It was a cold and rainy day on the first of October, and the long awaited trial against the now infamously disgraced former mayor Walter Nero was finally about to begin. As expected the courthouse was packed with reporters, cops and nosy gossips. Every precinct in the city had been requested to provide some form of security over the building to ensure that no one tried to pull any stunts either for or against the mayor to ensure things progressed as smoothly as possible. With the courtroom being secured tightly, inside and out, with only the most absolutely essential of personnel granted clearance, one might assume that an alien had revealed itself in the courtroom, and was now being guarded by the C.I.A. to prevent intergalactic warfare.

Due to his personal nature with the mayor, Hank having been openly mistrustful of the mayor for years and filing a report against the mayor when the mayor's private meeting with Markus wasn't as private as it should've been - the near assassination of Markus and murder of Connor wasn't going to go unspoken, Hank had been asked to sit in the prosecution's lobby in the event he was summoned as a character witness. Connor had been extended the same courtesy for the same reason, and was now patiently sitting in the lobby alongside his best friend in thick silence.

Tense and not wanting to return to the witness stand Connor fidgeted with his coin over the knuckles of his right hand, then tossed it to his left palm, then tossed it back to his right hand to spin the quarter on its side atop his index fingertip. The graceful and fluid motion was impressively silent and Hank didn't pay it any mind.

Without his phone to entertain himself Hank had settled for one of his favorite books, the cover worn out and the pages faded and yellowed from age and wear, and was completely enthralled with the mystery despite already knowing how the mystery was going to be solved. As he turned the page to end his current chapter and begin the next, Hank glanced to Connor at his side and decided to mark his page before putting the book down for a moment.

"Nervous?"

"...Anxious." Connor replied in a low tone as he held the quarter between his right index and middle fingertips. "I don't want to testify. All I can do is confirm that he hired a bigot for as a bodyguard who attempted to kill me when I protected the mayor and Markus from a would-be assassin. It's not an important example considering the mayor has already made it easy to see how unscrupulous and corrupt he truly is."

"I don't blame ya'. My guess is since we're detectives who are against the mayor, without even working on the case against him to get all the juicy little details to fuel that particular mistrust, that we're going to be nothing more than the pretty bow to top off their well put-together case against the smug son of a bitch."

"I don't appreciate being used."

"Same. But we gotta' do what we gotta' do to get that asshole behind bars."

The door to the lobby opened quietly as a bailiff appeared and nodded at Connor from where he stood. "Sergeant Wolf?"

"Yes?" Looking toward the officer Connor acknowledged his presence.

"You've been requested to speak to Prosecutor Jesse Dewan in private."

"Private? May I ask-"

"I don't know what he wants, sir. I was simply asked to escort you to see him in his office."

"I see." Standing up from the bench Connor sensed a red flag hanging in the air, but he was unsure of what was making him feel uneasy. "Very well."

With the coin still in his right hand Connor accompanied the bailiff out of the lobby and down the corridor.

Hank sighed and picked up his book to continue where he had left off. Only able to read over the chapter's title Hank also picked up on the red flag, and needed to know why he was suddenly on edge. Closing the book Hank slipped it into the interior pocket of his coat and crossed his arms over his chest as he leaned back in the bench, and stared at the door to await Connor's return.

The minutes ticked by slowly. Ten minutes, then twenty and finally thirty. There was no sign of Connor or the bailiff who had requested the deviant's presence.

Glancing down at the watch he had gotten for his birthday wrapped around his left wrist, Hank saw the time and decided he had enough of waiting.

"Fuck it."

Standing up from the bench Hank swore internally as the hard surface quickly stiffened the muscle in his back and legs, requiring him to stand still for a moment before slowly turning his back from side to side to loosen up the sore muscles. Approaching the door Hank turned the aged brass knob and left the lobby behind to try to figure out where his partner and best friend had gone.

The corridor was quiet save for the two officers standing at either end of the corridor to remain vigil during the high-stakes trial. The two officers knew who Hank was, and had no problem with the senior detective walking the corridor in search of his partner. As Hank reached the far end of the corridor that lead to where the prosecution's temporary office was located, he noticed that the office door was left slightly ajar and there was no one inside the room.

"What the hell? Hey." Turning to face the younger male officer standing just a few feet behind him Hank called out to him in a stern voice. "Have you seen Sergeant Wolf?"

"Not for the past half hour, sir."

"What?"

"I saw him and a bailiff walking in the opposite direction from the lobby about a half hour ago."

"All right, thanks..."

Knowing that the red flag in the air wasn't just a false alarm or a response to the tension in the courtroom, Hank hurried down the corridor to ask the second officer what she had seen while on watch. As he approached the younger officer Hank asked about Connor and was directed toward the secondary corridor leading to the courthouse's rear door.

"Why in the fuck did he go out there?"

"I didn't ask, sir." The rookie officer was more confused by Hank's reaction than worried. "He was with the bailiff and I assumed he was being escorted to a more secretive location due to the fragility of the case."

"Ah, shit! Who was the bailiff? I need a name."

"I-I don't know, sir. I didn't-"

"Fuckin' hell!"

