Chapter Text
Hank Anderson hated waking up early to walk his dog.
More accurately, he didn’t mind walking his dog, he just hated that he had to wake up early. Sumo was a docile Saint Bernard, and although the dog weighed over a hundred pounds, it would never leap up and knock over anyone. Hank used to fantasized about a warm dusk, with no calling from Fowler, no annoying unfinished cases, only him, Cole and Sumo, strolling through the streets and stepping on the yellow leaves that made crisp crunching noises.
Deep down, he knew that this wasn’t a fantasy, but rather memories that came to a sudden halt from four years ago. Cole’s death changed his routine. He completely abandoned walking his dog at sundown; instead, he picked up Russian Roulette. People’s laziness toward life can sometimes result from their everyday hustle and bustle, and at other times, a result of low spirits. Alcohol had seeped into Hank’s central nervous system, he was drowning himself in the golden liquid, running far away from reality. Occasionally, when he had enough of his drinks, he’d go out to walk his dog at midnight. Sumo made no complaints. As is said, it was a good dog.
What’s more, Sumo couldn’t speak either way.
Since the beginning of time, people have attempted to atone for their misdoings, like confessing their sins to a priest or buying indulgences. Hank’s way of making it up to Sumo was both straightforward and effective: he only ever purchased the best dog food for the Saint Bernard while opting for Blackram Whiskey - a cheap drink that is not particularly tasty - for himself. Whenever he accidentally bought the honey flavor, he'd have no choice but to wash it down his throat with Coke and regrets. He never gave in on dog food, though. On Black Fridays, he’d rush into the supermarket, and while others swarmed the electronics discount section, he’d be the only one charging into the pet section with a cart, stocking up on boxes and cans of dog food.
People with a hard life seek solace in ordinary, trivial little things to compensate for their losses. It could be a glass of icy whiskey, a slice of hot pepperoni pizza, or a round of Russian Roulette. He’d load a bullet into the chamber, spin the wheel, and press down on the hammer. The first round always progressed slowly, as he wouldn’t dare pull the trigger while he was still sober. Once he was hammered enough, though, he’d point the gun to his temple, firing shot after shot. During these death-laden memories, Sumo was the only living constant. The dog would enjoy Hank’s hand-picked canned food in the kitchen and rubbed his body against Hank's legs until his owner put down the gun to respond to him. The Russian Roulette often ends with Saint Bernard's warm breaths.
Then Connor entered his life, perfectly resolving the game along with the revolver.
Hank had to admit that it was somewhat wasteful to have Connor - the noble prototype, the most advanced android designed for police use, Markus’s right-hand man who managed to rob the entire Cyberlife tower the moment he deviated - walking his dog for him. This was why Hank had thought himself to be either hungover or still asleep when he saw Connor standing there in a three-piece suit, getting ready for his first dog walk ever with Sumo’s leash in his hand.
He had pulled Connor back into his room to rummage through his wardrobe. Eventually, the older man gave up trying and pulled out a set of unopened outfits for his partner to choose from. The android seemed slightly surprised but didn’t have a chance to say thanks as he was kicked out of the bedroom immediately after. Hank heard the shuffling of Connor changing his clothes, followed by the clattering of Sumo’s collar and the rustling of the dog shaking his fur, before the thud of the front door closing. However, it didn’t take long for a a soft knock on the door to interrupt his short-lived blissful privacy.
"Open up, Lieutenant!" at that time, Connor was still addressing him by his title, "I forgot something."
Hank opened the door and tossed the keys sitting on the shoe cabinet to Connor, all the while evaluating the android’s fashion sense. Connor wore an oversized jacket that was much more reasonable for the occasion, which helped to downplay the overly formal trousers. Finally, a beanie to finish the look… Hold on, a beanie?
For God’s sake, who told him that a beanie could go with a suit?
Hank prided himself on not being punctilious, yet the fit was way out of line. He ripped off Connor’s beanie and slammed the door as fast as he could, shutting the messy-haired android out, along with his words of gratitude.
Where the hell did he get that beanie anyway?
"Lieutenant? Are you listening?"
"Oh!" Hank came back to his senses. The computer in front of him had three case files opened. "Oh, were we discussing the similarities among these three cases?"
"You were spacing out."
"Stop analysing me with your goddamn sensors!"
"I wasn’t. At least not just now."
"Uh, alright." Hank looked up at Connor, whose LED light blinked a calming blue. The android never took the LED off; instead, he kept it as an integral part of himself. "Carry on."
"I was just saying that these cases are connected. The informant from the first case discovered a triangular toy block wrapped in red thread. In the second case, the informant received an anonymous letter containing a charred block inside an envelope. The informant in the third case found a rectangular block that had been cut in half at the scene."
