He didn't know why he'd said that, nor why he'd said it the way he had. He was unsure of her reaction, but it seemed to be a good one. He liked the sound, though he wasn't sure why, and felt his lips curl up in a smile.
"We should go, then?" He said, clearing his throat and mentally flailing. He was out of his depth here.
Abby gave one more chuckle and smiled at him - more kindly than before, and for some reason he was happy about that - and then nodded.
He nodded in response and started walking in the vague direction of the car, and Abby quickly caught up so she could walk next to him. She trusted his own intentions, but she didn't trust whatever influence Helen still had over him. Rome wasn't built in a day, as the saying went: so a clone could not be freed completely this swiftly.
She was surprised by how much more like Connor he seemed, now that he had lost some of the robotic-ness. But it was a bit sad, not only because he most definately wasn't her Connor, but also because the poor clone had no idea of why he behaved the way he did, or much about the world around him at all. Maybe. Abby took a guess at how he felt.
"Bit like the blind leading the blind, yeah?" She said, wanting to fill the silence as they walked. Both of them were walking rather swiftly, but she'd run a good long distance from the car when he was pursuing her.
The clone looked at her, blinking.
"What?"
"Nevermind." She told him, shaking her head.
Dark, stuffy, and cold. The best summation of his cel he coudl come up with at present. Connor leaned his head against the wall, and shut his eyes. He hoped Abby was comign to find him - surely it wouldn't be too difficult to find him, right?
Surely, when he hadn't shown up for dinner last night, she would've noticed something was amiss, and simple deduction would've led them to Helen.
Except she was supposed to've been dead, killed by a mix of a raptor and a cliff in the wrong time period for the both of them. He wondered how she'd managed to for all intents and purposes, come back from the dead.
It kinda wasn't fair.
He shifted, ignoring the irritation from the manacle on his right wrist that was chained to the wall. He'd tried to get the thing off of his wrist with his left hand, but he'd only managed to rub his skin till it turned red and began to hurt.
He could move around to a certain extent, but not enough to inspect the series of thin, horizontal windows placed near the ceiling on the other side of the... cell. That was the best word for for it.
He'd been walking home, whistling and not paying attention at all, from the video store, eager to get home and enjoy a movie night with his wife. His lack of attention to his surroundings had been to his detriment, as he'd seen a blur out of the corner of his eye, and then what looked like a taser touched his shoulder and Connor had only had time to silently scream in pain before he'd blacked out.
He'd woken up in here. Helen had visited a few hours ago, but she hadn't said much, just gloated about his capture and laughed at the look of fury on his face when she'd mentioned Nick.
He hated her.
She'd had some of her clones - the cleaner clones again, though how she still had them, he wasn't sure - walk by every so often, and one of the times, food and water had been left.
But that had been a while ago, and Connor was not one for inactivity.
"Where are you, Abbs?"
The quick pace soon progressed into running, because Abby couldn't waste time dawdling and talking when her husband was in trouble. She didn't know for sure if he was in immediate danger or not, of coruse, but he had been kidnapped by Helen. Bloody. Cutter. And she meant danger, so she wasn't taking any chances. Plus, the woman had sent a clone to kill her, which clearly meant bad news for all involved. There always was when Helen was involved.
They reached the car, and Abby got in first, telling the clone to turn away so she could get rid of the gun. He complied easily, even shutting his eyes. He didn't know why, but he just knew he did not want to hurt Abby, or connor.
Saying that in his mind felt weird, because Helen had told him that he was to respond to being called connor, but he knew that he wasn't the man, he was just his copy.
Abby had said she was going to throw the gun away, but on the way back to the car, she'd realized it could be helpful.
Helen would surely be armed, and loathe as Abby was to actually shoot anyone or anything, if the woman threatened her - or her connor - Abby was going ot do whatever it took to protect herself and the love of her life from harm.
After she told him to turn around - and the clone even closed his eyes, for added precaution, which she appreciated, and it was a good sign that he was becoming more free thinking - Abby took the gun out of the glove compartment and searched for a good place to hide it. Abby took a few steps away from the vehicle and picked up a pinecone laying on the ground, taking it back with her. She kept the door open, and after hiding the gun in a safe place, Abby tossed the pinecone away, nodding a little at the thump it made as it vanished within tall grass and thick bushes on the ground. She might trust the clone, to a point, but she didn't want him ordered to take it from her or something like that, which he could if he knew where it was. Helen's influence on the clone was making her paranoid, but whatever.
"Okay, you can come in now." She told the clone, settling into the driver's seat.
"Okay, turn here, I think? Connor's in this direction..." The clone said tentatively, unsure how to phrase it. The connection between himself and the real connor was not a very solid thing, even to him. It was tenuous and hard to give clear directions towards.
"Alright." Abby said, biting her lip as she made the turn and then switched lanes. The road wasn't too busy at this time of day.
"Erm... No, no... too far left now..."
"We can exit back onto the street in a bit, this is faster, even if it isn't the exact right direction."
"Right." He agreed, though he couldn't be sure. Still, Abby knew what she was doing, directionally, and he knew where Connor was, as if the man was a lighthouse and he was a ship at sea. Where had that metaphor come from?
Was Helen trying to drive him insane by way of cabin fever, or something?! Connor was irritated and restless, wanted to move around but could not go very far, and his muscles ached from being tased earlier and from his current inactivity.
He was, of course, happy that she didn't seem to want to kill or tortue him or anything.
Yet, a little voice in his head added pessemistically.
Where was Abby?
A terrible thought occured to him then, something that he determinedly tried to pretend was not a possibility. That
soemthing could have happened to Abby, that Helen had done something ot his Abby...
Why was she keeping him locked up like this? He would understand if she needed his help on something related to the anomalies - because they had quickly come to realze, at the ARC, that the device he'd recently began work on was clearly - paradoxically so - a prototype of the anomaly opening device that they'd used to get back home. But Helen hadn't demanded his help on anything, hadn't even visited his cell since the first time.
She'd taken his watch, and destroyed his black box. His cell phone was still on the table in the lounge at the flat, probably flashing with unread messages and missed calls.
Yes, Connor was very confused, and very worried. And now he was hungry, too. Wonderful.
TBC
AN: hmmm, wonder what helen's plans are? anyone wanna take a guess? Or about how she's "back from the dead" ? ) :)