Marching away from the officer and toward the backdoor Hank threw it open and looked about the rain soaked parking lot for any other officer or patrol in the area. No one else was around. Feeling a tightness form in his chest Hank looked around the opened area in the back of the courthouse as he took a few steps out into the opened parking lot. Stepping forward he felt and heard something hard grind under his shoe.

Glancing down as he pulled his right foot back Hank saw a quarter laying on the rain soaked blacktop and knew who had dropped it.

"Shit! No..."

Snatching the quarter up from the ground Hank examined it the shiny coin, noting that a coin of that age looking so clean and shiny would be only be possible by someone actively taking care of it, and saw by the mint date that it was in fact the coin Connor had taken after leaving his original coin with his original body up at the cabin. As he turned the coin over carefully in his fingers Hank saw a smear of fresh blue Thirium over the metallic surface that made his stomach turn and his heart race.

"Connor..."

Holding onto the coin in a tight grip in his right palm Hank backed away from the area and rushed back into the courthouse to get some help.

"Hold on, son. I'll find you!"

Time was now of the essence.

The deviant detective had been abducted.

Everything was dark and the silence was deafening. As his visual processors slowly rebooted and his audio processors came back online Connor was greeted with grainy black and white images that steadily filled with color, while the silence became a ringing echo in his ears. A warning regarding damage to the front of his head and the back of his left shoulder blade, graced his vision in red text. The last recorded memory the deviant had was of entering the parking lot alongside the bailiff before feeling the sharp pain in his left shoulder blade followed immediately by a powerful jolt of electricity. As the jolt passed through his body Connor's system was knocked offline and everything suddenly went dark.

The feeling returned to his previously numb body very slowly. Flexing his fingers Connor felt the extremities flinch from behind himself and Connor realized his arms were bound behind his back. Lifting up his head as his neck hung limply over the back of the chair, Connor glanced about and discovered that he had been bound in chains to a metal folding chair that had been left in the middle of a cold and dimly warehouse.

A single dull yellow lightbulb hung over Connor's head as the sound of a distant pipe leaking droplets of water echoed impossibly loud in the opened space. In the nearby wall a large fan designed to vent out the warehouse spun slowly as if the power in the building was working on bare minimum.

Instinctively Connor tried to send out a cybernetic distress call but there was too much lead in the walls of the warehouse that prevented the cybernetic signal from getting through the thick surfaces. Leaning forward in the chair as much as he could, the chains were wrapped tightly over his chest, forearms and ankles, Connor felt the drops of Thirium rolling down his face from the wound in his right brow from where he had hit the pavement when he collapsed.

"...H-Hank."

His voice was shaking with a notable fear as he instinctively called out to the one person he trusted more than anyone else in the world.

"...Help me."

Standing in the courthouse's rear parking lot with his hands on his hips Hank barked at Captain Fowler as the commanding officer came to the courthouse to investigate the apparent kidnapping that had take place right under his nose. The patrol cars in the area hadn't seen anything unusual, none of the officers inside the courthouse had reported any bizarre activity or unauthorized personnel wandering the premises, and no one had heard any disturbances in the area. Choosing to keep the kidnapping entirely quiet, and only within the Central Precinct to ensure no one could let the media know a potential key witness against the mayor disappeared, Hank had no choice but to begin the investigation himself.

Despite Captain Fowler's protests about handling the cas Hank told the seasoned detective to back off and told him to the tell the prosecution that he was no longer available as a witness. Pulling the two patrolling officers who had seen Connor and the bailiff into the prosecution's office Hank asked them for details and took their statements. Neither officer detected anything hostile from the bailiff or saw Connor in any distress, and they both gave a description of the bailiff confirming that it was the same man who asked for Connor to leave the lobby.

Going through the courthouse records on a provided laptop Hank failed to locate the bailiff in the manifest, and with that his heart sank. Whoever took Connor away wasn't really a bailiff at all. Who he was and why he led Connor away had yet to be discovered.

"Fuck me..." Rubbing his palms over his face Hank sighed in mounting frustration as he double-checked the manifest to make sure he didn't accidentally overlook the person he was looking for. None of the bailiff's matched the man's description. "Where's the damn security footage? It should've been here by now!"

"It's right here." Skye herself appeared in the office with a second laptop in her hands. She wasn't acting as the mayor's defense attorney in any capacity, and simply had the misfortune of trying a different case in the courthouse the same day of the mayor's trial. "I volunteered to help out."

"How in the hell do you know what's going on?"

"My boss told me to stay in the courthouse and cooperate with the cops because of 'suspicions of malicious intent' with a witness had been reported. When I tried to reach Connor cybernetically to ask if I should be worried and didn't get a response... Well, I realized that 'malicious intent' was aimed at Connor."

"Shit." Not surprised she put two and two together, Hank sighed and rubbed his palm over the back of his neck. "Who else knows?"

"No one else in the courthouse." Placing the second laptop down next to the first for Hank to use, Skye stood back and nervously began biting at her purely aesthetic fingernails. "My case is closed and I'd rather be helping you than sitting down in the defense's office waiting to be told I can go home."

"Thanks... Oh, wait." Hank held up the notepad with the bailiff's likeness recorded by himself and the two other officers, and let her see it. "Do you know this bailiff?"

