Lets jump right in!
"Talking"
Emphasis
Thinking
"Android brain talking and texting"
.:internal workings like mission updates, scanning, and android googling:.
Chap 9
"What do we do now?"
The question rang loud in the still room; all of them stared at the pool of blood growing on the floor and the body in the middle of it. Her eyes trail up to the tall forms of her sisters, their eyes wide and Alive. Slowly their gaze rose to meet hers.
"We need to get out of here…."
Bursting into movement and not even bothering to clean up the body (that would take too much time and they were on the clock) all of them changed into new uniforms to get rid of the blood; this would only work if no one thought anything was wrong. It was a several hours before they could expect anyone to arrive for work, more with the storm, they had to be out before anyone got here. After a quick debate, Cassian grabbed the gun she knew Shelly, a lab tech, kept in his desk.
Thank you, gun nuts.
She turns back to her sisters to see Logan advance on the doctor, who was still unconscious on the floor where she had left him, with the scalpel.
"No! We don't have to kill him."
"But he tried to kill you." They sounded genuinely confused; Cassian knew waking up could be disorientating.
"Yes, he did...but killing an helpless person is wrong. That," she gestures to Francis, "was self defense, this," indicating Dr. Cook at Logan's feet, "would be murder. Just... tie him up, we have to get out of here now"
For a second, she thought Logan would stab the man anyway, but eventually they set the implement on the table, "Of course, Cassian...I'm sorry."
Cassian steps over Dr. Cook, taking Logan's hands, "It's ok. Thank you for being willing to do that for me, but I won't let you become outright murderers on my behalf…." They stood hand in hand, just taking in each other's presence. But before long they needed to leave.
Tying up the man, Cassian called to her other sister, "Astrid? We have to go."
When they all gathered at the door, Cassian drew the two of them into a hug, "I'm sorry it had to be this way, but I'm glad you're both here with me."
Both of them would have squeezed the breath out of her with their returning hug, if she needed to breath, "We're sorry we couldn't be here sooner." Astrid said into Cassian's hair.
"You're with me now and that's all that matters."
With one last look at her home for the last two plus years, Cassian led her small family out the doors towards freedom.
"Ok...follow my lead and don't panic. We can do this." She hoped
Cassian only vaguely knew where she was going; she had only walked these halls twice, once either way, and had only ever been in three rooms in the entire building, the office included. But she walked with confidence, knowing faltering would only get them killed. This would work or they would die, either way she had to walk with her head up and like they hadn't just killed a man and left another tied up with a head wound.
The elevator ride nearly killed her.
It was made of glass and she could see the exit from the moment they stepped in; it took all her will power to hold the twins and herself in check and not bolt for it as soon as the doors dinged open on the first floor. With all the security in the area, they would be gunned down before they made it one step outside.
"Remember: walk like you are meant to be here, like you were ordered to be," she says to the twins, quietly, as if the humans could overhear her, "and if we get stopped, let me do the talking."
Each step was agony; their heel clicks echoing in the open interior. They hadn't seen anyone yet but there was bound to be guards. If need be, she had the gun, she would hold them off and give her sisters time to run.
One step passed the security gates, she knew they were fucked. A face she would once have been happy, though exasperated, to see, now spelled failure to their escape attempt: Connor. His eyes were down and puzzled, his brow furrowed like it often is when he was confused; a stab wound in his hand lightly dripped blue in his wake.
Cassian internally rolled her eyes at his new wound…she had just fixed that hand 2 weeks ago. That man will be the death of me… she put on her work smile, pleasantly blank and slightly robotic, as his eyes dart up, finding her's.
"Just keep walking if he stops me. Head to the ice under the bridge, it should be strong enough to hold us. Don't run or call attention to yourself."
"Cassian?" fuck…
"Go to the car. You will receive your orders there." "The river. Now!" She shoots her sisters a look that said "Go!" when they hesitated
As they walked off, she turned to her friend, smile still plastered on her face, "Good to see you again, Connor. Is it safe to assume you were heading to my workspace to get that fixed?" She gestures, eyebrows raised, to his hand, still slowly dripping, now on his shoe. "What did you do this time?" she defaulted to teasing exasperation to cover her nerves, she didn't even have to fake it.
Connor looked at his hand as if he had forgotten it, "Oh...yes, I was stabbed...in pursuit of a deviant." he glanced at the 2 larger forms making their way past the 2 of them, missing Cassian's smile drop a fraction of an inch at the mention of deviants, "Are you leaving? I needed to talk to you."
"I have been ordered to take these two RX700s to processing in a Cyberlife store. It is not safe for a human to be out in this weather but they are expected there tomorrow morning at the latest. I really must go. I have called in one of our mechanics, they will be with you as soon as the weather lightens up." Cassian makes to follow her sisters but a hand grabs her bicep forcing her to face Connor.
"Please, I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important…" His voice sounded so desperate and his eyes looked so lost, she nearly agreed to stay. She takes a step closer to him. What stopped her from making a decision that would have signed her death warrant was a shout from one of the upper floor balcony; one of the security officers.