"Weird. Why would anyone specifically abduct android children?" As Hank began analyzing the clue map made by Connor, he realized that the crime scenes of the three cases had no apparent connection in space or time. "And... these android children... are they deviants?"
"There’s not enough data to answer your question. However, there are a few deviant android children in Jericho who remain in a childlike mind, despite having been successfully deviated."
"How absurd. Aside from being with android sex partners, people are now unwilling to properly educate their own children. They are buying android children only to discard them once they are no longer needed."
"By the way, we receive the forth crime report when you were spacing off."
"Fuck!" Hank proped his hands on the table. A new case is on the way while he hadn’t got any clues on the first three. "Only a few hours left until I can—"
"Go to Jimmy's bar?"
"Not what I meant."
"The new case seems quite unusual,“ Connor stated as he logged the details into the case file. Fowler was watching them from behind the glass wall. "The informant is missing both her android and human child."
"Seems like my plan’s gone south for tonight." Hank stood up and put his phone back into his pocket. "Let's go."
This damn snow in Detroit may be a good sign for farmers, but it's a hell of a torture for drivers. Hank, unfortunately, was a sucker for manual transmission cars in the age of autonomous vehicles. The muscle car manufactured in 1987 reflected his particular taste, and his neglect in maintaining the cae revealed much about his personality.
After his third failed attempt to start the car, Connor left the passenger seat and moved to the front to pull open the door on Hank's side. The older police officer had fought an internal battle, gripping the steering wheel tightly with both hands before he reluctantly relinquished the driver's seat to his partner.
"There's no way you can start the car."
"Lieutenant, you have approximately 15 years before your license expires," Connor said as he smoothly slid into the driver's seat, turned the key in the ignition, and started the car with ease. "Considering the visibility on the road and your age, it would be safer for me to drive."
"It’s not the time to give me shade for my age!"
"I'm not 'shading' you for your age, Lieutenant. I'm merely stating an objective fact," Connor closed the door and watched as his partner cursed and hunched into the passenger seat. "From what I know of anthropology, it is fortunate to age without suffering from any pain or illness. I should be happy for you."
Damn it, Hank was rendered speechless. He stared at the ornament on the steering wheel and came up with a few questions: Why could the latest RK800 model operate an old manual transmission car? Could Connor download the manual directly from CyberLife’s database? God, he really hated electronics and their manuals. To this day, Fowler still received emails he had sent in the wrong format - most of which were his leave requests.
Hank went down a memory lane. He remembered being drunk before the Eden Club, so Connor had drove him to the scene in this old muscle car. He was so dizzy and hungover that he only sobered up when the deviants attacked them in the warehouse. He couldn’t even remember how many models he had rented until the case was solved, only the sensation of his stomach churning. Connor helped him in applying for reimbursement, and he had no idea what arguments the clever android had used for Fowler to concede.
"You've been lost in thought, Lieutenant."
"Well, not anymore, thanks to your interruption."
"What you were thinking is irrelevant to the case."
"Pff..." Hank turned his head to see the android staring straight ahead. Visibility on the road was low due to the the snow; of course the android’s road condition monitoring system would be much more accurate than his mere human eyes. "When did you install a mind-reading system?"
"You tend to stare at a single point when you're pondering something, whereas you have a habit of looking to your left when recalling memories."
"Did they incorporate criminal psychology into your program as well?"
"I made the inference based on my observations and assessments of you," Connor said as he turned on the headlights which were yellowing from disrepair. "What were you remembering?"
"I was wondering how you managed to convince Fowler to reimburse me for the Eden Club bill."
"I showed him my memory footage to prove that you hadn’t used the expense for prostitution. You had also returned the workers to their positions once I was done with the memory probing."
"You should’ve gave me a heads up!"
"Alright, Lieutenant," Connor said, sidestepping Hank's protests. "We’ve arrived."
Hank looked out the window to the sight of an old house with a dilapidated exterior, its walls covered in black and red graffiti. He was the first to get out of the car, sinking his leather boots into the snow. Hank dreaded the conversation that was approaching. He was no better at dealing with anxious parents than he was at dealing with his own anxiety - especially those waiting outside the operating room.
They entered the footprint-less front yard and stepped over the icy steps to stand in the doorway. Hank glanced back at Connor, who was still wearing a suit. He had suggested to Conner more than once for a change in style, but the older man was quickly struck by the android's fashion sense - struck by how poor it was. In the end, he opted for the suit, as it was hard to go wrong with a set of formal clothes after all. Deep in thought, Hank reached out to ring the doorbell. However, before his finger could touch the button, the door was opened by a gaunt woman.
