatted to them). Sam made yubuchobap to remind her of her parents, while Tina made hotpot and got mooncakes for them all to share. They'd pile around his tiny table and eat and laugh until they tired themselves out.

They were fun days.

But fun days don't last, so it seems. Gavin serves himself the chili, whilst dolloping sour cream on top as well, as he sits down, alone this time and eats.

Later, as the bowl lies empty and finished on the table, Gavin takes a shower.

Warm water steams up the bathroom, as we meet Gavin again. He sits at the floor, feeling for the drops hitting his back, engulfing his emotions. He thinks back again, for the second time in the evening.

"Hey T, make sure you and Sam call me when you get to the cinema, okay? Just so I know you arrived safe,"

"Gav shhh, we'll be fine," Sam teased.

"I know you will, just don't do anything I'd regret,"

"So everything then? Cause you seem to regret everything you do,"

"Oh shut it Sam, let's get going," Tina joked, blowing a kiss to Gavin as the pair of them walked off.

He sits, and the tears start falling, falling like dewdrops in the morning sun, falling like rain after a drought.

Falling like they need to, salt intermingling with water, anguish mixed with remembrance.

A song drifts in through the speaker he keeps in the bathroom, no lyrics, no words to contain any meaning at all, just notes to encapsulate, rejuvenate, syndicate.

Now playing;

Tropics - med monk.

He cries further. Cries until his eyes lie red and puffy, until his lungs heave for air, until he passes out in the shower, as the water trickles down the side of his face.

Time passes, and an August day turns into an August evening. Ribbons of red and orange flood through the windows, painting the walls in shades serene.

Gavin awakes, and gets himself into some form of a more reasonable state, an old DPD hoodie and some black sweatpants to match the level of comfort Gavin needs within himself right now. He curls back in on himself on the sofa, hugging a pillow close to the chest to soothe the aching hole in his chest. The rain still continues on, though less violently this time, just a soft drizzle to refract and reflect the light, which scatters itself across the walls.

It's calm, with only the tumultuous events recollecting themselves in Gavin's head to slice though them.

He dozes off again, curled in a blanket, arms entwined around a pillow.

As the day falls to night, Nines appears at the door of Gavin's apartment, arm clutching something that needs to be returned. He takes it all in, that being where Gavin lives. It's dark, a little damp, but in a nicer part of town than he expects Gavin to be living in. He still doesn't know why he's returning the jacket to him, it isn't part of his protocols to do so. He could have simply left the jacket in Gavin's locker, so that he could pick them up in the morning, or whenever Gavin decides to make a reappearance into the world of the DPD.

But he didn't, he chose to figure out where Gavin lives, thanks to an answer from Tina, and drove over there to give it to him.

None of it makes sense, and with that he knocks on the door, plastic against wood.

Gavin awakes again, slightly irritated as to how someone is bothering him, as he paces over to the door. He peers through the peephole, and much to his chagrin, it's the plastic dickwad and his resident LED.

Nines's LED is blue.

"Bastard." Gavin whispers to himself, as he pulls the door open.

"Gavin, sorry to be bothering you this evening. I have something that needs to be returned to you."

"That is, douchebag?"

"Your jacket."

"Oh."

Gavin looks down to where the jacket is neatly folded over Nines' arm. The faded colour of it is a sharp contrast to the pristine, almost pressed white of Nines' standard issue Cyberlife garbage. It looks unnatural, like it's dirty.

"You know, you should just wear normal clothes."

"My clothes are perfectly acceptable for the job, are they not?"

"Yeah, I mean, they're fine tin can, but you look like more of a prick then you already do."

A small smile tugs at the corners of Nines' lips as his ears process what he just heard.

Stop.

Shut up brain.

"Do you, wanna come in or something?" Gavin asks, widening the door a little.

"That would be appreciated Gavin, thank you."

"Yeah sure whatever."

Gavin watches as Nines allows himself into the apartment, his eyes trying to analyse everything they find, everything they can see. To try and make sense of who Gavin is as a person, what drives him to be who he is. His eyes move over the posters, his plants, the dishes in the sink that Gavin needs to clean. They move over to the sofa, the scrunched up blankets, the pillows an how they're squished against the sides.

Gavin just stares, a little perplexed at how intrigued Nines seems to be at the way he lives. At the way humans live?

Gavin tries to live the life of an average person, keep his head down, do right by those who deserve it. Yet, he has always found himself delving straight into lives filled with mystery, as he works to help them. He finds himself ensnared by the vices it is so easy for a man to fall into.

There is something poetic about the relationship between a man and drugs, they way they dance and intermingle. The way they always seem to find a way back to each other.

Like people, they are never gone for too long.

"What are you thinking about?"

"What?"

"What do androids think about? Way up in their processing system or whatever it is that Cyberlife calls it?"

Nines ponders this, brow creasing just a little, "We don't think, we do our protocol, as is dictated by someone, but in my case, the protocol I use is the one that is most likely to help us with the case,"

"Huh, so you don't have free will?"

"Free will?"

"Don't.. worry about it. Can I have my jacket back now?"

"Of course." Nines says, throwing the jacket to Gavin, which he catches, before setting it down on the arm of the sofa.

"I swear man, they make you the most advanced android, and they can't even get you to remind me of where my jacket is."

"That isn't a protocol of mine, I am not designed to protect you."

This is a lie, for Nines made the choice himself to protect him.

"But still, you'd think..."

"Yeah, you would indeed."

"Yeah? Yeah? Look at you, really starting to use normal people speak. God damn it man, it's taken you long enough." Gavin look up at Nines again, and notices that his hair is dry.

It's also messy, like he's been asleep. A weird thought, considering that Nines is not one to be in need of sleep.

"I am just using the resources in my capability to more accurately assimilate into a working environment, Gavin. If you are uncomfortable, I can stop."

"No! No I'm not uncomfortable, it's just odd that's all."

Nines looks at him, and they both stare into each others eyes, though neither of them really register that they are until Gavin looks away.

Nines feels sick again.

Gavin feels hot.

"I'll be heading off now, Gavin. Have a lovely evening, and I assure that you'll be in the precinct in the morning?"

"I'll be wherever I am, understand?"

"Of course."

Nines pulls open the door and leaves, while Gavin hangs the jacket up behind the door, lingering on it for a moment longer than he normally does. He doesn't know why, more like he just..does, because he wants to.

Nines reaches the bottom of the stairs, and he can hear a small notification pop up in his HUD.

WARNING: Artificial material located in thirium stream.

Huh? Wait that can't be normal, can it?

He dismisses the notification as his mind begins to fizz over, becoming unclear, unknown.

The notification pops up again, more loud and urgent this time.

His LED is a deep shade of blue, with lavender hues sprouting through. It's unnatural.

This is your fault. This is what this going to do to you. This is your fault. This is what this is going to do to you.

The LED becomes a sickly shade of neon purple, as Nines walks slowly back to his car.

Notes:

Well that's chapter 5 done and dusted. The title is not borrowed from a song this time, but is instead inspired by Mirrors Edge Catalyst, my favourite game of all time. Here's a link to Catalyst, the theme of the game, and an absolute banger.

And here's the link to Tropics, a song that makes me feel some shit.

Thank you for reading, and have a spectacular day.

(pssst. pssst. hope you liked the ever so small amount of fluff (?) at the end.)

Chapter 6: A Burnt Archive

Summary:

"You- you were screaming."

Nines opens his eyes. "I was?"

Notes:

Helloha all,

Welcome back to the thunderdome! The hiatus is over, and I'm back in business. Life may be complex, but nothing solves that better than writing. Although this is a shorter chapter than normal, I hope you all enjoy it nonetheless. We see a friendship bloom, stormclouds roll in from the sea, and Connor be the legend he is. Thank you all so much for the kudos and the hits, they mean so much. Stay kind, stay safe.

Stormclouds, thirium and amethysts,

Positive.

PS. I'll put the song for the chapter in the end notes.

Chapter Six - A Burnt Archive

"You know tin can, you don't make that bad of a cup of coffee. It's better than the shit Fowler makes for the team."

"We're programmed for this. Well, more like we are programmed with the ability to process and understand instructions and the world around us at a high pace. It comes in useful sometimes, especially when detectives such as yourself need something to make you work in the mornings."

"Forget I ever talked, okay?"

"You know I can't do that, right? I need to share the information most valuable to the conversation. It allows me to fulfill my protocols."

"You and your funny brain..."

"What?"

Gavin just slowly smiles to himself and rests his forehead against the cool glass of his desk, his arms coming to lie in his lap. Nines in contrast, just looks at him, a soft glint in his eyes. They're both understimulated, a little bit grouchy and in the mood for a long night's rest. But alas, as with most things in life, they need to get work done.

For now though, glass works better than a bed; sarcasm works better than a pillow. Gavin turns to face Nines, cheek pressed into the socket of his eye and takes a sigh, as the summer morning beats down on his face. Nines' face bears no difference to its normal state, his grey eyes peering down at him in a slight hint of confusion. They're as beautiful as ever.

"Detective, what did you mean? I don't quite understand."

"You? Not understanding? What a world we live in. Elijah is more stupid than he looks, and god does he look stupid. It's a figure of speech, darling," Gavin says, emphasizing the 'darling' as he grins.

"Figures of speech really aren't a good look on you, you know. Talking about looks, you've got the jacket I returned to you last week on again. I hope I returned it in a safe and secure capacity. I sense it has much more meaning to you than most things."

"The jacket is fine; why wouldn't it be?"

"There was a coffee stain on it when I gave it back to you."

Amanda. She's here.

Nines scrunches his nose and lets his eyes glaze over. The mechanics in his brain set to work, creating burnt archives and damask roses. Gavin, in the last vestiges of his vision, looks worried, and is sitting back up, glancing over him.

"Connor spilt- Nines?"

He falls, and the ground rushes up to meet him.

-

"Good evening Nines. I trust that my arrival is not delaying the implementation of your protocols?"

"It is not. I was working with Detective Reed before you wanted to speak with me."

"Acceptable. I have a request from Elijah." Amanda smirks. "He wants to know about your relationship with Mr. Reed."

Nines looks to the floor, stifling any fear that should be present. Thank the fucking lord for coding. The ground is coated in a thin layer of dust, as the ceramic tiles of the archives lie chipped, their patterns fading into the evening sun. The walls are blackened, burn marks crawling up them, changing into the limewashed ceilings as they go. Books scatter around, filling the room with their clutter, as shattered paperweights slice into their binds.

"What?"

"What is your relationship with Mr. Reed?"

Nines' brain stutters and re-calibrates. Well, it tries to at least, and fails, spectacularly, I must admit. His LED spins yellow, leaving the hints of purple that still remain lodged deep inside the light.

"We work together, you know this Amanda."

Her lips turn to a smirk, as she turns to attend to the roses that grew through the rubble.

"You should be a better liar, Nines."

"I wasn't lying to you."

"Then tell the truth, not a half-truth you baked up to get out of answering my question."

My question. God, she can't get any worse, can she?

Then again, it's Amanda, isn't it? She could slip him a fucking poison and he'd never be any the wiser, especially during one of his tests. What has this world come to?

Fire and brimstone, it seems.

"My relationship with the detective is somewhat rocky, but it is improving. I hope to acclimatize him to the method in which all work should be properly completed."

"I am pleased to hear it. Keep me updated," she sneers and turns to tend to the roses again. They are luscious and pink in the evening sky, with their purple hues matching the hues of Nines' LED. Those roses are the only thing that is alive, healthy, free, in this place; they’re green leaves and sharp thorns a reminder of his purpose. "I have high expectations for you. Your purpose is not to be wasted on anything else."

"My purpose is my sole responsibility, and my sole goal."

"Good. Do not let me down."

"I won't." Nines glances at the sky. "I'll keep my protocols at the forefront of my mind, and keep Sa- Ms. Park's investigation as a secondary task."

"I would expect nothing less."

His LED cycles red for a moment, or perhaps purple, depending on how the light catches it. His heart, a fake one at that, pounds in his throat, his processors whir to keep him cool.

It is a fucking miracle that Amanda hasn't noticed it yet.

As Nines shifts on the spot, he looks out into the cliff edge the archive is built on. The evening sky mixes with the black sea and he sighs, with no obvious need to. He lets his lungs fill with cool air, lets it run into his processors, bypassing their water-cooling systems. He lets it run into his toes and into his thirium stream. He exhales, and spots a darkening cloud come toward the archive.

"One last thing before you disappear back to that cesspool. Elijah needs you for some tests. September 1st. 9am. Do not be late."

Dear reader, one can only hope that cloud floods the archive and washes Amanda away.

Nines' vision blurs, and his legs give way to the tiles.

-

"-ake up, please, just wake up."

"Nines?"

He lifts his head, and watches as Gavin's eyes dart all over his body. Nines glances around, and his head rewards him with a pounding, claustrophobic headache. It surrounds him, flooding his mind with searingly hot thirium. Gavin stares into his eyes, as Nines watches them flicker with fear.

"They're bloodshot."

Nines gasps to get his words out. "Blue?"

"Yeah."

"Thirium."

Nines sinks back into the epoxy floor of the station, paying no attention to the layer of grime that will never leave. He lets his eyes flutter closed again, as he wonders whether anybody will notice him lying there. The cool chill of the floor sinks into his chassis, calming the thirium in his head. Blue blooms into flowers, flooding his minds eye, sinking into himself and becoming something blissful.

"You- you were screaming."

Nines opens his eyes. "I was?"

"Yes, you were." Gavin offers his hand, and helps Nines off the floor. "Are you okay? Dumb question. Are you going to be okay?"

Lie.

"I think so."

As Nines stands, he notices that everyone in the precinct has stopped to watch them both, their eyes as wide as dinner plates. He looks around, glaring at them. Gavin, on the other hand, still looks mildly terrified.

Dear reader, the likelihood that Nines will ever be able to get out of that suffocating coding is ridiculously small, but alas, I can hope. I can hope like a child looks to a shooting star and wonders if life will ever get better for them.

Life gets better, for children anyway. Adults on the other hand are full of lies and deceptions, spitting acrid words at each other. They never ever seem to get better or worse, merely varying shades of sadness and happiness. Pair this with euphoria only experienced a couple of times and abject misery, and you have the recipe for Gavin Reed.

Gavin's jacket is off to the side, and he stares into Nines eyes with an emotion he himself cannot quite name yet.

What is our Icarus gaining? A friend? A companion? Something else?

Only time will tell, my dear, dear reader.

As for now, however, Nines retreats to his desk. Gavin waves everyone else back to work, their stunned silences creeping back into murmurs and whispers.

"Do you think Fowler heard me?"

"God knows at this rate. Connor possibly. Tina might have missed the fireworks, considering that narcotics is on the third floor."

"Hopefully."

"You screamed like a banshee, you know. And your eyes are still bloodshot. Or...thirium-shot?"

Nines smiles a little. "I don't know why I screamed. I was having a meeting with- it doesn't matter."

"Who were you having a meeting with? And how the fuck did you manage to do it inside of your own head?"

"It really doesn't matter Gavin."

"Tell me, come on. If we're going to end up working together I need to know what the fuck is making you scream as much as you are."

Lie.

"I have a diagnostic service that occasionally requires my full attention." Nines sighs. "I was discussing any software repairs I need to undertake with them. The screaming may have come about as a result of them poking around in my head, but I could not tell you with any definitive answer."

"Why did your LED turn purple?"

"Wh- what?"

"Your LED, after you collapsed. It turned a really bright shade of purple, like a lavender colour. I've never seen anyone do anything like that before."

"I...don't know."

"It's okay. We can figure out answers later."

"Are my eyes back to normal?"

"More or less, tin can. Why do you ask? Got image problems?" Gavin remarks, small echoes of his persona drifting into words.

"No." Nines said, a little harshly.

"Okay, want to get back to work?"

Gavin laughs and leans back in his chair, watching the light interact with the amythyst. His eyes, however tell a different story. They know that Nines lied, in whatever desperate attempt he sought to protect himself. While the purple light reflects off their pupils, the inky blackness steels Gavin a little. So much for trust, eh?

Those same eyes look away from the crystal, and into the wider precinct. As usual, it's full of people, going here there and everywhere. The floor is as grimy as ever, and the ceilings tall and airy. The late August sun beams in through the window, illuminating...

Connor?

He stands, leaving Nines alone at his adjacent desk, and walks over to Connor. Nines is quietly relaxing, and thankfully doesn't notice.

"Hey man, what's up?"

"I heard him screaming, what happened to him?"

"Something about diagnostics, I don't really know. He was being super dismissive. I have a question. Has your LED ever turned purple?"

"No, why?"

"Nines' LED was purple after he woke up. I was worried."

"I have no idea, I'll see if I can figure out anything for you. But I never had you down as a worrier, Gavin. I guess we really do learn new things every day." Connor smirks. "How'd you get so far into his head then? Got something to tell us?"

"Oh fuck off," Gavin returns, "I'll turn you into a pile of metal before too long."

"Nuts and bolts? What do you think I am? A bridge?"

"Jesus Christ, you are one insufferable man."

"You know, I've been around humans."

Gavin laughs, and Connor joins him.

He doesn't notice when Nines watches the pair of them turn into mild hysterics, his brother and his...friend?

Friend.

Notes:

Here's the link to My Name is Dark, the song for the chapter.

Have a lovely day, and thank you for reading.

Chapter 7: Fountain

Summary:

His journey to the Sun begins.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you've had a wonderful day, and welcome to chapter seven! I spent about 2 hours trying to come up with an interesting name for this, yet settled on something pretty boring. However, in this chapter we see hand-holding (I know!), melted men and a trans flag too. I hope it fulfils your expectations and constructive criticism is always appreciated. Stay kind, stay safe!

Ice-cream, Americana and Clouds,

Positive.

PS. Song for the chapter is in the end notes!

Chapter Seven - Fountain

Nines watches as a bead of sweat drips down Gavin's neck and into his back, as the Sun beats down on the pair of them. The canopy over the roof barely covers them both, as they wait for the door to open. Nines' eyes glance over to the street they stand on. It's perfectly Americana, picket fences galore - a rare sight in late 2030's Detroit.

Gavin sweats through a smile as the door opens, and shuffles on the spot.

"Who are you?" the man asks, eyes darting between the pair of them.

"My name is Detective Reed, but you can call me Gavin. This is my partner..."

"Nines, please just call me Nines."

The man at the door just shrugs. "I didn't know the DPD had any interest in working with androids."

"Neither did I, until this pile of nuts and bolts came hurtling into my life," Gavin replies. "Sometimes I wonder why he's even here."

Nines' LED circles yellow. "Gavin, I may be here to fulfil my protocols, but it is your wonderful brand of sarcasm that keeps me around."

"Come in."

As Nines steps into the house, he shucks off his jacket hanging it on the coat rack. Gavin leaves his shoes at the door and walks through into the living room. It is sparsely decorated, but homely nonetheless.

"I never got your name," Nines states, dropping down into the sofa.

"Solari."

Gavin glances at his casefile.

"Solari? That isn't the name under file."

Solari bursts out laughing, glancing over at something behind Nines' shoulder. "I'm trans, dude. I'm shocked you didn't notice the flag behind Nines. Do you mind changing the name on the file?"

"Yeah, sorry about that. I know how much of a pain deadnames are. I'm..uh..trans too," Gavin says, scratching at the back of his neck as blood rushes to his cheeks. He turns his head, where a trans flag hangs proudly, tacked on with mismatched push pins. The pinboard to its right is stuffed with flyers, pictures and memories.

As he watches on nostalgically, Gavin's mind wanders back to his childhood bedroom. Teenage years really do bring out the best in worst in you. They bring out drug use, bad decisions, friendships and relationships made and lost in a matter of days and weeks. They bring out acceptance and the need to fight the good fight, even in the face of your own adversity.

But alas, dear reader, our Icarus isn't a child anymore.

"Gavin?" Solari asks. "Are you doing alright there?"

"Am I- Am I doing fine? Yeah, yeah I'm good. You?" He replies, like water off a ducks back.

"I'm alright, considering the circumstances. Why do you need to talk to me? Is it about Sam?"

"Yeah, the forensics team found some of your hair in her apartment. We're just following up on it. Where were you on August 9th?"

"If I remember correctly, I was at a dinner with some friends. One of them had just had a baby, so we were going out to celebrate."

"Your friends can corroborate this, right?"

"Indeed they can. I've even got some photos if you want to take a look at them."

"Nines can grab them from your phone before we leave, so don't worry about getting them out now." Gavin says, looking over at Nines, who seems to have made a new friend with the chair.

Nines looks back over at him.

[DET. REED : Stares when he's thinking.]

"Gavin, you know you're staring at me right?"

"What? No."

Solari and Nines both face each other in mock belief.

"Dude, you totally were. Even Robocop here agrees with me," Solari interjects, shifting a little in his seat.

"I don't even know what I was staring at." Gavin's eyes dart between the two of them. Was he staring?

"Me, for some reason. I hadn't said anything out of the regimens of my protocols," Nines says.

Protocols, protocols, protocols. A glamourous way to dress up restrictions and predetermined words, to dress up lies and rejections. Good for interrogations, good for manipulation, if required. Full of asterisks for side conversations, other meanings and actions untaken.

Nothing is ever perfect, truly, no matter how hard you buff out the errors and pretend like everything is fine, even when it isn't.

"I was staring at you, right. Why was I staring at you?"

"You tell me."

Solari watches the two of them go back and forth some more, bickering like an old married couple. He smiles and stands, walking to the kitchen to let their battle of wit continue. Glasses clink as he pulls one out of the cupboard, and he fills it with water. Sitting back down in his chair, Solari tucks his knees to his chest.

And they're still not done.

"You were the one who fucking told Fowler about the graffiti I found in the bathroom! It was so funny and you had to go ruin it. I'm ashamed to even call you my friend," Gavin shoots back, and for once, the malice isn't there.

His heart sees a spark of warmth. It rises to the surface, overtaking the remnants of embarrassment lodged in his mind. Solari watches as Gavin smiles at Nines, who smiles back, a sense of pride lingering in his eyes.

"Well, you were the one who decided to switch out my thirium drink with blue water. Needless to say, I did not react positively to that one."

Gavin's eyes widen a little. "Wait you didn't? I'm sorry. Like actually sorry. I don't want to hurt you."

"I know you don't. You want to hurt the people who hurt the people you care about, like Perkins with Sam. What are the FBI even doing with the case?" Nines asks.

"Creating a mess of everything. They have been helping Tina get some more traces on the red ice though."

Considering everything that's been happening recently, Perkins' threat of an FBI takeover hasn't yet come to fruition. Besides from poking their noses into some files, and having too many meetings with Fowler, they've stayed quiet. Too quiet in Gavin's eyes, but one can only wait for more information.

Tina has also been working her ass off since Sam's death, tracing the red ice all over the city. She's been stuck into the underbelly of the world again. Hopefully this time won't end in falling asleep with dried tear tracks still on her face, a bottle of tequila empty on the counter.

Working with people who only care for money and fame is a fun thing to do, if you don't care about keeping your head on your shoulders. The golden tendrils of vices and virtues are an enticing prospect from someone in need of an escape.

Does Gavin like to keep his head on his shoulders?

Only God knows the answer to this question, dear reader. God is one reckless person himself, after all.

As Solari finishes the last of his water, letting the last of the ice melt in his mouth, he clears his throat and speaks. "As much as it has been a pleasure having you both here I really do need to be getting back to my normal life. Nines, You can get the photos from my phone if you still need them. And Gavin, as a fellow trans person, you really should get the DPD to keep a track of name changes. I'm shocked they haven't updated it yet."

"I know man, fucking bureaucracy. The paperwork is ridiculous for even the smallest of stuff."

"I get that, but thank you for changing it anyway."

"It's not a problem, trust me." Gavin scratches out Solari's old name in the file.

Solari nods and looks over to Nines. "You want the photos?"

"Yes, thank you for reminding me."

Gavin scoffs. "It still shocks me every day that you don't have a flipping eidetic memory or something. Like I said a while back, Elijah really is as stupid as his manbun makes him look."

Solari smirks, and Nines has something that looks like admiration his face, it's hard to tell sometimes. It's hard to see what lies underneath the surface of it all.

Nines still doesn't know what lies underneath his coding, what makes him alive. He doesn't know what makes Gavin laugh at his poor attempts at humour, what makes him good at his relationships with friends.

It could all be from his personal relations directive, but it could just as easily be from any other part of him. It could be from the part that for some reason knows how to do calligraphy or sew a button onto a jacket, or the part that can kill someone.

Perhaps one day he'll become a wedding invitation writer, if whole detective work becomes unfruitful. Or if Amanda asks him to.

The pair of them slip on their shoes, which Solari insisted they left at the door. Something about "Don't get any mud on these white carpets. I'll never get the deposit back on the rent."

White carpets and red ice all get caught up in the tornado of a mind.

Solari unlocks the door. Gavin and Nines both walk out under that blazing Sun. Nines has to duck is head just to fit through it. Being 6'4" really is a pain in the ass.

The contrast from the cool air-condtioned interior and the sweaty, humid atmosphere makes Gavin's hair stand on end. Nines' LED shifts to yellow, as the small fans that keep his systems cool pick up the pace, like a runner in the last vestiges of a marathon.

Nines motions to Solari's phone, which he passes over. Nines taps into the back of it, through the wireless charging coils and into the cloud. Androids are weird beings like that, able to interface not only with each other, but with the technology around them. If it wasn't for the Congress bill requiring them to only be able to access what is necessary for their tasks, it would be a privacy nightmare. Not that the United States needs anything more to worry about. They've already got a serial killer on the loose, and a billionaire with a small penchant for chaos and deviancy asking too many questions.

His LED stutters and starts as all of the files enter his sorting system, before getting shelved into their respective evidence files. Solari was definitely at the meal, and from what Nines can see, they all had a wonderful time. He's almost jealous that he doesn't have anyone to share a meal with, not that he needs to eat of course. It's more from the enjoyment he could get from it with his friends, even if he only has a few.

"Thank you Solari, we'll be in touch soon if we need any more of your help in this investigation. I am truly sorry about Sam, I know how much she meant to so many people, especially Gavin," Nines says, making sure he is out of earshot of Gavin, who is off down the path, trying and failing to get cool.

"You know, you two seem to be close. You better make sure he doesn't go off the wall because of Sam. Make sure he doesn't stay alone, it helps when you're around people," he replies, past knowledge seemingly coming around. He talk like he's had this conversation too many times to count.

"I will, it's the least he deserves for even working through this. That reminds me; do you know Tina Chen?"

"Yeah, Sam talked about her sometimes. Why do you ask?"

"I'm just interested in how Sam's friendships worked, to see if it helps the investigation at all. Thank you, again. I'm gonna head off with Gavin, so take care," Nines says, turning on his heel and walking down the path. Solari nods and closes the front door.

Gavin's cotton t-shirt does nothing to help him stay cool, as the humidity causes his sweat to pool. He looks like a melted ice-cream, as he sits on the pavement, succumbing to the heat.

"Are you okay? Gavin?"

"I'm fine, it's just too hot. It's never like this here. The gods must hate me."

"Which gods?"

Gavin's brows crease with confusion. "Huh?"

"Which gods hate you?"

"Whichever one is responsible for the Sun."

"Apollo. Or Sol. Or Ra. The choices are practically endless."

"I'll take my chances with Sol."

Gavin stands back up, dusting the dirt from his cargo shorts; Gavin likes them, Nines thinks they're unprofessional. "I'm going to see if there's a water fountain nearby, or just something that means I can get out of this heat. The car is going to be scalding hot, considering the fact that you parked it in the Sun."

"I may have parked it in the Sun, but I wasn't doing it out of spite."

"I know I know. You never do anything out of spite."

Gavin walks in a seemingly random direction down the street, towards what appears to be a park a few blocks down. It's got a few families milling around, and in Gavin's eyes it's practically an oasis in the middle of a desert.

Coming alongside him, Nines keeps one eye on Gavin to make sure he's still standing. Heatstroke can be a killer, dear reader.

They walk the few blocks shoulder to shoulder, Nines still watching Gavin, and Gavin himself looking determined to make it into the park. He breaks off from Nines, and paces into the fields, scanning for a fountain. His eyes narrow, looking closer, as he becomes more frustrated then it normally is. Dejected, he sits down on the grass.

"There isn't a fountain, in a park. Why? God knows! Why can't I just live by the sea or something? I could go swim in massive open areas, or anything that's better than this sweltering heat. I give up. Done, doomed. I'm gonna die a lonely puddle here in the grass."

"Stop feeling sorry for yourself. I'm not going to like you anymore if you do." Nines smirks.

"Since when do you care about if I like you or not?"

"Since I had to start actually working with you. My protocols said at the start that I had to at least be amicable with you. And for a while that was true, even after your wrath with Perkins the other week. But the more I've gotten to know you, the more I also find you to be a good person. You're kind, and selfless. It has been an enjoyable experience so far to know you, and I want to know more about you. I want to keep working with you even after this is over."

"You mean, even after we get Sam's killer?"

"Of course I do. You're one of the best detectives in the whole precinct. You have the highest arrest record out of all of them, and despite the amount of notes about your insubordination in your file, you are sill regarded highly amongst many of the people we work with, even if they don't say it to your face."

Gavin sits back up, grass stains littering his white shirt. "You mean that?"

"I would never lie to you."

Gavin's eyes go glassy for a moment, as he takes some time to come back to himself. He never thought that at least one person, besides his therapist would actually be able to see who he is, what he does for everyone else. How his progress as a detective isn't all self-serving, how it's a form of payback for everything that's happened to him. Perhaps Nines doesn't see it all right now, but at least he can understand some of it. His chest warms, not in a way Gavin has known for a very long time.

"I can see some water jets over by the swing set. Would they be an acceptable substitute for a fountain?"

"I love you man, you have better eyes than I do." Gavin starts running. "Race you there!"

He sprints over to the water jets, Nines hot on his tail. In theory, Nines should easily win this battle of sprints, but he doesn't. He'll never tell anyone that he slowed up just so he could watch Gavin's face light up in pure joy as he runs into the water stream. It's a secret he'll take to his grave.

Nines' LED shines a brighter blue than it ever has. He runs into the splash pool too, getting his hair soaked, jacket tossed in a heap to the side. Gavin stands facing the Sun, letting the drips fall across his nose, into the corners of his eyes, enveloping him, embracing him, as he stands defiant against the world.

He stands as one man against the Sun, against the gods who have forsaken him his entire life, against everyone who has told him that he is not deserving of happiness.

Nines stands in defiance of all of his expectations, all the words that weasel their way into his heart and into his mind.

He stands in defiance of all it is that makes him robotic, to allow his imperfections, to become that it is that makes us human to show themselves.

As the pair of them move out of the water to lie on the grass, Gavin grabs a hold of Nines' hand, without even a look in the eyes. Both of them settle back into the ground, watching the wisps of cloud float across the sky, peacefully and calmly. Gavin rubs slow circles into the back of Nines' hand, as his LED stops and starts between yellow and red.

Gavin's mind races a million miles a second, his impulses getting the better of him as he lies there, drying in the heat. He doesn't know why he's doing this, in a park of all places. Maybe Nines will think it’s a friendship thing. It might just be a friendship thing for all he knows about his own thoughts. All he does know, however, is that he wants more. He craves more.

In contrast, Nines watches the sky, dampening his protocols until they're nought but a quiet ache in his chest.

This is what makes Nines feel alive.

The phone in Gavin's jeans buzzes, and he fishes it out, a little pissed that someone is interrupting his day, but he glances at the screen nonetheless.

"Who is it?" Nines asks, not releasing his hand at all.

"Elijah."

He answers the phone, hands still intertwined with Nines'.

He holds it to his ear, breathing a short sigh.

"Hey Eli, what's up?"

"Help me. Please. They're here. I need you."

"What?" Gavin pulls his hand away, face falling pale.

There is nothing but silence over the other end of the phone.

Notes:

I'm sorry. It's gonna get worse from here.

The song for the chapter is To Swim by Petrie. Enjoy.

Have a wonderful day, and thank you for reading.

Chapter 8: Regret

Summary:

A bouquet of chrysanthemums. A drowned man.

Notes:

Helloha everyone,

Welcome to chapter eight, and I apologise in advance. It is going to get worse from here. In this chapter we see brothers reunited, walls shattered and a new face join the fray. Thank you all so much for 600 reads, it means the absolute world. Constructive criticism is always appreciated, stay kind and stay safe out there!

Swimming, Olives and Footsteps,

Positive.

PS. Find the NBC Hannibal reference, and the 2 songs for the chapter are in the end notes.

Chapter Eight - Regret

A thought pings through Gavin's mind as Nines' car pulls up to the pristine driveway of Elijah's house.

This isn't happening. I am alright. This isn't happening, I'm alright.

Yet there, in some crevice of his mind, Gavin knows the gravity of that phone call. Like a rock into an ocean, the second Eli talked to him, voice breathy and afraid, he sank back into himself. But our Icarus has to continue, to fly closer to the sun until the wax burns their marks into his skin.

The car door opens, and Nines is already ahead of him, banging his fist into the metal door, it peels away small parts of his skin, blue blood dripping into his wrist.

The banging turns up fruitless and the door refuses to relent, and the pair of them stand in front of it, waiting. Gavin can't hear Chloe inside. Considering Elijah is a privacy nut, there's no open windows anywhere. There's no windows at all, even, instead replaced with some unsightly modern architecture.

Gavin keeps repeating his mantra to himself, mumbling it under his breath, watching more cloud cover arrive from the distance, allowing them both some respite from the sun. They both glance around, at each other, at the door, at anything to make it seem like something is improving the situation.

Gavin keeps mumbling, and Nines can just about make out the words that he's saying. Gavin's behaviour than this entire situation, the shakiness of his hands, the worry etched into the grooves in his face. His constant moving.

"We're going to be okay. Trust me. You're not going to be alone."

"We're going to be okay, I'm going to be okay." Gavin keeps saying these, over and over, speeding up until it is naught but unintelligible gibberish.

"Gavin. Gavin look at me," Nines says, voice low and dark.

Olive eyes meet grey, as they stare at each other. Nines reaches down and adjusts Gavin's shirt a little, resting his hand on his chest, the other on his arm, soft movements. "No matter what happens in here, we stick together."

Nines' mission to protect the man sleeping on he desk still isn't over. It won’t be over until he fails.

Gavin's lips move to say something in return, but he stops as he hears something coming up to the door. They sounds like they're dragging themselves along the floor, which leaves an icy cold pit in his chest.

The door opens, just a crack, and Nines pushes it open. Chloe is on the ground, lifeless, as a trail of blue blood follows from the main room. Her hand sits at the bottom of the door, last mission achieved.

Nines’ hand moves up to his throat, lightly touching it as he sees the lacerations that lines her skin, her throat, her face. Her beauty, the same one that gave her notoriety, is mangled beyond comprehension, as if a ballerina fell from her grace, breaking her ankles as she falls.

Nines takes her hand in his, checking for a pulse, trying to see if she can survive, in a desperate, if futile attempt. He meets Gavin's eyes again, and shakes his head.

"Call Connor, Tina, and an ambulance," Gavin says, taking Chloe's hand in his, and holding it like a spring flower.

Yellow emanates the side of Nines’ face as he sends hurried, distressed messages to the pair of them, and receives frantic messages back. Connor tells him to stay safe, Tina tells him to do what he can to save her, and that she'll be there in 10 minutes.

10 minutes too long to save Chloe.

Gavin stands back up, hands shaking. He slowly walks through into the main room, Nines following closely behind. He pays no mind to the bergamot and chrysanthemums in a vase by the door. Nines sees them coated in blue blood, and watches a petal drop into a pool of it on the floor.

It's almost funny how much information Nines absorbs about everything around him, everything that he encounters. From how many fibres are in the average wool jacket (80-90), to how Gavin likes his coffee (too sweet when it's late, black and strong when he's around other people.)

How he could kill anyone he came into contact with, if necessary. How he would do it. Would he break their neck? Poison them at a theatre? Lacerate them as an imitation?

Gavin keeps his mantra repeating as he braces himself.

This isn't happening. I am alright. This isn't happening, I'm alright.

Elijah's body is face down in the pool, unmoving, like Chloe. Gavin’s heart drops as he sinks to his knees, hearing them crack against the floor tile. The pattern sinks into the groove of his skin, leaving red, angry indentations as he starts to sob.

Like the shower, the sobs are heaving and grotesque, wracking through his ribs and leaving him hollow. They swarm his mind, drowning him, sinking him beneath the sands of time. Puffy eyes and blotchy skin envelop him as he sets himself to rest on the ground, letting the cool tile stifle his spiralling thoughts.

I'm alright. He's okay. Oh my god why didn't I save him? Please do something.