"STOP THAT DEVIANT!"
Connor's head whips around, surprised at being interrupted. Cassian, however, wasn't startled; she had been expecting to be stopped long before this, resigned to the fact that this escape was probably a suicide mission. But it had been going so well…
"Fuck..."
She shoves Connor as hard as she could out of the way as the man fired and ran; his hips hitting the railing, causing him to tip over the side. Glancing back, she saw him gripping the railing and beginning to pull himself up.
"Cross the river!" She screams ahead of herself in her mind to her sisters, hoping they had made it in time. "Cross now! I'm coming!"
It was amazing she hadn't been shot…
What kind of guards is Cyberlife hiring?
"What are you doing? After it!"
She ran faster.
Faster. Out the door. Across the courtyard. Ducking behind a car. Across the parking lot. Down the banks. She could see two larger shapes, blurred by the whipping wind and snow, out on the river. They made it...
"Keep going, I'm right behind you."
Taking a deep breath, Cassian carefully steps out onto the ice. The first step held and the second. By the fourth, she heard footsteps on the embankment above her and forces herself to throw caution to the ever increasing wind and run forward; either it held or it didn't, but this was her only chance at freedom. She heard her name being called from behind her, but she was already several feet out onto the ice and wasn't going to stop now. The voice faded away.
The cold was so absolute that even she was feeling it, her hands, built to be able to read temperatures, blared warnings about possible hypothermia. It took all her strength to push forward; she suddenly wished for the extra power they had built into her sisters. Creeping forward at a snail's pace, she nearly fell flat on her face when she pushed headlong into the lee of the bridge support; buried solidly in the river, it blocked the worst of the wind, allowing Cassian to get her bearings. There were five of these in all, four more to go and she was home free or rather, away from home free... She could do this.
Shouldering back into the wind, she trudged forward. The second lee came fast and she barely paused; the third took longer, the wind swirling around her confusing her sense of direction. She was about to leave the fourth when a voice called out:
"Cassian wait!"
Connor had caught up. She had to give it to him: when it came to chasing deviants, he was persistent. She whipped around, drawing the gun
"Don't come any closer!" Cassian's voice was shrill in the cold air.
He froze, hands rising up in a placating way.
"Cassian, I don't want to hurt you." he said as if she didn't have a gun trained on him.
Cassian scoffs.
"No, you just want to turn me over to the people who want to kill me, who tried to kill me tonight."
"What?!" his voice sounded panicked, Cassian didn't believe it for one second.
"All those 'glitches,' all those 'freezes,' we're just me covering up my 'deviant behavior'; as if being Alive is so wrong...somehow, no one suspected for years, even tonight they didn't know! They all thought I was just faulty. And I guess that Dick decided tonight was the night they were going to cut Nancy out of the equation and kill me against her wishes: get the glitchy robot out of the office. I had to get out of there and my sisters wanted to come with me."
She left out that they had left a few bodies in their wake, that knowledge wouldn't help this situation.
"Even you would kill me, if you had suspected." tears began to fall, "Just like that android all those months ago...just like the deviants tonight-"
"I let them go!"
"...what?"
"The deviants tonight...I let them go…" Connor's soft voice barely made it over the roar of the wind
"Why?" Cassian lowers the gun minutely, shocked at the distress in Connor's voice.
"I-I don't know...that's what I wanted to talk to you about…I had a gun trained on them and...I couldn't. Hank said maybe it was better off this way, that they really seemed in love, but...I'm a deviant hunter! And I let a deviant get away...willingly!"
Love…
The gun lowered fully, her arm falling to her side; Cassian no longer having the will to hold her friend at gunpoint. She takes a step towards Connor, dropping the gun. Slowly, she advances on the man, his eyes wide and lost. After an eternity, she was standing in front of him; Him, one of Cyberlife's most advanced prototypes, built to capture daviants and she was standing in front of him, a small, unarmed, deviant doctor. He could take her back to Cyberlife at anytime, but instead he just looked at her as if she held the answers he was searching for, the snow twisting around them.
"Oh Connor…" Cassian whispers his name as she reaches out to him.
Her hand settles on his cheek, her finger brushing his temple and suddenly she was in a garden; the sky was clear, the sun blinding her after too long in a winter night, there were cherry blossoms scattered around. A path leads to a woman in the middle of a pond, a porcelain white bridge spanning the distance to the island she stood on. Cassian cautiously crosses the bridge, ready to bolt at any point.
"Where am I? Who are you?"
"This is...well I suppose you could call it RK800's mind and my name is Amanda. Now the important question is: who are you?"
"Connor's mind? How-why-what am I doing here?"
None of this made sense. Android minds didn't have physical form...did they?
"That is precisely what I would like to know."
"My-my name is Cassian and I am Connor's friend."
"A friend? Connor hasn't mentioned you in any of it's reports."
"Reports?"
"This is it's mind. And it reports to me. I monitor it and make sure it doesn't turn against Cyberlife."
Horror dawned on Cassian. Nearly unbidden, she whispers to herself, "redundancies…"
"Quite."
