Despite his worry for Connor, Hank's exhaustion won out. He slept for the remainder of the night and well into the afternoon. He didn't wake up until Markus came to see him.
"Lieutenant?" he inquired, shaking him gently.
He blinked groggily a few times. He wasn't necessarily still exhausted, but he was reluctant to get up. He looked at the deviant leader leaning over him and sighed. "What time is it?" He asked.
Markus leaned back as Hank sat up. "It's 2:36 in the afternoon," he responded.
"Shit," he groaned. "You could've woken me up sooner, you know." He turned, letting his legs fall over the side of the bed. He had to admit he felt better now that he had slept.
"There was really no reason not to let you sleep," he said. "We only just finished going through Connor's program."
Hank felt his heart stutter at the mention of Connor. "Please tell me you have good news, for once."
Markus joined him, sitting on the bed and not meeting his eyes. It didn't leave Hank with a good feeling. "I… don't have bad news," he said after a moment. "But I wouldn't necessarily call it good either."
"So just news then?" Hank asked. As hard as all this was, he had to know.
He nodded. "We managed to restore basic functions, got him to re-register his name. That all went basically like we expected," Markus told him. "It… didn't fix as much as we had hoped, he's still not very… Connor, but it's a start." He turned to him finally. "A lot of his programs are still jumbled and offline. We warned him against trying to use them, but it will likely be difficult for him to discern what is safe or not. If he tries to access one of those files, the same glitch as earlier will occur."
"So, if he can't tell what ones will cause it, how do we avoid it?" Hank asked.
Markus shook his head sadly. "We can't really. We'll just need to do a hard boot whenever it happens."
Hank's face scrunched a bit in confusion. "A hard boot? You can do that on an android?"
"That's what Elijah did before," he clarified. "It's likely you'll need to do it at some point, so we'll show you how."
He didn't like that, not one bit. The thought of having to reboot Connor like a defective computer made him feel sick to his stomach. But it wasn't like he could just let the kid glitch. "Yeah, ok," he agreed reluctantly.
Markus gave him a sympathetic look as though he understood his discomfort, but didn't comment on it. "We did find something else," he said instead.
He looked at the deviant leader skeptically. "What new bullshit are we dealing with now?"
"It's actually not bad," Markus insisted, although Hank had a hard time believing that. "We found a locked file," he went on. "It looks like he frequently backed up his program in a protected file. From what we can tell, it was unaffected when his code broke."
"Wait," Hank said, doing his best to understand what Markus was telling him. "Are you saying all we need to do is access this file and Connor will be ok?" It was almost too much to hope for.
"That is what it looks like, yes," he confirmed.
"Well, shit," he breathed. "What's stopping us then?"
Markus pursed his lips. "Like I mentioned, the file is locked. We aren't sure how to unlock it."
"Damn it, I knew it wouldn't be that easy."
"Elijah tried a code breaker," he told him. "Unfortunately, it didn't work. He kept getting an error message saying 'triggering event not found'."
Hank frowned. "What does that mean? What kind of 'triggering event' is it looking for?"
"That's the problem, I'm afraid." Markus stood up, taking a few steps before turning back to Hank. His expression was one of frustration, but not hopelessness. "It really could be anything. A word or phrase. An object. An action. We really have no way of knowing." He looked at him earnestly. "That's why we think it would be best if you brought him home."
"Wait, what?" Hank felt his brain stutter. He wanted Connor home, of course he did, but what could he possibly do to fix the kid? "Isn't it too early for that? I thought you'd be taking him to New Jericho or something."
Markus shook his head. "Elijah and I have done any of the physical repairs he needed. He even ensured none of his welds came loose. There's nothing more we can do for him." He took a step back towards Hank. "Connor likely chose something he expected to encounter in his daily life as the trigger. It would be best for him to be in a familiar environment. Besides," he gave him an encouraging smile. "You know him better than anyone. You have the best chance of figuring it out."
"No pressure though, huh?" Hank said with a sigh. How many times had he wished there was something he could do to help Connor? Now Markus was basically telling him he was the only one who could help him. And it was so much worse.
"I'm sure you'll be fine," Markus insisted, picking up on his concern. "Just take him home, try to do what you normally would do. I'm sure you'll find the trigger."
Hank ran a hand through his hair, tangled strands getting caught in his fingers before coming loose. "Yeah, yeah. I'm sure you're right." He knew he didn't sound particularly confident. "How is he doing though? Is he awake? Can I see him?"
"Of course," Markus answered the last of his questions with a nod. "He's awake in the other room. He's… Well, he won't act much like himself, I'm afraid."
"That's to be expected, I guess," he said standing. It didn't matter. He wanted to see his kid, no matter how many screws he had loose. After a brief delay of getting changed into his recently washed clothes, he joined Markus in the other room.
Connor was sitting on one of the couches, posture impossibly perfect. He didn't look at them when they entered, eyes forward staring at nothing. His blank expression was chilling.
"Connor," Markus called, drawing his attention. "This is the man I told you about, the one you live with. Lieutenant Anderson. You call him Hank."
He looked at him and offered a polite nod. "Hello, Hank," he said.
It still sounded like him, Hank realized, heart clenching painfully. Sounded like him. Looked like him. But there was no recognition in Connor's eyes. He was greeting a stranger.
But Connor had to still be in there somewhere.
"Hey kid," he said to him, trying to keep his voice steady. "How're you doing?"
Connor's head twitched for a moment, so briefly he would have missed it had he blinked. "I have been restored to basic functions and am capable of resuming designated tasks," he responded.