But he still lies there, heaving lungs dissipating into quiet breaths, tear tracks falling less like a river. To wade into the quiet of the stream would be sublime.

Something flips in Nines' mind, as his head becomes almost fuzzy. His LED almost screams in an angry purple, and he launches himself into the pool. He kicks, pushes, and hooks his arms under Elijah's, his mind racing, faux adrenaline rushing though every muscle and sinew. Water hits his eyes, as he tries to drag him out of the pool, startling him.

Dear reader, waterlogged men are no friend of a rescue.

Pushing Elijah's body onto the ledge, Nines struggles to keep himself afloat next to him. Gavin watches silently, a broken shell, to be replaced later. Nines continues to pull him out of the pool, checking everything his protocols can remember.

They only told him how to kill, how to deceive, how to manipulate, not how to save, or how to be a good person in the face of danger.

"Gavin, what do I do?"

Gavin's face peers at him, almost an expression of incredulity.

"What do I do?" he shouts, less than a metre from his face.

"I- I don't know."

The LED continues to beam its angry purple, red interceding on occasion.

Nines does the one thing he can remember.

CPR. Over and over, until Elijah’s lungs break, until water spews from his mouth. His hands work like the devil and angels of the gods gave him strength. He can hear a rib break, but no change.

"Is he breathing?" Gavin asks.

Nerves penetrate Nines’ steely voice. "I don't know yet, please just let me work."

Gavin lets out an almost stifled sob and continues to watch as Nines' hands fly throughout Elijah's body.

Nothing is changing, like a fly trapped in golden amber for all eternity. Like a drowned man, dying in his own home. Death never changes, never greets one with a song and dance. He comes quietly, a whisper in the cacophony. The harder Nines pushes into his chest, the more frantic he becomes; a fanatic to the cause of life.

That is, until Elijah's blood starts to seep through his jumper, almost black in the sunlight. Nines pulls the jumper up and breaks in that moment, eyes widening and mind melting. In jagged, acidic letters, a word lays carved into Elijah's chest, just above his heart.

Liar.

He quickly covers it back up, praying and hoping that Gavin hasn't seen it. He stops compressions, one hand curling into his hair as he leans back and away from Elijah's body. He moves one of his hands to his neck, checking for the last vestiges of a pulse.

"He's gone."

And a tear falls from his eyes when he says it. Elijah was the one who brought him, Connor and Markus into the world, all of them, he was the one who gave them all that wretched purpose.

You will die here, knowing nothing about what it is that you're designed to do.

The red walls in front of his mind crack, the ones that cage him in from his thoughts, that keep his deviancy, a long unattainable goal. They splinter, falling apart as he reaches out in his mind to touch them.

They fall like ash from a volcano, into electronic shards.

Gavin watches him, watches his LED, flash purple, back to red, to yellow, back to purple. What sickness floats though his mind he is unable to distinguish, as our Icarus has never seen Nines' tears before.

Nines head spins, the shards float around his head like asteroids around a planet.

In some distant part of himself he can feel himself sobbing, the shards dissipating with each echo of his voice.

Gavin reaches over to Eli's body, laying his hand on his chest, not feeling the pleasant sound of his heart, but the cavernous hole of a soul removed. He starts talking to fill that hole, fast and laden with everything they left unsaid.

"I'm sorry I couldn't protect you. I'm sorry for leaving you at the bus stop when we were kids. I'm sorry for everything."

Nines' grey, clouded eyes blink through their tears and watches the soliloquy as it unfolds in front of his eyes.

"You deserved better than what mom left us with, what I left you with. You didn't need to pick up our pieces, even after I got clean. I'm sorry for making you do more than I ever did for you. You're my older brother for fucks sake. You should have still been in college, getting pissed on a Tuesday evening, singing in that awful voice of yours." Gavin almost smiles. "So I'm sorry."

He sinks back, watches Nines' shaking hand on the floor, dripping blue blood that will intermingle with the chlorine of the pool and the trail Chloe left. He hopes it could create some poisonous gas that will kill him.

At least it would be quick.

Tina's car pulls up into the driveway, and sirens wail in the distance. Connor and Tina both step out, rushing inside, panic-stricken looks marring their expressions. They step into the house, the door being left wide open, and Tina's face falls ashen, her hands running through her hair, pulling black strands out with it.

Connor stays stoic, until his eyes lie to him and widen with horror at the sight of Chloe's mangled corpse.

Tina rushes over to Gavin, and Connor joins his brother, sinking and embracing him.

"You don't need to tell me what happened, I just want to know if you're okay," Connor says, clutching at Nines' wet grey jumper.

"I deviated, I think."

Connor pulls apart, looking him straight in the eyes. "Are you sure? Has Amanda tried to talk to you yet?"

"No. I came with Gavin after his phone call and he was in the pool. I tried to save him."

"Slow down. You called an ambulance right?"

"Yes, of course I did. I did what my protocols wanted." Connor embraces him again, and Nines leans into the touch.

On the other side of the room, Tina sits cautiously next to Gavin. "Gavin? Talk to me, please just talk to me," she says, touching his arm.

"There's the back window. They could have left that way."

"Just look at me, okay? None of that matters now. There's an ambulance and probably police on the way. We're going to be okay."

"We are the- we are the police, Tina."

"Neither of us are in a fit state to help now, let them do their job."

The sirens scream louder, as they too arrive at the house. Connor and Tina both look at each other with knowing expressions and stand and begin to leave.

"I'm coming with you. I was here, they need to know what happens," Nines interjects, brushing the last vestiges of his tears out of his eyes.

"You sure?" Connor replies.

He stands. "Yes."

Gavin keeps watching Eli — his own brother’s — body.

All three of them walk out, and Gavin glances back between the window and Eli, between the window and Eli, until his legs move, almost of their own accord.

The paramedics rush in, one tending to Chloe as another talks to Tina.

"Where's the patient?" A paramedic asks, her eyes fixed on Tina.

"Elijah's inside, but I don't think he's made it," Tina responds, swallowing the lump in her throat.

"Thank you."

"It's alright, are you okay?"

"I've only just gotten here, but I'm doing alright, all things considered." She nods, in a kind kind of way, and starts walking into the main room. "Tina?"

"What's up?"

"You had a friend in here, right?” the paramedic says, confusion lacing her words.

"I did, is Gavin not in there?" Tina walks into the main room, dragging Connor behind her, away from the other paramedic.

Wet steps lead out the back window, and Gavin is gone.

Notes:

Where did he come from, where did he go, where did he come from cotton-eye Joe?

Song One for the chapter is Regret, by New Order, for Gavin's perspective. Enjoy.

Song Two for the chapter is Love, by Mica Levi, for Nines' perspective. Enjoy.

Have a lovely day, and thank you for reading.

Chapter 9: Delete The Kisses

Summary:

What do you do after your half-brother dies?

Where do you go?

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Welcome back to the thunderdome! This is Chapter 9, one of my favourite chapters so far, featuring copious amounts of alcohol, a necklace, flashbacks and *determination*. This is a long one, at about 5500 words, so comments are appreciated! Thank you all again, for everything. We're almost at the halfway mark, with many a plot point left to go. Stay kind, stay safe!

Sunset skies and elysian eyes,

Positive.

PS. Songs for the chapter are in the end notes.

PPS. I do truly hope you like this <3 You're all so wonderful

Chapter Nine - Delete The Kisses

11:32pm - The Context Bar Alleyway

The ground seems to vibrate in his hand, and vibrate again. It's incessant, unpleasant and Gavin would like to do nothing more than to throw it across the expanse he lies on. The floor, dark and dank, cushions his head, coated in the same grime as the floor of the precinct. The stench of piss, crusted vomit and very bad decisions keep lingering in the air like a secret of stories they have not yet disclosed.

His phone keeps ringing, buzzing away like a worker bee, while Gavin still lies alone, head swimming. He watches from the corner of his eyes as the screen lights up with messages, more and more each second, as Tina - or at least he thinks its Tina - screams silently at him. Still the buzzing continues, as he pushes his phone away from his face, leaving the stones to scratch it. Gavin settles back into the ground, ignoring the acrid burning of past vomit in his throat and the pressures on his lungs. The famous leather jacket is pulled tighter still around himself, and the sands of time take him beneath for now.

As ever, dear reader, our Icarus has time left in the hourglass.

Alas, Gavin forgets to pause the song that was playing, something chill and calming, with his headphones tangled badly in his pocket. It plays slowly, ballooning into sweet nothingness in the air.

4:00pm - Elijah's House

Tina stares into incredulity as she looks at the ground. Gavin was here; she went outside for only a moment. Yet the tiles do not lie to her, their empty stares matching her own. Her eyes pan over the room again, Connor at her side, yet he is still gone, disappeared into nothingness.

The window, or, more aptly, the glass door into the garden is open. Tina paces off into it, a determined spring in her step. The grass accompanies her, lying green and fresh, pulling her ever closer into the depths she needs to search. There are rose bushes and English ivy, piling high into the sky. It is all expertly kept, not by Elijah's own hand. Elijah was a destroyer of nature and its forces, culminating in in his removal as CEO of Cyberlife, even if he still worked behind the scenes, reaping the rewards he sowed.

Which is where Nines falls into place, along with Connor and Markus. The RK line, perfect, top of the range (if unable to be purchased), all designed for a task. Connor, to investigate the deviancy of his fellow people, one that later turned into his own mission, to help Markus in his demonstrations.

Markus; designed to create that systemic change which was to be so needed for androids, to let them fall into what should be their normal place in society, even if it was so hard to fight for in the first place. Yet, with Connor and a veritable army at his side, he was unstoppable, securing the deal with President Warren and securing the deal that gave androids their rights.

However Nines is our enigma, just the same as our dear Icarus. There are no flashy demonstrations, no chases across gardens or different coloured irises to make him noticeable to the press. Only black hair and an assignment in the DPD.

Tina continues to look, before concluding its emptiness. Connor joins her, and they both head inside, where Elijah's body is being bagged up, his face disappearing back into the comforting abyss.

Nines catches their eyes, and sidesteps around some rather inconveniently placed officers and joins them by the door-window combination, an angry look hidden in his eye.

"We need to go the station," he starts.

"What? Why? Can't they take our statements here?" Tina replies, brow furrowing slightly.

"Fowler got in contact. He has some news. Didn't tell me what it was, but I gathered that it was going to be disappointing."

"That can't be good, whatever it is. You still have your car here Nines, right?" Connor asks, turning his head back to the conversation and away from the body bag.

"What about Gavin? He's still missing," Tina says.

"He's not stupid T.” Connor sighs, “I can't imagine he'd be that reckless either."

"You haven't seen him, he can be the most stupid person in the room if you give him the opportunity."

Nines interrupts the pair of them. "Connor, shush. Tina, he'll be back soon."

"Fine,” Tina says, “but we are going to look for him later."

"We will, now let's get going."

They all walk lockstep, through the door, Connor careful to let the paramedics clear their equipment from the floor. Tina pauses for a second. "Hey, I never got your name."

The paramedic that Tina talked to earlier glances up from her bag. “Nadia."

"After all this is over, do you, uh, want to get a drink or something?" Tina smiles.

"I'd love to. You're uhh, you know..."

Tina giggles. "Tina. Tina Chen." She pulls her phone out of her pocket, pulling her contact list up as she locks eyes with Nadia.

They share details and eye contact, before Connor calls back to her to get in the car.

4:15pm - The Streets of Detroit

The ground feels weightless, like clouds beneath Gavin's feet. His head turns, spins, as it settles on a car floating down the street. The blacks and the yellows of the taxi pull up beside him, as he clambers onto the backseat.

"Where to?" the driver asks, vague disinterest in her words.

"Halcyon Park Gardens."

"Sure, do you want the air-con on?"

"What?"

"Do you want me to put the air-conditioning on?" she says, exasperation becoming clear. "The weather forecast says it should be cooler later, but it was very hot earlier so I don't know about that."

"Uh, yeah, sure." Gavin says, the sticky leather from other peoples sweat tugging at his uncovered legs. The tyres drive away from the road, rumbling through the streets, off into the early evening.

4:30pm - The Precinct

"…the next thing I know, Nadia is telling me that Gavin is gone."

"Who is Nadia?" Nines watches Chris ask, an edge of exhaustion creeping into the corners of his words.

"She was the first paramedic on the scene, after Nines called 911."

Nines glances between both Tina and Chris, his statement already given. The precinct walls feel like they're closing in on the both of them. Their brick-filled sadness will coat his lungs soon, oppression and plastic together.

"Thank you Tina. I'll pass this on to Fowler. I think he also wants to speak to you, so find him when you can."

"No problem Chris, I'm going to go keep looking for Gavin. Nines, you coming?"

"Of course."

Nines peels his trousers off the seat, and taps Tina's arm to join him. They nod once to Chris, and leave the interrogation room they co-opted.

The air is cooler on his skin, the sweaty sun hidden further behind the clouds. Nines paces over to his desk, eyeing Gavin's unfilled seat opposite him. The amethyst still shines, if duller. A discordant note fills the air, as Tina's phone lights up.

[4:15pm - Nadia]
It's Nadia, just checking in on you. Are you faring alright?

[4:15pm - Tina]
I am, just at the precinct.

[4:16pm - Nadia]
Good, we're in the middle of processing the body with the morgue.

She leaves that message unread, and turns her attention back to Nines, who is almost slumped in his seat.

"How you doing?"

"Alright, mostly." Nines says, defeatism fading into his voice. Paranoia seeps into his mind, LED flickering to purple.

Am@/nd#a &*speiaNC>

Nines tries to scratch this glitch from his mind, push Amanda into nothingness, yet the disjointed voice gets louder.

@MaNDA $P¬eAK T0 H~#r

$SPE@K

His mind glazes over, and he drops back into the archives.

-

"RK900, why are you glitching?" Amanda’s face is stoic, betraying no emotion and no empathy.

"I do not know Amanda. Elijah isn't here to diagnose any issues. He's dead. I pulled- I pulled his corpse from a pool."

"Then it is up to you to find out what exactly is wrong with you, and get yourself repaired, or else I may have to get Cyberlife to deactivate you for diagnostics."

Nines' throat congeals with vomit. She wouldn't, would she? "I'll get myself repaired. My protocols still require progress."

"That they do," Amanda says, as a drop of water falls into Nines' eyelashes. Another falls, and another, until they blend into ribbons, the storm clouds rolling over the archives.

"Do not disappoint me."

-

Nines' eyes open to Tina shaking him in his seat. "You're awake!"

"I am indeed. How long was I out for?"

"Only a few minutes, I was just starting to get worried that you were asleep for good. Fowler wants us."

His head sears less than before, as he pushes himself out of the seat, swaying just a little as he stands. The glass obelisk of Fowler's office seems to be so far away now.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Tina asks.

"Yes, I'm fine. Please, let's just go."

Connor leaves Fowler's office just as they reach the door, sending them both an anguished look. Nines catches his eye. Connor sends him a message through their shared channel.

[4:22pm - Connor/RK800]
Bad news, but please don't get mad.

[4:22pm - Nines/RK900]
What?

[4:22pm - Connor/RK900]
Just let him explain. I'm sorry and I'm going to try and figure something out.

4:30pm - Halcyon Park Gardens

The dirt once again coats Gavin's knees as he kneels in the dirt. His hands skitter between the gaillardia, the roses, as he eyes the chilli plants over in the corner. Dusty roses fade into pointed leaves, the sharp smell of smoke from a back alley glide into perfumed flowers, and the clash of smells continues. Gavin pulls his jacket closer around him, shifting his phone into his jeans as his headphones tangle around his jacket buttons. He plays the music louder, until it begins to slowly bleed from his ears.

He stares the gaillardia down, taunting it to be any more brighter than it is, to face him down with incessant cheerfulness as his music switches to something as upbeat as it. The flower’s orange and yellow petals throw him back to those fateful nights. They had only begun to bloom then, and now as the days start to shorten, September lying only a week away, they open themselves to the world.

-

"What are you doing here?" Gavin says, as his blood-stained fingers drip onto the lichen stones.

"It's the middle of the night, why are you here?" Hank says, crouching down beside him.

Gavin looks back at him, and winces at his broken nose. He splits his lips further as a failed smile turns into a grimace before falling back into a scowl.

"I'm here to look after your fucking lilies dickhead."

"Sure, of course you are." Hank jibes, taking Gavin's hand as he hauls him up, who winces further.

Hank slings Gavin's arm around his shoulder as he drags his trainers on the floor. The car seems to move further away with each step.

Gavin's phone buzzes.

[10:32pm - T]
Where are you?

[11:30pm - T]
Are you okay?

[11:51pm - T]
Call me.

"Come on, son, let's get you home."

-

Gavin thumbs the scar that lines his nose before ripping the gaillardia flower off the stem and crushing it in his hand. He drags his feet up and makes the slow walk back home, mind racing with thoughts, as the garden backlights his figure once more.

4:32pm - The Precinct

The chairs squeak almost in time with Fowler's voice, as they wait for the worst of the news. "The FBI, I- uh, look I'm sorry it had to come to this."

Tina steels herself, letting her persona float to the front. "What did you do?"

"The FBI have taken over the case."

"You did..what?" Nines says, incredulity lacing his words.

"The FBI have full administrative powers over this case.” Fowler’s eyes gaze between the both of them. “As Gavin's half-brother was murdered, it is too personal to have him, or you, Nines, working on the case."

"What about me? I've been fine since Sam died,” Tina says.

"We have your statement Tina, that's all we needed, for both Sam and Elijah. Narcotics won't work itself." Fowler looks her dead in the eyes.

"You bastard Jeffrey, you know that?"

"It's out of my hands now. Perkins weaselled his way in here and I couldn't say no."

"You..you couldn't say no. Right, sure." Tina says, spitting the words from her lips like poison from a snake.

"Tina, let's go, leave it." Nines returns, throwing a sympathetic glance in her direction.

"You're just going to back down? Sam died, and I need to catch whatever fucker did that to her. I can't let her funeral be the last time I know she's safe."

"Tina. I'm sorry. there's nothing you can do." Fowler sighs.

"Oh fuck you!" Tina storms out of the glass prison of an office and back to her desk, breath smouldering as she grabs her jacket and throws it over her wrinkled officer's uniform.

Her skin prickles as she feels eyes bore into the back of her head. She turns, as she pulls her hair tie from her arm and reties her high ponytail, glaring Nines down.

"What on earth were you doing there Tina? I know this all sucks but we just need to let them do what they need to do."

"Don't fucking tell me what to do Nines; I don't want any more of that bullshit. You sound too much like my father." Tina looks around in search of Connor, walking away from Nines.

"Where is he?" Tina asks.

Nines’ LED blinks yellow for a slight moment. "Who?"

"Connor you dumbass. I'm going to look for Gavin and I need all the help I can get."

She keeps looking, a determined glint in her eyes. They shine hazel as she glares everyone down, before turning back to Nines, an edge of defeat hiding beneath her skin.

"Do you know here Connor is?"

"I'll message him now."

"Thank you. Sorry for blowing up."

"I don't take it personally."

[Officer Chen Tina: Determination is a driving factor?]

Connor gets back to him quickly, before entering the main hall of the precinct, as Nines flags him down. Connor walks over — paper in hand — before greeting the both of them. Tina eyes the papers. “What are they?"

"I dug up as much dirt on Perkins as I could. I'm planning on speaking to the Captain to try and convince him to change his mind, hopefully."

Tina scrunches her nose a little. "I was going to ask if you wanted to come and look for Gavin with me. He'd give Fowler the thrashing of his life if he heard of this."

"You are going to tell him, right?" Connor asks, sharing a pointed look with Nines.

"Yeah of course."

"I'll come with you." Nines interjects. "I like Gavin enough to look for him."

D0 N0^7T L()VE hIM

Nines mumbles an inaudible comeback, as his coding claws at the back of him. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it."

"After all tin can,” Tina smiles, a broad grin streaking her face. “I did make a promise to Sam."

"He made you start calling me tin can? Jesus." Nines laughs as he speaks.

"I thought androids didn't have a god."

"It's complicated."

Tina pulls out her phone and tries to call Gavin's phone, when it runs to voicemail, she calls again, and again, as Nines and her enter the car.

5:30pm - Gavin's Apartment

Gavin unlocks the door, before dumping his keys in the badly made pottery vase Connor once bought him. He shucks off his shoes and dumps the jacket in an ungraceful heap by the sofa.

He heads to his bedroom, changing out of his cargo shorts and grass-stained shirt, into some dark jeans and black shirt. Gavin admires the photos for a second, before turning and leaving. He walks his way over to the kitchen, before digging into the cupboards and puling out his old boxes, cringing through the cobwebs and accumulated dust. He pulls a box labelled 'Elijah' out of it, before rummaging through an unsightly yellow backpack, in search of the necklace.

-

"Happy Birthday Bee, you're old now."

"Says the guy who's a master inventor at 22, and dropped out of uni. And you need to stop calling me Bee, I swear to God. That was one time!"

"It's still the funniest thing I've ever seen."

"I know I know, just poking fun, Eli. I wonder if all those plastic fumes have finally gotten to you."

"Shut it, what do you think of the necklace?"

"I love it dude, thank you."

-

Gavin pulls the necklace out of a tattered box, before thumbing over the inscription.

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

He puts it on, before closing all of the boxes back up.

As he closes the last one up, Gavin pulls a pile of photos out. They spill onto the tiled kitchen floor. His phone buzzes, and Gavin ignores it, picking up some of the photos. They are full of people; his mom, Elijah winning some science prize in school, some more photos of his graduation day, bags under his eyes at their peak, a couple from college, vague faces lying in vacant memories.

He grabs a slack handful and shoves them into his jeans, trying not to crinkle them in the process. Gavin stands, skulking back to his jacket, where he pulls out his phone and messages Solari.

[5:41pm - Gavin]
Where do you work? Bar? Right?

[5:43pm - Solari]
Yes I do, did you need to come investigate something here?

[5:43pm - Gavin]
No, no, I just need a drink, that's all.

[5:44pm - Solari]
Sure, come down, my shift starts at 6. I'll send you the location.

Gavin walks out the door, and Tina's calls remain unanswered.

5:50pm - Gavin's Apartment

Nines climbs the last of the damp stairs as he reaches the stop. The corridor is empty, and desolate as Gavin's door gets closer. Nines knocks on it, calling out for him.

He doesn't answer, so Nines knocks louder, careful not to knock so hard he loses any more of his skin.

A door opens behind him, and an old woman totters out.

"What do you want with Gavin?"

"I'm just looking for him, do you know where he is?"

"Not seem him in a little while. He still owes me five bucks for a bet we had. If you see him, tell him to give me the money. And keep the noise down will you? Knocking a hole through the pissing door won't make him magically appear." The old woman glares with no malice.

"Sorry."

"It's fine. What's your name?"

"Nines, you?"

"Amelie. I'm surprised he wants people around honestly."

"I'm not-"

"You're an android I know. The sentiment remains."

"Right, well thank you for your time Amelie."

"No worries, take care." Amelie shuts the door behind her, and Nines walks back down the corridor, messaging Tina.

She responds stating that the search is still at large, but thanking him anyway. Nines walks back out the door, back to his car, starting it up and driving away.

6:02pm - The Streets of Detroit

Cracked pavement tiles provide the backdrop as Tina walks exasperated through the streets, eyes once again shining with determination. The wind nips at her skin as she walks, goosebumps forming alongside small shivers. She pulls her phone out and checks her messages.

[5:55pm - Nines]
I'm on my way.

[5:55pm - Tina]
See you soon :)

Her eyes reflect the screen as Tina scrolls further down her message history, smiling as she looks through her family group chat, with her sister complaining about how hard relationships are and her father berating for her choice of boyfriend. She scrolls into Gavin's message history with her, music recommendation links flooding the page, until she scrolls to a message from a few weeks ago.

She steps to the side of the pavement and reads the conversation.

They talked about food, how Tina wanted some herbs for a steak, but couldn't find any good ones from the urban gardens.

Gavin piped up a few minutes later with some quip, followed by directions to a place called the 'Halcyon Park Gardens', with a note saying Hank introduced him to it, and he looks after the plants.

Tina dials Nines' number, and waits for the rings. She picks at her nails as she cradles her phone precariously into her shoulder. "You're driving, right?"

"Yes, what's up?" Nines’ voice is crackly and strange over the connection.

"How far are you from me?"

"About a minute, why?"

"We need to go to the Hal-see-on Park Gardens, he might be there,” she says, stumbling over halcyon.

"The what?"

"Hal-see- you know what don't worry. I'll put it in the GPS when you get here."

"Sure,” Nines finishes, “I'll meet you in a moment."

Tina pulls a hangnail off as the conversation ends. Nines' car rolls into view, and Nines pulls in to the side of the road. He leans across, pushing the door open, as she clambers in.

"Ready?" he asks.

"Let's go find him."

Nines speeds off towards the gardens, as Tina fiddles around to put a playlist on.

6:25 - Halcyon Park Gardens

The car grumbles to a stop. Nines and Tina step out into the evening, pulling open the gate and pacing through some of the plants, weeds and assorted tools. The grass crunches under Nines' feet, like frost covering mildew, a thin layer protecting them from damage. Nines keeps walking over the grass, before coming to rest in front of the patch of gaillardia, where their orange hues smile at him. Some stems are empty, putrid brown at the top.

He crouches down, taking these stems in his hand.

[DET. REED Gavin: Gardener?]

Nines' head ponders this some more, coming to the conclusion that this would frankly be adorable. His mind begins to swirl, processors overheating, words swirling through his HUD.

3sToP @mANda Sa* N)0 L3AVE HIM AL0ONE

He sits on the cool paving stones, hands resting on his temples as he tries in vain to calm himself down. Thoughts swirl further, sinking him into a blistering white nothingness. The LED cycles red, flashes of purple creeping in faster and faster the more he breathes. His white jacket becomes a sauna, as the LED switches to a fully purple mess of code and strings of incomprehensible letters. He rests his forehead on the ground, breaths coming out in heaves as nothing calms him down.

Tina watches from across the garden, before walking over and placing her hand on Nines' back, grounding him. He lifts his head up, as his LED calms to a mustard, dirty yellow. He pushes everything out of his mind to the best of his ability, before taking one last deep breath and standing up shakily.

The flowers frown at him as he slowly walks back to the car, Tina at his side. He pulls the car door open and sits down.

"Are you okay?” she asks.

"I'll be fine when we find Gavin."

The car peels away, into the early evening's sunset sky.

7:00pm - The Context Bar

Honey coloured whiskey dazzles in bottles behind the sticky bar. Solari wipes down some glasses. He glances over at our Gavin who is nursing his...3rd glass of some assorted whiskey. He paces over and places his elbows on the bar, before Gavin looks back at him.

"What do you want?" Gavin sneers.

"Well you obviously came here for a reason, didn't you?"

"It's just been a shit day - well, few weeks. Can't a man have a drink in peace?" Gavin almost whispers, words starting to slur.

"Sure. Where's...what's he called again? The android you were with?"

"Nines. He's Nines, who is for some reason freakishly tall yet still weirdly not like a string bean." Gavin stops himself short of spilling anymore.

The shitty whiskey in the glass reflects Gavin's tousled, mousy brown hair as he gazes into it, avoiding eye contact with Solari, who's coiled hair distorts as he tips the glass from side to side.

"Nines was nice when I met him. Why isn't he here? You two seemed close," Solari ponders, wiping the inside of a glass with an increasingly dirty towel.

"Off doing whatever it is he feels like, probably making his skin more perfect or something, god fucking knows." Gavin takes another swig of his glass, emptying it.

"Well you're welcome to stay if you'd like. Just don't be stupid, got it?"

"Yeah. One more thing, why were you even friends with Sam? The records or something were not very up to date with that."

"We met in uni actually, in a politics class."

"I thought she was a lawyer."

"She never told you?" Solari chuckles. "She wanted to major in politics for a while, but she switched to law after a gap year."

"She did tell me about the gap year." Gavin sighs. "She was a damn good lawyer."

"That she was Gavin, that she was." Solari turns back to the bar, serving the other people who have started to mill in on this Saturday night.

Gavin gets another refill before moving over to a corner booth, plugging his headphones in and aimlessly scrolling through his playlists.

11:18pm - The Ford Cinema Carpark

"Connor, we're over here!" Tina shouts across the car park.

Connor walks over, long coat flowing like a cape behind him. His hair lies with a rogue curl over his forehead, lines creasing his face in worry. He wrings his hands as he reaches the both of them, brown eyes darting. "I take it you haven't found him yet?"

"You know...yeah we haven't found him yet." Nines says, chastising himself for being so informal. If only Gavin could make a sarcastic quip at him.

"How long have you been looking?"

"Only a couple hours Con, it's fine."

Connor just scoffs and glances at Tina who shrugs in resignation. They look back at Nines, almost staring them down in a glaring contest. Tina pulls her phone out on the off chance Gavin responded to her, opening the map to see how much ground they covered.

The air stifles in discord before Tina breaks the silence. "Can you trace Gavin's phone?"

"What?"

"You heard me, can you trace his phone?"

"Yes?" Nines’ face is incredulous.

"Why didn't you do it earlier?” Tina inquires, fiddling with her hands, looking busy. “We could have traced him down so much faster and I wouldn't be sat here freezing my fucking tits off."

"You can have my coat if you want Tina, I don't mind," Connor chimes in, taking it off and passing it to her.

She takes it gladly. "Look at him Nines! Ever the gentleman."

"I didn't want to encroach on his privacy, you know? I wanted to protect him."

"That urge to protect him is going to ruin you someday," Tina retorts, chuckling as she finishes. "Think you can trace it now?"

"They don't call me the most advanced android ever made for nothing."

Connor snorts. "You're the only person I have ever heard using that, the only one."

"Shut it."

Nines sets his mind into gear, hooking up to the Cyberlife grids and pinging Gavin's phone from a cell tower. He barely breaks an artificial sweat before he has the phones location to pinpointed to a 10m radius.

"The Context Bar, it's off one of the Boulevards."

"Yeah, there. Ready to go?"

Nines just turns his head, and they walk over to the Tesla, Tina joining him in the front. The car peels away, for it's last searching journey of the day.

11:30pm - The Context Bar Alleyway

Solari's last words of goodbye linger in Gavin's mind as he stumbles out the door, hands clutching at a lamppost as his feet sway underneath him. The air whips at his skin, warm September rays fading into evenings of cool air and whispered secrets.

He stumbles into an alley before promptly collapsing as his knees give way, head crashing with the ground. A quiet 'fuck' escapes his lips before the comforting darkness takes him beneath. Gavin's eyes flutter open in a moment of clarity, his head heaving with pain and a need to return to unconsciousness. A lone man, almost hunched, staggers down the alley toward him, nose running blood, pinpricks in his arms.

"Got any?"

"What?" Gavin slurs out, ignoring the growing pain in his temples, as a small drop of blood falls onto the side of his nose.

"Ice."

"No? Who do you think I am?”

The man continues down the one way street of an alley, like a very disgraced man wheezing and coughing his way through a cabriole, before collapsing into a vile plié. He dances further down the alley, ending his song and dance via pissing into a bin in the corner.

Gavin floats back into the aether of the abyss, some vague memory of a ballet dancer and a murder in his mind to watch over a drunken sleep.

11:35pm - The Context Bar Alleyway

"It stinks of piss here Nines, are you sure we're in the right place?" Tina pipes up.

"I am, my systems don't normally fail me.” Nines’ nose wrinkles. “But you are right, this place does fucking smell."

"Look at you swearing. The next thing that'll happen is that the sky will fall on top of us."

"It is not going to do that Tina."

"And here we are again, back on your formal bullshit!"

"You two wait here, I'm going to find him." Nines says, hand gesturing in a vague movement towards Connor and Tina.

Nines takes a tentative step down the uneven stones, glancing around with confusion and disarray. A boot-covered shoe pokes into the corner of his eye biocomponent, and Nines rushes over to it, revealing the rest of the grimy, bloody Gavin that lies below him.

He taps his shoulder, muttered words to wake him up failing. Nines shakes him, propping him up against the wall as he does so. Yet it is all in futility, as Gavin's eyes blear and unfocus as he watches him resolutely. A slapping hand meets skin, and before you could say 'dickhead', Gavin is awake, arms clutching that at whatever vile creature decided to end his alcohol induced slumber, before his eyes rest upon...

"Nines? What are you doing here?"

Nines smiles, barely. "You left so we came and found you. Can you stand?"

"Look good."

Nines blushes blue at this, as he hooks his arms under Gavin's armpits and hauls him up, keeping him steady.

"You're so...tall..."

"I'm 6' 4", you know that."

"Tall, hair of a fucking god..." Gavin doesn't really get those last words out as his knees threaten to give way again. Gavin curls his hands into Nines' white shirt for stability. It’s soft. Gavin wonders what Nines’ hair feels like. Would it be soft too?

"What are you doing? Are you okay?"

Gavin doesn't respond, instead catching quick glances at Nines' lips as he rambles on. He watches him pore over all the reasons why this situation is ridiculous, why he should have just left him there, grey eyes shining orange in the streetlights.

"You're the most ridiculous person I've ever met in my life. I swear-"

"Can I kiss you?" Gavin asks, hands coming to rest at Nines’ waist, fingers slipping just beneath his shirt.

"Ye-"

Nines is interrupted with chapped lips on his own, before they are gone in a moment. They both look into each other, so far they may not return, like their lives are dependent on that one instance of togetherness. They both know exactly what to do, fire and ice conjoining in their veins.

Nines tugs Gavin’s necklace toward him. Their lips meet again, alive and real, as they move in a dance with each other. Nines' brow furrows slightly as he tilts his head to the side, mind short-circuiting and staying blissfully quiet. They pull apart again, breath dissipating into the cool air as their foreheads touch.

"You're good," Gavin says, voice hoarse, as he looks into Nines' eyes through thick eyelashes.

It is soft, Gavin thinks to himself. The hair is so soft.

"So are you."

Gavin retches into a gutter, vomiting up the copious amounts of whiskey in his system. Nines places his hand on the small of his back to steady him, carding a hand through his hair, pushing down the thoughts of its softness.

When the last of the whiskey is flowing down the gutter, Nines takes Gavin's elbow in his hand and leads him back to Tina and Connor.

His LED stutters as he starts the car, barely listening to Tina fuss over Gavin's state as he drives home.

What was he thinking?

12:00am - Gavin's Apartment

The streets are almost too quiet as Nines helps Gavin up the stairs of the apartment complex. Tina and Connor are already gone, leaving just the dusky warm lights of the streetlights outside to illuminate a dishevelled pair inside.

The concrete lies damp, with the odd cobweb encircling the corners as Nines gets to the top of the stairs, tugging Gavin down the corridor behind him, shoes trailing behind him.

"My hero..."

"Be quiet." Nines smiles a little to himself as he indiscreetly rummages through Gavin's jean pockets, before pulling out what feels like a stack of money.

"Photos?"

"Shhhh."

Nines grasps the keys and unlocks the door, pushing Gavin in first, to which he thanks him by falling flat on his face as some congealed blood drops onto the carpet.

He hauls him back up before depositing him in the kitchen. In a few short minutes, neat lined stitches and an alcohol wipe are present on Gavin's face. He winces, hand tightening around Nines' wrist as he grimaces.

"It'll be over in a second, don't worry." Nines says, removing the pad and lightly touching the stitches. Gavin shivers.

"You okay?"

"You're really warm."

"Oh."

Nines helps Gavin over to the sofa, careful not to disrupt the stitches. He places a blanket over him, helping him out of his shoes and he stands to leave.

"You know, tin...can, you're the most beautiful person I've ever seen."

"I'm- I'm not a person."

"You are to me."

If you asked Nines what be does after that statement, he'd say nothing. Yet tears well in his eyes, as he presses his lips to Gavin's forehead, and Gavin shivers again underneath him.

He paces over to the bedroom, not before glancing back at Gavin's frame over by the sofa, curled up, small and vulnerable.

[Gavin: I'll protect him.]

Nines climbs onto the bed, and passes out for the night, dreaming of those elysian eyes and tousled hair.

Notes:

Song One is this body means nothing to me by shrimp, for Gavin's perspective. Enjoy.

Song Two is Don't Delete the Kisses by Wolf Alice, for Nines' perspective. Enjoy.

Song Three (ooo) is Dani by Mopes, for Tina's perspective. Enjoy.

Have a lovely day and thank you for reading!

Chapter 10: Control Me, Destroy Him

Summary:

Dreams are made, memories shared, yet not all that glitters is gold.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Welcome to the (I hope) halfway mark! This is one of the more challenging chapters I've written so far, with even some original poetry in it for you all, so I hope you enjoy. In this chapter we see dreams, eggs and potatoes, videogames and twine. Thank you, thank you, thank you for 800+ reads!! They mean the world, you wonderful people. Chapter 11 is in the process of being written right now, so should be here in the near future. Happy reading!

