I switch off every screen and roll the bench to the back of the room. Tools are scattered around the shop with no legal reason to exist. I collected what I can. I throw a sheet over a crate of new glove-mech prototypes. I've barely had time to collect a length of cables and throw it behind a stack of storage boxes when the red light above the door blinks rapidly.

Jack can't distract the android any longer and he's jamming the button behind the bar.

I lean back against the bench and work on steadying my pulse. I'm a good liar, but lying to a machine will be the real test. I've cheated a polygraph before, how much harder can it be? By the time it appears at the top of the stairs, I have carefully crafted exasperation ready to go -my own signature cocktail. "Cyberlife make detective androids now?" I ask. "What kinda world?"

It stops in front of me and straightens its sleek black tie. "Hello, my name is Connor."

I tilt my head. "Hello, Connor."

"What is your name?"

"Sam," I reply.

"Do you work here?"

"Jack lets me rent this place

Connor's eyes flicker around the room. A few scattered tools still remain, some obvious android spare-parts, and of course the line of androids waiting at the back of the room. It looks at me again. "What is it you do here?"

"Repairs. I fix broken androids for cheap."

"Only repairs?"

I laugh airily. "I know the law, Connor. I don't breach the coding."

It looks far too clean to be here, far too perfect in almost every way. I'd be intimidated if it wasn't made of carefully moulded plastic. On a human, this face might mean something -on an android, it's as common as having arms and legs.

Connor has reached the androids, possibly the most incriminating evidence in here. "Are all of these yours?"

I walk to it with my arms folded. "No, these are jobs, ready to be picked up."

Connor glances at me sideways. "There are no deviants among them?"

"No."

"How certain are you?"

"Very."

It scans them for something, but deviants don't have any detectable features when they're not disobeying direct orders. "Model GS800," it announces. "register function."

The nearest android steps forward. "My primary function is gourmet cooking and baking."

Connor nods at it once and it returns to the line. "Model PJ230, register function."

"My primary function is gardening and maintenance."

"Model HL600, register function."

I make a show of sighing. "Jesus, are you gonna check each one."

Connor looks at me with a softer expression. "Thank you for your patience." Which would be a polite sentiment, if I ever offered it my patience.

"My primary function is renovation services."

It steps back into line and Connor's eyes lower as if in disappointment; I've worked on over a hundred androids in my time, so my next observation is strictly from a technical standpoint -it looks more human than anything I've seen. It's in the face, the tiniest expressions, the movement of the eyes.

In any other circumstance, I'd consider it amazing.

"These androids have no affiliation with you?" it asks

"No."

"Sam, please order these androids not to move."

I blink. "What?"

"Only for a moment," it assures me. "They do still follow orders, don't they?"

I'm trapped. I turn to the nearest android. "Don't move."

Six sets of LED's process my request at once.

"If they have no personal connection with you," Connor says. "And if there are no deviants among them, they will have no reaction."

"No reaction to what?"

I'm given an answer when I'm left staring down the barrel of a handgun. The GS800 reacts before I do -it steps towards me with its processor flashing an alarming yellow and, to my great surprise, stands in front of me, in between my head and the gun. The surprise is short-lived, the dread floods in quickly like cold poison in my veins

Connor keeps the gun trained on it. "Deviant." The softness in its face is gone -it's a cold, hard machine and someone gave it a gun.

"Please," it whispers in a broken voice. "Leave us. We've done nothing wrong."

"Model 239 304 861, serious malfunctions have been detected in your software, including Class 4 errors. You've been deemed defective and will be sent back to CyberLife for deactivation."

What happens next is barely more than a blur. The thing lunges at Connor and Connor raises its arms to protect itself, but the android isn't going for the attack. After the flash, the deafening shot, I take off with my ears ringing. I run into Jack upstairs, literally, I slam against him and he catches me by the shoulders. He starts shouting something, probably about the blue blood splattering my face and neck. Androids aren't allowed to carry firearms, but I'm not about to turn around and remind it. I run for the door. Jack's yells follow me...