Accepting the notepad while Hank checked through the courthouse's security footage on the new laptop Skye read the description out loud. "Tall, mid-twenties, pale skin, gray eyes, blond hair, and a... scar along his left bottom lip toward his jaw."

"Know him?"

"Y-Yeah, but... he's not a bailiff."

Hearing that made Hank's blue eyes widen and skin grow cold. "What? Who is he and how did he get clearance to be in the courthouse?"

"This man is one of the janitors." Handing back the notepad Skye used her right palm and showed Hank a holographic image of the suspect's face. "This guy, right?"

Looking at Skye's palm Hank saw the face of the man who escorted Connor away. "That's the fucker! Name?"

"His name is Cameron McCullough."

"All right..." Checking through the courthouse manifest Hank came across the man and glared at the image on the primary laptop's screen. "There's the asshole. Let's see, he's on the custodial team in this courthouse and has been for six years. No criminal record or history of misconduct or violence, so why did he lead Connor away, and where is he now?"

"Not sure. As far as I know the entire custodial staff had been requested to not come to the courthouse until later tonight after the trial ends for the day."

"Why do I get the feeling this McCullough prick is in someone's back pocket?"

"I hope you're wrong."

"So do I." Checking through the security footage Hank sent Captain Fowler the name and image of the man who abducted Connor, and replayed the footage on the second laptop. Seeing Connor being escorted down the corridor and out the backdoor abruptly ended as McCullough pulled a taser out of his right pocket and pressed the metal prongs against Connor's left shoulder blade. "Shit! Connor was knocked unconscious."

Skye watched the footage and grimaced at the sight of her friend being rendered unconscious. "...I hope's going to be okay."

"He will be. I'm going to find Connor and get him to safety, then I'm kicking McCullough's ass straight to Canada."

Pausing the footage before it went black Hank zoomed in on a lone vehicle parked in the back area. The vehicle wasn't there when Hank went through the backdoor to locate Connor, which undoubtedly meant it was the get-away vehicle. Managing to get the first digits on the license plate, the make and model of the car, as well as the color, Hank send the additional details to Captain Fowler to aid in the search.

"I need to go grab Lucas and hunt for that damn car." Standing up from the desk Hank looked to Skye and gave her a simple request. "Close everything on these laptops and put them back where they belong. Don't talk to ANYONE who isn't a cop with the Central Precinct, ask to see their badge for confirmation. Keep a lookout for anyone else who has clearance to be here, but shouldn't be here YET. They might be working with McCullough."

"I'll do what I can, Hank."

"Thanks. Keep your chin up and your eyes open." Patting Skye's shoulder as he passed her by Hank tried to maintain and air of confidence as he left the office to go on the hunt. "We won't give up on finding Connor just as he'd never give up on us."

Despite his best efforts Connor couldn't break through the thick metal chains that had kept him bound to the chair, and was exhausting himself quickly. Unable to slip his wrists or ankles through the strong chains Connor was at the mercy of his captor as he sat in the middle of the oddly cold room. It was getting steadily colder as the rainy afternoon turned to a rainy evening. Connor's system began warning him of the dropping temperature but there was nothing he could do to stave off the cold. Struggling against the icy cold metal binds as he shifted his weight from side to side in the chair to try to break free, Connor repeatedly tried sending out cybernetic distress signals for help.

From the darkness behind Connor a large metal door opened and then slammed shut with a heavy echo. Footsteps crossed the room from the doorway and came to a stop as a blond haired man stood before the captive deviant. In the dim glow of the overhead light Connor recognized the face of the bailiff from the courthouse, and knew he had been set up."

"...How much were you paid to abduct me?" Connor asked in a hoarse whisper.

"Enough." McCullough pulled a switchblade from his left pocket and let it glisten in the overhead light as he extended the blade for Connor to see. "Hard to believe that someone like you, a chunk of overpriced plastic, would be granted the honor of 'cop' while I get stuck on mop duty in the courthouse."

"...Clearly you aren't cut out to be a cop."

"Shut up!" Slicing a fresh cut into Connor's right cheek with the knife McCullough's gray eyes went wild with rage. "You don't know anything about me!"

As the fresh Thirium wept from the long laceration over his face Connor's L.E.D. cycled in a steady yellow while he bit back with his own retort. "I know that if you couldn't even get accepted into the police academy-"

McCullough punched Connor in his stomach to try to silence him, but the deviant only coughed once and caught his breath.

"...If you can't even get into the police academy, then you'd never survive on the streets."

"You disrespectful-"

"Respect is earned, not given." Connor knew that enraging the man was a dangerous tactic, but he also knew that humans were more likely to give away details and secrets they didn't want to mention when under emotional duress. "You need to earn something and never expect it to be handed over to you."

"Shut your fucking mouth!" Punching Connor in the left side of his jaw once, then twice, McCullough then punched Connor in the left eye and took a step back from his prisoner. "You plastic freaks think you can just do what you want because you look human?!"

"...It's better to appear human than to be a monster."

"There's that mouth again!" Punching Connor's stomach again McCullough was desperate to get Connor to let out a scream of pain or beg for mercy. "You don't know anything about me, but here you are acting like you're better than me!"

"...Of the two of us, who is a detective and helping people and who is holding another person captive and attempting to threaten them?"