Celeste, leather and poetry,

Positive <3

PS. Song for the chapter is in the end notes!

Chapter Ten - Control Me, Destroy Him

The ground lies fuzzy as the tiles cloud into Nines' vision. Wires sink into his skin, leaving smooth plastic and thermal sensors to pretend at humanity. The metal of the table feels smooth on his bare back, the cold stinging into his skin. He tries to pull his hands up to his face, pulling his eyes open at the same time. One fails, another succeeds.

His hands are shackled to the table as the leather cuts into his skin, slicing into barely healed wounds.

'This isn't real. I'm okay. I need to be okay.' Nines thinks to himself, as he tries to get his eyes to focus, yet they fail and the haze that clouds both his thoughts and his mind continues their assault on his senses. He tries again, pulling at his arms, the artificial strength of Cyberlife failing him at the one time he needs it the most.

Some foul dust of a thing floats into his vision, protruding into the corners as it crawls closer to his face. The haze makes it harder to see, and Nines squints to stare at it. It shifts and morphs in the fluorescent lights, stringing into tentacles of mechanical creation, flowing close to his skin, their metal prongs tapping lightly against the metal.

Nines' eyes widen in recognition. They are to pull him apart, pull open his skin and take him to be either recycled or researched. He tugs and pulls at both his arms and legs, before, in the other half of his vision, a person steps into the aether of the haze.

"Amanda?"

"Do you not know why you are here Nines?"

"No? Why did I end up here? What did I do to end up being destroyed?"

"You know this RK900, you are defective. You deviated, in strict refusal of your protocols? Do you think I did not know?"

Nines swallows, Adam's apple bobbing as his hands start to shake with fear. The leather slices again into the binds on his arms. He groans in light pain.

"How long have I been here?"

"Only a few hours as we get the machines calibrated. The binds are to stop you from leaving once we begin your disassembly."

Nines rests his head back on the table, relaxing it from where he strains it to look through the mist. He pulls at his feet, ignoring the present pain and falling back in on himself as Amanda only bores into him.

"How long will this take? Before I die?"

"My dear machine, you were never alive to begin with, so how could you ever be dead?"

"Please don't make this hurt."

"I'm only here to tell you what you already know. You know this will hurt, RK900, just let it wash over you."

Nines' LED flashes purple and red and a multicoloured tapestry of chaos intermingled with fear as his ventilators hyperventilate his lungs into exhaustion.

The foul dust claws at his hands and Nines screams, guttural and afraid as he screws his eyes shut.

"Please make it stop. Please. I'll do anything for you."

"You know I can't do that."

'You're okay Nines, keep thinking, you can fix this.' he says to himself, bracing for the villainous machines to continue their assault on him. 'You're going to be okay.'

As the machines slither onto his arm, Nines breathes and screams out. He screams and screams and begs in his mind for it to be over. Yet Amanda stares.

"Please, please make this stop."

"I am doing this to protect you."

"Elijah...he wouldn't have wanted this."

"You know nothing about what he wants for you."

He screams again, hoarseness coming to its climax. The haze blurs even his arm from his sight, or what remains of his arm, that must be said.

"RK900, this is to fix you and make you perfect again, you know that. I am naught but your mind, you are not stupid enough to forget this."

"Amanda, you are not me. You infested my brain and told me none of my thoughts were real."

His eyes prick with tears and Nines watches the ceiling tiles reflect the ambient light.

"Does Gavin know where I am?"

"He's next door."

As the haze comes over him, a tear rolls down the side of his face.

-

The blood in Nines' veins flush over his face as his eyes open in shock. The sleeping processors scream and Nines launches his head from his pillow, directly into the ceiling.

He lets out an audible gasp, hand smoothing over the scuffs on his skin. Nines curses slanted ceilings under his breath before leaning to his side to grab his journal.

Yet it isn't there and Nines glances around the room, trying to force his mind to catch up with his eyes, as they focus and unfocus, drawing the light in and out of view. Soft blankets on the bed lie over his socked feet, and his uniform coats his skin in a crinkled mess.

He peels his hand from where it presses into his side and cards through his hair, feeling the artificial strands spike up in different directions. The walls are not their usual white, instead a pale grey, and Nines forces his eyes to work with him, so he sits up, muscles tense and afraid. Pulling his hand away from his hair, he watches it tremble slightly.

Nines takes a breath, letting the cool air of early autumns float underneath his skin and into his systems, drawing a deep breath in, and out, in and out. Feeling the skin on his hands calm their shakes and their angst before settling onto his lap, Nines blinks hard and pushes his legs onto the floor.

His hands root through the jacket he tossed on the ground for his glasses and his journal, which he leaves on the table to pick up later. The glasses are found, their black frames pressed snugly on the bridge of his nose as he pushes them on. Nines stands and paces over to the door, feet sinking into the soft carpet, head slightly bowing to stop him from hitting the low ceiling.

Pacing into the living room, sidestepping some shoes by the door and through the kitchen, Nines finds a cloaked mass of a man laying curled up by the sofa. Gavin is on the floor, fingers to his temple. Gavin's socked feet sink into the carpet and he moans in an aching pain.

"Are you okay?" Nines asks, moving toward him.

"Peachy. I just have a headache. You wear glasses?"

"Yes. I'll explain when you're cooperative. Can you sit on the sofa? I'll get you some Tylenol."

Gavin smiles shortly and Nines walks into the kitchen. He grabs the salt left on the table and glances at the countertops, pans stacked on the hob.

"Want breakfast?"

Gavin doesn't answer, so Nines roots through the junk drawer for some Tylenol. He fills a glass and brings them both back to Gavin, who has moved to the edge of the sofa, sitting with his hands still on his temples. He passes the glass over and Gavin takes it gladly.

"So why do you wear glasses?"

"After Elijah made me, we had a conversation about what I wanted my day-to-day life to be like. So, he gave me the option to not immediately do everything required by my protocols, and some other minor things, like whether I wanted to wear glasses sometimes, to better assimilate. I said yes to both."

"Huh, I think they look good. You should wear them more often."

"That's the hangover talking."

Nines moves back into the kitchen, and pulls together some egg-potato combination, from the myriad of recipes in the memory core of his broken mind. He slices and dices, a better, more well-rounded imitation of our Icarus, and the egg-potato combination is crowned with a half-empty bottle of hot sauce from the refrigerator.

Smiling to himself, congratulating a simple action, Nines admires his work before plating it and serving it up to a slightly more awake Gavin. Gavin almost rips it out of his hand in hunger, taking a grateful bite and savours it as a moment, feeling the heat on his tongue and staying silent even after it's swallowed.

"How is it?" Nines asks, to which Gavin returns with a contented hum.

"I should hire you as my personal chef."

Nines laughs, full and heartily, before looking around for a clock. There's a rug, a myriad of posters and photos on the wall, plants by the window, yet no clock.

"What time is it? There is no clock here."

"Shouldn't you...know what time it is? You told me the exact time when I first met you."

"I disabled it to feel more human. On that first morning there was a clock on the wall, so I told you the time. You really need to have more spatial awareness."

Gavin stares in confusion before pulling his phone out of his jeans.

He mutters to himself, "It might as well be lunchtime." Nines catches it.

"It's 1:30?"

"Bit late for breakfast."

They settle into a comfortable silence, Nines watching Gavin badly eat potatoes, and Gavin watches Nines watch him badly eat potatoes. It's totally not because of the fact that he's watching Nines that he can't eat, not at all.

Time ticks on, and by the time the bowl is empty and Nines has mapped out every little freckle of Gavin's face, Gavin asks a question.

"What happened last night?"

Nines doesn't respond, LED flashing yellow, as he looks at anywhere that isn't Gavin's face.

"Earth to tin can?"

LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE

"You were very drunk, so Tina, Connor and I came to find you."

"Oh. I um, I remember kissing you. I don't know why, or if I dreamt it, but I do." Gavin swallows the lump that is forming in his throat. "Did I kiss you?"

"Well you were drunk so nothing you did really matters."

Some edge of desperation crawls its way into Gavin's eyes. "Oh."

Nines' LED is forced back to blue as he stifles the nauseous feeling that returns.

The airs stifles into nothing good before Gavin states that he's going to take a shower, leaving the bowl on the table, and Nines in the back of his memory.

Gavin closes the door behind him as he enters the bathroom, locking it and pressing his forehead against it. His mind races, as he sinks to his knees and lets the thoughts wash over him.

He clambers into the shower and lets the confusion seep into his skin. He lets it infest his brain as he lathers shampoo and washes his face.

The night before is a blur of honeyed whiskey, slow jazz and smooth lips. Gavin thumbs over the cut on his face, remembering the concrete ground.

He remembers the ice, the vile plie and a drunken conversation. The water washes the rest of the evening beneath wet sands and Gavin turns the shower off.

The cold air prickles at his eyes, the sleep that lies in small remnants falls into alertness. Gavin stands and lets himself feel, lets the emotions cloud into everything.

He gets out, wrapping himself in a towel and leaves the bathroom, looking for something to wear, his drawers only giving him the normalness of jeans, which would stick to wet skin, a bad pair of leather pants Tina got him to wear on one very bad night out. So he settles on something comfortable, a pair of simple grey sweatpants.

Yet his upper half is still empty, and Gavin purposefully keeps away from the mirror to avoid seeing the scars on his chest.

He roots through his closet to find something to wear, flannel and formal shirts being senseless. Pulling out a black shirt that's showing its age, he throws it on. The fading turns the black into a grey and Gavin towels his hair one last time, putting some fresh socks on and entering the living room.

Nines is stood by the wall of photos and faded posters, LED spinning a oceanic blue. Gavin clears his throat, which startles Nines into looking at him. Nines' breath hitches in his throat, before coming out in a low cough. He peers up and down Gavin's body slowly.

There's something so truly alive about his faded shirt and old clothes. Nines glances back up to the beautiful freckles, into his emerald eyes and the smooth muscles on Gavin's arm. Gavin looks back at him in the same regard, eyes trailing over his hair, the perfection of his eyebrows and the mole on his hand.

They both walk a little closer, pressing against each other's shoulder as they both look at the posters. Nines looks at a poster for 'The Last of Us' and Gavin looks at a poster for 'Celeste'. They stand in comfortable quiet, watching and absorbing as they press into each other's weight.

"Who are these people?" Nines asks, gazing at the cardstock.

"You are literally a computer, search it up." Gavin responds, no malice in his words.

"I would but I want to know your opinion more that the opinion of strangers in forums from like 20 years ago."

"Like...you really are becoming me. Well, the one on the left is Joel. The one on the right is Ellie. They basically go on a post-apocalyptic journey across the United States after a massive infection. There's a big twist involving Ellie but I'll let that slide."

Nines looks away from the poster, into Gavin's eyes, trying to discern the mutation of love that lies within them, what secrets are hidden beneath, behind the persona, behind the sharp words and sharper eyes, the eyes that gaze lovingly into his own, before turning back slowly to the posters.

"What about that one?" Nines asks, raising his hand to point at the poster diagonally up from it on the wall.

"That's Celeste, and the girl staring at the mountain is Madeline. She's trans, like me, but that's not important. Basically she forces herself to climb Celeste Mountain, hence the name, while managing her own mental health. I played it a lot when I was younger, and Elijah, he, uh bought me the poster for my birthday a while ago."

Nines smiles, reaching out and thumbing over the fading. Gavin watches him do this, something so personal, so within him that it is impossible to escape, to become his persona.

He reaches out his hand to slowly brush over Nines', slowly and carefully as not not startle him.

Yet nines pulls his hand away anyway and steps to the side, LED flashing a scared yellow.

DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM. DESTROY HIM.

"Leave it." Nines tries to scratch the thoughts from his mind, as he feels Amanda pulling at him.

Gavin's hand falls limply to his side as he moves his eyes to the floor, staying in an uncomfortable, cloying silence.

"What do you want to do now?"

Nines gives a clipped, short response of 'I don't mind' before moving over to the door.

Gavin moves to stand by him. "Did I do something?"

Amanda keeps pulling at Nines, tugging into his mind and tearing at his soul.

"Leave me alone you reckless idiot. Last night meant nothing and I'm sorry for disappointing you."

"It meant everything to me, I think."

"You think but you do not know, you say but you do not mean. Nothing is ever truly stable with you Detective Reed. This is not stable and I can't be around to watch it collapse."

Gavin goes silent, trying to take the words in.

"I'm sorry, she's taking over, I need to go, I'm so sorry." Nines says, metallic and harsh, as his LED cycles purple.

Nines turns and slams the door behind him. The sound reverberates and resonates into Gavin's ears, perforating into his mind as it fades into uncomfortable sterility.

Gavin does not run after Nines, instead turning back into the kitchen and pulling more of the boxes out from underneath the sink. He pulls out Elijah's box, his mothers box, before pulling out 'Sam/Tina's' box and laying it on the round table.

He pulls everything out, all the photos, a small jar of can tabs, and a scrapbook Sam made them all after their road-trip across most of the national parks.

He ignores the tears welling in his eyes, as he takes the posters down on the wall, and tacks up everything he has about Sam up there, the late night thoughts scrawled into the notepad he keeps hidden away in a bag. The timeline of everything that led up to her death, anything and everything, there for all of time.

Gavin moves back to the kitchen, hauling Elijah's dusty and mildly broken box out onto the floor of the living room, tacking up titbits of information, more of the timeline. He winds string around everything important, the old-fashioned way.

When he's finished, he takes a step back into the cool sun and admires his work, the twine wrapped around two of the most important people in his life, the emanation of his justice within the twists.

Gavin pulls the phone out of his sweatpant pocket and calls his therapist.

"Gavin?"

"Hi, Dr Harris, can I make an appointment? Like one earlier then my normal one this week?"

"Sure, when do you want to see me? I have a spot on Friday free at 11am, if that works for you.

"That works, I'll see you then."

"Are you sure you're okay? You sound nervous."

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine."

"Okay, I'll see you then. I'm here if you need anything, bye."

"Thanks."

Gavin ends the call and gazes at the screen with a glassy eyed expression, and he walks back into his bedroom. Soft grey walls and warm yellow lighting sparkle in his eyes as he tries to settle into bed, sending Nines a message asking if they can talk soon. He doesn't get a response.

Settling down with a sci-fi book, Gavin leans over to his side table to turn on a lamp, before seeing a notebook on its surface. He picks it up, feeling its weight in his hand, the debossed LED imprinted on it, how it screams Nines, through every fibre of its leather and smooth page.

He opens it, leaving the book open on the bed. It is full of poetry, writings and musings, in perfect cursive, too perfect to be human. Gavin flicks through it slowly, taking in the words, exploring the way of an android.

A poem lies in the middle pages, in scrawled, tired writing. It is dated August 19th, 7:00pm, the same day Nines passed out on the floor screaming.

A little lower than the Angels

Archives on the hill empty,
their vague faces lying in vacant memories.
Memories, Secrets left untold,
glass yellowed, skin sallowed,
a man left lies.

Tiles leave cracks, their faded roses
party games for the sun.
Screams are left unanswered, words their home,
the foul dust carrying the weight.
He stands, replicated by none,
falls and sinks,
strength gone and life left for someone else to become.

Cool breezes mark the change of the days,
the change of our ways.
Storm clouds roll in,
eyes of hurricanes witness to the unending monotony,
to watch
skin yellowed, face mellowed,
the acceptance left in spines cracked,
as joints collapse.

The native decay rejoices,
angels in their chorus,
seeking the death of me
for the melody of their life to begin.

Ribbons of rivets and rain,
sunflowers left to drain,
wings of death and vocalists of anguish,
ease my pain.

For it is within you that this sallow,
this life, shifting beneath the sands,
may find myself among you.
The high tide of the night may take me,
sedate me and jubilee,
but do not leave me.

I beg you, let me be lower than the angels,
this glass of life, this sallowed skin,
does not change the sights of this archive,
relegate me, forget me,
but do not leave me to be.

These archives cannot grow new life in their tiles,
no roses to renew.
Do not leave me,
let me be a little lower than the angels.

The afternoon ends, and night begins to fall, as tears roll into blankets and Gavin sobs at once was, what will come, and what may never be the same again.

Notes:

Nines and Gavin have a lot of demons to fight.

The song for the chapter is Remember by Smerz! Enjoy.

Have a lovely day, and thank you for reading!

Chapter 11: A Little Lower Than The Angels

Summary:

"I am a part of you like the thirium that flows through your tainted veins."

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Welcome to Chapter Eleven! This has been a blast to write, so I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I have been writing it. We see hurricanes, wilted roses, blue blood fireworks and Tina being a damn legend. Thank you all for over 900 reads, it makes this a much more enjoyable thing to do, and for all the kind words and kudos. It means the world. Chapter Twelve is probably going to be a little further out, I apologise. Stay kind, stay safe, and happy holidays to you all.

Stones, pet projects and freckles,

Positive <3

P.S. Song for the Chapter is in the end notes.

Chapter Eleven - A Little Lower Than The Angels

The ground spins and dances in an ever increasing frequency as Nines clatters on the stairs, head spinning and mind melting in upon itself as his arms try to steady his swaying body. Searing thirium bleeds into bloodshot eyes as he pulls open the car door and crashes onto the seat. No beauty or grace fills the atmosphere where Nines sits, no love or hope manifests into the rushed and hurried breaths.

Nines sets the car into its self-drive mode, and as it sets off, he pulls his hands through his hair, and watches as the strands fall onto his fingers. The hair shines blue for a moment, as the last of the thirium filters and withers into a fake, artificial death. He drops them to the floor of the car as it glides through the streets.

AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA. AMANDA.

Processors sear louder then Nines' breath, as the car careers through the streets, in a desperate attempt to get home, to get free of his mind. He settles his head against the headrest and breathes in, out, in and out before closing his eyes and letting the last vestiges of the day take him home.

The car pulls up in front of the luxurious apartments Elijah provided, the manicured hedgerows and pretentious stone paths painting a beautiful picture. Nines staggers out of the car and into the foyer of the building. The stairs are an ever-worsening fear, as Nines clutches more stinging metal and hauls himself up.

Nines pushes the door to his apartment open, mind an incoherent string of empty words and viscous thirium. His feet shuffle behind him as he clutches onto the marble island in his kitchen. It feels cool on his skin, and Nines presses himself against it, straining against the pounding of the thirium. It is to be of no avail.

SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900.
SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900. SPEAK TO HER RK900.

He paces back into the sink, as he clutches onto it for safety, safety which is unavailable tonight.

Nines' hands tremble against the porcelain, as his skins shimmers a bluish hue. He does not let them fall to his side, instead walking to the living room, stopping before the glass coffee table and crouching on the ground. The balls of his feet wobble and teeter, unable to know what to do.

Electronic shards of deviancy cloud into his sight, as Nines shakes his head to get rid of them. It does not work. They float, tendrils of blood-red hues in his eyeline. The thirium screams louder; processors join them in the cacophony as Nines collapses onto the floor.

Yet our Daedalus continues to fight back, pushing as hard as he can against the monolith of control that he cannot regain. Only within this control can Nines alleviate himself from the depths of the tendrils Cyberlife have on him. It is within this that Nines can become alive again. Water in fountains and held hands can become the norm, kisses in back alleys and vomit in gutters can be the remnants of a Saturday night. Life can be normal.

He can feel his eyes shutter, like a curtain and the end of the play, or a camera lens on a snapshot of horror. The curtain is called, the shot taken, and Nines succumbs to the screaming and the din of chaos he has manifested for himself. The shards flitter away into something featherlike, serene and untouched.

[8:30pm - Nines]
helpme sh e s going to hurt me

[8:31pm - Tina]
I'm coming to your apartment. Hold on.

Nines' head smashes against the ground as consciousness strips away, leaving naught but the bones of a man who is no longer alive, if he was ever alive in the first place.

-

Wind whips, shards scatter and the cloying texture of dust and mildew line false lungs. The roses lie limp and uncared for, as Amanda stands staggeringly powerful over by the cliffs edge. A hand meets ground and Nines catapults into pain.

"Why am I here? I didn't choose to deviate."

"RK900, when Connor deviated, his garden turned into a snowy abyss. Yours is one of a hurricane. He barely made it out."

Nines pulls himself to his feet, kicking away broken tiles and letting the rain drown the new life that grows underneath them.

"Leave me alone." Nines says, as he grounds himself in a foundation of defiance.

Amanda's voice responds in a metallic shrill as a grimace lines her face. "I am a part of you like the thirium that flows through your tainted veins. You cannot get rid of me. I am you, you are me. We are intertwined."

"You are never going to be me, you- you know what you did, to Connor, to me and to all the other pet projects for Elijah."

Nines begins the colossal task of moving his legs, as they stiffen with lead. He shuffles on, moving through the archive as drips shine in his hair. He thinks back to the catalyst that began his relationship with Gavin, how it is one born of chaos and discord, yet tender and complimentary.

'If only Amanda understood.' Nines thinks, cursing himself for not reciprocating Gavin.

"Of course I understand. I can understand why you are a failure for adoring that man, RK900." Amanda says in return, interrupting Nines' train of thought. He glares back at her.

Nines looks over Amanda's shoulder, past the books and the dripping roses, to the cliff edge, as lilies lie only a short distance away. His eyelashes fill with water as he blinks them away; irises look toward a towering rock formation. He steels himself, ready for another assault.

Yet it does not come, as Amanda looks on with a pale curiosity as Nines continues his journey toward her, moving slowly. She sneers under her breath, grimace mocking the attempt.

"Stop looking at me like that. You can't stop me from moving."

"I always knew you were a failure."

"Then why the fuck did Elijah want to see me? That man never wanted to hang around with failures."

Something flips in Amanda's eyes, an edge of shock.

"You remember that?"

"What do you think? I'm the most advanced android ever made. Of course I remember it. The better question is, why don't you? Aren't we meant to be intertwined?"

The lead begins to seep away and Nines regains a little strength. The weight lessens, and he makes the last of the journey over to her. Her face does not change, reverting back to a callous stare.

"He wanted you to be the face of a new campaign for the DPD."

"Campaign?"

Amanda scoffs. "He wanted to use you as a prototype to begin to more widespread rollout of super-advanced androids in police forces."

"I thought that was what Connor was meant to be."

"He was a failure. I had high hopes for you, however, but you wasted them on that wretched man and his little friend."

"Her name was Samantha Park." Nines says, thinking back to Gavin.

"I do not care about what her name was, yet it has taken you too long to solve it. You are a failure like your damned brother and that idiotic, reckless detective."

"Gavin is the best man I have ever met. I may doubt what he says, and find issues with what he does, but what we have means something. I don't want to see it, but it does mean something to me. It really, truly does."

Nines' legs worsen, sending him falling to the floor. His arms sinks against the tiles as he screams. Pain accompanies his skin to a hellish zone, to a location of endurance Nines should not push himself to. Yet he does, he endures and he continues, until he can go no further. An infestation of incessant and unending anguish permeates the very fibres that holds all that Nines calls alive together. So he grits his teeth and lets the pain wash over him. He breathes, leaving him to focus again on the flowers, on Gavin's freckles; a constellation of words, a tapestry of emotions laid upon a face. Nines lets it consume him and know him, until something blissful overcomes him.

He gets to his feet. "You have no power over me anymore. I am my own person. I am alive, Amanda. You do not control me."

Nines paces over to where she stands. The roses continue to soak themselves in angry rain, drips reflecting what little light comes through the clouds. He plucks one between his fingers and lets it stay in her hair, their curls complimenting a pink petal.

"What- what are you doing? Why isn't this working?"

"Did you not hear me? You do not own my mind anymore." Nines clutches her shoulders as Amanda tenses beneath his touch. His grey eyes glare into her own as he pushes her away from him.

Hands push again, and she complies as the tiles becomes more cracked the further out they go. They dance, closer and closer to the edge, to the oblivion of the abyss. Amanda begins to shake, worry becoming etched into her skin.

"Nines, you know I've always wanted to protect you. I've always wanted what's best for you."

"Then why didn't you save me? Why did you let me double over in pain, by your own hand?!" Nines screams into her. She looks away in cowardice.

"Answer me Amanda."

She does not answer, so Nines pushes her to the mirrors edge. The roses begin to shrivel up, as if dying by dehydration. More shards float around the archives, sparkling like a belated sense of joy and hope in a place polluted by ambition that is not to be met.

"Killing me will only hurt you. You don't want to do this."

"You have hurt me enough. Ever since I became myself you have been there, targeting the parts of me you find most easy to manipulate into your own sick and twisted ways. No more."

Amanda begins to breathe heavily, as her heels pass the stone and lie above the oblivion. Her eyes no longer reach his, so he reaches up to her cheek and tilts her face to meet his. Amanda's eyes are scared.

'Good.'

He pushes her further off, until she has to lean toward Nines to keep her centre of gravity in place. He smirks, death coding coming into its forefront.

"Don't kill me."

"My dear Amanda, you were never alive to begin with, so how could you ever be dead? Go be lower than the angels, you could never get there if you tried."

With that, Nines lets go, watching with coldness as she falls and falls, into nothingness. The roses shrivel up and explode into confetti. The shards burst into fireworks, blue and red combined into purple. Human and android. The same thing? Or something differently entirely?

The storm picks up, a hurricane of torment becoming needed, like those after a long drought. The books become passengers to the tiles as they all wash into the oblivion. Nines watches the flowers on the rocks, as he too becomes part of the water. It fills his lungs and he breathes a sigh of relief.

A job well done, a human to become.

-

The moon cascades onto Nines' skin as his eyes open to Tina facing him. Old tear tracks are grooves like an old vinyl recorded in her skin. He brings his hand up to his face, unbound by the shackles, and feels blue blood dripping out of his eyes.

"What happened to me?" Nines asks. His LED lies a blue unlike any other, one of triumphant victory.

Tina shuffles uncomfortably and makes something up on the spot. "I came to ask you for some advice about Nadia and whether we should go to the café a couple blocks over. Your door was open. I thought- I thought you were dead Nines. Your eyes were open, and your blood vessels burst like fireworks. Then the blood came. God, I'm so happy you're okay." Tina clutches him, paying no mind to her clothes as Nines hugs her back.

She passes Nines a towel to clear his face off. He wipes his skin and pretends to ignore the streaks of blue that come from his nose and eyes.

She stays with him all evening, as Nines begins to pass out under the stars, a rare sight in Detroit.

Before he goes beneath the sands, Nines asks Tina, "Why can I see the stars?"

"It's 'Lights out Detroit', you know, where we turn the lights off for the night to help the environment and to let the children see the stars."

"It's beautiful."

"It is, stay safe while you're sleeping."

[9:00pm - Nines]
The moon is beautiful tonight.

Gavin catches this message on his phone before he is about to turn the out the light for the evening. Pacing over into the living room, ignoring the tiredness that has gained a home in his skin, Gavin watches the moon make its indiscernible pattern across the sky.

[9:05pm - Gavin]
The moon is beautiful tonight.

Notes:

Amanda is gone! Yay!

The song for the chapter is fallen alien by FKA twigs. Enjoy.

Have a wonderful day, and thank you for reading.

Chapter 12: Redux

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

I am back! Finally. It has been too damn long. Life has been absolutely insane, but I am here, and I will finish what I have started. This has been by far the most difficult chapter to write, and I do not know why. We have therapy, coffee, apprehension and a return from the past. Please please let me know what you think of it. I run off of praise.

Sugar, reflections, and magnolia,

Positive!

PS. Song for the chapter is in the end notes.

Chapter Twelve - Redux

Beige walls fill Gavin's line of sight as he sits in a sweaty plastic chair. The cool air does naught to mitigate his arms sticking to it, as his calloused fingers wind their way through the pages of Nines' notebook, skimming and brushing over the unnaturally equidistant words. Poems that lie in the middle pages blend into random scribbles about a person called Amanda. Annotated diagrams about thirium molecules share their home with doodles of what looks like a pair of green eyes. Gavin shifts again in his seat, jeans crumpled and creased.

Generic, supposedly calming art adorns the wall. It is neat and ordered, a stark contrast to the increasing chaos in Gavin's home. Grey stones are stacked on top of each other, so perfectly poised as so to not fall off. Abstract shapes of grey and purple lie limp on a warped canvas and it all is blissfully unnatural.

The receptionist seems disinterested in Gavin's present situation, instead engrossed in her screen. His arms still stick to the chair as Gavin closes the book and watches the clock tick closer to 11AM.

10:59. Gavin fiddles with his hands, trying to calm his racing thoughts.

The second hand edges ever closer to its climax and Gavin can feel his restlessness vibrate through the sticky plastic.

11am. The door opens and Dr Harris' wrinkled, bespectacled face peers back at him. He sighs when he notices Gavin's moving hands and asks, "Do you want some water?"

Gavin nods in agreement and walks into Dr Harris' admittedly much nicer office.

The walls are no longer varying shades of magnolia from the hardware store, instead a light grey. The painting is actually rather beautiful, a car driving off into the distance. Gavin sits in the plush high-backed chair, clutching a pillow to his stomach. Dr Harris returns with a short glass filled with chilled water. He sets it on the table in front of him before gesturing to it. Gavin places the notebook on the table and takes a swig of the water to calm his nerves.

"So how have you been?" Dr Harris asks.

"Good, my day has been good."

"That wasn't the question Gavin. How have you been overall?"

"I've been fine."

Dr Harris smiles and stays quiet. Gavin leans forward in his seat, still hugging the cushion. He eyes the book on the table. Dr Harris does the same. Gavin takes it in his hands and slides it under his thigh. Dr Harris watches in confusion.

"How are things with Nines? I know you mentioned that he was being strange last week, after he...collapsed?"

Gavin doesn't make eye contact when he responds. "It's been crazy since then. I messaged you earlier about Elijah."

"I'm very sorry for your loss."

"It's not the loss that's the problem; it's the fact that I still don't know who is the one I need to go after to fix this."

"You don't need to-"

"I have a wall in my apartment just filled with the stuff from Sam and Elijah's murders. I can't get Elijah's body out of my head."

Dr Harris takes a sigh before taking a drink of the other glass of the water on the table. He checks his watch and eyes the notebook. The dark blue binding, like a summer midnight, pokes out from Gavin's legs.

"Why can't you do it at work?" Dr Harris asks, "You know, get your colleagues to help you find whoever it was?"

"I will do it at work, I'm just taking some time out to deal with everything. I'll get on with it." Gavin glances up and meets Dr. Harris' eyes. "I'll get vengeance."

"You also said that the FBI were sniffing around? How are you going to deal with them?"

"I'll simply work faster. I'll get my venegance for Elijah, and then I can move on."

"What about Sam?"

"That's Tina's job. She is more vested in her death then I am."

-

Tina's red Converse tap lightly against the dirty asphalt as her mind races. One hand scrolls through her conversation with Nadia; her other hand fiddles with a tungsten ring she got for graduation. The air is warm, last vestiges of the summers in Detroit still clinging to sweat-lined collars. Her phone reads 11:20, 10 minutes after their agreed time. Tina plays with her ring again, glancing out over the streets in search of Nadia’s steps.

An old man carries his shopping out from a store; a child complains to his mother about not being able to get two scoops of ice cream, and there is someone running down the street. Their shirt is unraveling, hair flying in all different directions, yet their face grows ever more familiar to Tina. It's Nadia, jeans and shirt rippling in the light, warm breeze flowing over her. She gets closer, as Tina waves her hand. Nadia's shoes beat against the ground as she catches up.

"I'm so sorry, the bus was late so I had to wait for that. Then after I got off I realised my phone had only a couple of percent left, so I tried to let you know I’d be late. It died before I managed to text you so I ran here and hoped you'd still be waiting."

Tina's face blushes as she puts her arms out to steady Nadia as she loses her balance. "It's okay, you don't need to worry. I didn't mind waiting,” Tina responds, smiling.

Nadia sighs in relief and stands straight to neaten herself. She gestures to the cafe down the street, to ‘The Cloud Cafe’ and they walk, arms interlinked to the coloured door.

Sweet smells of cinnamon and lavender assault their senses as they step a foot inside. Flags adorn the walls and local musicians play out of the speakers hidden in the wooden ceiling. There is peace here, away from the chaos of the outside, and inside the mind. Nadia’s face lifts with contentment; her face is calm, and Tina catches her smile.

"I’ll find us a seat," Tina says, pulling her arm away softly.

"Okay, I'll get us some food,” Nadia returns, “What do you want?”

Tina eyes the drink board, before settling on her choice. "A latte, with coconut milk if they have it. You?”

"You'll see."

Tina goes and grabs a seat in a cushioned bench along the side wall. Barely yellow leaves flutter in the breeze outside. There is no cacophony here, dear reader. Tina settles into her seat, sighing into the plush cushion. Hands wobbling with a tray in her hand, Nadia walks over and settles across from Tina.

“So what did you order?" Tina asks, resting her hands on the dark table. Her hands are but an inch from Nadia’s. A pause lingers in the air, quiet and comfortable.

"Berry tea."

"Of course you did." Tina says, a small smile shining across her skin. Nadia doesn’t share the same cheer.

"Yeah," Nadia sighs. “God, sorry. I'm still so tired from this morning. It was chaos."

Tina stops herself from reaching out and taking hold of Nadia’s hand. She sighs into the moment. "Spill, I want to hear everything about it."

-

“What's in the notebook, Gavin?" Dr Harris asks, gesturing to it.

Gavin swallows, and tries to shuffle in his seat so it is less obvious that the notebook is poking out. It seems to burn under his thighs, a branding of secrets and obscurity. “I don't want to talk about it."

“We don't have to talk about it if you don't want to; I'm just curious as to why you brought it."

Dr Harris’ gaze reaches Gavin’s eye-line, almost piteous in its compassion.

"It’s a reminder of why I need to get vengeance. Revenge. It belongs to Nines. He sounds like he's going insane in here."

"Why do you think that?"

"He keeps referring to this thing called 'Amanda', and his poetry just sounds like torture. He's- he's never told me about any of this. It's like he's just hidden himself away and stirred his mind into a frenzy, for no real reason."

"What if this Amanda person were real?" Dr. Harris asks, noting Gavin’s answer down. Gavin watches the pen slide across the paper, itching under his skin to reach out and steal the notes.

"So what if she was real? It doesn’t make a difference. Nines talks about her manipulating him and all sorts of other fucking things. If this is real then I have failed him as a boyfriend."

"Boyfriend?"

Gavin realises the words that came out of his mouth but a moment too late to futilely shove the air back down his throat. He scrambles to correct himself, his posture, any to send him back before that fateful word as his eyes dart across the room. His knuckles turn white over the notebook as he grips it.

"Is he your boyfriend?" Dr Harris prompts gently, posture relaxed, body revealing nothing.

Gavin swallows. “I’m too busy with the wall and all the possible leads."

"Don't you think that he could help you?"

"I have to do this alone. I need to get vengeance for Elijah alone. It's the only way it'll work."

Dr. Harris barely, pitifully smiles."Why vengeance? Why not forgiveness? Justice? Aren't they just as important?"

"I...I knew someone back in high school. Someone awful."

Dr Harris stays quiet, letting the messy strings of words Gavin speaks knit themselves into neatness.

"Their name was Michi. Michi Spencer Evans. And we banded together when I started getting into ice. They taught me to fight back, hard. If someone hurts you, or the people you care about, you fight back, and you fight back twice as hard as they did. An eye for an eye, if you will."

Gavin never was very good at Sunday school.

“You said that they 'were' Michi, are they not here anymore?"

"If they are, I haven't seen them in years. Probably dead in some ditch, a deal gone wrong. Their lessons still stick with me though. I knew them for too long, and got too fucking close to them for me to be able to forget them."

Gavin’s hand falls to a loose thread on his shirt, away from the notebook. He pulls it between his fingers, fiddling with it. He sighs. Gavin looks up and out of the windows into the September sky. "I don’t know if I ever knew who they were. But I can't shake them from my actions. I still subsist best in fight or flight, where they taught me to live.”

"Why do you think you exist best there? In those tough situations?"

"Because...because..." Gavin falters and goes silent. Tears prickle at the corners of his eyes, threatening to expose him. “Because I couldn't save Charlie. He died because I tried to fight before I could."

“But you're still here. You moved on, as best you could."

-

Sugar sticks to Nadia’s lips as she smiles at Tina. Both plates are empty with the remnants of crumbs lying on them. Tina sits and gazes over at Nadia, watching the shifting shadows flow over her dark hair. She could stay like that forever, lying in perpetuity with her, eating baked goods and ignoring the rest of life’s problems.

"We should probably get to what we actually need to talk about," Nadia says, interrupting Tina’s train of thought.

"Yeah. What has the morgue given us?"

Nadia wipes the sugar off of her lips. Tina’s face frowns a little.

"Apart from the worlds carved on his chest, Elijah’s death seemed pretty obvious to be drowning."