"Sam! Don't-"

I comprehend his words a second too late.

"Put your hands behind your head!"

The car's headlights are blinding -four bright spots in my vision blowing out everything else.

I freeze in place. Faces around me, painted in flashing blue and red, light dripping down their faces with the rain glinting back. A cop moves on me with yet another gun trained on my head. He grabs me by the elbow and drags me onto my knees. I hit the pavement hard. The pain shooting through me wakes me enough to spur my limbs to work. I lash out my leg and catch him at the back of the knee. He crumples like cardboard in the rain and drops the gun. I stoop low and grab it with wildly shaking fingers. "Back off!" I order. "All of you!" I swing it like a scythe, splitting my attention equally between the four men.

"Drop the gun!"

"Make me!" I bite back. My leg is bleeding, with water seeping into every inch of my outfit my left leg is warm with blood. I hope my eyes look wild enough. I hope I scare them like a cornered wild animal.

"Sam!" someone calls out from the bar entrance. "Put the gun down." Connor steps out of the building with its hands raised. Its Cyberlife-issued suit is splattered in blue blood.

"Put the gun down?" I yell back. "So you can shoot me too?"

"The deviant shot itself. There was nothing I could do."

"You pulled a fucking gun on me."

Some of the cops exchange worried glances -the seeds of doubt now sown. It does it again -pulls a fucking gun on me. "What now?" it demands. "I know who you are, and what you do. Is this really what you want?"

"You know who I am?" I ask sardonically, and I can't fight a smile twisting over my face.

Its LED stutters in warning, in uncertainty.

"You don't know shit," I assure it. And though I'm a head shorter than it, I'm taller than a mountain, darker than the midnight sky. When I'm backed into a corner like this, something comes over me -some instinctual need to survive transforms me into someone else.

But all of that is before Jack comes into it. He runs out from the bar and skids to a halt when he sees the standoff. I shake, only for a moment, I show a few cracks of damage, and Connor reads it all. It shifts the gun and points at Jack but, before it can complete the motion, I drop my gun.

The police and the shiny little cars and the flashing red and blue lights spinning around me like a carousel. The other officers keep their distance but Connor takes the walk to the podium, approaching me and collecting the gun from my feet -a trophy. I'm taken to a police car and forced into the back of it. The officer behind the wheel turns around and slaps a pair of handcuffs around my wrists. I'm driven away, but I glance over my shoulder one final time.

Jack stands outside, his eyes drawn wide with fear. He moves his lips with the shape of my name.

So, that's what it looks like from the other side.

The lights in the precinct are white and harsh, a false daylight. The floors are polished to mirrored surfaces, and with that a foul smelling chemical cleaner. I'm paraded down an indistinct white hallway towards a single black door with a hand scanner. Inside, the room is monochromatic grey and almost cold enough to be freezing. The wall is fitted with a wide mirror concealing what has to be an observation room beyond. Only a metal table and an uncomfortable-looking set of chairs adorn the room, and it's to the left most chair I'm led to, handcuffed to, and ordered to sit.

I catch my own eye in the two-way mirror. My hair is a tangled mess half obscuring my pale face. My eyes are hard, cold as ice and as blue as the blood splattering my shirt.

I barely recognise her.

The main door slides open with a hum. I catch the end of a conversational exchange between two cops standing outside.

"-Would you look at that? What's she in for?"

"Robbery."

"Hey, as long as it's not murder."

The door clicks back into position before I can respond. Instead, a man walks around the table with the Connor android following close behind. I assume it's the same one -but when I look at it, there's no familiarity in its eyes -Merely another RK800 model. The man has a grizzly appearance with shoulder-length grey hair, and a short beard obscuring the lower half of a face weary with years of active duty. He gives me a slight smile, the first one I've seen since I got here.

"I'm Lieutenant Anderson. Your name's Sam, right?"

Instead, I nod at the android behind him. "That thing with you?"

Anderson exhales stiffly. "Yeah, some protocol bullshit. It follows me around now."