"Lieutenant Anderson, Detroit police." Hank introduced himself as he heard the sobbbing. "We received a report from you. Thank you in advance for your cooperation."
"Please, come in." The woman quickly placed the garbage bag she was holding down on the doorstep, a corner of an android blood package was poking out of the bag. "Would you like a cup of coffee?"
"No, thanks..."
A wave of dizziness consumed Hank once the words left his mouth, and he had to grab the door frame to prevent himself from falling. Oh gosh, this was what he got by being hungover. He definitely didn’t want Connor to know that he had sneaked into the bar, even though the android probably already knew it anyway.
"Are you all right, Lieutenant?"
"Oh, it’s nothing," Hank said, pinching the bridge of his nose, "Just some nagging pain."
The woman opened the door and invited them into the old house. At first, Hank glimpsed at the bills on the shoe cabinet in the porch, then lowered his gaze to look inside the cabinet, which contained three pairs of snow boots: one adult-sized pair and two pairs for children. They were neatly arranged, and only the adult's snow boots had water stains on them.
"Where's your husband, ma'am?"
"We’ve been divorced for a long time. We had some... disagreement."
"Could you elaborate on the circumstances under which the children disappeared?"
"I was in the kitchen preparing dinner, and I was going to take care of the kids afterward, the woman said as she led the way up the steps. Hank surveyed the walls on the way, which were old yet very smooth. "Next moment they were just... gone..."
"Have you heard anything unusual?"
"No, I didn't hear anything," the gaunt mother opened the door to the children's room for them as they reached the end of the hallway on the second floor. "This is their room."
"Thanks, and if you recalled anything else, please let us know."
When the lady's footsteps faded at the end of the stairs, Hank was done roughly surveying the scene. The children's snow boots had not been used recently, there were no signs of a struggle, the door lock showed no denting from forced entry, lastly, the windows in the room remained closed. He slowly paced into the house; the pink and blue children's room was simply decorated with old furniture. The first thing he noticed was the wooden bookcase next to the bunk bed. These books were quite special - despite the advancements in touch-screen holographic technology for magazines in 2038, there remained a type of paper book that cannot be replaced, even by audiobooks.
Hank ran his hand over the raised braille on the book, while Connor chose to inspect the glass windows. The windows were closed with water stains on the windowsill, and no fingerprints on the handles. Through the glass, he could see the snowy courtyard below. A few pots of tomato plants were scattered about, and most of the overwintering plants were covered with plastic sheeting. The thickness of the snow was in line with the current snowfall, and even if there had been footprints previously, they would be difficult to discern in this weather.
Connor's gaze shifted from top to bottom, landing on a yellowed cloth basket of toys resting quietly beneath the windowsill. As he crouched down to examine the worn toys, he noticed that the fabric dolls had been mended by someone and that the plastic blocks were neatly arranged inside. He rummaged through the toy box and finally discovered an "extra" piece among the organized blocks. This wooden block was particular; it appeared to have been thoroughly soaked in some liquid, and whoever had done it didn’t left fingerprints. Connor glanced behind at his partner, who was carefully exploring the depths of the bookcase, so he seized the opportunity to sample what exactly the liquid was.
"Oi, Connor! For the hundred time, that’s disgusting..."
"I don't have saliva or fingerprints. I won’t contaminate evidence."
"That doesn’t change anything!"
"According to my investigation," Connor did not respond. He had learned to change the subject quickly - a technique often used by Hank in response to other’s kindness - "The window handles…"
"Have no fingerprints on them."
"Right, Lieutenant."
"Same old," said the man, looking at the drawings beside the child's bed, which were filled with abstract patterns. "Anything else?"
"This block was soaked in water for at least three days, sourced from the same brand and series as the previous cases' evidence blocks.
"Good. Do you have any other conclusions?"
"They didn't leave through the front door, and the children's snow boots by the door showed no signs of recent use," Connor said, turning to see the back of Hank, who was scrutinizing at the drawings. "What’s more, this house does not have an attic or a basement. The first level has a flat floor, so footsteps won’t create echoes. As for the room on the second floor, the ceiling’s height is cohesive with its exterior."
"One of the two children is blind, so it would be unlikely for them to climb out of the window and create a locked room."
"Not that unlikely, if it was the android child."
"What do you mean?"
Connor sighed and walked directly next to Hank, leaving the poor old police officer to question when the kid had ever learned to sigh. "Look at these drawings."
"I'm on it."
Surprisingly, Connor tore down the messy drawings. Hank was about to ask his partner why until he saw the graphic text behind. They proceeded to tear down all the drawings, as if they were uncovering the truth behind a fairy tale. A string of strikingly familiar code appeared before their eyes.
RA9.