"That's good," he said calmly. "But how are you doing? Like emotionally and crap?"
His head cocked to the side in confusion. "Request unclear, please restate."
Ok, shit. That wasn't working. A sense of dread filled him. He turned back to Markus. "Is he… He's still deviant, isn't he?"
"Yes," Markus assured him. "Technically. He still has free will and emotions, he just... lacks the ability to comprehend them."
Connor glanced between the two of them momentarily, whether or not he was taking in what the two were saying was anyone's guess. His gaze landed on Hank. "You are my owner, correct? Please state my primary function."
Hank swallowed the lump in his throat. "No, Connor. I'm not your owner. You're my friend, my… You stay with me because you want to, not because I own you."
He blinked once as though not understanding. "Parameters unclear," he said. "Please state my primary function."
"Fuck," he breathed in disbelief. He knew Connor wasn't going to be all there, but he had hoped the kid would have some form of autonomy.
Connor's head tilted to the side and his LED blinked yellow as though processing the expletive. "I am afraid this model lacks the proper genitalia to be a suitable sexual partner."
"Shit! No, that's not what I meant." Hank insisted quickly. "You're not… you don't have a primary function, Connor. You're my friend. Just my friend."
His LED flashed a distressed red for a moment before returning to yellow. "Parameters unclear. Please state my primary function," he reiterated.
"Damn it, Connor," Hank was already getting frustrated and that did not bode well. "You don't have-"
"Lieutenant," Markus interrupted. "He doesn't understand. I don't think he can understand right now." He took a step towards Connor and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. Connor looked up at him with an expressionless stare. "Connor. You are a companion. You keep the Lieutenant company," he told him.
Connor looked back over at Hank. "Parameters accepted," he acknowledged. "How may I be of assistance?"
Hank resisted the urge to turn away. It was painful seeing Connor like this, so empty. He hadn't even been this mechanical when they had first met. "I hate this," he said out loud, voice barely above a whisper.
Markus gave him a sad smile in agreement. "I know. I'm sorry."
He steeled himself and took a steadying breath. "Alright, you said I should take him home, right? Kamski doesn't need to do anything else?"
The deviant leader nodded, stepping away from Connor. "He's ready to go. Elijah is resting in the other room. I'll update him on anything he needs when he wakes up."
"Right." Hank figured he would never particularly like Elijah Kamski, but he had to give him some credit. The man had pulled an all-nighter to help Connor the same day his house had burned down. That earned him a little respect at least. "I guess it's time to go home then. Come on, kid."
He nodded to Markus and made to leave, but Connor stayed where he was. Hank stopped when he realized the android wasn't moving. "You coming, kid?" He asked, concerned.
Connor looked over at him calmly. "Are you requesting that I follow you?"
"Yeah, of course I am," he said, trying to hide his exasperation. This was going to get more and more frustrating, he knew that. He had to be patient. "What did you think I meant?"
"Apologies," Connor said, standing. "The request was unclear. Should I add 'kid' to the appropriate variations to my designation?"
He ran a hand over his face and glanced at Markus again. He nodded, though it seemed to pain him to do so. "Yeah," Hank told him, looking back at Connor. "Yeah, do that."
"Acknowledged," he responded, LED blinking yellow as he made the update. "I will now respond to the additional name of 'kid'."
Hank took a shaky breath and swallowed. "Alright. Let's go then," he said to him.
Connor nodded and moved to follow him like an obedient puppy. He felt his eyes water. This was all so wrong. He had to find that trigger. He needed his Connor back.
With a final farewell to Markus, he led the android outside and to the car. He reached into his pocket for his car keys and his hand brushed another small piece of metal. He fished it out, already knowing what he'd find. It was the quarter he had confiscated weeks ago during the investigation at Stratford Tower. The day Markus had declared before the world that androids were alive. The day the revolution officially started. So much had happened in such a short span of time.
He looked over at Connor, dutifully following after him, a blank expression on his face.
Hank's heart clenched. He felt as though he had both gained and lost the world in the same span of time.
"Hey, Connor. Catch!" He tossed the coin to the android who caught it with little issue.
He looked at it questioningly before glancing back over to Hank. "Is this compensation for something?" He asked.
"It… fuck, no. It's," Hank sighed. "It's yours. I know you don't remember, but you used to fiddle with that damn thing all the time. Flicking it back and forth and shit. Said you were calibrating, or something."
He looked back at the coin, no sense of recognition for the object. "Is that an action you would like me to perform?"
Hank bit back a few more expletives. "Sure, why not give it a try," he said instead. "Just, try flicking it from one hand to the other."
Connor obeyed. It wasn't nearly as smooth as it should have been, but it made it from one hand to the other without incident. He looked up as soon as the action was completed as though awaiting further instruction.
Hank bit the inside of his lip, trying to contain his disappointment. "It always seemed more like a nervous tick than any kind of calibration," he admitted. "You annoyed me with it any time we didn't have anything to do."
He cocked his head to the side inquisitively. "Contradiction. It aggravates you, yet you wish for me to continue?"
"I, well," Hank turned away and started back to the car. His eyes stung. He suddenly just wanted to get home. "No, it never really bothered me that much. I just… fuck."
"You were eliminating it as a potential triggering event for my system backup," Connor concluded for him.
He unlocked the car door but didn't open it right away. "Yeah. I know it was a long shot, but yeah."
Connor nodded and joined him at the car. "Apologies. If the trigger was within my accessible files, I would inform you."
"I know, Connor," he told him softly. "I know. It isn't your fault." He pulled open the car door a little more harshly than he intended. "Let's just get you home."