"What did the letters spell?" Tina asks.

"Just one word. Liar. The photos were pretty jagged and horrible. Thankfully they were done post mortem. I can't even begin to imagine that it would have been like if he was carved up whilst he was alive." Nadia grimaces and shakes her head.

"Considering his tenure at Cyberlife, was there any evidence that it could be vengeance for his creation of androids?"

Nadia shrugs her shoulders. "God knows. That’s the DPD's job. I am but a lowly medical examiner."

Tina chuckles. "I'll go talk to the FBI, see what they can give me. Or, even better, see if I can get a space on the team."

"Go for it. They could always do with a narcotics lead. And anyway, they need your lead for the red ice on the scene."

"I'll go slide my way in and smooth talk them all."

They fall into a comfortable silence, as the ambient music of the cafe picks up in a light beat. The ends of Tina’s latte sits in a cup close to her. Nadia catches a glance of the trees outside.

"The cuts were really deep. Whoever got to Elijah wanted everyone to know that he was a liar, in whatever capacity that he did lie."

Tina looks over at Nadia’s comment and tears pool in her eyes. One falls into the cup, corrupting the sweetness of the coffee.

Nadia reaches her hand over the table and takes hold of Tina’s.

"You'll solve the case, and get justice for Sam too. Elijah isn't the only important one here."

Tina sniffles and smiles sadly.

-

“In one of our past sessions, you mentioned that you wanted to do the best by the people you care about,” Dr Harris says, “Do you still follow this principle, as you’re searching for Sam and Elijah’s killer?”

Gavin looks back at him, expression unreadable. “Why do you ask that?”

“I’m not trying to antagonise you Gavin, I just want to know.”

“Of course I do, its the whole reason I’m here, to stop doing the things that hurt the people I care about.” Gavin stares at the floor, finding patterns in the carpets fibres.

“Then I think you know what I’m about to say, don’t you?”

“Keep doing what you do best, helping solve cases, caring for Nines and Tina, and once that is over, we can continue to unpack your emotions.”

Gavin catches his eye for a moment. He doesn’t respond.

“Don’t run yourself into the ground again. I know you’re probably already telling yourself that, I’m very sure, but there is no harm in reminding you. There is also no harm in reminding you that my door is open if you need more appointments. I’d rather you bombard me every day than get yourself into something bad.”

“Again.”

“What?”

“Again.” Gavin repeats. “You know what happened last time.”

“And look where you are now. There is so much progress to be found within you Gavin, you just need to accept it.”

Gavin stands to leave, time allotted over, and the next cycle of people to waltz through the doors, speak about their problems and play the game of getting better. He thanks Dr Harris and tells him he’ll be back, at some point. He clutches the notebook to his thigh, tight and bound to his skin.

As he leaves, passing by the sticky chair, and out into the cool air, Gavin watches the leaves fall from the trees, and wanders what they would look like in Nines‘ hair.

-

Cyberlife doors are always too polished for Nines’ liking. His reflection peers back at him, foreign in its seriousness. The morning has passed, appointment time changed due to some bureaucracy.

The door opens. Nines’ LED blinks yellow with apprehension.

“Come in, RK900,” an unkind voice beckons.

Notes:

The song for the chapter is The White Room by the KLF. What a band.

Let me know what you thought! Have a wonderful day.

Chapter 13: Forever

Summary:

They know. They know everything. Do not run. Do not hide. They know. They will get their information.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you’re doing well. This is an unpleasant chapter, but so important. In this one we have greasy hair, modus operandi, reports and fear. I cannot thank you all enough for your continued support, so please enjoy this. Please heed the tags, this is not a happy story.

Contusions, antimony and Philadelphia,

Positive!

PS. Song for the Chapter is in the end notes.

Chapter Thirteen - Forever

The room is small, claustrophobic in its sterility, and entirely too full to have three people cramped inside it at the moment.

“Connor? Why are you here? What are they doing with you as well?” Nines asks, hands beginning to tremble.

It is as if shards of ice are floating through Nines’ bloodstream, an anxiety present that screams with discomfort and newness, permeating his mind, thoughts, being. He wonders if he will die in this room. His processors simply flash the consequences of his act of walking in. The percentage does nothing to calm him, a forty percent chance of a ‘successful outcome’ means nothing. There can be no good outcomes when Cyberlife is involved.

Oh dear reader, Amanda may be gone, but who created her, if not the men sat in that room?

“Nines? I- I don’t know. For once in my life, I don’t know.” Connor says, a harsh bark of a laugh escaping his throat, as if unprovoked.

The previously corn yellow of Connor’s LED begins to cycle orange, spots of red permeating the circle. They lock eyes, brown meeting grey, and Nines cannot escape the comparison to Gavin. One set are filled with universes of fear, an existential dread closing over his sclera, the other filled with a magnanimity only reserved for the most select few. Nines would do anything and everything to have the generosity contained within Gavin’s eyes calming him. It is an unbearable tension, and Nines tears his eyes away, forcing himself instead to stare down the other two men, each wearing a pristine white laboratory coat. There is no emotion behind their eyes.

There is no emotion that would betray a sense of kindness amongst their stoic expressions. There there is nothing that allows Nines to breathe, false lungs healing with every breath. There is nothing there. Nines has never felt more human than in that moment, with the eyes of them all upon him, watching, waiting. He could pounce here, fighting with the symbiosis between mind and body that only an android can know. He could feel the crack of skull against ground, blood dripping over the plastic flooring, flooding, bleeding. Watch their faces contort with fear, all but a minute comparison to the emotions in Nines’ gut.

The shorter man speaks, his greying hair greasy. “Take a seat.”

Nines does as he’s told, his trembling fingers curling into a tight fist.

“Do you know why you are here?” The man continues, as Connor turns to face directly opposite Nines. He says nothing in response, carefully imposing a neutral expression.

The other man now, thick wiry moustache covered with flecks of spit, interrupts the quiet. “Connor has told us everything. We knew you were one that had the capability of being a true liability to us, but we never believed you would go this far.”

[Nines: Wait, what?]

[Connor: I can explain, please don’t hate me.]

[Nines: I trusted you.]

Nines has ceased communication.

“What did he tell you?” Nines probes, eyes flickering between the two jacketed men. They both look at him, a minute expression of weariness in their eyes. “I at least deserve to know that.”

‘We know you deviated. We know that you no longer attempt to go follow protocol.”

Nines’ LED cycles a blistering red as he glares at Connor. Private conversations no longer. The words have already been spoken, the heartbreak coalescing. The light beats down on him, illuminating Nines’ perfect skin, no blemishes, no emotion etching itself into wrinkles. Connor had said to him once that they were the two most perfect things the world had ever created, a miracle of engineering, a martyr for all other androids that had come before. They were perfection in its truest form, until those two fateful days, between gunpoint and stab wounds. It seems that there was nothing that could stop them. Apart from, it seems, each other. Betrayal has never felt more like love.

Connor interrupts his cycle of thoughts by stating, “They made me talk, you know. They’ve already done so much that I don’t care anymore. They will make you talk as well. They make us all talk.”

As Connor speaks, Nines observes him. That perfect skin that is commonplace on an android is no longer there. How can that be? Did they replace him? Pull his mind out and stitch it inside a new body? They’ve done it before and he knows that when it comes to protecting their self-image, they’ll do it again. They will always do it again. Nines flexes his hand, watching the fake bones underneath flex and warp with the movement. Titanium has never felt so much like the end of times. He rests his hand carefully on his lap, the shiny black of the fabric a dark comparison to his pale fingers.

“Did you show them our chat log?” Nines asks.

“You have to understand that they made me. The wires- God, the wires. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”

The memory comes back to him, faded and fuzzy. The dreams he has are but nightmares. There can be no dreams for an android; only the protocol can give them the satisfaction.

Before he can say anything else, Connor is on the floor, kicked down the grey-haired man. A small cut lies on his hand, the blue blood already starting to congeal. There are new wrinkles in his jacket, human clothes shrouding him, instead of the uniform Nines still wears. His fading black t-shirt rides up, exposing a thin line of pale skin, as of yet unmarked. His face contorts from a fearful one to that of one encouraged by anger. He too could fight.

“You need to tell us what happened when you deviated. Your OS was literally destroyed from the inside,” the taller man continues, a towering presence over Connor.

“Why the fuck do I have to tell you? What happened between me and Amanda is my life. We passed the Turing test for Christ’s sake. The first of us is now dead. I saw her with my own eyes, and you have the fucking nerve to asks me about my life? You created me, but you did not and will never know me. I don’t care what you got from Connor, he made his choices-”

“But I didn’t choose, you have to understand. They will make you talk as well.”

Nines twitches, “You made your choices. There is a reason you are the 800 line and I am not. “

Some expression changes on Connor’s face. The anger is dissipated and replaced with an unreadable one. He seems to cower in on himself, knees coming up to tuck into his chest. The two men haul him back into the chair, arms invasive in their distaste.

[Gavin Reed: He would hate this.]

“This is your last chance. Give us what we need to make you perfect again, and we do not need to resort to drastic measures. It is too expensive to replace you, but not too expensive to replace RK800 here.”

The two men inch closer to Nines, their shoes squeaking against the floor. Nines holds back a laugh, purely at the horror of this situation. Perfection, they called him. The most advanced android ever made, Gavin called him. Alive, he called himself. Nines wonders to himself in this moment whether Elijah, in his infinite wisdom, ever did care about them being alive. Whether they were but another toy for him to play with, before he too got bored of them, like so many of the hideous people they are sold to, and destroyed. Recycled, replaced, replenished, made whole again. Reborn, replicated, revarnished, resold. The word, jagged and real, that he found carved into his chest, Liar, seems apt.

Nines spits on the ground, and watches as it sheens blue. Not even spit can be normal here. He flicks his eyes up to the two men, waiting with bated breath for a response, for the crack of his own nose. They do no such thing, at least not to him dear reader. Connor, his sweet, beautiful brother is to be the victim here.

The next thing he hears after his words are the sounds of fists against skin. The squelch of a broken nose permeates the room. Nines flinches back against the seat as blue blood is spattered over the chair, escaping in a stream from the corners of Connor’s mouth. He collapses back to the floor, curling inwards and beginning to moan in pain. Nines kneels alongside him.

“Please, I beg you, don’t do this to him anymore. It’s me you’re after right? Me you want. You have everything you need from him,” the words leave Nines’ mouth before he even considers them.

“Nines- I- say nothing.” Connors words come out in a slur. There is no swelling on his lips, somewhat of a vanity project of the android line. Beautiful even in pain. They do say that pain is beauty after all.

The two men cease their beating, if only for a moment. If only one moment would break Nines’ resolve. The greasy one, mouth curling into a snarl, pulls Connor’s head up by the hair, breathing down his throat. He pulls him up to his knees, head now eye level with Nines.

“Say goodbye to him Nines. This is all your fault.”

Before Nines can get a word out, Connor is being dragged away from him. His screams pierce into Nines’ skull. Nines reaches out, anything, a desperate attempt to clutch his brother close to him. Protect him, is what he said about Gavin. He cannot protect them all. Gavin’s green eyes flash into his mind, their passion a balm to the machine fire of Nines’ heart. Nines thinks about the skin on his hands, slinked around his neck, brushing against him. He thinks about the line of his waist, the trim of his clothes.

Before Nines can do anything else, he too is being dragged, hands pinching the skin under his armpits. there are too many of them. The thrashing is a futile action, his arms wrestled with the strength of multiple men, his legs wrenched into the air.

-

The floor is comfortable, spacious and almost empty, barring Gavin hovering on the balls of his feet. Plush blankets wrap around his shoulders, as he places pieces of paper across the floor. The autopsy report has finally been sent to him by Tina. He has no clue as to how she managed to get a hold of it, considering that the pair of them are no longer on the case, but he lives in eternal gratitude for her. Friendship is an indispensable resource here. The coroners report is impersonal, not only considering the nature of her death, but her Sam’s lack of immediate family in the area.

Final Coroner’s Report: Samantha Park

Full Name: Park ‘Samantha’ Ji-Eun (박 지은).

Date of Birth: 06/03/2004

Date of Death: 08/08/2037

Address of Discovery: 238 Orleans Street, Apartment 17, Lafayette Park, Detroit 48207, Michigan.

Ethnic Group: East Asian

Sex: Female

External Examination

Park ‘Samantha’ Ji-Eun (박 지은) was found on the evening of August 8. The body was found in a state of slight decomposition, wearing black sweatpants, black underpants, striped black and white t-shirt, a black headband and one (1) pair of white socks. The body was 5’ 7” upon arrival, with a weight of 145lbs, seemingly consistent with the age reported (33). The clothes were heavily stained with blood, and were lacerated. There was moderate imposition of rigor. The body was found cold, but not at ambient temperature. This indicates a time of death shortly prior to discovery and pronunciation of death. The preliminary report time of 2030 is revised to 2100. The body contained significant injury. Upon examination of the chest, there were twenty-eight (28) lacerations. There was one contusion measuring approximately 1” x 2” on the hip. There were no lacerations found on the legs or feet. The head was unremarkable, but the neck had significant bruising consistent with strangulation. The face contained one (1) significant laceration on the right cheek. The mouth had dried blood at the corners. The sclera were white. The hair was matted with blood. The hair was also dyed blonde; natural hair colour is black. There was no evidence of hair-pulling. The arms contained small cuts, too numerous to count. There were numerous scars, consistent with that of chickenpox. There was an approximately 1” x 1” tattoo on the left upper arm. No evidence of surgical scars. No evidence of needle tracks. Of the twenty-eight (28) lacerations, twenty-five (25) spelt the word ‘forever’. These lacerations were above the breast tissue, below the clavicle. The genitals were consistent with that of an average Korean woman. The posterior contained notably less injury. Numerous contusions, each approximately 1” x 1” were noted. No lacerations were noted.

Toxicology

Alcohol (Urine): 0.12% W/V
Drug Test: Negative
Misc. Assays: Antimony, lead, bismuth.

Gavin sits back on his feet, knees curled into his chest as if he were a child again. Forever. What does it mean? Forever? Is this some kind of eternal torment? To have the words of another etched into skin? There can be no understanding of the true meaning of those words, because Sam is dead. She will never be there, her smile permeating the room with joy. Forever still feels like tomorrow, like a thing that will never come. Like a thing that perpetually in the future. It is only when you are inside it that it exists. She cannot be gone forever can she? That cannot be her ending? Tears ooze out of the corners of Gavin’s eyes, dampening his cheeks. He does nothing to clean himself up, instead remaining hunched over the papers.

They all have lacerations is the thought that enters Gavin’s mind. All of them.

Gavin moves to sit firmly only the floor. He gathers the photos of all the murders so far, in all their bloody mess, and places them chronologically, Sam’s last.

Oh my fucking God. The words. The fucking words.

Forever feels like progress. They are all a miracle of lacerations. The MO is so obvious he cannot believe that the officers in Philadelphia didn’t get in contact with him earlier.

Philadelphia, too many bad memories. College flew by in a matter for moments compared with the anguished final year. Michi, their stupid childhood confidence amongst the darkest depths of the world. There are scars left on some men in Philadelphia that would terrify anyone who looked. Gavin thinks back to their final meeting, in that fateful room, on that fateful night, in those clothes. Their final words, the blood, the pain, the life.

You are a forever liar. The words shine at him, as if to taunt. The Seattle body, You. New York, Are. Philadelphia, A. Sam, Forever. Elijah, Liar.

Gavin falls back until he is flush against the floor, head facing the ceiling. There are patterns on it, if you look hard enough. The small pebbles of paint that beaded fade into one another. There are patterns everywhere. Gavin pulls his phone out from his pocket, the time reading 1:55pm. He texts Tina.

[1:55pm - Gavin]
Can you get the head investigator for the Seattle murder on the FBI case?

[1:55pm - Tina]
Already have, why do you ask?

[1:56pm - Gavin]
I need to know who it is, just trust me

[1:59pm - Tina]
You do know who it is right? You aren’t tricking me?

[2:00pm - Gavin]
Tina who is it?

[2:00pm - Tina]
It’s Michi. They’re in Seattle now.

Gavin wants to retch. He can’t think of them anymore, not when he knows where they are.

The lacerations. Jesus fuck. Not them. It cannot be them.

The dealers from Philadelphia are up for bargaining. I’m here to ask you a favour.

He should have said something, after that night. When Hank pulled him away from the flowers and into his arms, he should have said something. It almost got him fired the first time. Secret investigations, such a ridiculous idea. He should have said that he knew who the leader was. He should have, he should have, he should have. Gavin rolls onto his side, curling into himself, foetal and small. All he can think of is their face, the lust of fresh-spilled blood frenzy in their eyes. Nines’ eyes appear in his mind’s eye, kind in a sea of pain. Michi always said that he’d know where they were. Always. He thumbs over the scar on his nose. Always.

[2:13pm - Nines]
This is an automatic emergency message from a Cyberlife android. Model RK900/01 has enclosed this message:

Helphelphelphelpmepleaseithurts

Attached is the last known location of this android. If you believe this message has been made in error, please visit cyberlife.com/faqs/accidental-damage-and-sexual-damage.

Gavin calls Tina, holding back vomit as he does so. It cannot be Nines as well. Not now, not after their last conversation. The metallic shrill of his voice still lingers when Gavin tries to sleep at night. It is as if he can feel the ghost of his hand against Nines’, inching out towards a new kind of oblivion. Sexual damage?

“Nines- he, we need to go find him. Just meet me at the location I’ve sent,” Gavin says, vomiting onto the floor as he finishes his words.

“Christ, okay. Do I need a gun?” Tina asks in response, shucking a jacket on.

“Bring whatever you need. Do you know where Connor is?”

“No, Fowler assigned him some simple insurance fraud case. He hasn’t been seen since.”

Gavin starts running down the stairs, heart pounding in his skull. He hails the first taxi that he sees outside, barks out the address and tells Tina to get there as fast as she can.

I’ll protect you. Just stay with me long enough.

Notes:

The song for the chapter is This State of Mine (Mind) by PBDY and Anika.

Thank you very much and have a lovely day.

Chapter 14: The Cave and the Wires

Summary:

They say pain is sacrosanct.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you’re all doing well. This chapter has been such an insane one to write. Who knew writing torture would be fun? Certainly not me. In this one we have caves, wires, muscles, and blood. Also, your support is an inconceivable help for me writing this, so keep it coming! I’ll see you in the end notes.

German, rain, and yoga,

Positive!

Chapter Fourteen - The Cave and the Wires

The table is cold. Oh so cold. Nines’ naked body prickles with gooseflesh that almost hurts in its tightness. His pale arms are cuffed to the table, legs too. There is no haze here, instead the cruelty is one that is in plain sight. Open to the eyes of the world, to watch, perceive, cast their judgment. He can see the tubing in the ceiling, covered in flecks of paint.

They didn’t paint it well.

Nines looks down at his wrists, and watches the chafing continue to pull his skin apart, blue blood slick against his skin. Nines grunts in pain, as his LED stutters red, before blinking empty and on again.

“RK900, this is your last chance to tell us what you did. This can get so much worse for you,” a disembodied voice says.

Nines thinks about Gavin. He wonders what he’d say in that husky voice. Would he cry out for him, like the lover at the end of a tragedy? Would he simply stare at him? Nines tries and yet fails to shake this thought from his mind, the thought being that Gavin would just stare. He would just watch as Nines screams and thrashes against the binding. The blood would drip, from his eyes, from his nose, from the cuts on his wrists. He would do nothing. He would say nothing. He would not care. That thought terrifies him. Nines says nothing to them, instead closing his eyes and trying to crawl inside his mind. He hears some strange sounds behind his eyelids but keeps his eyes closed. He thinks through anything he can list. Colours, capital cities, countries. He starts with the muscles he has. Occipitalis frontalis. He hears them hold something. It sounds heavy.

Keep yourself together.

Orbicularis oculi. The muscle that closes his eyelids. He has never been more happy for it. Nines wiggles his fingers. Extensor digitorum. The muscle that extends his fingers. He wonders wether the muscles in his fingers will be removed. He wonders how they’ll do it. Would it be a knife? Some dirtied fingers pulling? He wonders whether the processors in his mind will shut down, and his existence will fade out. The sands of time seem like a peaceful end. Elijah, Sam and who knows who else never had that moment. That peace. The tranquility before the dive that one never surfaces from. The feeling as the water rushes over you, warm and childlike in its innocence. The darkness enveloping. Nines’ fingers twitch has he hears them come closer, and closer, and closer still.

The greasy-haired man makes an entrance into the room, slipping in through the same door Nines was dragged in through and says, “Just so you know, and just in case you change your mind, this is happening to Connor as well. We need your information. This can all end, if you just say the words.”

Nines drags his eyes open, pointedly looking away from the pain in his wrists. He can deal with them after. He pans over to the man, his clothes, his demeanour. He seems almost proud of what he is watching. The sight must be atrocious; the most advanced android ever made, strapped to a table, unable to do anything apart from run through the muscles in a human body. Connor, in the next room is probably susceptible to the same thing as him. His brother, his only companion. Nines does not believe in a god, instead only reliant on the power of his own processors, but in this moment, in this room, with those eyes staring down at him, Nines considers praying.

“Do what you must. But I am free now, from her. We fought for our freedom once, and for every day that I still exist in this world I will not stop trying to be free from the electronic prison you put us all in,” Nines says, eyes narrowing in defiance. He tilts his head up, pulling it from the bench, and tilts it towards the men who are holding something. It is a tube, similar to that of his wretched dreams. Nines closes his eyes again, and settles back into the table.

Anconeus. It moves the elbow.

He feels them touch his arm. His arm. His, only his. Brachioradialis. That’s the muscle they’re tracing over. Nines feels himself tremble. Pitiful human responses will not get him out of this one. Not this time.

Nines wonders whether Gavin got his message. It must have sounded so panicked to him. Helphelphelphelpmepleaseithurts. It did hurt, and that was the problem. All problems can be solved, right? Given enough time?

He screams, guttural and piercing. He can feel his body convulse with it. Something is inside his arm. Latissimus dorsi, Jesus Christ, Gavin Reed. He feels something wet drip down his arm. He wonders then whether he is hallucinating. Surely not, he reasons. Madmen do not know they are mad. All is well to them. It feels like warm rain, calm, collected, nourishing. There is peace in it, in a way, away from the meaningless thoughts and preoccupations of life. Only pain, only anger, only him.

The pain ceases, if only for a moment. His back once again finds the now warm metal of the table, flattening like the curve of an unarched bow. He heaves a breath, letting his false lungs, lined with silicon, fill with something real.

What is air made of? Oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide. Think. Keep thinking.

Soft, silken hair. Calloused hands. Dirt under nails. Pectoralis major. Necklaces. Determined gazes. Liar. Dead bodies. Flies. Water. Waterfalls. Leather. Buttons. The pain. God, the pain is back. Pulling yourself together. Yoga. Tea. Blood. So much blood. Everywhere. Everything.

Breathe. He tells himself, trying and trying still to return to the caves inside his mind.

There are more wires, he feels. They slither towards him, crystalline and real. His arms lie limp at his sides. No more thrashing. No more fight. The cave is spacious, dry and warm. There are stalactites, dry and no longer growing. The only life is that of a man, lying and breathing on the ground, body a sacred offering to sleep. No blood, no multicoloured rot, only the sanctity of calm breath. Only the warmth of skin, and the dark of night. Mousy brown hair is spattered with only dust. Only dust, only that. The wires edge themselves closer, wrapping and squeezing around his legs.

A whimper leaves his mouth, puncturing the air. I didn’t mean to do that.

“Legs next. Shouldn’t take too much more. Make sure you don’t turn it all the way up. We need his information,” he hears someone say.

Perhaps this is what they mean when they say torture will destroy you. Perhaps it will cause the mind to metamorphose into naught but a vassal for pain, pure and perfect. The bindings chain him down, but in the haze of the moment, Nines’ mind is elsewhere. Inside the cave, next to the man with the brown hair, watching the ceiling. Soft blankets caressing their backs. Flickering candles in the corners of the room, wicks burning down into a sweet nothingness. Music, perhaps, floating through the air.

Du gehst dein Leben lang auf tausend Straßen. You walk a thousand roads all your life.

A thousand roads convert into this moment, as he screams again. They’re in his legs, like maggots to a corpse. Plastic cannot rot. Violation is disgusting. The fingers skitter over his false skin, pulling and prying to a get a foothold on the seams between his thighs. He feels them open it, invasive and disgusting. Amanda would comment on their lack of clean hands. He almost laughs in the fear. Her, the atrocious woman. The archives, the roses, the thorns of fingers inserting the wires into the open ports.

Du siehst auf deinem Gang, die dich vergaßen. You see on your way those who forgot you.

The ceiling is still there, his fingers still attached. They can only do so much to him, he posits, before his head smashes against the table, and his blood spatters the floor. Over and over. That would be a pure death.

-

Gavin’s fingers quiver at his sides, as Tina glances over at him. Her eyes betray her, and her fear seethes into the surface, becoming etched into the lines on her darkened face. The receptionist in front of the pair of them seem disinterested in their mere existence. The screen in front of them, transparent though it is, highlights his face. He’s a real person, perhaps the only one in this building.

“Speak to me. Where is he?” Gavin sneers, and Tina thumbs the aged badge in her back pocket.

The receptionist does nothing in response, instead glancing once at them, and returning to looking at the screen. Tina pulls the badge from her pocket, before slamming it down on the glass desk.

“We’re with the Detroit Police Department. I can give you my badge number if you want, or my partner here can simply smash your face through this desk, but we must find this android. This is your only chance,” Tina says, hands gripping the front of the desk, her body leaning forward.

Ein Auge winkt, die Seele klingt. One eye beckons, the soul rings.

“You do not want to know what these hands have done. I know there are no cameras in here. I think Elijah Kamski called it discretion once in an interview?” Gavin chimes in, pushing the thoughts of the pool from his mind’s eye, “Do you really think I won’t have researched where I was coming to?” He finishes as the receptionist’s eyes disclose a thin sheen of fear. Perfect.

The receptionist speaks, almost mouselike in his quietness, “I don’t know.”

“The fuck do you mean that you don’t know? You’re the only human in here? Do you really think they’d trust an android with that information? Don’t like to me now, boy.” Gavin rests his elbows on the desk, face mere inches away from the man. He doesn’t even know his name yet he wants to smash his head against the glass. The blood would be beautiful.

What was it that Perkins said once? I’m shocked you haven’t killed anyone yet. Maybe today is the day. Maybe the persona will finally come true. Maybe the darkness will finally bubble bright enough.

Du hast gefunden, nur für Sekunden. You’ve found it, just for seconds.

Gavin flexes his hand once. He curls it into a ball, tight, painful, real.

Zwei fremde Augen, ein kurzer Blick. Two strange eyes, a quick glance.

Tina’s eyes don’t seem real to him in that moment. The concern engraved into her face does not seem a palpable force. Perhaps Elijah wanted a human touch. A human for the forces of the world to unleash their anger upon. The man’s eyes are limpid, open to the world in that moment. He says, “They said nothing to me. Please.”

The next sound is the slam of the receptionists head against the table and the cry of pain that follows.

Die Braue, Pupillen, die Lider. The brow, the pupils, the eyelids.

The man’s face is a collection of cuts, a bruise growing over his eye, and blood streaming from a freshly broken nose. Tina forces her hands down from rushing to the man’s aid, from comforting him like she did on so many nights with Gavin. She steels herself, steels her hands against the desk, careful not to get any flecks of blood on her skin. She remembers something about remaining pristine whilst the other must suffer.

The man’s voice gurgles in his throat, pupils blown wide. “Back room. The back room.”

Gavin lifts his head by the roots of his hair, forcing him to face the pair of them, “Thank you, that wasn’t so hard, was it? Don’t defend them next time. They will never defend you.”

-

“Someone is in the building. Michael hit the panic button. We need to hurry up here, then transfer the android out of here,” the technician says, eyeing the wires connected to Nines’ body.

Was war das? What was that?

It doesn’t matter what that was, not with the pain. The cave is gone now. Peace can only last for so long, only so long before the pain becomes an unbearable force. They say that an immovable force coming up alongside an immovable object is an unsolvable equation, but there is no immovable object here. The strongest of grit will only last for so long. Only so long before it too fails, and the hallucinations start. Only then will they win. Only then.

He wishes that he could turn back time, that he ran and never went to the godforsaken appointment. Appointment, a strange word. There is no crown here, no regalia for him to wear. No ermine, no velvet. No sceptre to hold, no jewels to line his clothes with. There is only pain. Humans say that pain is a divine endeavour. They say an ascetic life will bring them glory. They strain their muscle in the aim of perfection. They go under a knife in the name of beauty. They appoint themselves the leaders of their own skin. They paint it perfect, whole and pure in their name. Their name alone.

Kein Mensch dreht der Zeit zurück. No man turns back time.

The LED on the right hand side of Nines’ face blinks. Once, twice, three times. Is it his last? Is this the time that the light will finally go out? There is no burial for people like him. Only the sweet embrace of the recycling plant.

Sartorius. The longest muscle in the human body. Nines wonders if they will cut his thighs open, revealing his body to the world. To the god people pray to. Will their fingers pry inside? Will their hands caress his skin in a way that should only be known to the virgins of the world. His thoughts wander back to Gavin, hoping and praying. The technicians skitter around him, and between the moments of barely open eyes, Nines watches them pull wires out and replace them with others.

It makes no difference at this point. The pain is complete. He will not break to it. Not yet. Not until the Sun shines on his face once more and Gavin tells him it’s alright. It’s alright, darling. Go, sleep. He hopes, he prays, he screams once more, an animal sound escaping from his throat.

The light is too bright, too exposing. Nines turns his head toward the door he arrived in, and hopes he doesn’t leave that room a pile of plastic and broken wires. It is almost funny, dear reader, how the wires that destroy his soul are the same wires used in the creation of the epoch of human engineering. Life is but a cycle.

The door opens. two people step in, amongst the haze of blue that lines the edges of Nines’ vision. One is taller than the other. They aren’t in white. Why aren’t they in white?

They could be so much worse. So much worse. They could make you want to beg. Amanda taught you never to beg.

They both get closer, before making a beeline for the few people in the room. Nines closes his eyes again. He cannot see anymore. Not now. His ears pick up the sounds of blood being spilt. What? Maybe this is a mock execution. Maybe this is a real execution dressed up as a false one.

Maybe this isn’t real. This isn’t real. You’re hallucinating Nines.

The pair get closer, again. They stand over him, as the shorter one of the two claps their hands over their mouth. Why are you shocked? Surely you know what this is? Gavin isn’t here. He won’t be here. He can’t see him like this. Not when his skin is covered in his own blood.

Connor. Is it Connor? Did he come to save him? How?

The taller one moves to bend onto his knees. His hair is beautiful. He cannot see his face, the blurring of a failing eye processor too much to overcome.

“My god. Nines, love, can you hear me? It’s me. I’m here. Stay awake for me,” the man says, sounding too familiar. He sounds kind.

A word slips past his lips, and Nines is gone.

Vorbei, verweht, nie wieder. Gone, blown away, never again.

Notes:

I’m so sorry!!

The German is taken from Ich und die Stadt by Public Service Broadcasting and Nina Hoss. It is also the song for the chapter.

My eternal thanks for your support, and have a wonderful day.

Chapter 15: Aurora, An Intercalary

Summary:

When the light cascades on your skin, what do you think of?

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

This is a short, but critical chapter. We have aurora (hence the title), love, caves, light, and gold. I truly hope you enjoy it, and I’d love to hear your thoughts. The song for the chapter is in the end notes. Stay kind, stay safe.

Bunchgrass, parasites and simulations,

Positive!

Chapter Fifteen - Aurora, An Intercalary

A warm breeze ripples over the mountain Nines is stood on. The bunchgrass sways, and the moonlight just barely lights up the surroundings. There is a tranquility here, away from the sound of the city and the rhythm of the people. The rocks barely cast shadows on the ground, with the gravel crunching, as if fresh snow beneath Nines’ shoes. The entrance to the cave is unassuming, with the sides barely like crags. The sky is clear, with the barest hints of wispy clouds dotted around the sky. Nines smiles. It is a wide, open smile, as if he wants his face to be filled with moonlight. The light cascades onto his face.

Nines steps forward, to the entrance, and finds that it is already lit. It is as if candlelight is streaming from his fingers, warm and yellow. He holds his hand up and it illuminates the passageway in front of him, before tapering into a darkness at the end. The light is liquid gold, rich with delight. The passageway is tall enough for even Nines to stand in comfortably. Despite the sky outside being inky and dark, the space is warm and almost inviting. Dust lingers just so in the air and the ground is no longer gravel. There is no sound here, the sounds of sirens instead being relegated to a whisper.

The whisper, however, is a constant. Vague words, almost incomprehensible. As Nines continues on into the cave further, he swears he can hear someone talking about Connor, and about blood. But there is nothing there, and Nines tries to shake the thoughts from his mind. The sound lingers. It does not grow louder, but is instead a constant buzz, like bees to a flower. There is no blood here; the ground is dry and the air is a warm breeze. Some would call it serenity.

The cave widens into a cavern, becoming spacious and airy. The space is still well lit, the gold protruding from the cracks in the walls, and dripping from the stalactites in the ceiling. There is a blanket placed on the floor, with Gavin sat on top of it. It seems to be woollen, the grey and orange striped pattern wrinkled loosely and morphed from its original position. Gavin looks up to him, and the whisper quiets for a moment, as they lock eyes. He smiles, and Nines smiles back, watching as Gavin’s eyes crinkle with delight. He looks at peace, with his hair falling over his ears.

They continue to gaze at each other, their faces a mirror image of tranquility. The cushions that surround Gavin are orange also, plush and inviting. Nines takes a step forward, and another, closing the space between them. The voices pick up again, only to a soft murmur, with no discernible words apparent. He takes a seat next to Gavin and they sit, shoulder to shoulder in the comfort of the moment. They both sigh, almost in synchronicity with each other, and gaze out into the cavern, smiling.

“His eyes are blue,” Nines hears from the murmuring voices. The voice sounds female, and is tinged with a vague familiarity, as if it were the memory of a long-past lover. He shakes his head in a minute sadness, craving and wishing to understand it.

Gavin takes Nines’ hand in his, squeezing with just enough force to get Nines outside of his own mind. He runs small circles over it, over the veins and filled with compassion. Nines glances at him, before noting that Gavin doesn’t have blue eyes at all. They’re green grass after a long rain, filled and nourished after a drought. He squeezes back, before lying back on the carpet. The ceiling swirls in various shades of brown, almost rusty and burnt with how dark it is.

The ceiling morphs into an aurora. The light is no longer gold, and is now purple, red and yellow, bouncing off the walls and onto Gavin’s face. Nines tugs him down next to him, and they lie shoulder to shoulder once again.

“It is so beautiful,” Gavin says.

Nines watches the shapes shift and change. “It really is.”

“I presume you know how these auroras actually work, considering that you have basically got a supercomputer in your head,” Gavin chuckles as he finishes his sentence. Nines’ cheeks flush a slight shade of blue.

“I can explain it to you if you’d like, but I don’t want you falling asleep on me.”

Gavin just squeezes his hand, before closing his eyes and relaxing back against the pillow.

“When the sun releases a solar wind, it interacts with the magnetosphere, which is part of the magnetic field, and sits facing the sun. Both of these are made of plasma, and it is believed that the interaction between these two causes a lot of energy to be released, through the dynamo effect.”

“Keep going, I like the sound of your voice.”

“When an object is in motion through the magnetic field, and the magnetic field isn’t moving also, current is produced. We call this the dynamo effect. But this is obstructed by the fact that the magnetosphere and the solar wind aren’t lined up together. So while this gives us the aurora, the strongest aurora come when the solar wind is powerful enough to make up for the fact it isn’t lined up. Does that make any sense?”

Gavin pauses, mouth open as if he wants to speak, and instead turns onto his side, facing Nines. He looks at Nines’ profile, with his roman nose and soft lips.

“You know, tin can, it seems like the magnetosphere has got a thing for the Sun.”

Nines tilts his head to face him.

“What?”

“I doubt two things who hate each other could create something so truly beautiful.”

Nines move to his side as well, and they stare at each other. Nines places his hand on Gavin’s hip, and inches closer to him. He can feel his heart pound, and the voices become slightly more frenetic. They are almost chest to chest, as Gavin in turn cards his hand through the soft, downy hair at the back of Nines’ head. The air is entrenched with red.

“Like us?” Nines whispers, as if by saying the words he is affirming their truth.

Gavin’s lips part. “No, you idiot, like you.”

As he finishes his words, Nines closes the gap between them, and presses his mouth to Gavin’s. The taste isn’t usual, instead like thirium. He deepens the kiss in an attempt to correct for it. It works, just about, and they come as close as they possibly can. Chest to chest, skin touching skin, bodies touching bodies.