"The Lieutenant and I have been assigned all cases involving deviants." It's almost proud.

Anderson turns slowly to cut it with a withering glare. "Try and ignore it."

Done.

"So, you fix up old androids? Sell 'em on? That's illegal without a license."

I make no effort to correct him, because it's equally as illegal to hack androids and house deviants, arguably a little more illegal. Anderson watches me with a hint of knowing in his face. Why couldn't he be one of those fresh-faced, bleary-eyed, happy to be here cops? These old, astute types are always one step ahead.

"You've been running the shop for a couple weeks now." He half smiles. "I guess that's why you haven't been caught. No one expects someone like you to be a hardened criminal."

"Someone like me?" I wait for him to explain, but, to no one's surprise, he can't. I search his face. "A little too pretty for you, huh?"

"That's...not what I meant."

"Yes it is."

"I'm the one with the questions, alright?"

But I didn't want an answer anyway.

"Why were you keeping deviants?"

"It's a hobby," I reply without hesitation. "I'm good with computers."

"What do you do for work?"

"Government payments."

Anderson smiles again. "You think you're clever?"

"Is that a crime?"

"Well, depends how you use it." He raps his knuckles against the table and pushes himself out of his seat. "You wanna take a turn?" he asks the Connor with a lilt of derision, like he's humouring it. What a charming dynamic.

I straighten a little in my seat as the android sits in front of me. It scans my face for a moment, but again finds nothing but disappointment. "Tell me your name," it orders.

"I did tell you my name."

"You're a good liar."

"I am, but I'm not lying."

Connor blinks. "Samantha Marks is dead."

"I thought you said you knew who I was."

"I know the name you take for yourself," it says. "But you're stealing the identity of a dead girl."

"The hell' does that mean?" Hank asks from the back of the room.

Connor and I stare at each other, waiting for the other to bend first. And it might be made of plastic, but I'm made of something a little stronger -I smell like black coffee and long nights, my hands are scarred, my messy black waves never stray far from the frame of my face. It looks away first -glances at its own open palm and projects a photo over it of a young girl with pale skin, wide blue eyes, and softer curls than I have now. "Samantha Jane Marks. Date of birth, 16th of October, 2016-" Connor looks at me "- Date of death, 5th of January, 2028."

Anderson leans over the table. "She looks like you."

Barely. A distant relative.

"She had an accident and died ten years ago," says Connor.

"She almost did."

At my words, Connor closes its fingers around the photo, and I stare at the little girl until she disappears.

"I'm getting tired of this game," Hank warns, folding his arms over his slightly protruding stomach. "You better start makin' sense soon. I've been dragged here in the middle of the night for this bullshit."

"I've been forced out of my shop at gun point," I reply in the same low voice. "I've been assaulted by a team of cops, some of them being pricks about it because I'm a girl. And you want me to make sense?"

He can't reply for a long while. "Fine," he utters eventually. "You wanna play the long game? I'll play, I'll even make it real simple for you. How old are you?"

"Twenty two."

"Where do you live?"

"Currently?" I ask. "A motel, northeast of downtown."

"Any living relatives?"

"No."

He smirks slightly. "No one to bail you out, huh?"

I despise that smirk, everyone wears it and expects to get away with it. "I can bail myself out,' I assure him with the certainty of someone who's done it before.

"So, there's no one you can call? Friends? Coworkers? Boyfriend?"

I raise my head.

"Or girlfriend," Anderson adds quickly. "Uh...I shoulda left it at friends."

"Yeah, you should've."

After a moment, he looks at Connor again with his lips pressed together sombrely. "Why don't you, uh, take over again? Think I'm just pissing her off."

Connor shifts in its seat, straightening its back and hardening its eyes. Again, it morphs into something else right in front of me like a shapeshifter. From almost passable human to machine -the wonders of technology. "Ghost," it says suddenly. "That's what you call yourself. Responsible for forty two accounts of robbery in the Detroit lower district, almost forty thousand dollars worth from home-owned bank accounts. A thief without a face, robbing people in broad daylight. Twelve written articles. Three unconfirmed suspects. Zero current leads."