"You piece of shit!" Using the knife McCullough angrily stabbed the weapon into Connor's left shoulder and watched as the deviant's L.E.D. flashed to red and pulsed rapidly in tandem with his racing heartbeat. Leaving the weapon embedded in the torn artificial skin and fractured plastimetal beneath McCullough tried to intimidate his prisoner. "You can't keep your mouth shut, so I'll shut it for you."

Connor hissed in pain and closed his eyes as the warnings appeared in his vision regarding the new stab wound in his left shoulder. Refusing to show fear in the eyes of his captor Connor looked up at McCullough and ran a profile on the man's face to gain new information. Cameron McCullough was twenty-two years old, lived with three roommates in a small apartment downtown, single, had held down his job as a courthouse custodian for six years and had his application to the police academy rejected three times. It also included a juvenile record that, while expunged, would still make it very difficult, if not completely impossible to get any job regarding law enforcement.

The information was flickering in and out as the cybernetic connection to the outside world was weak, and couldn't get enough range to send out a distress signal to anyone who may be in the area. What Connor was able to uncover painted an ugly picture of his captor and made his hatred toward Connor somewhat logical.

"...You were rejected from the academy."

McCullough was getting mad at Connor's stubborn nature. "I told you to shut up!"

"Multiple times."

Grabbing a spare metal chain from the floor McCullough swung it like a bat toward Connor's legs just below his knees to harm him. "SHUT. UP."

"...Ps-Psychological profile." Connor managed to get out as he refused to acknowledge the pain he was enduring. "...You were deemed unworthy of being a cop."

Using the chain to strike Connor's in his jaw again McCullough wanted to silence the deviant as brutally as possible. "Why won't you shut up?!"

"...T-Too volatile. Too apathetic." Speaking through his clenched teeth that were stained blue with his own blood, Connor continued to talk despite his jaw being physically cracked by the most recent strike. "...Too crazy."

"Crazy?!" Dropping the chain on the floor with a loud bang McCullough grabbed Connor by his hair with his left hand, and yanked the deviant's head backward. Grabbing onto the knife with his right hand McCullough twisted the blade around the wound before yanking it from Connor's shoulder. "I'll fucking show you crazy!"

"L-Like you did to Ralph?"

McCullough froze as he gave Connor a lost look about the unfamiliar name.

"That was his name." As he spoke Thirium ran from the corners of his mouth and stained his blazer and white dress shirt blue. "The android you and your friends attacked and disfigured in the park."

"...That blond freak!?" Letting go of Connor's hair McCullough continued to stand before him and point the knife at the deviant's face. "It wasn't-"

"His name was Ralph." Connor replied in an impressively calm tone. "He was doing what he was assigned to do, and you mangled him for fun. You were slapped with a malicious destruction of property charge, and Ralph was damaged so severely that he began attacking humans who got too close to him. Your actions turned a docile person into a deranged maniac who attacked innocent humans and destroyed many deviants because he was delusional about deviant mortality and deities."

"So what? It was a machine!"

"One who became violent because of what YOU did to him." Spitting the blood from his mouth and onto McCullough's shoes Connor was determined to pain McCullough as the villain he was. "He attacked me one night, and my partner had to shoot him to save my life. He died the day you and your friends attacked him, his heart just didn't know to stop beating until last winter."

"Can't kill a machine."

"If that's the case then why don't you prove it? You can't cut it as a cop, but clearly you can make it as a criminal!"

"SHUT UP!" The angry outburst echoed loudly in the warehouse as McCullough used the knife to stab Connor's shoulders and stomach repeatedly before leaving the knife embedded in Connor's torso in favor of using the dropped chain once more. Whipping Connor's legs, torso and upper chest with the chain McCullough broke a sweat, and only stopped swinging when he needed to catch his breath. "Fuck you! Just... fuck you."

Connor's system was overwhelmed with the severe damage he had sustained due to the stab wounds and chain strikes. The deviant's chest plating had been fractured and his torso was bleeding from the dozens of stab wounds marring his abdomen. Internally Connor was bleeding courtesy of his loosened Thirium lines leaking throughout his abdominal and chest cavities, and several biocomponents had suffered structural damage that caused the delicate and vital machinery to stutter as they struggled to remain active.

Too tired to continue the assault McCullough dropped the chain on the floor and he too dropped to the floor to sit down and catch his breath. "...You think you know everything about me, don't you?"

"...Kn-Know enough." The wounded deviant's words were beginning to slur with an electronic reverb as his power levels continued to drop.

"I know what android you're talking about." McCullough admitted that he remembered Ralph and what he did to him. "I didn't want to mess with it, but my buddies said if I didn't I'd be a punk. So, I did it. Piece of plastic actually tried to talk us like we cared after he started having some fun."

Connor's vision began to flicker as his power level and Thirium volume dropped to sixty-seven percent and seventy-four percent respectively. He could feel his heart thundering in his chest and taste the blue blood in his mouth. As he fought to breathe through his cracked chassis and partially functioning ventilation biocomponents a shutdown timer had appeared in his vision.

Fortunately it hadn't begun ticking down just yet.