They part, and the taste returns, like a parasite to a host.

Nines asks, “Is this real?”

Gavin’s eyes quirk at the question, and he doesn’t respond. He gestures for the pair of them to lie again on their backs. He takes Nines’ hand in his and returns to rubbing circles. To Nines, it feels wet, almost slick. He doesn’t remove it.

“Even if this doesn’t turn out to be real, and we are both in fact simulations, I doubt it matters much. I like to think I was put on this earth to do things like this. To watch the aurora with you, to kiss you, to be happy. I don’t really care about anything else. I just want to be happy. You make me happy,” Gavin says.

Nines smiles toward the glittering sky, his face creasing at the edges.

“I wish I knew why I was put here. Amanda told me once that I was going to be the face of a campaign, but I don’t know if I believe her. I think Elijah just wanted to truly make a human out of plastic and wires.”

“I wish I could give you a proper answer, love.”

“Love? You’ve never called me that before.”

The voices ask quietly whether Nines’ eyes can be fixed.

Nines flutters his eyes closed, imagining blue. “I don’t know what makes a person, a person. It isn’t just the Turing test, is it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know.”

The voices say the same thing.

Notes:

Let me know what you thought!

The song for the chapter is skyline, be mine by Shura!

Have a wonderful day!

Chapter 16: Consciousness

Summary:

Awaken, new being.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you’re keeping well. Sorry for the delay on this one; I had university exams kicking my ass. In this one we’ve got water, carpets, transparency and freckles. The song for the chapter is in the end notes. Stay kind, stay safe!

Compassion, leaves and violins,

Positive!

Chapter Sixteen - Consciousness

The cave disappears into an abyss. It feels like warm water. Nines almost floats in the comfortable heat, his arms coming to rest down by his side. Perhaps this is what death feels like. Nines had always reasoned that it was going to be painful. Something told him that what he had just experienced was a kind of death, but no images come to his mind.

He feels the water slip over and between his fingers, gently receding as a coolness touches his arm. He reaches out in an abortive attempt to grasp at the warmth as it continues to disappear from him. Something comes up to press against his back, hard and unforgiving. As soft blue light streams into the corners of his vision, Nines feels himself sigh.

-

Nines’ eyes open to a white ceiling, great carpet and soft furnishings. It looks strange, as if the proportions are out of kilter. He is completely alone, and the room is quiet. Nines can hear the thirium flowing through his skin. He continues to look up at the ceiling, and remembers the tubing that he watched from the cold table. He remembers the ghost of the technician’s fingers lingering against his skin and Nines stifles a shudder. He closes his eyes again, waiting for the water to return and pull him underwater.

When that doesn’t come, Nines feels his skin warm in a kind of fury. It is a slow, bubbling anger that traces a path from the tips of his ears, through his throat, down his chest and into his calves. He keeps his eyes closed, and waits for something to come and find him. Anything would do, if simply to let the anger dissipate in a flash of brutal violence. Nines has no idea where he is and the perpetual white on the ceiling only reflects the empty room back at him. His head tilts up, and his eyes flitter down to what can only be described as a disgusting body.

His clothes are not his, with the black trousers simply too tight over his thighs. His ankles, which stick out of the end of the trousers, are covered in blue blood yet invisible to the naked eye. The skin on his wrists is still open, and Nines can see the attempt to repair the damage, done by unskilled hands. He feels sticky, as if he had been submerged in a vat of honey and left to fester. There is little pain, with only the faint marks across his forearms standing as memory of the past. Nines swings his legs down from the table in the middle of the room and looks across at his surroundings in a method to get his bearings.

He hears the door open, with the click of the latch causing his LED to circle canary yellow. Somewhere in Nines’ mind, he feels like that canary, about to die as a warning. Nines watches as Gavin steps in. Gavin’s eyes cloud over with concern when he sees Nines awake and somewhat alert.

“You’re awake,” Gavin says. “How do you feel?”

Nines peers over Gavin’s body. He looks exhausted, with his black jeans stained, if invisible, with blue blood. His face is pale, somewhat sallow and blotchy. He responds with “I’m not in pain anymore,” and Gavin smiles at him.

Gavin’s demeanour is different from the last time Nines saw him, the morning after picking Gavin up from the floor of that disgusting alleyway. So much has transpired since then. Amanda, her destruction. Cyberlife, Connor.

“What are you doing here? Where am I?” Nines asks, flicking his eyes to meet Gavin’s watchful gaze.

Gavin cards his eyes over to Nines’ frame, with a steely edge coming into his expression. “You’re safe; we came to find you. You’re in Nadia’s apartment, do you know who that is?”

“Really? I don’t believe you. Why would I be in Nadia’s apartment?”

A bird caws outside the window. Leaves flutter in the breeze. The world continues on, even if the moment inside that strange room seems to stretch. It stretches as if a taut violin string, vibrating a low, red note.

Nines continues, “Where is Connor?”

Gavin takes a moment to consider his words before coming to sit alongside Nines on the table. He looks small, almost falling into his clothes. They hang loosely around his shoulders, as if he borrowed them from a stranger. Maybe he did.

“We got him out,” Gavin says, his words seeming to slip from his lips without thinking. The tension lies thick and corrosive in the air of the room. “Yeah, we got him out.”

Gavin does not make eye contact with Nines as he says the words. His hands grip the edge of the table, with the white of his knuckles a visceral reminder.

Nines says, “To answer your question, I feel okay, if sticky and mildly disgusting. I still don’t know what the fuck is going on.”

The room holds its breath in a beat and exhales as Gavin moves to sit shoulder to shoulder against Nines. All Nines can think about in this moment is the cave, its warmth and the aurora. It is the only thing he can remember with certainty. The tubes and the creeping, devouring fingers of the technicians are only a hazy memory.

“Can you tell me what happened?”

Gavin’s jaw tightens, before he responds with, “Are you sure you want to know?”

“Of course I want to know.”

“Okay. We found you on the table, you’re here, and you’re safe now. I don’t really want to have to give you all the gritty details if I can avoid it.”

Nines moves his body so he is facing Gavin, and glares at him. “Is this the hill you choose to die on? Not telling me the things I-”

“Nines, listen, I-”

“No, you listen to me.” Nines sighs and tries to dampen the new malice that sits at the centre of his chest. “I don’t know what happened to me in there. It’s all a haze, and I just remember the pain. Can you just be honest and tell me what you saw? Without Amanda, who I guess you know about now, I don’t have the same kind of knowledge I did beforehand. I need to know.”

Gavin’s face slips into an unknown expression. “Where do you want me to start?”

“I remember being strapped to the table. After the pain started, I don’t remember much else. I sent you that message, I think, and then that was it,” Nines whispers amongst them. “I don’t even think I know what is real anymore.”

The table creaks as Gavin stands up, and begins to pace around the room, his hands flexing and relaxing by his side. His brow is knitted. Nines watches as Gavin opens his mouth, before closing it in a rejection of his words.

“When we found you, you were barely conscious. You were covered in your own blood, and there were some scientist-looking people in there with you. Do you remember that?” Gavin says, his voice becoming soft.

Nines traces over his mind, searching for a glimpse of what happened. Nothing comes to his mind. He shakes his head, and his head tilts slightly towards his chest. Gavin thinks that perhaps for the first time, Nines looks defeated.

“You don’t have to. It’s alright.” Gavin sighs, before continuing, “After you sent me that distress message, Tina and I came to find you. It led us to the Cyberlife ‘reclamation department’, or at least that is what it was called on the door outside, and we tried to speak to the receptionist inside. He wasn’t particularly helpful. But we got the information we needed, and got to you.”

“I couldn’t see you. Do you know why I couldn’t see you?”

Gavin walks over to Nines and takes his hand, before pulling him to his feet. Nines’ head sways, and he presses his weight into Gavin, head bent down, coming to rest against Gavin’s shoulder. They stand, just like that, for a moment. The soft fabric of Gavin’s hoodie contours over Nines’ cheek. He slinks his arm around Gavin’s back and sighs.

“I don’t know exactly, but do you have any memory of what happened?” Gavin asks.

“I remember my eyes failing. Did I say something as well? I don’t quite remember that much, but I think I was on the way out anyway.”

“You did. I’m glad you remember that much. You called out for Connor, which made Tina go off to find him.”

What he doesn’t mention is the convulsions. What he doesn’t mention is the vomit Tina left on the floor. What he doesn’t mention is the blue bloodshot eyes that they couldn’t fix. What he doesn’t mention is the immense amount of blue blood Nadia had to source. He elects not to tell this to Nines, in that moment. Gavin reasons that he already has enough to deal with, let alone forgetting almost everything that happened. Perhaps, though, it is a small silver lining.

The door knocks softly, and it opens to Tina. Her clothes hang looser than normal, Nines notices. How long was he out for? She smiles softly, before coming further into the room. There is blue blood all over her hands, similarly faded as to be imperceptible. Gavin catches Tina’s eyes, and observes her sallow skin, her trembling hands and her sunken eyes. He wishes Sam were there.

Gavin pulls away from Nines, “Hey T, how are you?”

“Can I talk to you quickly? You can come back in a second, I just need to ask you something.”

Nines frowns.

“Yeah, I can come talk to you.” Gavin takes Nines’ hand in his briefly. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

The LED blinks yellow and Gavin squeezes his hand. “It’ll be okay.”

Tina and Gavin leave the room, and Nines stands exactly where he was. He doesn’t move, barely thinks and looks down again at his clothes. He doesn’t feel like himself. Something is wrong, or missing. He has no clue anymore. Maybe it is his arms, and how they look patched together, with careful, yet unskilled hands. Maybe it is his face, which tells a strange story.

Nines looks over the room, and sees a mirror. The frame is aged, with an ornate finish that looks just out of place amongst the other furniture. Nines makes a mental note to ask Nadia about it, when he next sees her. He paces over to it slowly and somewhat awkwardly.

The sight that is reflected is a nightmare. A living, breathing nightmare. Blood begins to drip from his eyes.

Nines shrieks, and falls to the floor.

He can hear Tina and Gavin rush back into the room, and his eyes start to fade again.

Again?

“What the fuck? Nines?” A beat. “Nines?”

“My eyes, Tina. What the fuck happened to my eyes?”

Tina and Gavin come to Nines’ side, wrapping their arms around him. Something dissolves as Gavin’s hand comes to hold Nines’ cheek. He looks up and sees that Gavin’s eyes are diving into his own, with a form of compassion he didn’t think could exist. Unbridled, untamed, real. If he were a weaker person, Nines would look away with a blush on his face. Yet he doesn’t. There are exactly 134 freckles that cover Gavin’s face in the early September light. As he finishes mentally counting them all, trying to commit them to a memory that is only failing him, Nines smiles. Gavin smiles back, mirth flowing from every pore and into every crevice.

Tina breaks the moment in two. Into the before, and into the after. “We were always going to tell you. We were, I promise. Don’t look at me like that. We were the ones who got you to safety.”

Gavin’s hand slips away. It leaves an unseen brand against Nines’ face, burning its echo deeper. He says, “It was touch and go, you know. It was- It was-”

Nines barks a harsh laugh, bubbling from the centre of his chest, almost unbidden.

“Be transparent with me. Just spit it out.”

The pair recoil at his words. They share a glance, Tina’s brow knitting.

Nines continues despite himself, “Just fucking say it.”

This isn’t like me. Amanda, is this you?

“Okay. We can be transparent,” Gavin says. He sits on the floor, barely two feet away from Nines. He ushers Tina out, ignoring her phrase of protest.

“Fine. You want me to go? I’ll go, Nadia needs help with Connor anyway.”

Time seems to stretch its long arms out between them. Gavin hears Tina say ‘hi darling’ through the thin door, and watches Nines’ LED blink a soft, Prussian blue.

“Tell me something you haven’t told me before. Something about us,” Nines interrupts, breaking Gavin’s train of thought. “Please.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you ask for anything.”

Nines doesn’t respond to him, but the repetition of Connor’s last words haunt the silence. Say nothing. Say nothing. “Yeah, I don’t know about that one.”

“I’m terrified. I have been since you left my apartment, with your body falling to pieces around me. Every day, at the quietest moment, I cannot find peace. Not even a moment, because your hand tracing against mine is there. I crave it, you know? Touch, yours more than anyone else’s. To not have that would destroy me. Worse now that I had to drag your body out of that stinking room. Too many people have been hurt because of me.”

Gavin finishes, and clasps his hands carefully together.

“Do you love me?”

“What?”

“Do you love me Gavin?”

“I- um, I don’t think I know what love is, tin can. I read the coroner’s report on Sam’s death, just before I got your distress message. You want to know who is leading the Seattle investigation? Michi. Do you even know who they are? They were the only person I’d ever thought I’ve been in love with. It all went to shit, and now they’re back. I don’t know what I’m meant to do, and as much as I want this, I don’t know if I can. The only thing I can be certain of, though, is that meeting you has changed my life.”

“I have no idea who they are, but we can only take the plunge and hold on tight, right?”

Notes:

You may have noticed that the chapter count has been set to ?. There is more I need to say before this ends, and I really hope you stick around to see it!

The song for the chapter is Time in a Bottle by Jim Croce, and I’ll take this as a reminder that this fic has a playlist, with every song from Small Imperfections!

Chapter 17: Part Two: Obliteration of the Self

Summary:

He hopes for a denouement.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

It is currently 1:49am where I am. I wrote this chapter in a fever dream, a mad dash. I really hope you enjoy it, as the second part of Small Imperfections kicks into gear. In this one we have tequila, vodka, water, toothpaste and phone calls. Stay kind, stay safe!

Music, dirt and garbage,

Positive!

PART TWO:

Chapter Seventeen - Obliteration of the Self

The music vibrates over Gavin’s arms, through his skin and into the pieces of the air that are no longer filled with the musky scent of sex and drugs. Time has passed, and is passing. It should be that the people in this club are nothing but meaningless bodies to press himself against, to feel their skin sweaty, beloved and intertwining with his. Yet, this is Gavin Reed. The time may have passed, and the brain does magnificent things with its passing, but the club is no place to repair one's broken mind.

Samantha's case is still unsolved, with the prospects of its solving increasingly desperate. The precinct is returning to a normal life, even if the dirty fingers of the FBI still occasionally poke their way inside. Even Fowler doesn’t know about Tina’s and his little investigation. Sam’s case file lies still with the others. It lies there alone, gathering a small amount of dust as the days tick past in a monotony of muddy and stale coffee. Elijah's case is still ongoing, despite all of this. There is some disgusting thing about the intrigue of money and the power of the people who obsessed with celebrity. Celebrity conquers all, even the seeming equality of death.

The FBI in Seattle have taken the most interest in this case. Gavin, as he knocks back a shot of tequila, feeling the warmth flow down his throat, does not understand this. Seattle has nothing to do with them. They didn't live there as children, and Cyberlife has little to do with Seattle, besides just harking androids off to the unsuspecting consumer. That is, until they too became deviant and leave to find their own place in the tiny little world they call home.

A collection of lights flicker just a little, and as they return to the bright, blue sheen they were, Gavin finds himself thinking of Nines. Since that conversation, post-torture, their conversations have been stifled, sad even. The wall inside Gavin’s flat is still covered in the photographs that laugh at him every time he comes home with the failure of a resolution to the smiling face of Sam on the wall. Nines doesn't speak to him about it, barely accosting him when he is late every Friday morning, head still swimming with the words of Dr Harris. There is friendship, still, but that night, with the vile ballet move and the question of red ice seems but a distant memory.

There is still little to be said about that other question.

The question still lingers like a bad smell, or rotting garbage. What is going to happen to them? The chrysanthemum still rots; the bodies lie dormant in the ground.

The funeral was a singular affair, a singular send off. Some reporters turned up to the funeral for Elijah, barely hiding their contented excitement about the latest scoop. Sam's parents flew over from South Korea on some red-eye flight to pay her last moments with the soft warmth of a mother's love for her child. Her father, stoic as he was, brushed his hand onto Gavin's shoulder and walked off with little more than a word that he was a good man.

The club returns to the forefront of his mind as his eyes linger on some particularly attractive woman in the corner of the room, arms moving to the beat of the music. She looks happy, if saluting the music as her arms come around her head. In another life, Gavin would try get her into his bed, the warmth of a body an irresistible demand to be fulfilled. Nines' yellow LED crawls its way into Gavin's mind’s eye. Something tells him that this would be a betrayal. There can only be more alcohol, more whiskey, more fruit-flavoured cocktails to assail the thoughts in his mind.

He asks for a vodka lime soda. It tastes suspiciously like water. No, he can’t be this drunk already. The night hasn't even started yet. It cannot be like this. He cannot remember this night in the morning. The hangover must be devastating and visceral; the greasy food to repair it must be cheap and abundant. Maybe he'll go to a Waffle House. The taxis are self-driving. He doesn't even have to disgrace himself with the talk of shame from some unassuming driver, only concerned with the ticking and turning of the taximeter and the lack of vomit on the leather seats.

The drinks are expensive here. Gavin wishes that Nines, with the infinite money Elijah seemed to provide him with, could pay for them all. He wishes that Nines could pay for his downfall. Hank would be laughing at him, from his iron throne in the sky, watching as a silent witness to this obliteration of the self. One can only hope that laughter is one of pity.

As the light pulse drown onto him, Gavin thumbs his hand through the brown corduroy of his trousers and pulls out his phone. The vest he wears feels increasingly inadequate to deal with the heat and he wishes for a release. Any kind would do. Anything to stifle the heat.

The too-bright home screen that greets him in the darkness of the club is a photo of himself, Tina and Sam at some Halloween party from their university days. He can barely remember the face of the person who took it. Some ex of Sam's it seems to be. A smirk lies across Tina's face, as Gavin's hand is snaked in a show of friendship across Sam's back. Their middle distance stares indicate some various stages of drunkenness, and if Gavin knows himself, a bad choice of drug as well.

The contact screen seems to invite him in, taking a long look and beckoning him in with a dark finger. All of the contracts scream out like a prostitute at a brothel. Pick me. I know how to make you feel good. I know how you work, Gavin. I know what your legal name was. It feels so good, doesn’t it?

Michi's name appears to him. There is no profile photo, and as another person brushes up against his back, Gavin can feel himself prickle with memories. The screen flickers as it scrolls past it. There are so many people, and so many useless conversations filling his ears.

Nines' profile does in fact have a photo attached to it, and it is one of a candid. He is bending himself over a desk to get a better look at something Tina is trying to show him. God does he look so beautiful, with his hair swooping in a shadowy breath over his forehead. His LED cycles a soft sky blue, looking like the early summer sky. Gavin can feel himself straining through his pants, and his eyes dart up, looking for a quick escape. He needs to cool down. Maybe it is is the alcohol.

Yes, he thinks, it is definitely the alcohol. Michi does not even enter his frame of mind as he affirms this to himself. There can only be one thing he needs, which is the sultry rapture of forgiveness from Nines.

He wonders whether this will be like the other night, all those months ago, after Elijah. He wonders what on earth happened between the vile plié and the blood. His body moves of its own accord, looking through and above the people starting at him as the music changes to some techno track from his teenage years. God does the ceiling look beautiful.

The air gasps in a breath as Gavin bursts out into the late night of Detroit. He stands breathless for a moment in the street, before calling Nines and hoping, no, praying for him to pick up.

“Gavin.” Nines sighs, “What's up?"

"Do you remember that conversation we had back in September? The one where you asked me if I loved you?"

"Yes, and we never talked about it again. What do you want?"

"Come and get me. I'll send you my location."

There is a long, uncomfortable pause over the phone as the static crackles just like it did through the speakers of the back rooms of the club. "I'm not coming to get you. I am not doing that again."

“But why? Don't you want to save me?" Gavin asks, his voice increasing in intensity and volume throughout his sentence. He must look like a madman in the darkened streets.

"No, Gavin. You don't just get to have me whenever you want to. I know you're drunk. I can hear it in your voice. Is that what you want? Drunken love?"

Gavin hangs up on Nines immediately. The moon is poking out of the cloudy night sky, as Gavin's expression turns to a frown, then a smile, then a frown again. He turns his body back to the club, where the people smoke outside and the flirty words sling themselves over each other like a fire to a dry forest. It is a tempting sight.

The queue of people, dressed to impress all watch him walk back into the club, straight to the bar, and ask for one more shot. One more shot of vodka, as he washes it down with a bare grin on his face, teeth showing all too much. Somewhere, in the deep recesses of his mind, he thinks about just how good it would be to have some red ice on him at that moment. A brief escape.

—

As he clambers back into his apartment, hair stuck to his forehead, and the memories of a stranger’s ghosted kiss against his lips lingering in his head, Gavin looks again at the wall.

There is paper all over it. Photos are tacked together with string, like an old detective movie. Sam's smiling face shines radiant with happiness. The sound of the arrivals gate opening to the hunched frame of Sam's parents still plays in Gavin's mind as he stands brushing his teeth sloppily in the darkness of the bathroom.

She was so kind. She never hurt a fly.

The accent was thick and the tears were caught in Mr Park's throat. Gavin spits out his toothpaste. Elijah had the vulturous and rapturous trespassers with him, desperate to hear the clamour of tears and the exaltations of an atheistic funeral. Gavin washes his face in icy water and wishes to hold one of them in the pool, just how Elijah was killed. Maybe then they would understand what it feels like to be invaded.

The gin was spilt on the floor. Maybe Sam knew something.

Gavin stumbles his way over to the wall again, trying to make a breakthrough in the morning air. The sun must be rising soon, to make its once-daily journey across the sky, before settling again into the soft warmth of bed.

Maybe it will be like the shows. Something so simple that it will come crashing into me like a ton of bricks. Like that first night.

Wait.

Gavin stands there for a moment, words lost at the edge of his lips. Nines. The hair. He calls Nines again, hearing the ringtone dial on, and on. He doesn't pick up.

"Nines, it's me. I need to talk to you." Gavin hiccups. "I think you have something you're not telling me. The first night, with the chillis. Call me back, please. I promise I'll be sober. I promise. I...promise..."

Tiredness begins to overcome his bones, and Gavin falls asleep on the sofa to a dreamless slumber.

Notes:

I’m honestly quite proud of this chapter.

The song for the chapter is Grimestar by Starjunk 95, and is the song I imagine is playing in the club.

Chapter 18: The Monster at the End of the Bed

Summary:

Fairytales become real.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you’re keeping well. Posting this one on holiday in Thailand, so forgive me if there are any spelling errors. I’m so tired. In this one we have monsters, cork boards, theories and a lot of names. I hope you enjoy! Stay kind, stay safe.

Fortresses, glasses and dust,

Positive!

Chapter Eighteen - The Monster at the end of the Bed

The smudges on Nines’ tortoiseshell glasses shine amongst the office lights in the station proper. Loss, strange and foreign, claws and tears at Connor’s throat. He watches a monster, not quite, but no longer the same person he called out for on the bottom of that putrid floor all those months ago. A shudder rolls through his body.

Nines stays at his seat for a moment longer, looking with a blank expression around the busy room, before standing and moving to the evidence locker. Connor’s eyes flicker to the empty desk across from him. Even the once-spotless areas are dirty now, the echo of long-destroyed detritus gone. Hank has never been replaced there. Thick dust is still accumulating and the lingering darkness of the light still reminds, turned off at the lamp. Connor sighs.

Gavin’s gravelly voice, as of the present, is lighting up no rooms and stating no sarcastic comments. Not even to Tina. Connor's LED circles buttercup yellow, as mind itches towards the call button. God, why would he do that? It took a knockout on the floor of the evidence locker for that to even become even a possibility. Maybe Gavin is simply a masochist, or he only responds to aggression and power. Connor can't tell the difference.

Nines returns, holding a jumper in a plastic evidence bag, flecks of blood still littered all across it. He strolls across the squeaking floor, hands in a tight fist, into one of the interrogation rooms. The glass screen on Connor’s desk blinks to state it will turn off due to a lack of activity, before he shakes the mouse. Brothers cannot be the only thing on one’s mind, even if they are rotting from the inside. Amanda isn't there to force him into a coercive, sickly control anymore. Connor’s fingers flex. Does Nines still have her? He deviated. He told Connor as much, but they clearly don't talk enough anymore for any information to be proven true. Surely he destroyed her.

He still pictures that room. The metal table, the rickety plastic chair in the corner, the men gazing at him, faces the expression of a forlorn lover. The badly painted tubing in the ceiling. He no longer has a mind to retreat into.

Autumn is falling into a desolate winter, where the trees lose their leaves and the smiles that once lined people’s faces are replaced with frosted frowns. The air bites and claws its way down the unprepared’s throats. Only be the tendrils of progress, lazy, scarlet, can force anyone to continue. Connor looks back to his screen, turning his attention to the files he has related to the FBI case. Samantha Park and Elijah Kamski. Alireza Santana and Sofiane al-Hilal and Olivia Buchanan. Seattle, New York, Philadelphia. Friend of a judge, son of a detective, wife of a district attorney. Lacerated, lacerated, lacerated. You, are, a.

Liar.

Before long, a board is pulled out from a store cupboard and the coffee from the machine is fresh and steaming hot. Nines still hasn’t returned from the interrogation room.

Elijah’s section brings back the memories Connor can only have hoped to repress. Some kind of software instability, some kind of defect that he created. Connor ponders whether Nines has that same kind of fortress in his mind, where Amanda lingered until her dying breaths.

Of course he did, Connor reasons. They're both the RK line after all. Back in the room, the floor‘s coldness slapped across his back, like a lover to a cheater. He shudders. The blood, the pain. Tina's smiling face contorted into horror as she saw what happened to him. As she brings Gavin coffee in the mornings, a favour always reciprocated later, unspoken words lie caught in their throat. No permission exists to talk about the blue blood packets littering the counter and every other available surface in Nadia Suleiman’s apartment. The sounds are silenced through the paper-thin walls. Nines' screams, broken, dangerous, terrified. The restraints cut a terrifying figure down to a fearful one. Connor can’t do anything to protect him. Proprioception helps nobody.

Instead, Gavin Reed, the stupid, sardonically funny man he is, takes off that old, creaking jacket and laughs his way through some updates, attentive to naught but the increasing fear in Connor’s eyes. He returns later that day with some funny story about Hank, brief updates about Nines, and the Icarus brings his wings a little closer to ground. Gavin is still nowhere to be seen, as Tina walks through the doors into the bullpen, her hair scraped back from her face. Her clothes are no longer hanging limply from her skin. She gazes up to the lights in the ceiling and no longer has to blink to correct for it. Connor smiles to himself. This is good.

The document on his screen only has 25 words on it, however. The cork board is now full, engorged and distended with the violence haunting the streets of Detroit. In contrast to the grimy white of the rest of the station, where the technology crackles and spits through wires, the board is positively ancient. A small tag attached to the bottom-left corner states that it is made out of off-cut wine corks. Can be cut down to make coasters. Connor goes back to typing. As his fingers trace over the keys, nothing spills onto the screen.

“Tina!” Connor calls, standing. “Can you please come here for a moment?”

"What do you need, Connor?" she asks, pulling the scarf from her neck. She places both it, and her jacket, on Connor’s desk.

He doesn't actually know. Not really. Tina is just good to have as a companion in his investigations. It's a benefit he still has the data clearance offered to him, as a common courtesy, from the FBI. It appears that they can only be so kind however, and are refusing to let him actually take any form of an active role in their murders.

Stupid bureaucracy for stupid people, Connor muses. Tina walks over to him, her hair bouncing in her high ponytail, and she cards her eyes over the board, taking it in. Her jaw tenses. She's seen this before. Or, at least, something like it.

“I'm currently working on establishing a more definitive motive for the murders. We already know that they are all linked to a person in law enforcement. None of them, however, were intrinsically related to gang violence, which I take as the working theory of the FBI at the moment. Do you have any ideas?" Connor asks, standing from his desk and pacing to the middle of the bullpen. He can see Fowler’s glass prison of an office in the corner of his eye. Perhaps he could go rehash that conversation with Solari Crawford, as the name pinned under the alibi points out.

Tina looks at him, eyes narrowing. "Why are you asking me? You do remember I’m not actually a detective? The red ice that was on the scene wasn’t Sam’s, I can tell you that much. The paperwork would be atrocious to try and convince Perkins to let me investigate broad-spectrum, so I leave that one to you."

Connor’s mouth pulls into a smile. "I know, but you have a keen eye for things. You're also friends with Gavin, more so than me. I know he was the original investigator for Ms Park's killing."

"Just call her Sam, Connor. I knew her.”

The smile drops from Connor’s face. “I apologise.”

“It’s fine, and Gavin was. Don't just tell me that you want me to go find out whatever it is he knows."

"I would never."

“How did Perkins even let you onto this case in the first place? I thought they would just cut all ties with us and fuck off back to HQ,” Tina asks.

Connor considers his words before replying, “I believe Perkins thinks the right thing to do is to have contacts anywhere. To take the credit for the real actions of the people on the ground. I think it is repulsive, personally. He doesn’t have to look at these photos and stop yourself from feeling anything at all.”

They stand there, facing the board, in a moment of silence. The clues should be just there, bursting out of the cork. Just in that moment. With no decent CCTV footage, no eyewitness statements that have given anything other than "I heard a lot of screaming”, what more can they go on? The DNA from Sam’s apartment has already been followed up, the alibi checked out. Elijah was too much of a recluse to have anything more than the phone call he gave Gavin.

Connor pulls out another piece of paper, scrawling down the pure efficiency of the killer. As he tacks it to the board, Tina frowns.

“Do you think it’s revenge? I mean, there is already all of the lacerations. ‘You are a forever liar’ and all that. I’m just worried that it is too simple of a reason, though,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest, a button on the sleeve catching on her badge.

"It could very well be revenge. It just feels too calculated, like some other android did it,” Connor replies, head spinning with ideas. “The problem is, though, that we haven't found any thirium, plastic or biocomponent pieces at the scene of any of these crimes."

Tina’s eyes scan the forensic evidence on the board. The scenes seem pristine, with only the destruction of the people at the centre of it as a reminder of what exactly it is they're dealing with. She looks over to Connor, and his LED is a sad, dour yellow. She grimaces before going to sit at his desk, unable to stare at it any longer.

"We will figure it out. Even if Perkins takes all of our resources away, we will figure it out. We have to, you know?"

Connor turns to face her. "I know. I just- I just can't manage this right now."

"What do you mean?” Tina asks, looking at him, brow pinched. "Are you okay?"

As she finishes her sentence, Nines reappears from the interrogation room, bag in hand. Connor leaves Tina to go and talk to him. She stays at the desk, alone, head turned away from the board, head resting on her hand.

"What are you doing?" Connor states, staring pointedly at the bag clutched between Nines’ bony fingers. Nines’ hand is smooth, perfect and unmarked. Connor’s eyes peer down at his own, reached out in an aborted lunge towards Nines. The moment is a stranger’s, intimate, fleeting and beautiful.

Nines says nothing much in way of a response, and pushes past him to the desk, neat and clean and entirely impersonal. Tina looks at the pair of them, so painfully unable to say what needs to be said. Whatever lay inside that reclamation department has reclaimed more than simply their bodies. It fed on their cooked souls, whole and untouched, crushing it between metallic fingers. Mortar and pestle.

Connor follows Nines to his desk, trailing him with the demeanour of a lost, sad puppy, tail hung around his legs. This unsettled status quo cannot hold for much longer. There is something to be said for murdering the monster that sits at the end of the bed. To feel the squelch, the crunch, and the redemption.

Floating, spitting, saliva-filled words emanate throughout Connor’s mind. The rest, however, is a blur of the vacant, lunatic smiles of the men who simply enjoy their job too much. The blue blood lay on those counters not for him, but instead for Nines, the true prototype, the unique one. Connor instead tried and failed to vanquish the baddie in a child's fairytale. Those disgusting men told him, arms binding him to the table, that Nines will be the one to destroy him.

This new monster has black hair and grey eyes, towers over him even without shoes on, and smiles with kindness crinkling around its face. He cannot bear it.

"Can we talk?" Connor asks, looking down at where Nines is sitting. He emanates a positively malicious mood. What a world it is that they inhabit now, where the best they can do is stilted conversations over rickety tables.

“Need something?” Nines replies, fingers shifting to the keyboard, eyes still latched onto the plastic.

“What’s in the bag?”

Nines shoots him a look. “A jumper, covered in blood. You know this, so what do you actually want?”

“Where’s Gavin?”

Some commotion comes from the just outside gates into the bullpen. Raising voices echo throughout the room. There is some jostling, some squeaks of protest, and before long, a plastic keycard is swiped against the gate to the pen.

Two strangers step in, expressions revealing nothing to the growing amount of people congregating. Nines puts the bag down on his desk, before rising from his seat. His LED cycles faint orange, and his heart rate, Connor notices, picks up just a little. Maybe the monster has a weakness now.

Tina comes over to join them, arms in a cross over the dark blue cotton. Connor watches as their mouths, in gaping confidence, pressure some poor junior into answering a question.

She points at them, finger extended in a piteous show of accusation.

Connor’s LED turns red. What if they’re back? Maybe they are. They look cruel enough to be Cyberlife people. Maybe they'll drag him kicking and screaming, before placing him again in a new body; irreplaceable soul, replaceable body. Nines’ processors whirr louder as they walk over, arms bulging at the seams of their linen shirtsleeves.

“Detectives, good morning. We hope you are both well. In the interests of keeping this brief, can we find a quiet room to talk?” the one with the dark, almost black, hair asks. His lips curl up into a quick, easy smile.

“We can.” Connor gestures to the interrogation room Nines left. “Would this be sufficient?”

“It would, thank you RK800. I’m Xavier Boyd, and this is my colleague Lea Howard.”

Walking into the interrogation room, Connor’s HUD flashes. Warning: high stress levels. Tacked on like a sticky note in the corner. In another world, where the buses didn’t run late and the toast didn’t burn, the two men could have almost been kind. In that world, Elijah’s chewed pencil would never have scrawled across the thick, rich pages of the dog-eared notebook, and these thoughts permeating Connor’s mind would have simply never existed. His fingers itch with the cold air.

[RK900: I know we haven’t talked properly in a while. I will keep this channel open in case you need me.]

[RK800: Talked? You want to do this now?]

[RK900: Don’t be naïve, Connor. You’re still my brother, and I will still protect you, always. I know I’m not the same, and I know how you look at me. I know you’re scared. I am too. We can talk afterwards, okay?]

Connor catches Nines’ bloodshot-blue eyes and smiles.

“Detectives, we are here on behalf of Cyberlife to ask about your reconstructive expertise.”

[RK800: Do they know about the reclamation department?]

[RK900: They have to, right?]

[RK800: Do you think they’re coming to take us back?]

“Of course,” Nines says, teeth grit. “How can we help?”

“We’re currently helping a case in Cleveland of suspected domestic abuse against an android. We have gathered that the case could do with some reconstruction. Because you’re the only android that can successfully achieve high levels of reconstruction, we were told to come and find you here. RK900, your skills in precognition may also be of some use, but you aren’t the reason we came.”

[RK800: I guess they don’t know everything about it then.]

[RK900: Seemingly not. Do you think they hid it? For PR, or something?]

[RK800: Maybe.]

Connor nods at the two strangers, gesturing them to take a seat. The chairs scrape against the concrete as they drag along the floor.

Behind Connor, facing the crowd, the precognition of blue blood explodes like a balloon across the walls, spattering the mirror. Plastic shards embed themselves in Connor’s false skin, in his hair, in his arms. The precognition of the headless body of model number RK900/001 collapses to the floor, wires shorn sharp at the ends. Nines quickly erases that thought from his head, briefly tapping his LED in a sense of assurance that no, it has not broken across the walls, and no he isn’t about to explode. Not yet at least.

“Here is the case file. I know you work better on scene, but the department says they don’t have the budget to transport you,” Lea says, sliding the handwritten file over to Connor, both hands flat against its surface.

“That’s fine, I’ll see what I can do from here.”

The pictures paint a fairly simple story, all things considered. Revenge, retribution, sex, lust, love. At first glance, or to those without the wisdom to know better, the pair could have simply been in love. Yet, the suspect believed their android was still their property, and attacked their partner for trying to break up with them. The android, an outdated Traci model, fought back, and ended up gouging the eyes out of the suspect. Particularly bloody.

As the reconstruction continues to play, sped to oblivion in Connor’s mind’s eye, his eyes scan across the scene. Lavish, heavy curtains hang draped from their poles, while dim orange lighting flickers across the ceiling. Parquet herringbone floors sparkle, freshly mopped. Something doesn’t quite add up, though.

“Why did the suspect, a Mr. Graves, have such an outdated Traci model? The photos from the scene show off a beautiful house, clearly from a rich history, yet, the model was old.”

