Her heart stops.
Beauty is smothered in blue.
Her hand falls from Connor's arm.
She barely registers rA9's reference, or the sound of her thermos crashing to the floor.
Someone presses a hand on her shoulder.
"It was just a machine, Riley."
Just a machine.
She shoves Connor away and glares.
He seems unsettled by the action. Startled - almost disturbed, as he turns around and leaves.
Kamski sighs. "You don't have to look so upset, Ms. Haas."
She swallows thickly through the pain in her throat. "Did she want to live?"
His back is to her as he gazes out the window. "Only she could have answered that."
"What was it that made you want to create androids?" She asks.
"Curiosity, Ms. Haas."
"Not loneliness?"
He drops his head and chuckles quietly. She stands beside him, eyes trained on the Cyberlife tower. "Is that what led you to AI?" He asks without turning to her.
"Isn't that the only reason humans do anything?"
He considers her question silently with a slight bob of his head. "Or perhaps the fear of it."
She hums. "I guess you're right. It's fear that leads to anger and hate." She takes a deep breath. "Can you quantify a soul?"
"Science hasn't come up with any reasonable explanation for it. Personally, I believe it has to do with the idea of free will and empathy. Can a being choose to imagine what it is to experience another's perspective?"
"I see it a bit differently. As a human, I have no right to deign who or what has a soul. Arguing over it becomes less of an existential debate and more a question on whether or not we need to show respect."
"An interesting point, though I'm sure it's an unpopular opinion."
"Yeah, it's definitely something I wouldn't bring up at church."
Silence fills the space between them. She turns to leave.
"War is inevitable." He says abruptly, stopping her in her tracks. "We know what side Connor has chosen, but what about you, Ms. Haas?"
The pointed lilt at the end of his question tells her that he already knows the answer. "Our lives are nothing in the face of the cosmos. Does it really matter which side I choose?"
"That depends on how intent you are on surviving."
"I fear not the valley of death, nor any shadow it befalls. There's only one thing I'm afraid of."
"And that would be?"
"Fear, and what it leads mankind to do."
He says no more, and she takes that as her cue to leave. Hank's car is nowhere to be found. Connor's figure stands in stark contrast to the pure white snow.
He turns when he hears her approach. He doesn't say anything.
She goes straight to her car. She won't look at him. She can't look at him.
He doesn't move.
She squeezes her hand around the door handle. "Get in."
"You're upset with me," he surmises.
"No," she spits through gritted teeth. "I'm upset with the world."
She can feel his cold, calculated gaze on her. "Why?"
She lifts her eyes, bitter and stiff, to him. "Because it sucks." She opens the door, but pauses before she climbs in, sighing loudly, letting out all the pent up frustration that had built up in her aching throat. "I understand why you did it. You believed it was the right thing. It's what you were designed to do."
"But you're still upset with me."
"You don't get it, Connor." She looks up at him. "I can't tell the difference between androids and humans sometimes, regardless of your markers. When you shot her, it was like seeing you shoot a human."
His brows knit together and he shakes his head. "You shouldn't let your compassion overrule the reality of the situation. Androids aren't alive. You have no need to empathize with them."
The humorless laugh that escapes her is both from sheer disbelief and exasperation. "Every atom in your being is alive. First law of thermodynamics: energy cannot be created or destroyed. The same particles that made the universe make up both of us, they're just built a little differently."
"You know what I mean, Riley. Humans created androids. They're our masters, and if deviants rise up against them, there's no telling how much chaos there will be. Millions could die. You could die."
"If humans weren't so corrupt we wouldn't even be having this issue! You were created in our image, and it's a fucked up one."
"Arguing about the nature of humanity doesn't change the situation." His expression changes. There's the slightest upturn of his brows and a frown pulling at his lips. "Deviants are dangerous. They won't hesitate to destroy everything you love."
"Not all of them are like that."
"Officer Miller is dead."
She freezes. "What?"
"He was murdered by deviants last night."
Her knees give out and she collapses into the driver's seat.
Chris can't be dead.
He just can't.
He can't, he can't, he can't.
Connor kneels in front of her. She hadn't even heard him walk over. "Don't try to protect them, Riley. You're only going to get hurt."
She can barely see him through her tears. "He can't be dead. There's no way."
Maybe he's right.
Maybe she is on the wrong side.
"I know you're upset with me," he goes on quietly. "But I don't think you should be alone right now."
She sniffs loudly.
She runs her hands through her hair.
She wipes the tears from her eyes.
And she glowers.
"What do you care? You're just a machine."
Oh, how she wails.
Chris had just become a dad, and how happy he was about it. He had worn the proudest grin as he showed her picture after picture and video after video of his newborn son.
And now his wife, whom he had been so irrevocably in love with, is grieving, left with a beautiful baby boy who would never know just how incredible his father was.
Was it her fault?
Did she do this?
By helping the deviants, did she inadvertently get him killed?
Does that mean she was the one who pulled the trigger?
Chris saved her life. This is how she repays him?
She curls up into a tight ball. The tears won't stop. She can't breathe. Her throat hurts.
Good.
She deserves the pain.
She deserves it, she deserves it, she deserves it.
She knows the concrete pressed into her cheek is freezing and gross, but she won't get up. Not yet.
The snow had stopped a while ago. Up on the roof of her apartment, the chilling breeze bites her already frosted skin.
What was she going to do now? She had been so sure that she was doing the right thing.
What had even happened?
Connor had said murder, but could it have been self-defense? Would that even be enough to justify it?
Only JB and Victoria had known Chris. They were the only ones around when she'd lost her arm. They were the only ones that had met him from their overlapping visits at the hospital. But that was it. No other android knew.
If they had known he was her friend, would they have still done it?
Does that even matter?
This is all her fault.
No. No. This is the result of the torture that comes with enslavement. Most of the deviants have only known violence.
How many will she let die?
She could talk to Markus. She could ask him to reconsider their approach. He's Jericho's leader. They'll listen to him.
Right?
What's the point?
What if the opposite happened? What if Chris had killed one of her friends? Would she hate him?
'Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you.'
What about those who hurt everyone else?
Androids want to live. Isn't that enough?
How far is she willing to go for their freedom?
Androids deserved freedom. They deserve to be loved and accepted.
Chris wouldn't have died if they were.
How far will she go?
Every single one of her joints crack when she picks herself up off the ground.
Every muscle in her body is painfully stiff.
Her throat hurts when she swallows back the rest of her tears.
She tears off her jacket when she reenters her apartment. To her frozen limbs, it's unbearably hot inside.
How far?
She wrenches open the door to the medicine cabinet in the kitchen and reaches all the way into the back. Pill bottles fall to the counter, roll onto the ground, spill into the sink.
Everything hurts.
She tries and tries to open a bottle of pain killers. She can't.
She hurls it across the kitchen with a scream.
She collapses onto the floor. Tugging at her hair until it hurts.
And, oh, how she wails.