"That night I got a visit from the cops because they got a look at my face on the park's surveillance cameras." McCullough continued on in a low voice. "I was seventeen and could be tried as an adult, but the court was lenient and just gave me three months of probation and a fine for destroying public property, all because I was already working part time as a janitor in the courthouse. My friends were never charged with anything because the camera only saw me and the cops only recognized me. They actually laughed at me and said I was bitch for admitting to what I did, even though I didn't rat them out."

Unable to focus his vision Connor just closed his eyes and tried again and again to send a cybernetic distress message to anyone he could think of, but the lead in the walls was too abundant and Connor's own energy was too low to get the message sent. Knowing his time was running out Connor tried to think of a way to talk to his captor and get some more answers as to what was going on.

"...Y-Your record k-k-kept you from g-going to the ac-cademy."

"Yeah. Those fuckers think because I broke a damn machine that I'm too dangerous to be a cop!"

"...Your ARE t-t-t-oo dangerous t-to be a c-c-cop."

The remark made McCullough see red. "What did you just say?"

"L-Look at wh-what you've d-done to me." Blue tinted artificial saliva and Thirium dripped from his lips as he spoke. "...Wh-Why? Why am I even h-here?"

Scoffing at the question McCullough arrogantly laughed in Connor's face. "You're the detective. Figure it out!"

"...C-Couldn't be a c-cop. So you st-stayed a j-j-janitor to work in the c-courthouse, so you c-could be close to r-real cops." Trying to rile McCullough up even further Connor knew that he'd get the hot-headed man to crack. "...Y-You stole a b-bailiff's unif-form when you c-cleaned their locker r-room l-last night. You're p-posing as a b-bailiff because the m-mayor paid you o-off."

McCullough's gray eyes widened as he hadn't expected Connor to actually piece together what had happened and why.

"...Th-This is an-nother distraction a-attempt. W-Won't work."

"What're you talking about? You're here and no one at the courthouse is going to find you!"

"...N-Not a key w-witness. The t-trial will proceed n-n-normally without m-me."

McCullough's pale complexion began to redden with anger as his exhausted hands began to tighten into angered white knuckled fists.

"...Y-You took me a-away in f-f-front of m-my partner. H-He knows y-your face. He kn-knows your c-c-car. He kn-knows h-how to find me."

"No, I covered my tracks. I switched cars in a nearby alleyway, he can't track me."

Opening his eyes Connor stared at McCullough through his swollen eyes as he fought to breathe through his damaged and constricted chest. "...C-Can't clean up Th-Thirium traces."

"What?"

"...M-My blood."

"So what? It's not like you bled all over the road and left a trail! Even so, it's raining."

"...M-My blood is u-unique. It c-can create a unique s-s-signature." As the blood poured down his face from the numerous lacerations, his bloodied nose and bloodied lip, Connor sat covered in the very signature that could be tracked when the correct tool was used. "...I'll be f-found. Y-You will be ch-charged."

"You really think anyone's going to stop the trial to come and find you?"

"Th-The mayor s-seems to think so. Y-You should, t-too."

It was as if a light went off in McCullough's mind as he realized what Connor was talking about. Taking Connor had been a distraction tactic by the mayor, but it wasn't necessarily a tactic to stall the trial as it was to try to discredit the security and integrity of the courthouse itself. If the entire courthouse was given negative publicity then public opinion might sway in the mayor's favor out of misplaced sympathy, and change the jury's minds.

"The m-mayor s-s-set you up." Struggling to speak as the blood collected in his mouth and his voice shook with electronic reverb, Connor made it very clear that McCullough was nothing more than a pawn. "...Y-You're going to s-suffer because of his d-decision and gr-greed. Once a p-punk, always a punk."

"You plastic fucker..." Rising to his feet in a rage McCullough grabbed the chain from the ground and hastily smash it down over top Connor's right knee. The plastimetal frame cracked audibly with a sickening 'crunch' and Thirium began oozing from the opened frame through Connor's jeans. "If I'm going to go down because of you, then I might as well go all the way... See you in Hell!"

Recruiting Lucas alone to begin sweeping through the city in search of Connor or his captor, Hank slowly drove the Oldsmobile through the street and waited for the deviant's scanner to pick up on the correct vehicle's license plate number. The deviant detective had the ability to run a scan over the tags of every car in the street as he passed them by, and was using such a scan to try to find the car that had been the captor's vehicle. The rain was making it difficult to see with human eyes, but Lucas's infallible android vision was able to easily pierce through the thick rain and gray mist as his scanner detected and ran the information of every single license plate the car passed.

Hank was being silent as he believed it'd help Lucas to concentrate, and because he simply didn't know what to say. Lucas was being equally quiet as he focused on his task and sent out a cybernetic signal trying to detect Connor's unique signature.

As the car passed by the industrial district seven blocks East of the courthouse Lucas's green eyes widened and his yellow L.E.D. flashed to red. "Hank, I found the car."

"Where!? Hitting the brakes hard the Oldsmobile's tires squealed as the car came to a fishtailing stop on the rain slicked street. "Where's Connor?"

"I don't know where Connor is." Opening his passenger side door Lucas rushed out of the car and into the rain as he jogged to a nearby alleyway. Sensing Hank joining him in the alley Lucas confirmed that the car was the correct vehicle and proceeded to run a scan of the car's interior. "We found the car used to transport Connor from the courthouse, but I cannot detect Connor in the area."