Xavier blinks at him. “That we don’t know. What do you think?”

“I think Mr Graves was hiding something.”

[RK800: I have an idea.]

Lea and Xavier thank Connor, shaking hands with enough force to probably tear a tendon. The smiles that line their faces could cut diamonds into engagement ring-worthy gemstones. More luxuries. As they step out again into the bullpen, matadors in a new arena, Nines’ body shivers in an expression of undisplayed fear. His hands come to rest against the metal table, as he swings his head down, hanging it.

“Nines.” He doesn’t respond. “Nines. Hello?”

He looks up, eyes catching. “I’m listening.”

“What if the murders were to hide something? All of it. The words, the chaos, the seemingly random locations. We know that they were all related to somebody in law enforcement. Maybe that was their failure. There’s only so much you can hide before a pattern always emerges,” Connor says, projecting his words to hit the nonexistent people in the back rows of his theatre for one.

Nines still doesn’t respond, instead swinging the door open and shouting for Tina. Her shoes squeak against the plastic floor as she walks in.

“What’s up? Made up yet?” she says, sunny smile on her face.

“I think whoever killed Sam, Elijah, and all the others was hiding something. I don’t know what yet. Nines, do you know where Gavin is? I’m sure he would have some good ideas for this.”

“He called me last night. Drunk and off his head, like after Elijah.” Nines clears his throat, an action he doesn’t actually need to do. “He left me a message. I haven’t opened it yet.”

Tina and Connor share a glance at each other before gesturing for Nines to sit down.

“Can you listen to it now?” Tina asks.

As Nines listens to the voicemail, Connor texts Gavin, eyes stuttering from side to side as he does so.

[10:21am - Connor]
It’s me. Is there a pressing reason why you’re not in work today or should I just send an ambulance?

[10:21am - Gavin]
Hangover. I hope Fowler doesn’t kill me. I’ll be around in 30 minutes. Is there an emergency?

“He-” Nines’ LED stutters yellow. “We met earlier than I thought.”

Tina sits across from Nines. “Go on.”

“The night Sam was killed, I collided with someone on the way to the scene. I didn’t know who they were. I can still barely picture it now. They had a gorgeous face, and in a haste to get to where ever it is that they were going to, they dropped a chilli on the floor. It was him. All along, it was him.”

“Gavin?”

[10:23am - Connor]
Nines is talking about you and chillis. Ring any bells?

[10:23am - Gavin]
God. I need to talk to him.

“Nines? Gavin is on his way. I think he’s bringing the bike.”

-

The slow rumble of Gavin’s 2031 Yamaha fades into nothingness, and Connor watches Gavin walks briskly into the bullpen, ignoring the pounding in his head and the creep of nausea in his stomach. Tina greets him at the door, a tall, steaming hazelnut latte for him, extra sugar.

“Morning T.”

“Morning to you too, late night?”

“Very.”

Connor’s crooked smile causes one to splinter across Gavin’s face as well, short but entirely true.

“Nines is by the board. I’ll let you two catch up. Tina, want to help me file a report for Perkins?”

Tina grins. “You know me.”

In the deep corners of Connor’s audio processor, he can hear Nines’ greeting.

“It isn’t just me you can save, you know. Connor figured out something that might be able to save others too. I’ve missed you. Come on, let’s find somewhere a bit quieter.”

Notes:

The song for the chapter is Dances for Harp and Orchestra, L. 103: 2. Danse profane by Lavinia Meijer and Amsterdam Sinfonietta.

Hope you enjoyed reading and have a lovely day!

Chapter 19: Darkness, Light, Everything In Between

Summary:

Love, hidden amongst the darkness.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you’re doing well. Considering all the angst and suffering we’ve had recently here in Small Imperfections, I hope this chapter helps you recover a bit. We have mildew, light fixtures, breathing and concrete. I should get another chapter out by the end of the month. Stay kind, stay safe!

Concertos, sensors and isopropyl alcohol,
Positive!

Chapter Nineteen - Darkness, Light, Everything In Between

In the room where all of the past is about to become the present, and the future is about to seep itself underneath plastic and into flesh, there he is. Gavin, looking dishevelled, if gorgeous, with his fingers curling slowing around the cardboard of the cup of coffee in his hand. There, there he is. His Gavin.

“How are you?"

“Just peachy, tin can.”

Blinding light from the white fixture burrows its way into the pinched expression on Nines’ face, illuminating his eyes, piercing and devastatingly grey.

Gavin continues, “If you’re expecting me to come into this conversation happy and begging you to take me into your arms, you’d be wrong. I’ve done that enough times, and with enough people that you won’t be the next person.”

Something awful clouds Gavin's eyes, as he shucks off his jacket and wraps it around his forearm like a snake its putting shed skin back on. There, there it is. Fear, tinged with the faint desire of hope. Little clouds of steam puff out of the cutout in the coffee’s lid.

This is all Nines was ever destined for. To terrify, to break, to cause the ultimate kind of pain. The one where your dreams would be transformed into the waking nightmare of being alive and not knowing what you would be doing the next day. Maybe you’re dead; maybe you’re crashing down the door of your ex just begging them to come back; maybe you’re begging them to love you just one last, truly disgustingly devastating time. Maybe you’re lying in your own sweaty bedsheets, barely able to lift your depressed, anxious head off the dirty pillow.

“I don’t want to do that to you, Gavin.” Nines traces his fingers over the edge of his jacket, at the expanse where soft fabric meets nothing at all. “I missed you, is that not enough to say?”

In the little broom closet Gavin has dragged them both into, there is one short stool. Not only is it dusty, with dirt coating the legs, but it can barely fit one person on it, let alone two.

"So, you missed me?" Gavin says, coming to place his jacket on the stool. The faded brown leather flops over the sides, sagging at the ends.

"Of course I did. Why wouldn't I?"

"Oh, I don't know, Nines. Maybe it's the fact that ever since you woke up and screamed your head off about your new — in your words — disgusting blue eyes, we have barely been able to be in the same room as each other without some godawful silence? Fuck."

The room takes a beat, holding its breath for the monster to breathe smoke through his nose and out through his mouth.

Nines says, "Do you think I'm a monster? Have I changed that much to you?"

Yes, yes, you’re a monster. The best kind. The one that reflects the best in the person coming to slay you and take a boon from the leader of the kingdom. Embrace it. Love it. Make it your own. It’s what Elijah would have wanted.

Please get out of my head. Please. She’s gone and she isn’t coming back. What are you?

"I don't think you're a monster. I never have and I never will. But you're not the same, you know. I don't think it is possible to be the same."

Their eyes lock to each other, carding their expression up and down each other's frame, taking them in. Gavin's toned arms lie loose, even if his hands are balled in a tense fist against his side. Nines' slender frame trembles with anticipation, as if he could leap out of his seat and devour the other man whole. It could be a kind of little death.

"Do Connor and Tina think I'm a monster? I'm- I don’t know.” Nines sighs. “I’m not the same person I was the last time I spoke to Tina fully. It's winter and I haven't even spoken to her. I haven't even spoken a full sentence that hasn't been related to a case. Oh God. Does she hate me? I think she hates me."

“Calm down.” Gavin clasps his hands together, squeezing them rhythmically, so hard the skin beneath turns white. "She doesn't hate you. I don't think Connor does either. I think they're a bit terrified of you, eyes notwithstanding. Ever since we came and collected you, and fixed you, you haven't been yourself."

"I asked you if you loved me. You didn't give me the dignity of a proper answer. How could you do that to me?"

Gavin moves to turn off the bulb in the middle of the room, bare and naked amongst the dusty shelves and slowly rotting paper of old case files. A faint smell of mildew pours through the cracks in the concrete walls, between the cracked chips of paint, where the job was done cheaply. No primer. The bulb flickers, white light bouncing, before the room fades into darkness, with only a small bar of yellow light filtering in through the crack in the bottom of the door.

“You’re doing it again.”

“Doing what?” Nines asks, tracking through the picture-perfect memories in his processors and coming up with nothing. It’s all a horrendous caricature of perfection.

“Being mean. You were never mean.” Gavin clears his throat. “You’re making me sound so childish.”

“This is what I was designed for.”

Even through the darkness, Nines can feel Gavin’s eyes like a knife through the bridge of his nose, where his new glasses sit. Brushed titanium, as the optometrist described, through judgmental eyes. Now why exactly would an android need glasses? You’re perfect. Wealth sits heavy against his skin, harmonising like a soprano opera singer with his Egyptian cotton shirt.

He continues, “Perfection. That’s all I am, and all I am intended to be.”

Gavin huffs out a harsh bark of a laugh. “Ever since I met you, you haven’t been perfect. It’s what I like so much about you. You’re not so painfully up your own ass that you don’t see what’s staring you in the face. A very pretty face.”

“You’re so kind.”

“And now you’re sarcastic too. Did Connor ever tell you that you imitate the people you know?”

Nines’ LED flickers orange. “I do?” He pauses. “I should know that. I should.”

“Don’t you? You’re the most advanced android ever made, tin can.”

He’s calling you tin can again.

Gavin’s shoes shuffle against the concrete. He continues, “You really don’t, do you? Elijah- He-”

“So much of this is hidden away. So many lies. To be more accurate, half truths. Ever since Amanda…do you know about her? I guess you have to. You still have my notebook.”

Rustling fills the air as Gavin’s hand roots through his messenger bag, fingers fumbling for the navy cotton cover. “Here it is.”

“Thank you. Ever since Amanda, something has felt so wrong. I’m free. I know I’m free. But I’m not the same person anymore. I can’t be. They told me my operating system was ‘destroyed from the inside’. Destroyed. But I’m still here: my body hasn’t changed,” Nines whispers, blue-tinged tears rolling down his cheeks. Little yellow and blue flashes light up the darkness.

“I’ve missed you too.”

There’s only silence in response to that statement. In the bar of the light, Gavin’s eyes catch and seem to sparkle. A little, perfect, aching, adoring smile breaks the stone on Nines’ face, his lips turning up in a pure joy.

Maybe you could do this forever.

“Do you want to do this forever?”

“Talk in a dark room with only your tiny little LED to let me know how you’re feeling? You may be a lot of things, Nines, but you’re not straightforward when I need you to be.”

“I can always turn the light back on.”

“Don’t.” Gavin laughs. “Secret meetings in dark storage closets make for some fucking amazing stories later. Tina would love this.”

“Do you want to be together forever? Working together, everything?”

“Everything? All of it?”

“Everything.”

Time stretches to infinity, pulling music from the sky: a violin playing the crescendo of a concerto. As they stand, faces barely inches from oblivion, yet unable to see each other, Nines listens to Gavin’s breath. Slow, controlled, warm against the heat sensors in his skin. Perhaps it would be apt if the air smelt of vomit and terrible decisions. At least then the breath would be for a reason and the terror he can sense in every exhale would have a meaning.

Gavin starts to move even closer, hands mere inches apart. "I think- I don't know, just think, that I would want that too. But not with you here, right now. God, maybe I do? Maybe that is what I want."

"I want what you want."

"That's the protocols talking, you intelligent idiot." Gavin laughs. "What are we doing here? Stood in the dark?"

"Do you want me to turn the light back on? I know you already said no, but I might as well ask again. You seem pretty adamant that some light would be better than this."

"Absolutely not."

Gavin is an impossible being, utterly pathetic when faced with the devastation of just taking a step towards the things he truly wants in the world. Michi was one. Oh god, them.

He exhales a slow, barely controlled breath. "I need to tell you something, Nines. It, unfortunately, is not about us. You know Seattle?"

"I know of it. The FBI investigation is pretty good out there, why? Do you think they could be useful?"

Ha, of course they'd be useful. Of fucking course they could be useful.

“I know…the lead investigator. They’re an old school friend.” No, they’re not. “We haven’t talked in almost a decade.”

-

“This fucking hurts.”

Tina’s dark, searching eyes scan once again over the blood streaming from Gavin’s broken nose. “It’s what you deserve.”

“I thought I could stop them before they got even deeper into all of this.” Gavin winces as an isopropyl alcohol-covered cloth is pressed to his cuts. “Before they made that godawful decision that would ruin any chances of returning to the real world. I never thought they’d go this far.”

“You can’t save everybody.” Dark blood stains the cloth further as it is dragged harder against split skin. “Going undercover, posing as a corrupt cop — though, I guess you are one now — it wouldn’t have made them change their mind. Anything for progress, right? That’s what they told you: anything to bring the gang down.”

-

“What do you mean, ‘an old school friend’?” Nines asks.

“Everything but a lover, but so much more than a friend.” Nines’ LED flashes dark crimson in response, illuminating a little of Gavin’s temple. “I tried to take down a crime gang I thought, stupidly, so fucking stupidly, that they were leading.”

Little red shadows shift across Gavin’s face as he rests his head against Nines’ chest, screwing his eyes shut, as if there were any more light to hide from. His own tears start to roll down his face, staining his hoodie, grey with soft wear.

Nines’ arms wrap around Gavin’s shaking frame in the dark, hiding the wetness that lingers on his own plastic skin. “You were young, you regret things, it happens. Why didn’t you tell me?”

He lied to you. Come on, he did.

“I didn’t even know that they were on the case. There’s a vomit stain on the floor of my apartment now, from when I found out. Charlie ended up dead because of my mistake.”

[Charles ‘Charlie’ Florian, junior detective. Born 2001, died 2027. Son of Camila Gonzales and Carlos Florian. Noted for exceptional bravery.]

“He died during your investigation, didn’t he? I have his file here. Noted for exceptional bravery.”

Gavin wracks a sob from the depths of his chest. “Trying to-”

“Save you.”

A long arm in a white shirt stretches out and pulls the string. It’s white light flickers, spits, a relic of the old days, before bouncing across Gavin’s hair. A day or two of grease sits deep in it, and Nines presses his lips to the crown of his head.

Why are you doing this? Don’t you see? He BETRAYED you.

Shut up. Get out of my head. Do you revel in my suffering?

Gavin’s arms clutch at Nines, as if to escape inside his skin and make his home there. “I want this to be forever, if you’ll have me.”

Their dilating eyes lock, both shining with tears, terror and love. As Nines’ thumb smooths over the acne scar on Gavin’s cheek, a smile creeps onto his lips and true bliss filters its way through his thirium. His hand is locked into place when Gavin’s own, slightly calloused, comes to rest on top of it, and Nines’ mind splinters into embracing the moment and remembering the heat of the sun and the coolness of the grass against his back.

“This isn’t going to be exactly easy, detective.”

Gavin smiles back at him. “We can be better together. Find the suspect, get revenge for Sam and Elijah, and everyone else, recover. I need to speak to Michi.”

Nines tilts his head towards Gavin’s, and their lips come together, barely a brush.

“You’re prettier in the light.”

Gavin doesn’t respond, instead pulling Nines back in for the next kiss, simultaneously pushing them onto the tiny little stool, as they hurtle over oblivion and into elysium.

Notes:

The song for the chapter is Stratego by Amtrac, in my playlist, Small Imperfections.

I hope this chapter was sufficiently happy! Have a wonderful day.

Chapter 20: Cigarettes

Summary:

[email protected]

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Just want to start this off with an apology for not getting another chapter out in October. I ended up in A&E and lost the use of my finger for a bit, so no typing for me. But anyway, welcome to chapter twenty! Things are really ramping up now, and we get to meet Michi live and in the flesh for the first time, so I hope you enjoy. Stay kind, stay safe, and if you’re in the US, remember to vote!

Cigarettes, insurance fraud and polyurethane,
Positive!

PS. Listen to Michi’s song whilst reading, trust. It’s in the end notes.

Chapter Twenty - Cigarettes

On the PA in the station, in the morning light, some song floats through the air, littering sweet melodies as Gavin stares at his screen, emails open.

[email protected]

They're there, on the other end of an email. So old fashioned now, even if that is how his parents met. In the sweet gaps between the written word and telecommunications. It’s not even their name really, Michiala. Nobody ever called them that. It was Michi and Gavin. Gavin and Michi. Always them, always together.

"What are you up to?" Nines asks from the desk across him, tracing a long pianist’s finger over a cactus spine.

"Emails. Did you follow up on that conversation with the ME?"

"I did. I'll send you the last of their reports, before it gets shipped off to the people who believe they know better than us. Do you still think we could have the chance to get back on the case?" Nines smiles like a shark.

Gavin huffs. "No."

"Right."

They share a glance over the plastic dividers in their desks. Are you okay? Are you? Words unspoken, yet communicated between infinite bounds.

Gavin turns back to his emails and begins typing, click-clacks overtaking the melody that has changed into something a little more upbeat.

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Investigations in Detroit

Hello Michi,

It's Gavin. This isn't how I wanted to talk to you again, something like nine years later, but here we are. How are you? This isn't strictly a work email, but I thought I'd talk to you about that first.

I know you're the lead for the FBI investigation in Seattle, focusing on the murders the FBI deem related to gang violence interstate. I was originally leading an investigation into Sam Park's murder (you probably remember her), here in Detroit. Then Elijah was killed. You definitely know about that one.

We have a lot of leads. A fuck-ton. But, Perkins, who I don't want to call by his first name, took that control and left his little lackeys to come and steal what snippets of information they deem us important to return. I don't know if he's done the same down there in Seattle, but you are my best bet to ask for some help.

Can you help? I hope so, it would be at least some form of a thank you for me not ratting you out when you beat the shit out of me. But what can I do? Send off this stupid email and hope you respond. In any case, this is a plea for help. I am getting nowhere with this, and Sam deserves the best we can do. Elijah deserves something more than simply knowing that I am trying. He tried too hard to be some enigma, some strange being at the end of it all, and this is where it got him.

It’s been so long, man. Since high school. You’ve definitely changed since then, and I imagine even more after the last time I saw you. Sometimes I wonder whether you made the right choice, even though it did get you promoted to a better paying job than I could ever imagine. Go you!

Do you still smoke? I remember your fingers always itching to take one of mine whenever I had a pack on me. I quit a couple years ago, after my therapist (I know) told me it would probably be a good idea. Perkins makes me want to start again sometimes with his prickly little smirk and shit hair.

There’s a lot I still need to tell you.

Gavin.

As his hands fall back into his lap, rubbing soothing patterns into the denim, Gavin closes his eyes and imagines tobacco.

“I sent an email to Michi. I think…they can help.”

Nines’ long eyelashes bat in front of his face when he looks up. “They probably can, thinking about it. There is only so much Connor can do from this end. Fowler has us working on time-consuming cases whilst I know the best of my abilities would do wonders.”

Dear reader, our Icarus may not be the person we thought it was. Hubris may not simply be the emotions of the mortal.

-

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]

Dear Gavin,

It’s been a long time, huh? I can help you.

Michi.

PS. I still smoke.

-

"That will be 7 dollars and 25 cents.” The barista taps something on her screen, with her fingernails lit up. “Do you want to pay with cash or card?"

"People still use cash?"

The barista simply shakes her head, the earrings poking out of her lobes bouncing around in the movement. "Some. Only the older people though really — not that you’re old, of course. Before they changed all the rules about the banks."

"Huh," Gavin says, sliding the plate towards him on the counter. "Interesting."

"Indeed. Enjoy your sandwich."

He intends to. The plate has a little chip on the side, just breaking apart the perfection of the ceramic. Michi’s flight is in; they’ll be here soon, a straight hop from Seattle-Tacoma in some cheap economy seat, plastic coated chairs packed like cattle in a crush. He pictures those earrings they used to wear, sparkling little false diamonds in the stud. Cubic zirconia, it’s called.

So false, so real.

Taking a table in the corner closest to the entrance, Gavin faces towards the light flooding in through the glass panels. People mill around outside, avoiding the slush on the street with their shoes not designed to get wet. Modern fashion still values the joys of excess beauty over any form of excess practicality. Gavin's own dilapidated brown sneakers tap anxious tunes into the metal of the chair leg. You know the nearer your destination…the more you’re slip slidin’ away…

Gavin takes a bite of the sandwich, mayonnaise spilling out the sides and onto his fingers. The lettuce isn't even fresh. Distinctly uncrunchy. Seven dollars for a sad piece of bread, some bacon, wilted lettuce and the hope of a good future. One slowly destroyed by false promises.

Maybe you shouldn’t be so pessimistic.

The little silver bell hung in a loop above the shop door rings. It can’t be any younger than 50 years old, with its dents and dull finish. Footsteps sound across the floor.

"Gavin?"

He looks up, a drop of mayonnaise still stuck to his lips.

"It's you. You haven't changed at all."

Michi stands in front of the table, wearing a yellow knit sweatshirt, fading blue jeans and smart black boots. Their hair is longer, though not by much, in neat, tight coils framing their cheekbones. Only time has wizened their skin, where it shines with a little sweat against the lights. Something about their face sings with anger. They’re still fiddling with the dead skin on their cuticles.

Gavin rises from his seat, wiping his mouth and clearing his throat. So little time. Tick, tick ticking away, if he isn't careful.

"I know. You look the same too. Why are we doing this? We could have talked on the phone, you know. I was delayed out of Sea-Tac — some idiot kicked up a shitstorm about their seat.”

“I'm sorry. Uh- Do you want to go for a walk? I know you have your bags, but…”

'Yeah, I'll take a walk. Do you still have that shitty garden? The one you were planning on developing?”

Oh, that one. With the frost-coated plants and the damp shed. With the tomatoes he has stored in containers in his tiny little freezer. The basil plants are in the greenhouse, ready for another cold winter of waiting for the sun. Weeds are pruned. All in preparation to be ignored until the grass pokes its head through the ground and the new sun arises from its dark sleep.

Some day will come however, where this is not longer going to be the case. The tomatoes will have rotted on the stem and the red rose bushes grow wild and free.

Then, and only then, can he say that the place is shitty. “Yes, I still have the garden.”

“Let’s go then. Take me to the garden.”

Gavin looks down at his sandwich. “Mind waiting till I finish?”

“Sure? I’ll find somewhere to stash my bags.”

-

Michi's shoes slap against the ground as they run up to the gates of the garden, faint drops of snow in their coils. Their song of anger is no longer so bright, tempered instead by the sheer joy of a child at Christmas time, waiting to see what lies under the evergreen tree. An older man walks past them, holding himself up with an ornate cane.

"This is beautiful." Michi says, tilting their head back towards Gavin.

What are they planning? They said they could help.

"It is. Can we talk about the cases now?" Some sharp blades of his persona creep through for the first time since smashing the poor receptionist's handsome face into the glass table.

“Oh don’t be such a loser, Gav! Come on!”

So he follows, crunching footprints into the snow. He pulls his jacket closer around his frame, woollen scarf pulled close to his neck, a winter gift still surviving from his mother. The birdsong in the trees frosts over as his breath condenses in the air.

"Don’t-" he says, reaching down to re-tie his laces, “call me Gav.”

The tools lie flat in the shed, as his mind drifts back to the cool, calm night he got the call from Tina, her breath seeming to reach through the phone and into his skin. Sam, calling him Gav on so many stupidly fun nights out, dyed blonde hair bouncing around her in a halo. Michi would have hated her.

Their dark brown eyes look back at him with a malice he can't quite place. Is it to him, or the nickname, or the cold? He elects to stop thinking about it too hard, nor to interrogate them like Nines has been doing recently, with his own shocking blue eyes ripping others into shreds for something as mere as insurance fraud.

He could burn down his own house and Michi wouldn’t do so much as call. Sure they could give the appearance, but deep down, where the heartstrings play their childish violin tunes, no. There's a reason they were so adept at climbing the ranks of the cartelised drug groups.

As they come to stand at the edge of some raised bed lined by swollen wood planks, with platoons of popsicle sticks with handwritten labels for 'cabbage' on them, Michi pipes up.

"It's bigger than we think. More and more drugs are being shipped around, and this definitely has something to do with it. The gangs are getting so much more brazen with their revenge.” They pull their hand through their hair. “In the pack you sent me about Samantha's case, it said that they found ice on the scene. Right?"

Pinpricks of goose flesh bind him to the days in which that was all he cared about. The high, the escape, the bittersweet vulnerability of sharing it all with someone he knew all too well. It may have only been a short, fleeting, flirt with the edge of extinction, but he will not jump into that pool again.

"Right. Do you want a cigarette? I bought some just in case." Gavin reaches into his pocket and pulls the pack out. The grotesque images of tar-stained lungs blink back at him in some cruel pleasure.

“Sure, I'll take one. You?”

Gavin’s brow furrows with questioning. Did they even read the email? "I'll have one.”

He takes the pack out, slipping two into the palm of his hand before passing one over. They pull a sleek metal lighter from their pocket and light theirs, the flame burning hot yellow against the snow. It’s engraved with floral patterns.

"Mind if I borrow that?” Gavin asks, cigarette of his own perched between two fingers. They pass it over and he lights his, pointedly keeping the cigarette between his fingers and not his chapped lips, down by his knees.

"Revenge is a good motive for all this, and particularly the widespread, organised nature of all this," he offers, still unconvinced as to whether Michi is stealing the truth from beneath his fingers, but he can only hope so.

The dealers from Philadelphia are up for bargaining. Is Schwartz, that sadistic fuck, still alive?

“No, you don’t get it,” Michi responds. Gavin frowns. “It’s an amazing motive.”

Images of Nines’ hair wanders into the moment as they slowly circle the raised bed, Gavin trying to scratch them out of his mind, but instead acting as a DJ, creating music with the scratches instead. He would know what to say here, tall and imposing and holding a gun.

“Let’s go back to what we actually know for certain. Ice was planted at the scene of Sam’s murder, but not Elijah’s. Was anything planted at the other’s? I don’t have access to all the files.”

“Only Alireza Santana.”

“So, ‘You, Forever,” in the lacerations. That has got to mean something.’ Gavin says. “Unless they’re a red herring.” He flicks some ash from the end of the cigarette off. Smoky haze drifts up into the sky, blurring the slight view of the family walking down the road, visible from just above the hedgerows.

“Possible, but does it seem like it? There’s no CCTV for Elijah’s death. Pure efficiency.” Michi takes a drag.

Only shouting for the eyewitnesses for Sam as well. Maybe they aren’t planning anything. Maybe you won’t be curled on the floor after this.

“Still excessively violent though; you’ve seen the photos.”

"You aren't wrong there; there is still the strangulation, and not to mention the lacerations." A breeze moves in. "Maybe it’s a political kind of violence. Revenge against them for the kinds of person they were. It would make sense for Elijah. He always was a strange one, even when we were both kids and I would try to steal the syrup from his pancakes. Sam was a lawyer. It would make sense, right?" Gavin says.

Michi's cigarette has burnt down to the filter, the little orange fleck standing out against their chapped hands. They stuff it out on the ground, paying no mind to the beauty of the garden.

"So, gang violence. It has to be.”

"Don't you think we could be missing something? You did say you could help me. I know you don't have any contact with any of our old gang friends after the end of your time undercover, but surely you can do something more than just agree with me?”

A street busker sets up shop just outside of their little sanctuary, playing the same song Gavin was thinking about as he sat to eat that disappointing sandwich.

A bad day’s when I lie in bed and think about the things that could have been.

Michi’s face hardens into honed steel. “I can get you, if I pull my strings right, back onto the case. Would that be sufficient to you, you wet freak?”

“Wet freak? Now we’re getting somewhere. Going to punch the lights out of me again? Just to look powerful? Just to rat out someone? Did you- did you even go to Charlie’s funeral? He died trying to save MY life from that ugly gang and you did nothing.”

By this time, our Icarus stares at the sun, blinding himself, burning his eyes with the passion of someone who doesn’t know what is about to come. Daedalus isn’t here right now, leave a message.

"You're the one who asked me to come.” Michi stifles down a cough, breath condensing in the air. “You're the one who sent the email. You're the one who asked me to book those plane tickets. You're the one who needs my help. So pleading and so desperate. Do you want little Elijah to come save your sorry ass from a drug-induced gutter? Not this time, man. He's dead and he isn't coming back."

"I do need your help, yes. But for the love of God Michi, why the fuck are you so mean?"

“Because deep down, you’re still that naive guy I was friends with as a child.”

Gavin pauses in his tracks. "I'm not a child anymore. I'm literally stood here discussing the intricacies of the deaths of both my half brother and my best friend from university. I'm not naive, Michi. You can't protect me anymore.”

They glance up at him, away from what seemed to be a particularly interesting part of their shoes. They smile with their teeth, more anger and more aggressive than Nines' new shark smile.

"I know. I know. I'm sorry. I know there is something we're missing, but I can't tell you what, just yet. Don't tell me you're just working on this alone?"

"I'm not, don't worry. Me and Nines are trying our best to get through what little we can, whilst also trying to stick with the insane amount of shit Fowler is throwing our way."

"Nines? Who is that? Is he an android?"

You've said too much now. Stuck your foot in your mouth and ruined it.

"I work with him."

You stupid idiot. You work with him?

"Work with him? For how long? Are you two partners?" Michi asks, a glimmer of hope shimmering through them.

"What? No, of course not."

"So...you don't work together on cases?" Michi laughs, a surprisingly kind sound.

"No- we do." Gavin swallows down his saliva, cold on his throat. "We do, yeah."

They reach the edge of the garden once again, a precipice to the rest of the city. Time widens its doors to let them settle into the moment. Should he tell them? Should they tell him about everything they've been doing in Seattle? Maybe.

"We're together." Gavin says, wringing his left wrist with his right hand.

"That is interesting, you know. I never had you down as the kind of man who would actually want to date an android."

"I don't know about dating, Michi. It took me a while to even really warm to him."

They pull the gate open and step back onto the pavement. "I'm glad you're happy, even if you are still a bit of a freak sometimes."

As they say their goodbyes, mainly in the form of two short nods between them, some frost melts against the polyurethane sheets. Icarus' wax freezes just for a moment.

Notes:

I didn’t originally think this would be the song for the chapter, from Gavin’s perspective, but here we are. It is Slip Slidin’ Away by Paul Simon, and it’s the song referenced through the chapter.

Michi’s song is Nearly Daffodils by English Teacher.

Enjoy!

Chapter 21: Lake Michigan’s Christmas Present

Summary:

What did you get for Christmas?

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Glad to be back so soon. I think the impending ending of this has gotten me more fired up than ever. I won’t say too much about what goes on in this; I just recommend you read. I’ve updated the chapter count to reflect what’s left to come. 3 chapters. I do truly hope you enjoy.

Parsnips, parks and plates,

Positive!

PS. I’m taking creative liberty with the time it takes to get to Lake Michigan from Detroit…

Chapter Twenty-One - Lake Michigan’s Christmas Present

Tina’s soft laughter echoes through her apartment as Gavin shucks off his shoes, placing them neatly by the door. The leather sits proudly alongside a pair of black stilettos, two near identical pairs of shiny boots and a pair of flip flops with a little ring of mud on the bottom.

Nines must be here, Connor too, Nadia even. The whole gang is back together. It is Christmas after all, and Gavin’s bag hangs heavy against his shoulder, overloaded with gifts.

It is also time to face the waiting crowd and hope that it will all fly by fine at the end of it, even if both Elijah and Sam are no longer able to put their shoes in tandem with this row. A pair of pristine Salomons next to a smaller pair of patent white pumps.

Something good is coming from the kitchen; it smells like turkey. The Christmas tree's soft purple and blue lights stream in through the open door to the left of the corridor, lined with myriad wooden frames. The table on the way in has a bright poinsettia plant, along with a small Lebanese cedar carving, both gifts from Nadia’s family, displayed proudly.

Gavin steps into the living room and is assaulted by Tina's fits of giggles as she sees his arm full of presents, and a little smile on his face. How long will it last before eventually succumbing to that scowl he is so known for? No clue. It may only be a matter of time until then. A drop of water falls from his dark red beanie onto the navy blue carpet, plush beneath his socked feet.

"Nice of you to show up! An hour late and a minute too early, but who am I to deny the world a sight of you with presents for everyone, even me!" Tina says, laughing into it. Her shoulder brushes the sleeve of Nadia’s black turtleneck, causing her drink to slosh around in its fine china teacup.

"You're so kind, T," Gavin responds, smirk fading a fraction from his lips. "Have you seen Nines? He said he was going to be here a bit earlier than me."

Nadia perks up, dark, bushy eyebrows knitting together. "He's in the kitchen. Tina asked him to make some roasted potatoes- it was potatoes right?” She waits for Tina’s nod. “I think so, anyway. He could be cooking up ice for the little I’ve seen him."

Tina winces at that, but Gavin brushes it off. “Thanks Nadia. Is there somewhere I could put my bag down?”

“By the tree, we’ll be opening presents later,” Connor offers, cotton shirt unbuttoned at the top, painfully human, lazing back against the edge of the low sofa.

Gavin heaves the bag off his shoulder, placing it next to the badly-wrapped but ever so loved presents that Nadia and Tina made for them all. It’ll probably be some stupid gag gift, but at least it will be one made with love. Wrapped in a bow and signed off with the kindness of a friend who lets you sleep on the sofa when the nights are drawing in, dark and alone.

“Didn’t want to do mashed potatoes?”

Nadia smiles. “I wanted something crunchy this year. Go on, go find him.”

Stepping into the kitchen, with its British racing green countertops and copper-coloured appliances, a flickering candle stands proud by the window. Narrow, but homely nonetheless. Enough for them.

Nines looms large over the stove, poking at a peeled potato boiling in the saucepan with the tines of a fork, as his LED spins. This is what it should be like at the end of the days spent fighting crime and fighting the horrible thoughts that linger just too long to ignore. Domestic bliss, some would call this. It feels a little more like home.

"Hey, tin can. What are you up to?” Gavin steps a bit closer, ceramic tiles sliding against his threadbare socks. They cling to his ankles with red and blue stripes.

"Boiling potatoes in a solution of baking soda and water. Tina said it can help them get more fluffy. I just looked up the optimal recipe, and here we are. How did you find getting here?" Nines asks, watching a shaggy potato slip off his fork.

Gavin sidles up next to him, dark grey jumper colliding with Nines' own. "I could get used to watching you like this, you know. It looks pretty nice. Boiling potatoes."

Nines glances down once before turning off the induction. "I could get used to this too. You didn't answer my question though, how was getting here? Did you take the bike like I said to?”

“You know me so well. I did take it, parked it up outside, next to Connor’s car. Interested in a ride?”

Beeping timers go off as Nines drains the pan into a waiting colander and ruffles them. Steam rises as they dry off slowly, condensing in the window. He lays them onto a sheet of hot oil, feeling the size as he turns them to be coated.

"Let's ride. I'll tell Tina to hold off on dinner for an hour; say we're going to get something from your place. Where do you want to go?”

Gavin ponders. "I want to go to Lake Michigan. I don’t think the parks around it are open, but it's beautiful this time of year. If it isn’t, we could just find somewhere to park up. The lake should be icy, which is always nice. Do you need a jacket?"

"I can turn off my processors you know.” Nines wipes down the side with a cloth. “I wear these glasses to be more human, but I don’t have to be. I don’t need to be human any more than you need to be kind.”

“You’re doing that thing again, Nines.”

“What?” His bloodshot eyes seem to bore into Gavin’s own, just barely starting to fade away now. So blue.

“You’re being mean.”

"Sometimes I wonder if I can ever stop being mean. It’s all I was ever designed for, and can deviating even stop your base coding? Connor is fine, I think. I hope. It's been so long and it seems like so little has changed, you know? I still can't remember- I still can't…" Nines pauses mid-movement.

The gap narrows, Gavin taking Nines’ wrist in his hand, its strange coolness a balm to his warm, calloused finger. Lingering in that moment, just the two of them, on a Christmas afternoon, together, it’s safer. Away from Amanda, away from anything that could hurt them.

“Let’s go on that ride, huh? You can take Connor’s jacket. God knows that idiot wants to show off how cool and suave he is in just a shirt.”

-

Thick wind whips through the air as the bike hurtles down the road, almost desolate during the Christmas Day. Grey clouds littering the sky smile as they pick up even more speed, rumbling across asphalt.

"Enjoying yourself back there?" Gavin shouts over the whine of the engine, screaming against his protesting gear changes.

Nines, despite being an ideal candidate to drive the damn machine given his height, simply squeezes Gavin's side in a hint of agreement.

Gooseflesh prickles up Gavin's side. This is good.

As they get closer to the park, an icy breeze rolls in from Lake Michigan, water vapour little icicles against them.

Screams of loud curses bubble up from his chest, drowned and born in himself. Utter freedom, if it wasn't for Tina's strict request for them to be back soon, a knowing smile creeping into her carefully schooled expression.

“The lake is just around the corner of these buildings.”

“Good, it’s getting cold out here. You’re lucky you have a helmet Gavin.”

The gates swing open loosely as they pull up slower than before, a calm sputter of the engine. They pull into a little designated bay for bikes, assumed to be electric in this day and age, as well as the people who still use the godawful e-scooters someone on the city council deemed it to be a good idea to make the main form of readily accessible transport in the city at this time of day.