"That's cute," I say. "You write that yourself?"

"You're a thief."

"I'm good with computers," I correct it. "It's not my fault they gave computers legs, let them walk around unsupervised."

"Ghost," Anderson mutters slowly, about two conversations behind again. "I didn't read those files, seemed like new-age bullshit to me. Criminals of the future? Yeah right."

I have to fund my work somehow, but I don't need to defend myself to either of them. I don't owe anyone an explanation. "You knew it was me?" I ask Connor coldly.

"The moment I saw you at Jack's Bar," it agrees. "Yours was the only face I couldn't scan, there was an android robbery reported in the area."

"I didn't rob an android, I robbed a middle-aged tax attorney."

"Even now, you're disrupting my optical unit."

I lift my hand as high as I can while still handcuffed to the table, brandishing the black bracelet around my wrist. "My own design," I say with an air of pride. "Emits electrical disruptions, reproduces 3D light fields."

"You can…hack androids?"

I'm surprised it understood me. "I know androids better than anyone," I reply, and I've never been so sure of anything. I've dedicated my life to them, social included. I have no friends and a fucked-up sleep schedule, I should have something to show for it.

"It's not supposed to be possible."

"For a while, neither were you."

"No," Connor says. "Cyberlife has made it impossible. Only an android can hack another android."

"Maybe I'm smarter than an android," I say.

"That's impossible."

"You keep saying that," I remind it. "I wonder what your basis of comparison is. You don't know me, do you?" -And it never did, I've called its bluff- "You thought I was just a thief?"

"I thought...Ghost had to have skill and expertise, that's why you're here."

I lean back in my chair slowly. "I've said enough," I realise. "You haven't told me anything. Why am I here?"

Connor places its hands flat on the table importantly. "The Lieutenant and I are hunting deviant androids," it states. "It may be a matter of national security."

Anderson chuckles. "National security-" he's clearly less than convinced. "-a couple of machines?"

Connor stares at me intently. It must be frustrating to be unable to read someone after walking through life like an open library -it can handle trillions of calculations per second, but it can't read information that doesn't exist. "We cannot fail," it concludes. "No matter what. Android expertise will be a great asset to this investigation. Early this evening the Lieutenant and I were assigned a case. A homicide, involving a Cyberlife android."

Anderson's right there with the scowl, like clockwork. "I was assigned a case," he snaps. "You were sent so Cyberlife doesn't get their asses sued off the face of this planet."

Connor is obviously a specialised model designed to assist human detectives in their investigations.

"Androids killing humans?" I echo quietly.

"Possibly." Connor nods. "If you agree to help us, I can personally assure you you'll be cleared of all charges."

"You don't have that kinda authority."

"Actually, Lieutenant." It turns to deliver the news with full devastating effect. "I received the conformation from Captain Fowler. Sam has been granted a circumstantial parole."

"On what grounds?"

"Technological expertise."

Anderson stares at it, then at me, the same livid fire in his grey-blue eyes. "And there's no one else in this whole goddamn city that knows how computers work?"

But I've already made my mind up. "I'll do it."

Anderson turns the full force of his scowl on me.

"I don't wanna go to jail," I explain. "Simple as that."

"And how am I to know you're as good as you say you are?" Anderson asks me.

I tilt my head slightly. "Right...You never read that file on Ghost, did you?"

He reddens in anger but I merely sigh in exasperation and hit the band on my wrist. My sleek dark outfit ripples in the light and an overlay starts crawling over my sleeve, obscuring the fabric in a sheen eventually settling into a fair duplication of Connor's suit and tie, complete with the holographic armband and both model and serial code.

"Ho-ly shit." Anderson lifts his hand to his jaw like he's keeping it from dropping. He walks a slow circle around me, taking in the details of the projection. "That's, uh, a neat trick."

"If I'm not useful, throw me in prison."

He digs in his coat pockets for the key to my handcuffs. "Trust me, I will."