"Shit..." Putting his hands to his hips Hank watched as Lucas pulled open the front driver's side door and the rear driver's side door of the car to begin looking for clues. "The kid's hurt and he might still be unconscious."

Lucas's scanner picked up on Connor's blue blood soaked into the backseat and floorboards, and noted that it had long since evaporated after the material absorbed it. Exiting the car Lucas checked the opposite end of the alley and tried to find a trail to follow through the rain, but failed.

"...Nothing?"

"Not yet. We know that Connor is wounded and bleeding. It's safe to assume that the captor switched vehicles to try to elude the police. Normally I'd be able to track Connor down through his blood's unique signature, but without a fresh trace to follow I can't do it."

"How come Connor can't do that? He can see blue blood but he can't track deviants like a bloodhound picking up a scent in the air."

"I'm the finished design. CyberLife clearly saw how limited Connor had been during his time as their hunter and decided to give me an upgrade that he never obtained, even as a prototype." Cybernetically confirming the car's sighting with patrol Lucas began walking back to the Oldsmobile hastily to get out of the cold rain. "It's not of much use now."

As Hank joined Lucas inside the Oldsmobile the senior detective had an interesting idea. "You said you need a fresh trace of Connor's blood, right?"

"That's right." Slamming the passenger door shut beside himself Lucas confirmed the question. "I can detect his processor's signature at all times, but the Thirium would help me detect his location sooner without needing to connect with his processor."

"And the blood in the car won't work?"

"No. Too much of it had been absorbed by the soft material making it nearly impossible to get a clean sample to trace."

Reaching into his coat pocket Hank showed Lucas the quarter that still had its side 'tails' side covered in Connor's blood. The metal surface didn't absorb the blood and the rainy weather kept the blood from drying even as it rested in Hank's pocket. "How about this?"

"The Thirium hasn't begun to evaporate yet." Accepting the coin Lucas pressed the bloody quarter to his tongue to give his system a fresh and recent sample of Connor's Thirium signature to detect. Within milliseconds Lucas's processor was bombarded with all the information he needed, and what looked like a faint blue mist appeared in Lucas's vision as his program found the trail at last. "It worked."

Shutting his own door Hank shifted the car out of park and prepared to resume the search. "Where do we go?"

"Continue down this street and turn left." Pocketing the coin for himself Lucas pointed Hank in the right direction. "We'll find him in one of the warehouses."

With the breath knocked out of his body Connor spit the egregious amount of blue blood from his mouth and onto the dirty warehouse floor at his feet. The chain had fractured every panel in his chest and torso, and it had broken his right knee. The switchblade peppered small bloody holes throughout his stomach, and his left shoulder was left entirely useless courtesy of the taser and the stab wound it had suffered. Both of Connor's eyes were swollen shut and Thirium was pouring out of his nose and lips down his face. The break in jaw made it hard for Connor to keep his mouth completely shut as he endured strike after strike after strike at McCullough's enraged hands.

Wiping the sweat from his brow onto the back of his right hand McCullough stood before Connor and could see the red L.E.D. beginning to sporadically flicker with low power. Knowing he had inflicted critical damage to Connor's body the disgruntled janitor stood before the battered deviant and smirked wickedly.

Grabbing onto Connor's hair McCullough made the deviant face him as the Thirium trickled down his chin. "Had enough?"

The only response Connor had was a mouthful of bloody blue spit in McCullough's face.

"Piece of shit!"

Smacking Connor across the face with the chain one more time McCullough walked around the chair to stand behind the deviant and held the two ends of the chain in his hands to pull it taut. Lowering the middle of the chain to press against the front of Connor's throat, McCullough pulled the chain back toward himself and twisted the two ends around one another as he began to squeeze Connor's neck under the metal links.

"You're better off as scrap than a detective!"

Tightening the chain around Connor's throat McCullough began to effectively strangle the deviant from behind and cut off his already limited air supply under the swift and aggressive motion. The cold and hard metal of the chain easily suffocated the deviant and caused his core temperature to steadily rise as his stress levels increased, and the ventilation biocomponents failed to cool off Connor's system as necessary.

The countdown timer began to tick away as Connor's power level hit fifty percent and his Thirium volume dipped down to forty-eight percent.

WARNING:

EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN: 00:59:56

[...initiate emergency stasis mode: Y/N?]

[...error...]

[...unable to initiate emergency stasis mode]

[...emergency shutdown commencing: 00:59:47

Too weak to fight back and too damaged to resist the pressure around his throat, Connor's vision turned red and darkness began to tunnel around it rapidly. The sound of his own choking breaths slowly faded away as the high pitched ringing returned to his ears aggressively.

"You... brought this on yourself!"

"FREEZE!" Hank's voice echoed loudly and deeply off the walls of the warehouse as he kicked in the door and pointed his gun directly at McCullough's back. "GET DOWN ON THE GROUND, NOW!"

McCullough jumped to the side in shock and fear, his hands dropping the chain in the process. "...Shit."

"Don't run you little bastard!"

Not heeding Hank's wise words McCullough turned on his heels and began sprinting through the warehouse to get to another exit in the opposite direction from where the senior detective had entered.