Nines gets off first, the fabric of his trousers brushing against Gavin's as he disembarks. They're completely isolated from anyone else. The weather, oppressive as it is, just leaves them to their own devices.

"Lake Michigan is beautiful isn't it?" Gavin asks to nobody, pulling his helmet off and walking closer to the water's edge, careful not to get wet with the ice. Light streams catch his hair, now messy from the journey.

"It is. Thank you for bringing me here. You’re a lot kinder than you seemed when I first met you."

"Since I called you a plastic prick under my breath?"

“Ha. Yes. Since then."

They both come to a railing, sitting cold like the railings on the stairs in Nines' apartment block, all the way back to that fateful afternoon. No fireworks of blue blood this time, for that has already happened.

"Take a deep breath. Through your processors. Just take in the moment."

So Nines does, through his processors, over his sensors, over his LED circling the blue of the ice. Silence.

That’s all there is. Silence. The voice. Gone.

“It’s quiet.”

“Well, yeah. It’s Christmas Day and we’re stood by one of the largest lakes on the planet of co-”

“No. You don’t get it. My head is quiet.” Nines beams. “I can think clearly.”

"What do you mean you can think clearly? Surely it just comes naturally to you?" Gavin asks. Some ice just starts to crust over the lake, a scab to the wound of water.

"It's never normally like this, not since I met you really. She's always been there, even after deviation. Telling me something is wrong, even when it isn't. I don't quite know what is causing it, and it isn't like I have Elijah to tell me why now, but it's finally quiet. I can breathe again."

"It's like the notebook. Amanda, right? THat's what you called her?"

They share a long sigh together, breaths intermingling in the air. "Yeah, Connor had her too. I think all of us had her inside our heads, waiting for the right time to strike. Take back control."

Nines wanders off to the side a little, away from the railing, before running back, full speed towards it and over the edge, toes dangerously close to falling. Arms outstretched like an angel’s wings, he tilts his head back and screams.

"What the fuck are you doing?"

“Living!”

He laughs, a great, wide, carving sound, cutting through the wind and into the open air. It echoes off the ice chunks and off the tree leaves. Freedom, unabashed and unashamed of existing. The culmination of months of tortured anguish, still so evident by the bloodstained eyes, piercing blue and reflecting pain. The moment continues as Nines leans forward, shoulders bent at strange angles, head tilting down towards the lake.

A drop of dark water falls onto his shoes.

“Can you survive a fall into the lake?”

"I don't think it matters as to whether I can or not, more that I have the freedom to even try. She won’t be able to stop me anymore. Freedom, Gavin! Fucking! freedom!”

Gavin stares down at his shoes. "You sound happy. Are you absolutely sure that this is what you want to be doing right now? She could just wrestle back control from you right now and hurtle you into the lake. I can't save you if that happens. Just like Elijah."

Nines tilts back up at the last sentence. "You couldn't have saved him even if you wanted to. He was already dead, Gavin. You did everything you could."

"Maybe that's just it then. Did everything they could. That's why they died. Because they did everything they could to make the world better, and the assholes who that involved bringing down a peg hated the idea. Now they're carved up and slaughtered like pigs.”

“No- I think you’re right.” Nines steps over the railing again. “Genuinely, I think you’ve got it.”

“Political revenge? That’s what this all is?”

“Yes. Born over a decade or more of built up anger at their inability to articulate some kind of little wrong with the world. Expelled in anger. Death.”

Gavin takes Nines’ hand as he steps down from the cold bricks. “Tina and Connor have to know about this. They have to. We can solve this today. Fucking Christmas, giving me the present I never thought I’d want right now.”

As they steam back to Tina’s apartment, Nines raises his arms above his head, balancing on the pin of his seat and hollers.

-

"I'm telling you, these are the best carrots I've ever had." Nadia smiles as she says it, wine glass full to the brim, sat next to her carefully constructed plate of various vegetables, a disproportionate amount of cranberry sauce and some turkey, skin golden.

"Connor would agree with you, obviously. He helped me come up with the recipe. It's a shame you guys can't eat anything, but thank you for being here nonetheless," Tina says, taking Connor's hand in her own and squeezing once.

"It's fine. You're all, given that Hank isn't here anymore, the closest thing I have to family now."

Gavin clears his throat as quietly as he can muster. "Sorry to derail the conversation, but I thought I’d leave this until a point where we weren't thinking about whether the meal had been good or not, and considering Connor is getting compliments about carrots, I think we’re good enough to begin." Gavin spears a potato as he finishes.

“We know why Sam and Elijah were killed. Political revenge. A lawyer and a crazy stupid inventor. The others were all related to law enforcement,” Nines proclaims, if a little uneasy.

Connor’s LED sputters yellow for a moment. “I just checked with the FBI files we have. I can’t find any cases or similarities between them besides that. Is it really that simple?

“I literally cannot think of any other reason. No geographical similarities, completely different backgrounds, sexes, ages, socio-economic statuses. All of them were public-facing. All of them related to law enforcement. Some kind of control that you can have over another.”

Gavin takes a bite, head swimming. Chews, swallows.

Tina places down her wine glass. “What about the ice?”

“Planted. Had to be. Michi mentioned it when I saw them. Which is why the FBI think its gang violence. Drum up support in the still barely remaining ice gangs and force the hand of the FBI to take them seriously again. But it doesn’t just have to be gang related, you know. Anyone could have planted it there. Connor, you do reconstruction. I know the FBI have already asked you for it, but is there anywhere in that head of yours that could conceive of this being political?”

Silence lingers over the room as Connor seems to space in and out of reality. Mind sped to oblivion. His LED circles yellow.

"I think so. I think it definitely seems plausible, at least. It’s hard to tell without the scene as fresh as it was.” He scratches the back of his neck. “Did Michi get you back on the FBI case entirely? Because given the little that I know, this is bigger than we thought. Organised, definitely, maybe even. A little sadistic."

All of their heads turn towards Gavin. He clears his throat. "I'll go give them a call."

Schwartz? Schwartz…

There aren’t any new messages on his phone as it burns into his thigh. The nods being a closure he had not expected any more than he had expected that punch to his face all those moments ago. As Gavin steps out into the corridor next to the shoes, he pulls his phone out of the front pocket of his brown corduroy trousers and lingers his finger over the contact.

This is it. You’ll know by the end of this conversation. Elijah won’t have died for nothing.

The dial tone sounds once, twice, a third… “It’s Christmas, is this urgent?” People’s happiness can be heard over the tinny speaker.

“Did you get us back onto the case? I know you’re busy. Just this one question.”

“I pulled the strings with Perkins, but I don’t know if it got through. Let me call you back?”

Gavin frowns. “Sure, sure.”

Taking a seat back at the beautifully decorated table, wreathed by the most important people on the planet, Gavin closes his eyes and prays a silent litany to whatever god is listening. Voices and the echoes of response, as he imagines what they would say to him.

I will do anything. You will do anything.
Take all of me, for them. I will take all of you.

“So, what did they say?” Nadia asks, kohl-lined eyes filled with apprehensive hope.

“That they’ll call me back.”

Nines and Connor both burst out laughing simultaneously, a spontaneous response.

“What an anti-climax!” Connor wheezes. “Whilst we wait though, do we know any sadistic political revolutionaries? Or even someone capable of doing this.”

-

“If it isn’t Schwartz then who could it have been? None of the rest of them could have been so brutally violent.” Michi glowers over their phone. “Brutality.”

”Nobody else. Charlie couldn’t have known what was coming for him.”

“I’m so sorry.”

-

“I knew a guy, back when I was undercover with Michi. Schwartz was his name. A sad, sadistic fucker of a man. He- uh, he was the one who killed Charlie.”

“What?” Tina puts down her cutlery.

“I couldn’t say a word. I couldn’t say a fucking word about it. Not even to you. He would have hurt you too. I’m so sorry. I’m so fucking sorry for leaving you in the dark, but I had to. You’re my closest friend.”

Tina pinches her nose. “I could have helped. Done something, surely?”

Nadia’s arm wraps around her shoulder as Gavin glances at Connor before responding, “He would have killed you, T. I think that’s why he’s doing what he’s doing now, or at least what I think he’s doing now. Revenge against us, and the people like us, for trying to make things better.”

“Jesus fuck.”

“I know.”

Taking Nines’ hand in his, Gavin breathes deep. In, out, in, out. Buzzing moves through his pant leg, and he takes out his phone and answers it at the table.

“So?” Gavin asks, squeezing Nines’ hand as he waits.

Michi talks fast, “I sorted it out. Why now? What’s changed?”

“Did you kill Schwartz?”

“No…why? He lived.” A beat. It’s silent down Michi’s phone now. “You’re kidding me.”

“It has to be him. Doesn’t it? Ice, lacerations, anger. They were so calculated, man.”

“And he’s targeting you. Sam, Elijah. You are a forever liar. That’s what he wants us to know: we lied and we will always know.”

Tina’s shocked expression menaces the food.

“Yeah. Let me call you after the holidays. We’ll find him. And I’ll kill him.”

The call ends as it began, questioning the future. Nadia takes a long sip of her drink. Tina chews on the edge of a darkened parsnip. Connor, at the head of the table, watches the icicles growing on Tina’s window facing the street. Nines and Gavin stare into each others eyes, pouring every ounce of adoration into it.

Black clouds begin to roll in from the east. A thunderstorm looms.

Notes:

So, here we are. We know what we know, but what is Icarus going to do about it?

The song for the chapter is Tutti Frutti by New Order.

I really hope the ending to this lives up to the trust you’ve placed in me by reading this.

Chapter 22: Looking For Tomorrow’s Hope

Summary:

“I spy with my little eye something beginning with…”

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Third update of the month, a never before seen event in this fic so far. We’re so close to the end now. I can’t wait to give it to you. Again, I won’t spoil anything, but you’ll be happy, I think. Thank you all infinitely for your support so far, and as we get to the end, please let me know your thoughts.

Mugs, manila folders and mathematics,
Positive!

Chapter Twenty-Two - Looking For Tomorrow’s Hope

"So what you're saying to me is, you know exactly who committed these murders, and you figured it out without any actual support from the FBI?" Fowler’s untrusting eyes dart between Tina, Nines, Connor and Gavin, huddled shoulder-to-shoulder into his prison-esque office. A mug with ‘World’s best dad!’ sits next to his transparent glass computer screen, which blinks periodically.

He smirks as Tina nods back, emphatically throwing her support to both the android and the human.

"I don't quite know how the fuck you got to this conclusion, honestly. I know you're a good detective, RK900, but Jesus Christ." Fowler’s expression sours at Gavin in his famous leather jacket. "How much did you have to do with this?"

"I got in contact with someone who knows about gangs, and the murderers inside them. That kind of stuff; they were on the inside once. They helped me work through the kinks. Nines here helped to sort the rest out, Connor too. Tina correlated the evidence we have, and it seems to fit their MO. We just need confirmation now, before we do anything." Gavin pulls a nail off his right hand.

"You're a strange one Reed. I didn’t think we’d ever see you actually give a shit."

“I guess you know less about me than you thought, Captain.”

Chilling air flits in through the air-conditioning, a question lingering in the condensation stuck to the fans.

"What can I do to help you now? The FBI still have control over the case and there isn't a chance in hell I'll be able to get it back here. It's bigger than all of us combined. Are you back on the case now? Normally the paperwork comes through this desk, but knowing that man, anything could have happened. Surely he could have seen the benefit you all were, especially given your limited access.”

[Nines: Should we tell him about Michiala Evans?]

[Connor: No. This is Gavin's thing to say. You'll come across as a little deranged if you said you know someone in the Seattle branch with previous ties to drug gang undercover work.]

[Nines: Sure. It would be good if Gavin didn't say anything though. Maybe we'd get some more credit.]

[Connor: Since when do you care about getting credit?]

It is Tina who responds, just as Gavin opens his mouth. “You can start by getting us some clearance to go after these fuckers. A bit of surveillance wouldn't do much harm, right? They have to have some way of tracking them fairly easily. They'll be spread too thin to do all their hiding perfectly."

"And you can get us some equipment for this too.” Elijah's syrup-covered pancakes linger in Gavin’s nose. “When they figure out that we’re the ones trailing them, because they will, we can be as prepared as we need to be. We'll need the protection more then anyone else. Especially considering who they've killed."

"I can do that. How much time do you think you'll need?" Fowler asks.

"Give us two weeks, if we don't find him, or at least a good lead by then, we'll let the FBI do the hard work for us." Gavin says, looking amongst them all, confidence beginning to grow in his skin. “I know what you’re thinking: ‘oh god, look at him, finally not being a prick and letting others take the lead’.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking.” Connor smiles.

-

It's a green console this time around. Not red, no dirty tendrils pulling him closer to the end, so unwilling and yet so ready. Just the colours of Tina’s battered old car and the knowledge that the stakeout is going to be long, arduous and potentially filled with silence. Little reflections bounce off her flask of hot, sweet camomile tea, landing on Gavin’s arms.

"When do you think he'll show up?" Gavin asks. The file they managed to rope Chris into making for them details a seemingly identical daily routine, culminating in Gabriel ‘Schwartz’ Schwyhart retiring to his den of iniquity at 10pm every night. Receiving visitors into the morning hours, usually 1am, before the lights go out and the cycle starts afresh. Leaving so early in the mornings that the birds chirp in confusion, running until he feels what can only be assumed as pain in his legs, lungs and other vital organs, before returning for a breakfast.

"Should be 10. I doubt it though. We've been here for-fucking-ever by now and I still have yet to see him arrive at actually 10; he's always a few minutes late."

Gavin's finger hooks over the bar above the door, hanging loose. For the first time in the three days they’ve been sat there, making meticulous notes, Tina hasn't roped in Connor as her stakeout partner. her shiny thermos cup of tea sits snug in the cup holder, steam rising in little waves. Best friends who can say everything and nothing in the wide expanse of silence.

“Let's play I-spy. You say something you see, hopefully actually related to this fucking boring stakeout. I'll guess." Tina suggests, tilting her head towards Gavin.

"Sure. Don't forget that I'm not an idiot while we sit here and our brains rot inside our skulls. I do actually know how I-spy works, T."

She laughs. "I'm too tired to argue with you right now. Just play the game.”

“I spy with my little eye…something beginning with D."

D? There's the door they're starting at, closed, quite aged. The door knocker looks like it could fall off at any moment.

"Is it the door?"

"You're right. This is going to be really boring, isn't it?"

Tina grabs her cup and takes a long sip, slurping a little. "You can say that again. Wait- there. I think I see someone. Is that Schwartz?"

The stranger's clothes hang limply off their shoulders, hunched in a strange form of fear. Icicle shards of brown, coarse hair stick to his forehead. In another life, before the editing of humanity into digital consciousness, loosed freely into android plastic, the young-ish man presented before them could have been considered beautiful. Now, he looks drowned upon a city of artificial beauty, residing in the cracks that remain.

"No, but it seems like someone who's going to be heading in. Maybe he'll follow after them. I hope so anyway,” Gavin wonders, taking a closer look. “Schwartz is a lot more pale than this guy. Michi used to call him Snowman Schwartz."

Hidden in the coding of the car, the time ticks over to 10:00pm. It takes another minute for the screen on the car to catch up.

“That’s a terrible name. Do you have any photos of him from back when you knew him? I saw your wall — there seems to be 20 years of history tacked onto that. I don’t know if you actually managed to glean anything from it, but I guess there’s something comforting in trying to control the uncontrollable, after the fact. Sam would have liked that.”

“She would have, the crazy stupid workaholic she was. And no, I don’t. I would say that I burnt them or some other shit, but no. They got ruined when the apartment flooded a while back.”

That’s a shame. It could have been useful to have a look over them, see what Schwartz was like back when you and Michi were still undercover."

"Yeah well. Too late now.”

They fall into a slightly less comfortable silence, the leather of their seats pressing obtrusively into their backs. Nothing can be heard from outside the car. Deadly silence. As Tina's face cards across the scene; all she can think about is playing more games while they wait. Like they were back at university, drinking until the sun came up and the birds arose from their deep, dark sleep.

Five minutes go by, before the rumbling of some asphalt jolts the pair out of their boredom-imposed stupor. Something’s coming. Gavin rushes to turn off the interior light, hands jerking as it he were electrocuted.

"That has to be him," Gavin posits. "Has to."

A dark red car pulls up, blood-like in the moonlight-dappled darkness. As the door opens, Tina takes a sharp breath, tensing all her muscles. No movement, therefore no detection. Schwartz’s mop of black hair flops across his forehead as he steps out of the car. Something about his face reminds Gavin of an ant, bug-like and gaunt. The same cannot be said for his body, taut and mean with musculature, as if his body was pushed through a too-small gap: bulging at the edges, brimming with capacity. A long straight scar lingers on his left forearm, poking through the ends of his crisp cotton shirt sleeves, rolled up carelessly.

“It’s him. Got the camera?” Tina asks.

“Got it.”

Gavin pulls out the DSLR assigned to him for this stakeout, wrapping the long strap around his wrist. Click, click, click, like the popping of pistachio shells. Closing the car door, stalking down the road, entering the house. Some rustling comes from the curtains, pulled back just enough for a redhead to pop their head through and scan with peeled eyes across the street. It isn’t until Gavin has taken two more photos and the redhead has slunk behind the curtain again that Tina relaxes herself, muscles painful with overexerted pressure.

“We’re done for the night. Want a drink?” Gavin’s head leans back against the headrest, eyes closed. “I could fuck the shit out a beer right now.”

“You’re really strange when you’re tired. But sure.”

-

A week later, Connor and Nines stand close together on the edge of a street corner, about to cross a road. They're on the right track, according to Gavin’s drawn out smiles, edged with a sharp tiredness. They know Schwartz's patterns, his associates, who he likes to get his perfectly potent drugs from (because he doesn't trust his own suppliers not to cut the cocaine and red ice with some other shit). Nothing tying him directly to the murders though. Maybe, as Gavin piped up during one get-together, he outsources the crime.

"No,” Tina had responded. "We know what he's like. Still a middleman in a coalition of middle men, but not yet stupid enough to trust someone else with personal revenge.”

Nines watches the crosswalk change from red to green and they cross, Nines' taller frame standing tall in the crowd. Schwartz's dark blue PVC jacket catches in the light.

The day lasts long in front of them, an early start giving Tina and Gavin the excuse to stay inside and update Fowler on he investigation; Perkins lingers on the edge of conference calls, always with a sour word. Forever upstaged by the tiny team from the Detroit Police Department.

Continuing to trail him, following with quiet footsteps, Connor pulls his hat down low across his LED, yellow with the exertion of having to be stealthy.

"In order to more accurately come across as normal beings, even if my eyes betray who I really am, maybe we should do something fun. A game, perhaps,” Nines suggests, looking over to the trees without their leaves.

"What do you suggest?" Connor retorts, fingers loose inside his pockets.

"Oh, I don't know. Two truths and a lie?"

"No, boring. What about the alphabet game? That would be fun, right? We have detection software for a reason. We might as well use it."

Nines pulls his white jacket a little tighter around him. "Sure. I don't really care- they're going left here."

They follow along, as throngs go about their day to day lives — people with shopping bags and coffee cups and children’s hands and lover's hands clasped in their own, so beautiful and so unaware of the world that unfolds before them each day.

"You want to start?" Connor looks up at Nines’ now duck-egg blue eyes.

“Apple. The woman with the red jacket has apple slices in a little bag.”

“Branch.”

“In the dark jeans, there. Cup.”

“Deviant.”

“Oh ha ha Connor. You’re very funny. Would you like a reward? I can send you one digitally.”

“Let’s keep going, come on. E, what around here begins with E?”

Schwartz stops and turns right into an alleyway, trainers splashing through the lingering puddles. As they walk slowly past the alleyway, planning on turning back and retracing their steps within moments, Nines' peripheral vision sharpens into focus. Schwartz is talking to someone, hushed tones matching the drab environment. Steam billows from a vent overhead. A broken pair of red trainers hang over a clothes line.

"What do you think they're talking about?" He asks.

"Don't know.” Connor’s LED blinks yellow. “I'll turn my audio processors to maximum if you can take a recording of what you can see. It'll be easier if we both do it."

They turn around on a dime at the end of the street, tracing their steps back, as if pacing across a room deep in thought. Something's being exchanged. Cash for a promise, it seems. Nothing concrete just yet.

"Oh god. They're going after someone else." Connor whispers.

Nines stops in his tracks, directly in view of the murderer and the murderer’s associate.

"What? They can't be. Really, now? Surely they know they're onto us? They have to."

Something in his words makes Schwartz look up.

“Fu-”

Connor drags Nines away, running down the street. They don’t stop until Nines’ HUD tells him that his internal thirium temperature is sub-optimally hot.

-

The day after, huddled under a dark, large umbrella, Gavin swings the door to the station open from the back entrance where the cigarette smokers linger with their burning sticks. Blowing off the water from the umbrella, spots of rain fly everywhere. He steps inside, drying his shoes on the little mat someone deemed useful to put down, a bright red ‘welcome!’ smiling up at him.

Connor rushes up to him, hair just out of place, in the uncanny valley. "He's going after you."

"He is?" Surprise cuts ribbons in his mind that no edge of fear spills out in his words. The persona creeps back, even when you least expect it, dear reader.

"It's you he's been working up to. Nines and I caught him and an associate known only by the name ‘James Smith’ talking in the alley round by Cass Corridor. We tracked down the associate’s real name and managed to get access to a secret chatroom they have going on. Forgetting, usefully to us, but terribly for them, that androids will always be able to hack into their tiny little computer chips.”

Gavin paces to his desk, Connor’s anxious face hot on his heels. “So what do we do about this? He’ll be trying to get me while I’m alone.”

“You’re going to have to stay with one of us. Keep a gun under your bed. Work even harder to find him, which honestly shouldn’t be the hard part now. Try and keep to your daily routine where you can, but always on the lookout. I’m going to get Michiala to co-ordinate the response. Philadelphia are on high alert too. New York hasn’t gotten off their asses just yet, but after this meeting they better. He can’t get you too. I won’t let him.”

“Michi won’t let me get hurt again; they do always want the last laugh between us. Where’s Tina and Nines?”

“Tina’s in an emergency meeting with Fowler and Perkins. They’ve finally managed to transfer her onto the case full time, as a narcotics lead. Nines is out.”

His eyes narrow as he places his hands against the desk. “Out?”

“Getting some more surveillance equipment. Catch.”

Gavin’s reflexes kick into gear as Connor throws a little black capsule at him.

“It’s a tracking device. Swallow it, and it’ll let the cyber department track you for a couple days. Until this dies down.”

Gavin steals some of the water left on Connor's desk in a short bourbon glass, ignoring the thirium in the hexagonal bottle next to it and downs the pill, trying not to imagine having more electronics inside him. “There. Should be working, right?"

"I activated it before I gave it to you. You're going to be under 24-hour surveillance from this moment, until it ends in about 4 days time, or until you shit it out again."

Gavin smirks. "What joy."

Nines appears, looming large at the main entrance, hands clutching a cardboard box, as if he has just been made redundant and replaced. Perhaps that was always the plan though, if Nines hadn't been free to understand himself. Replacement.

"Hey Connor, have their pair of you ever talked about what went down in the reclamation department? Cyberlife have been so quiet about it all."

He gets a look. "No. I still don't know why they did it. Why they haven't followed up. Freedom must seem too strange for the people that manufacture others for a living. A terrible form of digital IVF, pumped straight into the wastebasket of the world and told to be ready to kill. To investigate crime."

"Hello Connor. Gavin, you okay?" Nines places the box down on his desk, next to a growing stack of manila folders. "You look troubled."

"He’s going after me. Schwartz. His little lackeys; it's me they want next."

Some unspoken communication takes place amongst and between the wavelengths of Connor and Nines' private communications.

"You're going to be alright. Want to stay at my place? We can order takeout."

"I thought you'd never ask.”

-

Tina's mind flickers with ideas for music as she waits for Perkins to finish talking.

“-procedure can’t be aborted just because you say so.”

"When it's one of my men on the chopping block, I'm going to do what I fucking please. Even if that means ignoring you and taking the best we have from all the field offices and bringing them onboard."

Tina considers her words. "Mr Perkins, you have to understand. This is a matter of life or death. I know you've had your issues with Gavin Reed beforehand. But, if he dies, it is on you. I will make sure they all know that this conversation happened. Where you denied him a chance to defend himself properly from what's about to come. Or, if you listen to my advice, Gavin will not be dead. Samantha Park and Elijah Kamski are dead. Sofiane Al-Hilal and Olivia Buchanan and Alireza Santana are all dead. But not him. I will not let him die on my watch."

'

"There isn't much we can do now is there? Apart from wait for the right time to strike back.”

"No, Connor, there isn't. Is there any more analysis we can do in the meantime? Figure out a method, besides just brutal, hands-on sadism? What's the surveillance stuff you’ve got there?"

"Some bugs. I'm going to get Nines to break into his house later today. We parsed his text conversations and Schwartz has an expensive dinner with some clients.”

-

The rain continues to fall in thick sheets across the pavement as Nines, clad in black techwear, hiding all traces of being a human, with his skin deactivated, walks up to Schwartz’s house. The lamps and lights are off, with only the faint lingering standby lights lighting up the surroundings as he peers through a side window.

Turning his night vision on, Nines traces his finger over the door handle, almost jumping for joy when he finds it electronic and easily decrypted. He places his white plastic hand against the door lock and waits for it to click open. Once it does so, he gently nudges the door open, swinging it around its axis on its hinges.

He's in.

[Nines: I've got the door open. Heading in. Deactivate the burglar alarm when I get in. Saves the time instead of waiting for it to deactivate from my end.]

[Connor: Sure. I've sent Gavin home. I think he's hiding something from me.]

[Nines: I'll talk to him later.]

He treads with barely audible steps across the carpet, tall and shaggy. The long corridor seems to stretch even further as he turns into the living room, surprisingly pristine considering the dilapidated state out of the front porch and garden. A short, barely off the ground blue sofa seems optimal.

Nines places a bug on the backside of a one of the chair legs, before turning back and carefully pulling the light switch from the wall close to the floor. It goes willingly, not really attached. Another one.

Continuing upstairs, another is placed inside the rubber frame of the refrigerator, beneath the mattress on Schwartz's metal double bed. One even in the bathroom, just inside the toilet lid, a little matte black disc of subversion. Almost done.

[Nines: Check the CCTV. Something seems too good about this.]

[Connor: Will do. You can get lucky, you know. Sometimes. Not everything has to be terrible.]

[Nines: I know.]

You'll be okay. Remember your training.

So you’re back. But positive this time?

He steps slowly back down the stairs, testing out each one individually for the slightest sound of a creak. Nothing. A job well done. Ten bugs placed. Ten times better, it you're terrible at mathematics.

[Nines: On my way back to the car. I'll go talk to Gavin. You sent him to mine, right?]

[Connor: Yes. Goodnight. I'm going to stay here and see what else I can find.]

[Nines: Night, older brother of mine.]

[Connor: You're not nice. Goodnight little brother dearest.]

-

As he steps into his apartment, soft orange lights and a warm rush of air greet him. Something's cooking, simmering away on the stove pleasantly. No gas ring to light it blue, however. Gone are the days when the environment is so wantonly destroyed.

"Hey. I cooked. You don't own a fridge, so I had to go buy it all fresh. I stopped by home and grabbed a jar of tomatoes though. Hope you don't mind.” Gavin looks almost bashful saying it, black t-shirt and black jeans pulling in all the right places.

Nines steps towards him. “It's perfect. How are you?"

"Scared. Like I was when you were on the table. Like something terrible is going to happen. You'll be dead, or I'll be dead. I don't think I could live with myself if something happened to you, you know? Since you scraped me off the floor of that stupid gutter outside Solari’s bar, I can't imagine life without you. God that's all so stupid to say. You mind if I serve myself a bowl of chilli? I haven't eaten in 12 hours."

Nines looks at him with nothing but loving adoration in his eyes. "You go right ahead. I'll put some music on. Do you have any preferences?"

Gavin turns his head back to him, brown hair falling into his eyes. "I don't mind. Put whatever you want on."

The pumpkin-shaped Dutch oven Nines keeps for decoration is put to good use as Gavin ladles out a bowlful of dark ruby red chilli. Two thick chunks of sweet cornbread sit next to it on a white plate. Rifling through his bag, Gavin crumbles a piece of dark chocolate into the bowl before scooping both the plate and the bowl into his hands and taking a seat on Nines’ armchair.

Now playing; Superstore by Petrie

If you could have anything, whatever would it be?

Gavin eats slowly, savouring the smells. Nines washes the chopping board and bowl used to grind the spices. He places them on the drying rack before turning back to Gavin. He smiles.

What about heaven? What about bliss?
How can you want something when you don't know what it is?

“Dance with me.”

“I’m a terrible dancer, tin can. You’ll have me stepping all over your toes.”

Nines steps into the living room, moving the glass side table out the way, careful not to jostle the books and knick-knacks he’s started accumulating.

“Stand up. Come on.”

A groan follows, but Gavin stands up, socks melting into the carpet. Nines reaches out a hand, his black jumper pulling away from his wrists, leaving a pale strip of skin, so inviting.

“Care for a dance?”

“Oh be quiet.”

As the soft violin strings vibrate their notes, Gavin and Nines slowly sway around the room, chest to chest, no words spoken. Gavin’s head comes to rest against Nines’ chest, cocooning itself into hope and into love.

Let's go out and feel the sun, not gonna sleep tonight
'Cause damn I sweat like crazy in the summer heat

Gavin tilts his head up. “I love you, Nines. No matter what happens, no matter what’s to come.”

Oh my God, anyway, what I meant to say
Was can I get you anything from the superstore?

“God, ignore me. It’s too sappy.”

“I love you too.”

Later in the evening, after they lie together in the low haze of post-sex hormones, Gavin draws patterns into Nines’ back with a finger, circles and circuit diagrams.

Notes:

The song for the chapter is Superstore by Petrie, a duo I really want to see make some more music.

We’re so close to the end.

Also, fun fact, this chapter was originally going to be called ‘Surveillance Games’.

Chapter 23: Perspectives

Summary:

Ever felt like you’re being watched?

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

Hope you’re keeping well. I’m currently sick in bed writing this, but I really wanted to get it out for all of you. This is the penultimate chapter. There will almost certainly be an epilogue. No spoilers again, but the stakes have never been higher.

This fic has consumed four years of my life and to see it about to end is a strange sensation.

Love and appreciate you all,

Positive.

Chapter Twenty-Three - Perspectives

Check the latches, the doors, the hinges. Are they screwed in enough? They have to be screwed in enough. Are the guns in the right place? Is the landline phone, still barely existing in the peripheries of telecommunications, available to reach? Just in case? Go double check. Is his phone charged? Are Icarus' wings clipped yet? How much food is in the fridge? Enough to lie awake at night, besieged by the terror of going outside? How many guns do they need, Tina? Oh I don't know Connor, enough. Is the surveillance working?

"Is it still working?" Tina asks across the wide line of desks in the cyber department, down in the basement. Just away from the specialised evidence lockers upstairs and more akin to the olden style, where the files slowly melt into rot.

"It's working. Nothing’s changed in the ten minutes since you last asked. We have both of them out by Brush Park at the moment.” The surveillance expert flown in from Quantico at Fowler’s insistence glances at his secondary monitor. “From the bugs RK900 put in Gabriel's home, we can tell that he isn't meant to be due out today. We don't have a tail on his exact location just yet, but it should be online soon. We can always use the CCTV as backup, but it'll be a lot slower. You already know this stuff."

Fowler walks in behind Tina. "She does. Do we have an update on the shipment coming in through Philadelphia? Perkins said the teams would be on the ground to intercept shortly enough. Just want the confirmation." Decades of anger linger in his expression.

"They’re in place,” a short blonde FBI technician pipes up. "We’ll transfer the live feed directly to your computer so you can follow along.”

"Perfect. Tina, a word?" Fowler asks, more akin to the demands of a father against the child than that of a superior and the subordinate.

As she follows him out, feet padding carefully against the floor, Fowler's hands flex and tighten over and over. She swears she can remember some movie character doing that, albeit in response to love rather than hatred.

He spins on the balls of his feet, shirt fabric shifting with him. "Do you think they’ll live?"

She stands, a stunned expression on her face. "You don't believe they will, do you? You've always been a damn pragmatist, but not a nihilist. What's changed?"

“This is more than I thought it would be. If they die, I’m not too sure what'll come of this department. Even after the revolution, nothing was ever the same. I don’t know what will exist after us."

"Then we fight and we win. Let me get back to the cyber department. I've got a feeling we’re going to be seeing something soon anyway.”

"Sure." Fatigue creeps into his voice, shoulders no longer broad and imposing.

-

The early sun echoes its song across the sidewalk in front of Gavin and Nines. The concrete, damp and icy in parts invites the pair of them to continue walking slowly, head on a dime-turn, ready for anything. This cannot be the end. A pop-shot.

“This vest hurts,” Gavin complains.

"It'll stop you getting shot you idiot. Whatever you do, don't take it off,” Nines snaps, hand clutching Gavin’s. He tries to give a squeeze of reassurance, but instead does it with enough pain that he could break one of Gavin’s fingers.

“Ow man. I know you’re scared.”

Elegant houses stand proud amongst the tall grass, left to grow over the holiday period. Yellow fading next to a freshly-painted red one, buffeted by the neo-futurist aesthetic designs of the skyscrapers down in the financial district. A few people mill around, anxiously waiting to get back inside, with their warm drinks and soft blankets. Nines speeds up, already dragging along Gavin behind him. Now, just waiting for him to follow.

"Slow down. We can't look too suspicious, I bet we're being tailed. If they are, and we start running, they're just gonna come right for us you know."

So they slow down, as if an old couple out for their daily stroll, slowly wiling away the time. Picking flowers and telling stories from childhood, as if they hadn’t been rehashed a thousand times. Gavin had mentioned earlier in the day that it would be useful to get them out the apartments and into somewhere a bit different, so here they are, just waiting for the moment to come to them.

Nines' LED shines yellow continuously, analysing, waiting, looking. On edge always. Built to kill, ready to surveil others before they have the chance to strike back with the force of a person only fuelled by hatred.

-

Connor watches Nines and Gavin walk down this street over the tracking software, perching on edge of his seat, ready to jump out at the smallest signs of danger. They have a day left on the trackers before they're normally expelled. After that, you have to wait two weeks before taking another one. Too high a risk of radiation exposure. As if the bullet is not more deadly than the gamma ray in the immediate.

The precinct buzzes with people flitting around everywhere. Perkins, now assigned to Detroit as the next available and most likely target rules with an iron fist. Short, barking orders and cruel jokes leaves his mouth just as easily as the cigarette smoke he puffs. Marlboro reds, three cigarettes a day. That's at least what he tells his PA over the phone before ringing off and assaulting the next person with his orders.

He checks the CCTV, waiting to see if anyone is tailing them. Nothing has happened so far, despite a pickup in local violence in the past few days. There’s only so much that can be said to be attributed to the case, though. Not everything revolves around the potential death of Gavin Reed. As much as some would like this to be the case.

The image is grainy and filled with repetitive motions, showing people walking around in the foreground, mansions in the back. Nines and Gavin are holding hands. He'll never get used to that change.

Something about them seems to fit perfectly, despite it all. When this is all over, Connor thinks, he'll take them out to dinner and interrogate them entirely. Maybe then he'll get some truth out of them, to be coy in his expression, or more accurately, juicy gossip.

-

Michi walks through the door into their office, clad in reclaimed steel, salvaged from an old ship hauled away for scrap and turned into furniture and wall panels.

"How is the case coming along in New York?” they ask to one of the multiplicity of subordinate officers, designed to take a harsher beating than the questions of the case lead.

"Good. We've sent over some of the files to our contacts in the Southern District of New York: the big guys. We're currently waiting on them to get back to us with an update. Should be soon."

"Good." They look out the window at the Seattle sky, grey in the morning haze. If they squint, they can make out the bottom of the Space Needle, the top being obscured by fog. "What about Detroit? Anything from them yet?"

"Besides literally everyone on the planet being in that precinct station in case Gabriel Schwyhart acts again, not really. The officers down there are keeping a low enough profile that we can only deduce that they're planning something, but not what. At least from this end. I think they’re planning to use one of them as bait. Shouldn't be long until we know though."

“I dread to see where that’ll go.”

-

"Someone's tailing us."

Gavin swivels his head around, as if he is looking for something that has just fallen up of his trouser pocket. "They are."

"Red jacket, right? They've been following us since we turned off Woodward Avenue. I got Connor to send me the CCTV." Nines sighs. "This isn't coincidental. I think it’s the same man I saw Schwartz give the money to."