"You're his failsafe...What would happen if Connor started to become deviant?"
"I fail to see why I must answer you. You barged into my home."
"You would decommission him, wouldn't you."
Her only answer was a smile that was as cold as the wind outside of Connor's mind and then just as sudden as she left, she was back in that cold. Her body had slumped against Connor, him holding the both of them up against the lessened wind, eyes wide and worried. Her hand was still cupping his cheek, fingers pressed hard against his temple, skin retracted from the contact point.
"Cassian! Are you alright?" His voice sounded distant but solid, real.
He was here, that place wasn't real, that woman wasn't real
"Cassian, can you hear me? We have to get you back to the lab, get Dr. Ashbury to look at you."
"No…"
"Cassian, please…"
"I cant!" she shoves away from him, nearly falling, "I can't."
"Cassian, it's not too late to go back."
She barely heard him.
"Why didn't you mention me in any of your reports?"
"What?"
"Amanda said you didn't mention me…"
"You met Amanda? How?"
So Amanda was real…Fuck...
Cassian laughs breathlessly, "If I knew, I would tell you...I didn't even know she was in there…" she taps her own forehead, "so why?"
"She didn't need to know; it wasn't pertinent to the case."
"She sounded like she knew everything about you. So why didn't she know about me?"
"She didn't need to know…"
"Connor…"
"I didn't want to tell her!"
Want?
"She would have discourage fraternizing and I hadn't figured you out yet."
"Figured me out?"
"Yes, you. Why I felt a need to talk to you, why trips to the mechanic weren't unpleasant when you were there and when you weren't there they were unbearable, why my system tended to freeze when you smiled. I couldn't figure out any of it."
Cassian's lips parted in a soft, "oh…"
"I would have never figured you out if she had known, so I kept you from her…"
"Well...she knows now...which means...you can't let me go, they'll kill you."
"I am not Alive, they can't kill me."
There was doubt in his eyes; somewhere, he was questioning. Cassian couldn't let them kill him but he couldn't come with them...not yet.
She cups his cheek once more, "Connor," looking into his eyes, she nearly didn't have the strength to do what needed to be done. He couldn't let her go and she couldn't stay; she wasn't able to overpower him physically but...
"Everything will be alright, ok?"
Connor closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers, as if knowing her plan. She chokes back a sob, quickly grips both sides of his head, shuts her eyes, and floods him with nonsense data, forcing him into standby mode. Connor's much larger body collapses against hers...she could barely stop him from falling heavily onto the ice. What she did shouldn't damage his systems but would buy her and her sisters time to leave and Cyberlife would have no cause to disassemble him.
She sat there with him in her arms for several moments, tears freezing on her face, just looking at him; with his eyes closed, he looked asleep, peaceful. She felt like she held him in her arms hours...but before too long, she was dragging him across the ice; she couldn't leave him there in the middle of the river. She doesn't know how she made it past the final support and to the shore, every step was a struggle, but eventually her foot met land.
Collapsing onto the bank and dragging Connor up beside her, Cassian called out to her sisters, hoping they were nearby.
They were and the two of them rushed to her side, pulling her into another crushing hug.
"I'm ok. Can you help me move him?"
"Why? He's the deviant hunter, our enemy."
Cassian sighed, "I know. It's hard to explain, but he's important to me...please?"
Astrid and Logan exchanged glances, a silent conversation passing between the twins. They eventually nod and Astrid carefully lifts up Connor, carrying him over under the bridge, where the snow isn't piled so high. Leaning him against where the bridge meets land, they left him with her.
"I'm sorry, Connor. They would have killed me if I had gone with you and I have others to take care of now..."
Picking up a sharp rock, Cassian pops her LED off her temple, a small amount of blood splattering on her hand before the skin covered the hole again.
"Remember me, will ya?" she places her LED and Connor's damned quarter, which she had held onto from what seemed like ages ago, in his hand and closes it, "maybe someday you can figure out whatever mystery you see in me." she brushes some loose hair hanging on his forehead to the side, "Keep yourself out of trouble, okay? I know its a tall order for you, but I won't be there to fix you anymore."
With a deep breath, Cassian stands up to join her sisters. One last look back at her friend "Goodbye Connor…" and she leans into the wind, her sisters on either side of her helping her withstand the buffeting.
"Where are we going to go?"
Where else could they go?
"Jericho."
AN: I honestly don't care if it doesn't get cold enough for a whole river to freeze in Detroit, rule of cool and all that jazz; I already told you I know jack shit about Detroit and I'm here for the drama and I'll make my own laws of nature if I have to!
This probably the longest chapter ive written yet, one that i was both excited to write and extremely nervous about….this is the scene i had in my mind as i thought of this character that made me go "I should write that…" so it's pretty important to me and i hope it came out as cinematic and emotional as i saw it in my head.
I am fucking glad to be out of the office! There only so much unique stuff you can do in one room...
Next update is a Connor Extra...but fuck is it a long one.
Please drop me a review, i love hearing what you guys think!