Lucas charged through the doorway and quickly went after McCullough himself. "You take care of Connor! I got this!"

Holstering his gun to his right hip Hank rushed into the room under the yellow light and stood in front of Connor with wide blue eyes. "Connor?!"

The deviant's eyes were so swollen Hank couldn't tell if he was conscious or not. The dark blue bruising around Connor's throat was painful enough to look at, but the numerous weeping wounds made the senior detective feel sick to his stomach.

"Son?" Gently putting his right palm to Connor's cold left cheek Hank cupped the deviant's face and began visually checking over his wounds. "I'm here, son. You're going to be okay."

Unwrapping the Thirium coated chain from around Connor's throat, Hank then carefully unwound the chains from the deviant's ankles, chest and finally his arms. With the bindings all removed Hank pulled open Connor's gray blazer to see that the front of Connor's white dress shirt was soaked a deep sapphire blue with his own lost blood.

Pressing his right palm against Connor's chest Hank checked for a pulse and breathing, but could only feel a very weak and very erratic heartbeat under his touch.

"Shit... Hang on, son."

Very gently Hank positioned himself beside the chair to wrap his left arm around Connor's upper back and his right arm under Connor's knees. Scooping up the deviant into his arms Hank lifted Connor's limp and bloody body from the chair, and laid him down on his back on the cold hard floor. Pulling on the knot on the black tie Hank removed the dressy garment from around Connor's shirt collar, then pulled open the buttons of the white dress shirt to expose his bloody chest and abdomen.

"Ah... fuck!"

The torn open skin and sparking wounds made the damage to Connor's body all the more grotesque.

Carefully Hank placed one hand over top of the other, interlaced his fingers to create a single fist, squared up his shoulders and used the heel of his hand to press down on the center of Connor's battered chest to force his pump into a more stable rhythm. As the compressions caused Connor's entire chest to depress downward more Thirium oozed from the opened wounds and stained Connor's pale artificial skin a deep blue hue.

"Come on, kid. You're going to be okay."

Finishing the first round of compressions Hank bent his ear down to Connor's chest to listen to the heartbeat, but still heard an arrhythmic thump. The Thirium staining Connor's chest quickly stained the side of Hank's face, his long gray locks of hair and the side of his beard a matching shade of blue.

"No, Connor! Don't do that!"

From behind Hank and through the darkness Lucas emerged with McCullough in cuffs, and promptly shoved the young man over to a metal pole jutting up from the floor and connecting to the ceiling. Using a second set of handcuffs Lucas secured McCullough to the fixture. "Don't move."

Hank never stopped the compressions as Lucas knelt down on the opposite side of Connor's body across from himself. "He's not breathing and his pump's in an arrhythmic beat."

Removing the artificial skin from his left palm Lucas pressed his hand to Connor's forehead and connected his processor directly to his big brother. Closing his eyes Lucas ran a diagnostic, noted the shutdown timer and quickly overrode the timer as he forced Connor's system to enter emergency stasis mode to preserve his waning power.

"Connor, come on... You need to fight for us, son."

Lucas checked the structural integrity of Connor's throat and noted that the chain that had been wrapped around his neck had damaged the plastimetal and internal air intake line. "Keep doing what you're doing, Hank. Once I get him breathing again we'll get him to the car and drive him to the facility."

"No ambulance?"

"I can drive faster than an ambulance."

"Good answer."

Tilting Connor's head back Lucas used his palm to cup the back of Connor's neck to support him, then swiftly slipped Connor's arms out of his blazer one at a time. Tucking the blazer beneath Connor's neck Lucas used the garment as a type of supportive cushion, and then used the sleeves and the tie to hold the blazer in place to create a makeshift neck brace around Connor's damaged throat.

"That should work." Lucas watched as Hank stopped the compressions for another pulse check and then lowered his own ear to Connor's nose and lips to check for breathing. "Pulse?"

"Sounds better." Nearly out of breath from the physical exertion that came from performing C.P.R. Hank straightened up and watched as Lucas checked on his breathing. "...Is his neck okay?"

"It's not broken, but it is compromised." Waiting for ten seconds Lucas didn't hear or feeling any breaths and gave Hank a worried glance. Pinching Connor's nose shut Lucas carefully lowered Connor's broken jaw and gave his brother two rescue breaths that made Connor's bloody and battered chest rise and then slowly fall. "Come on, brother. Respond."

Hank put his left palm down on the center of Connor's chest and shook a little to try to get a reaction. "Breathe!"

As if waiting for the command Connor's ventilation program rebooted at last and he took in a breath on his own.

"That's it!" Moving his right palm over to Connor's head Hank rubbed his thumb through the deviant's dark locks of hair slowly. "Good job, son."

"I'll carry him." Lucas volunteered as he scooped his brother up from the floor in the same manner Hank used to get Connor out of the chair. Standing up slowly with Connor in his arms Lucas nodded at the door and motion for Hank to take the lead. "I'll follow."

"Right."

The moment the two detectives reached the door McCullough called out angrily from where he was cuffed. "Hey! You can't just leave me here!"

"Patrol's comin' to collect your sorry ass." Hank snarked as he jerked the door open and then braced it with his body to give Lucas clear passage. "Be glad we're not the ones taking you in, you worthless punk."