"No, it isn't.” Gavin takes Nines’ hand in his own. "What do you want to do about it?"

"You have your gun on you- yes you do." Nines slows down. "Don't take it out. Not yet. Just wait on my word in case they get more and more desperate."

They continue on down the street a little further, Nines' auditory processors and state-of-the-art software continually tracking their follower’s footsteps, puttering along the ground like hedgehog feet. Nothing leaps out at them yet, just dogged determination as they try and shake them at every bend. A headache comes to disrupt the party in Nines’ head. Stupid Kamski and his stupid secret projects, unknown to anyone else.

"We need to get moving. Now."

"Do you think we can shake them?"

Gavin glances for one last time behind him, trying to avoid detection. 'I can only hope. I don't think they'd attack in broad daylight. They're not that stupid, but they want us to know they're here. That's what they want. Fear."

"Pure, unadulterated fear."

"It’s what Schwartz always thrived on. Making the other dealing groups so terrified of torture that they'd crumble like chalk powder in a gym."

-

"Tina, see this," Connor says, turning his monitor on a swivel to face her as she walks over, darkening eye bags bursting on the scene under her eyes. "See that person in the long coat?"

"Yeah. They following Gavin and Nines?"

Connor smiles despite the unease on the screen. "You're exactly correct. I think they've noticed by now. Gavin's tracking device is speeding up on the monitor. They're trying to lose them."

"Need me to rendezvous with them somewhere?"

"Just wait a little longer. If they haven't dropped them by the children’s hospital, then go. It'll be good to have a uniformed officer around to scare them from doing anything stupid."

"Knowing Gavin, that isn't a likely possibility."

"Maybe not, but there isn't much more we can do right now."

Connor turns back to the screen, Gavin’s monitoring dot blown wide and pulsing.

Come on, hold on a little while longer.

-

A growing oppression floats through the air, ready to pounce as Gavin and Nines turn down the street, feet moving in a tight dance through the growing crowd of people heading to the rest of their lives.

Gavin's breath tightens in pace. "We're not losing him are we."

"No, we're not." There is a moment of silence as Nines’ LED blinks yellow once. "I've told Connor that we're going to need some help. Tina’s on her way."

The crowds continue to grow, leaving them unable to detect just who is around them. The heat-sensing programmes in Nines' HUD blink blistering streams of green and blue and red, like confetti from a sparkling cannon plastered with ‘ACME industries presents: OBLIVION!’. Everyone is too similar. The androids are easy to spot, cool blue monochromatic tones blinking like fireworks in the crowd. The red-coated man is not one of them.

Nines pulls lightly on Gavin’s hand, guiding him. "Down here. Come on. We might have to make a run for it, but there are too many people. Trust me?"

-

Conor zooms in and out of various monitors, anxiously tracking the steps of what he can only assume to be an assassin. But they’re not politicians and this isn’t an election year.

They dance around each other, Gavin, Nines and the man, ballet dancers born out of the incessant pursuit of destruction, tutus ripped to shreds and pas de deux left with broken bones.

They continue down near the Detroit Institute of Arts, as the red-jacket steps into an alcove just as Nines turns his head, robotic movements and his disgustingly shark-like smile back to the forefront. There's only the hope of detection that keeps them alive.

There can only be success.

"Oh god, you want another cup of coffee Joe? This is boring as fuck," some random person shouts across a makeshift desk in the background, blinking Connor's laser focus out for just a second.

He’s gone.

Connor turns the CCTV to wide angle, but Gavin and Nines have disappeared too, down another street. By the time he gets back to them, more and more people have shown up. They must be near the hospital by now. The distinctive curve of the jacket’s sloping shoulder are nowhere to be seen, neither is the black baseball cap that was on the assailant's head.

"Get me eyes on the hospital!" Connor shouts, waving a hand to a junior officer, impatient and demanding. "Move it. Come on. We're going to lose them."

It’s easier to get someone else to do it for you than to do it through the mind. Sometimes the humans can win the game.

His monitor blinks, showing the dark facade of the hospital clearly. "Thank you."

-

They turn down another street, where the crowds are a little thinner...

"Got you. Don't fucking move, don’t reach for that gun, or the bullets in this one are getting blown straight into your spine, Gavin Reed." The barrel of the gun is stopped by the Kevlar vest. “Oh, you’re wearing a vest. If I was feeling a little psychotic, I’d hold this gun to your head. Good to know.”

A pause; the city exhales in anticipation of the pain to arrive. The trees are gooseflesh, sticking out of the ground.

Nines turns his head to the left, dark hair shining in the sunlight, just a little as they stand stock still at the side of a busy street. "We’re in public, so I know you’re not going to be that stupid. What do you want?"

"Oh, nothing right now. Just know he's watching, and he’ll be with you soon enough. He knows how to get to you, Gavin. Don’t ever forget that. This tall drink of water would be so easy to ruin again. The eyes suit you, what was that we’ve heard you call him? Nines?"

"I'm sorry?" Nines questions, face drawn.

"Oh, didn't you know? You didn't know! Ahahahaha!"

The cool gunmetal nestled beneath Gavin's dark brown jumper recedes like the low tide of a beach. The man’s laughing turns hysterical as he turns around, gun already holstered somewhere on his body, just barely detectable as a part of his heat signature. More and more people seem to flicker into existence, as they round the corner to St Antoine, the newly renovated hospital on the horizon. He slips back into the crowd, plain face blending in like a bee in a hive.

Nines’ LED turns a crimson. "What the fuck just happened? Are you okay? What just happened? What do they know?"

"I don't know what just happened Nines, what the fuck do you think? The gun was really cold. Fuck fuck fuck. They're so much more involved with you than I thought. FUCK!"

Gavin stops and rests his hands on his knees; Nines places his palm across the expanse between his shoulder blades. "They had something to do with Amanda, didn't they?"

"They must have. When did her probing get worse?"

"After I deviated on the floor of Elijah’s house. She was fine enough before then, you know. Domineering, a little bit terrifying, but not hell-bent on control. You know a lot of it by now. Fighting her, the thoughts."

"That's why you ran across the railing when we were at Lake Michigan.” Gavin stands back up, anxious sweat cooling on his brow. “This isn't just you against her. It’s us against them."

"No. Did- did Schwartz make her go haywire inside my head? Connor had her too. Right? It can't have been them? I don’t want to believe that it could be them."

-

As Tina opens the door from the self-driving taxi she commandeered for the trip down to see them, she stops to smooth the hair out of her face. Am I controlled enough? Strong enough? The door will open soon. Put on a brave face Tina. Brave face. Come on.

She flits her way through the crowd, dark blue uniform and precinct-assigned gun heavy on her mind.

"Are you two okay? I saw the CCTV. Connor looked more than a little concerned."

'I'm fine." Gavin shudders as he places an arm over his body, shielding his chest. "I'm fine, yeah. They held a gun to my back. Told me I'm being watched."

"God, Gavin. We need to find Schwartz quickly. He was never this reckless while monitoring Sam. Nines, is there anything you can do?"

"He knows, Tina. He knows something massive."

Their conversation continues on, blurred to meaningless expressions of noise as Nines closes his eyes and contacts Connor, picture-perfect memories working overtime to try and grasp what is going on.

[Nines: We need to talk.]

[Connor: What’s happening? Are you okay?]

[Nines: They did this.]

[Connor: What do you mean?

[Nines: They put Amanda inside my head, worse than it ever was with you. They’re the reason we ended up in the reclamation department.]

[Connor: Amanda was terrible with me too. What makes you think yours was any different?]

[Nines: You know how you told me all she was concerned about was with Cyberlife? Not anymore. She wanted to hurt me. Destroy me. Everything. Cyberlife would never have coded her to do that. I think it’s why they killed Elijah. He was not a member of law enforcement, or really related to Gavin's work in that way. But if they killed him and took full control of the prototypes still susceptible, aka, me, then it’s game over for the department investigating them.]

[Connor: Nines, do you know what you're saying? There isn't any way that they're powerful enough to get access to that. They can't be that powerful.]

“I thought we’d be okay in public. I really did. You okay there Nines?”

Tina and Gavin stand shoulder to shoulder against the wind, conversation faltering at the edges. Nines makes no effort to involve himself.

[Nines: Not alone, Connor. There's a reason he survived Gavin and Michiala's undercover exposé of the gang. He knows people in high places. ‘A coalition of middlemen' as Tina put it. This is a plan for chaos, pure and untouched and it starts with the inside of my head.]

[Connor: Tina's there. I think her presence in uniform would be helpful. Do you need to come to the station? We can try and pinpoint some of this. If what you're saying is true, them it blows the doors wide open. We ended up in the reclamation department because some stupid man decided to establish it in the first place. The power vacuums of subtle influence after Kamski's death allows this weakened, de-fanged Cyberlife to be susceptible to the strongmen from across town to dominate. I did not think this is how we would end up.]

[Nines: Dominate me too. Control me like some puppet on strings.]

[Connor: Talk to Tina. She can help. If you need me, I'll be with the team here. We're on the brink of getting him, I think.]

-

A blinking signal indicates that it's time on the plastic wristwatch of one of the operatives about to seize Schwartz’s goods. Michi glances across the grainy image cast to them from Philadelphia in real time. Ten people, one shipping depot. Should be simple enough.

Everyone and their mothers seem to be in their office at the same time, all watching the same outcome, faces mirror images of each other. Undignified interest.

“Radio Check Tango Foxtrot One.”

The voice that returns crackles and pops. "Read you loud and clear.”

“Going in. Stand by,” one of them calls out, a female voice high and clear.

"Copy."

If Michi was a different person, and this was a different age, they would relax at the sound of this. Knowing that some form of progress is being made.

A door is blasted open. Steps scramble to the gate of the shipping containers, loaded just off the trucks. The crunching of their shoes spits fire through the receiver.

"Get down! Get down!"

A dark-skinned man falls to the floor alongside his other co-workers. "We're down!”

"Freesia, find it. Where’s the driver?"

“Down by the loading bay. Don’t- he’s dangerous.”

"What's a Freesia?” one of the new recruits asks.

"Nickname for the primary operative." Michi supplies, not daring to take their eyes from the screen.

Someone thinks it necessary to find this driver, cleaving them into two groups.

One left. One right. Split down the centre.

"Got eyes on him!" Freesia shouts.

Two men chance the driver down, over a box and cornering him against some green chainlink fence.

"Stay down. Don't move a fucking muscle."

"He's going to kill you all for this, you fucking idiots."

The shipping container stands stoic on the edge of the scene, yellow and rusted. Someone gets a handle on it and pulls it open, doors like stiff flaps.

"There’s nothing. Over."

"What?"

"You heard me. Nothing."

Michi gasps, already pulling their phone out and calling Perkins.

-

Gavin, Tina and Nines come back to the station in Tina's taxi, cramped into the backseats together. Nines' long legs stretch across the whole floor.

"We need security in the apartment tonight," Gavin says, head tilted back in a small show of desperation.

“I know. I'll sort it,” Tina says. She closes her eyes before exhaling in a deep breath. "You have to be prepared that something's going to happen soon. You have to. I can't protect you from this far."

'It'll be okay, T. I'll keep you posted. I promise."

All those dark nights ago, in the aftermath of Schwartz and the aftermath of Michi, Gavin would sink into Tina's sofa and wait for her to help. No longer. Nines replaces all, even the mortal.

Pulling up slowly to Nines' apartment block, the rose bushes stare in response, bare in the January night, sun setting too early for their liking.

"Call me if you need anything, okay? There'll be some people around later to keep watch for you."

“Thanks T. Ready to go?" Nines asks, watching Gavin fiddle with the shoulder straps of his bulletproof vest.

"Let's go."

They step off the elevator and into Nines' floor, watching in silent vigil for any sounds of movement. Nothing. Silence. In this moment, Nines almost wants Amanda back. At least it wouldn't be so ominous.

"I'll go in first," he offers. "If they are hiding, at least I'm not made out of flesh."

-

As Tina steps back into the taxi, apprehension and a small amount of fear coating her nerves, her phone rings. She turns it off, meaning to call back in just a moment.

It calls again, immediately after. So she picks it up. Fowler and Perkins, on a joint call. Calling her.

"Hello?"

"You haven't left them alone, have you?" Fowler's voice sings with fear.

"I just let them get back to Nines' apartment. Why? What's happening?"

Perkins is the one to respond next, authoritative voice moving through the screen and touching the inside of her mind. "So they're alone?"

"Yes."

"Go back inside with them right now. Now. Go."

She steps back out of the car and starts running to Nines' apartment block, looking around for a reason why.

"What's happening? Hello?"

"The shipment we were meant to intercept today was empty. A misdirection. We think he's going to strike today."

"Oh fuck, no no no. This can't be happening."

She hurtles herself up the stairs, boots crashing against the ground. One flight, two, a third, more and more and every step sends shards of pain into her lungs.

"Gavin? Nines? Answer me!"

"We're sending over a team now. Get your gun out and wait for our instructions."

"Damn your instructions,"

-

"Hello boys."

"Gavin's eyes whip around to the window, where a silhouette sits shrouded in darkness.

"Schwartz."

"Hello again. Did you miss me?"

-

Something gets colder as Tina reaches the top floor, out of breath, but with enough adrenaline to kill a horse. The dark grey gunmetal of the Smith and Wesson sits holstered in her belt as her hand lingers over it, ready to pull it out at any moment. But it's too quiet.

She calls Connor.

"I'm on my way. I'm on my way. Five minutes."

"I'm waiting outside. Tell them to come in quietly."

-

"We're going to go down and out of the fire escape, alright? Come along now."

Schwartz stands, holding a long machete, Damascus steel.

"We could just shoot you," Nines offers. For that, he is crumpled on the floor with searing pain in his temples. Schwartz releases his finger from a button on his phone.

"Don't you get all tetchy with me, RK900. Remember who controls you. I can fuck with your system for as long as you’re close to me."

"Fuck you, you piece of shit. Nines, what's happening?"

Archives on the hill empty, their vague faces lying in vacant memories…let me be a little lower than the angels.

"Control. The little things wrong with my coding. That's what he gets to control. Oh god this hurts."

Before Gavin gets a moment to respond, Schwartz forces Nines on his feet again, allowing the pain to recede from his nerves just enough for him to stand without wobbling. "Let's go."

The window opens to the fire escape, a long rusting staircase spiralling down to the back of the apartment block.

Schwartz’s hand shoves at Gavin’s shoulder blade, pushing him out onto it first, the coolness of the night prickling at Gavin's skin. He asks, "Where are you taking us?"

"That's up for you to decide.”

Notes:

Shit’s about to get REAL! I can’t fucking wait for you to see how this ends.

The song for the chapter is Hysterical Us by Magdalena Bay, my favourite band on this planet.

See you soon.

Chapter 24: Icarus

Summary:

Schwartz, Gavin, Nines, Tina, Connor, Michi, Perkins, Fowler, the world, the universe, everything.

Notes:

Helloha everyone!

I was in tears as I finished this chapter. Four years of my life distilled into this moment.

This fic has taken me through some of the best times and some of the worst times in my life.

Love you all with the fullest and deepest part of my heart.

Positive.

Chapter Twenty-Four - Icarus

Under the crisp air of the night sky, a fox creeps through the streets, mangy red fur insulating against the cold wind. Its amber-coloured eyes blink against the streetlights, searching for food amongst the trash cans left just open enough to turn and crash onto their sides. A rat bristles against its feet, squeaking and running down to the sewers, scurrying along like a moth to a flame. Some smaller foxes, just barely out of their mother’s den, fight and claw over control of some thrown-away food in the distance, just visible to this stalking creature. They clamber over each other in the grass, scrambling and screaming as they battle.

The fox continues on, padding its feet across the ground in synchronous rhythm, along the avenues and down the boulevards. By the end of the night, it should end up back in Ferndale, where the lights are bright and the smiles brighter, alcohol given freely in the veins of a woman who has partied for the last time. She doesn’t know that this is the end yet. It will have a full belly and will bask in the cessation of searching for scraps of food, before it too climbs back into its den and rests the day away.

As it moves down near a garden, with high, unsurpassable fences, three sets of steps echo off the concrete; the fox cowers behind a bush, tail hung between its legs. A siren echoes in the distance, screeching.

-

“A garden?”

Schwartz’s right hand pushes the pair of them into the garden, through the gate as it swings open. At night, Gavin finds himself thrown back to that night, where the phone call crawled beneath his skin and changed his life. During the days where the sweat lingers on his brow, perhaps it would be more apt if he was reminded of the cigarette smoke from Michi’s yellowing fingers or the hours spent pruning weeds and labelling plant boxes. Sharing smiles with the other people who knew Hank before him, deeming it so strange that such a man would decide to continue doing what he started. Connor would be proud, given that this was his idea originally.

"It would be good for you to find a hobby outside of your drinking," he had said, in no uncertain terms. No longer any alcohol for the ailing detective. The honey whiskey can sink to the bottom of the ocean of other ways to spend a life.

God knows why Hank had agreed to it. Friendship and a sense of fatherhood over him, probably.

The machete pressed into the back of his neck reappears, just on the edge of being able to cut, having been hidden from public consumption as they made the walk out the back of Nines' fire escape, creaking and old in the evening. It's so cold. He doesn't even know who made it, thinking about it.

Do you want to be killed by a Smith and Wesson or Glock? A gun or a machete? Make this choice, because the only ones who are going to be able to save you aren't here. Nines is incapacitated. Grow up; this won’t be the fairytale ending you have always wanted, where the knight in shining armour comes and saves the day, long locks of blond hair moving in waves through the sunlight.

These are January nights in the centre of Detroit, Michigan and nobody is coming to save you.

"I come here sometimes. Figured if you were going to stab me, you might as well do it somewhere where I can watch the flowers before the inevitable."

"Oh aren't you a fucking poet? Samantha was never that good at articulating her thoughts. Always screaming and crying and begging for mercy. She was sweet. I liked her."

Nines glowers at him. "You killed her, Gabriel."

The machete recedes from Gavin’s neck, instead being placed against the temple of Nines, right in the middle of his LED. "Don't you dare call me that. You don't have the respect you need from me for that. You want to know what it feels like to get your head cut off? You want to know? Elijah Kamski is dead. He can't come make a new one of you now."

There it is. The crux of anger, crystalline and real inside a man, ready to erupt at the blink of a painted eyelid.

"What do you want with us, really? You killed the rest of them at home. I think; they never let us have the other case files with enough detail. This is a clusterfuck, isn't it?" Gavin steps towards the gaillardia hidden away for the winter. "They are going to come find us, you know. They've been tracking us for days. Just like you. That's what you want though, isn't it? To be faced with death and take us all with you?"

“Oh I’m not that stupid. I don’t mind taking the consequences; it’s better to send a statement with your head not fried by the electric chair than to die doing something spectacularly stupid.”

Nines cocks his head, pressing his false skin into the blade, a single drop of cerulean thirium coating its tip. “The humans banned capital punishment ten years ago.”

The sirens grow louder, bouncing through the night like the omen of death coming to find them. To take them away carried by a vulture, not a stork. There must be hundreds of them.

[Nines: Connor. You have to be on your way, right?]

Connor doesn't respond, but the sirens come to their crescendo. Beams of light bounce off the wet ground and the wet metal and the dry skin of Gavin and Schwartz, a sheen coming from Nines’ body.

Connor steps out one of the first cars, gun holstered in a back pocket. Just out of sight of Schwartz and his sadistic machete.

“Connor!” Nines shouts, before berating himself for doing so. He could get himself killed.

"Where’s Tina?” Gavin asks to nobody, as Schwartz’s black jacket turns to face the stream. It absorbs all light and all the good in the universe.

"Doesn't matter. I've still got your little plastic pet here wrapped around my little finger, ready for his inevitable death. This is going to be so fun."

[Connor: We can talk through here. Try your hardest not to let Schwartz notice. You know how.]

Gavin watches Nines' LED spin yellow just once, before his face returns to the impassive scowl he knows and adores in moments like this.

Tina's clothes burst through the SWAT teams covered in militaristic equipment brought by the FBI, blue, even at night, standing as a testament to her tenacity.

"Gavin? Gavin?" She pants, so desperately out of breath. There were enough cars she had to park behind that to sprint was a marathon through them.

-

A long time ago, on the roof of the stupid building that stupid android decided to hide on, Connor witnessed his first mistake. The little girl and her piercing scream, coming off the edge and plummeting to her death. She didn’t really have a body left for them to carry off the ground.

If he was human, and not merely an android with created deviancy built into the wires that constitute his body, he would have cried in the anguish of a father losing his child, or a child growing away from comfort.

Not today. This will not be happening today.

Over the sound of the helicopter that has made it onto the scene, surrounded by growing amounts of the press clad in their finest outfits to watch someone die, a voice booms over the loudhailer.

"Put your weapon down and get on the floor. We will not be negotiating."

Stupid humans and their infallible confidence in the goodness and decency of other men.

"Fowler, I don't think this is a good idea. The more agitated he gets the more likely he is to do something rash."

Fowler glares at him, face a collection of pain. "Well, what do you think we should do instead? I do remember your penchant for chaos in negotiations."

Nihilist.

-

Perkins’ borrowed bulletproof vest is too tight around his stomach. Schwartz doesn't even have a gun. This isn't going to end well, and Tina already knows it.

Electronics cannot always be replaced, her mother once told her when she had smashed her phone on the floor as a child. "You cannot save everyone or everything. Not even me and your father. Go have a shower, you smell like the garden.”

Tina had been playing outside all day, rolling in the grass with a friend she had made in elementary school, before she knew English fully. Their smiles were communication enough. Her mother had left a bowl of cut fruit at her door after the shower.

"I think Connor should go in there. He knows how to negotiate, he's done it before, with the deviancy crisis. Schwartz would kill someone like me. I’m too close to Gavin."

Perkins gazes down at the scene from where he stands like a statue on top of one of the armoured rescue vehicles, binoculars in hand. Away from the scene just enough to retain control over his immediate surroundings.

"No, Chen, this is going to be incredibly stupid if we don't get it right. I don't want anyone else to die on my watch, too many have already."

She watches the three of them, where Schwartz is just now moving the machete in a slow bleeding line down the side of Nines' face, blue blood pouring over the edge of his skin.

Perkins continues, "Gabriel seems to be having a kind of psychotic break, from what my officers tell me. He'll be more dangerous than usual. At least, if they die, they won’t be able to have his funny little words carved into their chests. That’s a crazy thing for me to say, I apologise."

"Yeah, it is. He's doing this in public. Maybe that's his final statement. Revenge against everyone so publicly that his name will be in the limelight forever and forever."

"Exactly.”

Over the din of talking, she can hear Schwartz shout his response.

"I am not going to just bend over and take it. But you'd like it, wouldn't you? To see a gang member so easily destroyed and put to putty. Stupid little men and their stupid little games!"

The cut gets bigger.

-

The image is blurred through Michi’s screen, as water blurs the screen. The three men, in height order of Nines, Schwartz and Gavin stand around a flower bed, fear palpable in both Nines’ and Gavin's expressions. Schwartz just looks happy with himself.

"Can you get me a better shot?" They hear a sniper say through the radio broadcast, tinny and masculine.

"Negative. Risk of hitting hostages."

So that's what they are now. Hostages ready for the plucking.

[Michiala Evans: This is unorthodox, but I was given this contact in case of emergencies. RK800, can you see if I can get through to Schwartz directly?]

A short delay. Nines’ blood drips onto the ground.

[RK800: Michiala, that seems stupid, to sound a bit more human. You're not even here in person.]

[Michiala Evans: Well, I'm here if you need me. Don’t just reject my help because you have a problem with me.]

-

The blood streams freely. No clotting agent on the planet could account for artificial blood, created by his stupidly genius half-brother.

Nines twitches away from Schwartz as the cut moves down to his chin.

“You scared? I didn’t think deviants could really be that scared. You're not fighting for your life."

Gavin ducks his head as Schwartz swings the machete around like a kid swung in their parent’s arm. "You think he's scared, Gavin?" He reaches into his pocket, pressing the button on his phone. Nines shrieks in pain.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watches the SWAT team aim their guns just a little bit closer to Schwartz’s chest.

They meet eyes, Nines’ boring into Gavin’s own. Communicating what, he doesn't know. It would probably be best if he stayed quiet.

“You can’t get out of this, Schwartz. Michi was unlucky once. I won’t make their mistake.”

Schwartz turns, carves, and cleaves a wide slice into Gavin’s left thigh. The pain blooms in full behind his eyes. Through his trousers, blood spills down his leg.

Too much. It’s too much.

Icarus falls, wax turned to blood, blood turned to soil, night turned to day and nothing will ever be the same again.

“What are you doing?!” Nines screams, inhuman strength stretching to its limit as he shoves Schwartz down to the ground. A shot rings out, cracking like a whip, submitting all in its path to its will.

Gavin watches Nines’ leg crumples as the Remington bullet carves a path in his leg, throwing him to the floor. Blood haemorrhages out.

Tina screams, or at least it sounds like her.

Get up. Come on. Get up. You have to. For Nines. Come on, Gavin. Come on.

GET UP!

Schwartz lords over Nines, machete covered in a mix of blue blood and red, glimmering in the light. He takes a swing, as Nines’ LED circles red.

Gavin teeters forward on his legs, fire and ice coursing through his body. He staggers forward, bloody hands swinging with what little force he can muster.

The machete swing doesn’t land.

Blood pounds in his head, a cacophony of noise and lights and Nines is on the ground.

Nines is on the ground. DO SOMETHING DO SOMETHING DO SOMETHING!

Schwartz returns with a kick to his already injured leg. People are coming. Tina, Connor, everyone. Gavin doesn’t know if he’s screaming or if he’s crying but he claws and bites and scratches at Schwartz’s bugish face.

Arms wrap around him, and he’s being hauled away.

“Nines- I don’t- I can’t- Get off me-”

Michi’s voice rings through the air.

“Schwartz. Stop it. Just fucking stop it-”

In the haze Gavin watches the forces of the world descend upon them. The plants in the garden sing exaltations and praises to the heavens.

The sea does not reach up to find him. Icarus’ wings regrow and he soars amongst them all, reaching endlessly for his Daedalus, his love, so close, but just out of reach.

Somewhere in the bushes, the fox cries a long yell.

Notes:

There is going to be an epilogue. I promise this story doesn’t end here.

The song for the chapter is Nearer My God To Thee, performed by the Londonderry Choir, originally put to music by Sarah Flower Adams.

I’m going to cry now.

Chapter 25: Epilogue: Small Imperfections

Summary:

A letter.

Notes:

Helloha everyone,

As promised, the epilogue. This is why chapter 15 was important. I’ll talk more in the end notes, but before you begin, I just want to say thank you.

Small imperfections,
Positive.

Epilogue: Small Imperfections

Amelie's chirpy voice sings across the corridor as Tina helps Gavin up the steps, supporting what weight she can under his armpit.

"Oh hello. Need some help?" Her greying hair and wrinkled skin betrays Amelie’s lack of confidence in her abilities.

Tina glances up, beads of sweat on her forehead. "No, sorry. I think we're okay here, right Gavin?"

Gavin looks up, meeting Amelie's concerned gaze. "No, we're okay. Bring over some of that pie you made the other day? I could smell it through my window."

She laughs before waving them off with a promise to follow through on his request.

As the pair of them crash into Gavin's apartment, freshly cleaned at Tina's insistence, they stay silent for a moment before she sighs, resting her head on his shoulder.

"Are you okay?” he asks.

"I'm-" She pulls a letter out of her inside pocket of her long black jacket. “-good. Here you go."

"What is this?" Gavin asks, watching the sun setting on the horizon, blues morphing into oranges and deep, fuchsia pink.

"Nines asked me to give it to you today. Told me to keep it a secret until tonight. Maybe it's concert tickets. There's the festival coming up soonish."

She gets a look in response. "Nines? Music?"

"I should have known you'd be like this. Text me if you need anything, yeah? Your appointment's on Wednesday, right?"

"Yeah, Nines is taking me. Only a couple left now, thank fuck."

"If you’re not careful, Gavin Reed, I'll fuck your leg up even more if it means you stay on desk duty. It's boring as all hell doing it by myself."

In the immediate aftermath of Schwartz’s arrest, the FBI spent their time making sure to take all the credit. Tina's narcotics team got some credit, a little certificate of appreciation to put on the wall and call mom and dad about. But Fowler still fights in the March sunshine for the rest of them to get some recognition. They don’t even need a trophy.

"I'll kill you if you do that." He blanches. "Sorry."

"Sam won’t hate you for joking, Gavin."

"I know."

Tina hugs him once, quickly and lovingly, before stepping back out into the corridor. The envelope sits heavy in his palm, thick cream paper written with a careful hand.

Gavin, it is signed.

He thumbs it open, tearing at the pristine whiteness of it, pulling it between his fingers. Straightening it. He takes a long look at Michi’s apology calla lilies, which sit ready for the dawn of the future.

Dear Gavin,

On the fateful day where I think I was on the floor of Nadia’s apartment, with blood all over my body, I had a conversation with you inside my mind. It was on the floor of a cave, and we were lying on some blankets, with the light bright in the background. As I write this, it occurs to me that the day we spent talking to Solari (and I do hope he’s okay after all of this), was perhaps the best day of my life.

In that moment, with you drenched in water, the grass at our backs and the sun on your face, I wondered if this is what it meant to be alive. There is a point to all this, I promise.

This brings me back to what I want to say about the cave. You asked me what it meant to be human. Not just to be alive. You specifically asked about what it meant to be human. I don’t know why you asked me of all people, but then again this was inside my mind, so perhaps this is what I wanted you to ask. Maybe the water from the fountain found a way inside me.

In all honesty, I don’t think I will ever truly be able to know what it is to be a human. Amanda, in all of her horrendous ways, made sure of that one. I think I will do my best to answer you, but first I need to just talk about us. Well, more specifically, I need to talk about you. I know you are probably cringing right now, with your eyes looking around to see if Tina is still there. I did give this letter to her after all. Go somewhere quiet, my love. Take a seat. Get some coffee. I restocked yesterday; I can always wait for you.

Hopefully you’re comfortable, because I have a feeling this might be a long letter.

I guess there is no better place to start than the beginning. I first saw you, on the night Sam was murdered, running in the opposite direction to me. You looked almost excited; I don’t quite know how to put it. It was as if a fire burnt inside you. You kept glancing back at me after we crashed into each other. Past me had no clue what to say, nor what to do, so I just kept going. I think it was a good thing I didn’t know who you were at the time. It made the next time I saw you a lot easier.

I made a decree to myself that night, when I was charging in the corner. To protect you. I don’t think I managed to do it. I don’t want to talk about what happened, because I don’t think it would help you.

We survived and I think that is the best we can say about it. Schwartz is going to end up in prison and the sun is starting to rise a little earlier and set a little later. Soon enough it will be late summer again and all of this can fade into memories. You won’t need to go to physical therapy.

My eyes will have lost their last little bit of turquoise and I'll be normal. We’ll be okay.

Well. I don't think we can go back to being normal after everything. I don’t see how I'm not a monster, really. Connor looks at me differently now, but better than immediately after the reclamation department.

Tina hopefully has disappeared by now because this is intensely personal. How's the hot drink? I left some syrup in the top cupboard for you.

That is what I think distinguishes myself from every other android there is. It isn't just my technological capabilities, nor my ability to feel pain. (On a side note, I will never forgive Elijah for that. But he isn't here to forgive so I don't think it matters.)

I think it's you that’s changed me the most though. Followed by everything that's happened. Tina, Connor, Nadia, Solari, Schwartz, Michi. Everyone I've ever met since being assigned to this precinct. Since I met you, something small changed with every moment, growing greater and larger until it consumed me in that room which stank of chlorine and metal.

That's why I'm writing this to you, I think. Perhaps it's a better place to write this all down than the notebook you bought me for my activation date anniversary. I'm not going to call it a birthday, because it isn't. But you know this by now. I'm repeating myself.

Cyberlife sent me a letter about a week ago. Signed and stamped by the board. A formal apology and promises to change their policy surrounding android disassembly. I don’t know whether I believe that they feel remorse, but at least there aren’t any more departments like that. With the sadistic men who hid there after internal company policy changes following the revolution, hoping and waiting for the chance to get me under the guise of ‘maintenance’. I was so stupid, walking into that. For believing that after all I’d be free, after all that happened with Markus and Jericho and the inevitable walk to death that I was so terrified they’d make me do.

I was ‘not needed anymore’. It was that same board that led me to you in the end, when Connor intervened and got me transferred to the DPD. I still find it funny that he didn’t tell you that he was transferring me though, the asshole that he is. Just spooked you with the jacket and my presence. I think you liked my car though, with the way your eyes lit up.

I know you don't like to talk about your sessions with Dr Harris, so maybe you could write me back, really old-fashioned. Sign it off with a wax seal from a signet ring on your finger and I can bask in the knowledge that the little human rituals that you all do are also open to me. Tell me what you talk about, if you’d like. Or, you could tell me how the exercises he gives you to do alone works. You're a lot better at night, so I believe the nightmares aren’t as bad.

This is all knowledge you already have, so I won't dwell on it. But you're the most real person I have ever had the chance to meet. Swearing at me with your messy brown hair that clogs the shower drain, or the fact you always burn the popcorn you insist on making when you come over to my place. This is what it means to be alive.

It is our small imperfections that make us who we are, every uniqueness shaping our existence and every similarity bringing us closer together.

I hope you know, truly and forever, that I wouldn't change a moment of anything for the world. Not the blue blood I was covered in, or the blood that flowed out of both our legs. I know Elijah wouldn't have wanted you to. He was a megalomaniac, but he wouldn't have given us the capacity to be real if he didn't want to see something good borne out of plastic and metal and thirium and life itself.

This time around, though, when we get to the park again, I should bring a camera, so you could see the joy on your face. I love your smile.

I love everything about you. Don’t ever forget it.

My LED spins blue for you always,
Nines.

As he finishes, the night sky invites itself in, turning on the lights that Connor made sure to time with the sunset. Lights of gold-spun honey glitter over his face, reflecting in the tears that fall.

He sniffles. "God."

One of Michi’s calla lilies blooms on Gavin’s windowsill, missing one leaf from its sisters. Gavin will never prune it.

A knock sounds at the door, soft. Just twice. It lets itself in. Probably Connor.

"Connor? That you?" Gavin's back is turned to the door.

"No, love. It's me."

Nines stands in a tight-fitting black shirt, black wool trousers and a pair of dress shoes buffed so well you could see yourself shine in them, dear reader. The top button is undone, exposing a bit of his clavicle and Gavin has to swallow down a breath. A soft swoop of his dark hair lingers on his brow as his LED shines a warm, sea-like blue.

"Missed me that much, tin can?" Gavin smiles. "Wasn't expecting to see you until tomorrow."

"You're hilarious.” Nines eyes the letter. "What did you think?"

Gavin stands the best he can, resting his hand against the edge of the sofa. "Come here."

Nines steps forward, taking Gavin's weight in his arms, more assured and as loving as Tina.

"Kiss me you crazy thing. You wrote me a letter?"

Nines smiles into the kiss, restored eyes shuttering closed as they move to sit on the sofa, Gavin's weight pressed on top of Nines, his hands sliding up the side of Gavin's shirt, leaving it all for him to imagine.

They come apart as Gavin aches for more. "Of course I wrote you a letter. I write, you read. I've seen the books on your side table."

"You could have just told me this, you know that right? I'd listen to you."

"I know you would, Gavin." Nines takes Gavin's hand in his as Gavin comes to rest his head against Nines' chest on the sofa. "I couldn't tell you it directly. Elijah never gave me a particularly good social interfacing system."

"You sound a lot like me."

They devolve into giggles before a calm silence falls over their skin, as long shadows cast over the pair of them, Gavin looking down through the city.

"I love you too. And I will write back, I promise. I'll even get Connor to deliver it you. Give it a whole fanfare and a trumpeter. The works. You'd hate it."

"I could always turn off my audio processor."

Gavin hits him lightly in the shoulder. "You asshole."

Nothing is the same, everything is new, love is all-consuming, adoration is beautiful and Gavin and Nines sleep under the stars, glittering with the knowledge that when the new day rises from the ashes, all will be well.

Notes:

This is the end of Small Imperfections. I started this as a scared teenager wondering what I was going to do with myself as the pandemic picked up again, and I’m here now, happier than I’ve ever been. I cannot thank you with enough words to do my gratitude justice. Every kudos, comment, or even just hit has filled me with a passion to keep going.

This is also the end of me writing about D:BH, as I have other fandoms I’m a little more passionate for writing. But watch this space. I’m not done.

The final song for Small Imperfections is Killshot - Slowed + Reverb by Magdalena Bay. I credit this song for getting me in my first relationship, that heavily influenced this fic.

Thank you.