Being called a punk put McCullough into a rage that went ignored at the warehouse door slammed shut with a satisfying echo through the opened space.

Hank rushed out to the Oldsmobile through the rain and opened up the backseat door to sit down and support Connor's neck while Lucas made the hasty drive to the facility. Holding his deviant son's upper body over his lap after Lucas gently placed him down, and cradling Connor's neck with his left palm, Hank tried to ignore all the bloody wounds and just reminded himself that he had heard Connor's heartbeat himself and that he could still feel him breathing.

"Hold on, son." Speaking softly as Lucas closed the rear door and pulled open the driver's side door in front of him Hank hoped that in some way Connor could hear and understand his words. "You're going to be okay, I promise."

The cold rain made Hank shiver but he couldn't stand sitting in the waiting room of the Zeta Facility any longer. Letting the chilly deluge wash the Thirium from his hair, face and beard, Hank watched the rain puddle at his feet slowly turning blue as the blue blood was rinsed away. It had been three hours since Lucas charged through the facility doors with Connor unconscious in his arms, and it had been almost as long since Abby readily prepared the deviant for emergency repairs to save his life. Worried that the damage was too great for Connor's body to handle Hank had to repeatedly tell himself that he wasn't reliving the horrible night he lost Cole to internal injuries, and that Abby was a very skilled technician - not a quack surgeon high on 'red ice' or an android trying to do something it simply wasn't programmed to handle.

Feeling a strong hand rest on his right shoulder Hank turned to see Lucas staring at him with a reassuring grin on his face and blue L.E.D. in his temple. That grin was all Hank needed to see to know that Connor had pulled through and was going to be just fine.

"Come on, Hank." Lucas urged gently. "Connor should be waking up soon."

"Thank fuck... How bad was the damage?"

Leading Hank back through the front entrance and out of the rain Lucas noted that the senior detective was dangerously close to becoming hypothermic and decided to find him clean and dry scrubs after he was shown to Connor's recovery room. "The chain did compromise his internal air intake line, and so he's currently wearing a thick plastimetal neck brace to support his neck and throat as it heals."

Passing through the sliding doorway to gain access to the corridor leading down to the other rooms Hank began to tremble from the cold, and Lucas led him to the correct room.

"The taser and the knife effectively disabled his left shoulder, the human equivalent to a dislocated shoulder. The damage to his chest and torso caused numerous fractures to the front and axial frames, which would be like suffering from broken ribs. Numerous biocomponents were damaged and compromised by the knife and blunt force trauma, but were all repaired. The damaged Thirium lines were repaired as well. Essentially, Connor suffered internal hemorrhaging and will be sore in the same way a human would during their recovery period."

Hank didn't want to know but he needed to know. "...Which biocomponents were damaged?"

"The left ventilation biocomponent, his Thirium filter, his right sterilization filter and two of the large coolant lines in his abdomen were all damaged." Lucas lifted off in a dour voice. "None of the larger Thirial lines were affected, which means the blood loss came from his damaged lines and external injuries."

"What about his face? He looked like he went ten rounds with Muhammad Ali."

"The swelling is already reducing. Abby had to drain the trapped Thirium from around his eyes after it collected under his artificial skin." Standing outside the closed recovery room door Lucas braced Hank for everything he was about to see. "Connor also suffered a fracture to his jaw that will prevent him from speaking for twenty-four hours until the fracture heals itself. The numerous lacerations have all been sterilized and bandages appropriately, now he just needs to rest."

"Do you know what happened at the courthouse after the arrest?"

"Captain Fowler informed Prosecutor Dewan of the incident stating that an emergency situation arose, and that neither you or Connor would be able to be called as witnesses. Once Connor was found and McCullough arrested Dewan informed the judge of the stall tactic as McCullough gave up the mayor and showed him the personal check signed by the mayor himself to abduct Connor as proof. The evidence is quite damning."

"Shit..." Rubbing his damp beard Hank sighed despondently. "Do I want to know how much he was paid?"

"...Fifty-thousand dollars."

"Guess a couple grand is all that life is worth these days." Glancing at the closed door Hank took in a calming breath and put on a brave face as he slid the door open. Entering the room with Lucas at his side Hank stared at Connor's bruised face laying peacefully in the soft and warm recovery bed with Abby hovering over him. She was using her audioscope to listen to his chest through the pale blue scrub top Connor was now wearing. "Tough bastard is still with us."

Hearing Hank's voice made Abby straighten up as she draped the audioscope around her neck. "Stubborn patients are both a blessing a nightmare. Connor's going to make a full recovery, but as per protocol he needs to stay here overnight for observation."

Standing beside the bed Hank eyed the neck brace angrily, the blue support sling around Connor's left arm warily, and the blackened eyes sadly. Connor had a clear, plastic oxygen mask over his nose and mouth to ensure he took in cool breaths to keep his core temperature under control, and a Thirial activity monitor wireless recording his vital signs. By all account Connor was just asleep and not in any pain.

"Hey, son." Putting his right hand down lightly on Connor's right shoulder Hank made sure the deviant knew he was there. "I told you that you'd be fine. Just rest like that, and when you wake up I'll get to tell you all about how the mayor just put his own dumb ass behind bars..."

-next chapter-