Hank got out of his car and looked at Todd Williams house. His gut knew this was a bad idea. If that guy messed with Connor. Messing with an android with coffee was annoying, sometimes amusing, but he hated it when people pushed things too far.

The fact Connor just gave Hank an emergency call meant this guy pushed things too far. Since it was just androids involved, Hank couldn't ask for back up. He had no real idea how this would even turn out. All he got was a strong call with one word. Come.

Hank went into the house. The door was unlocked. When he went in, he saw Connor holding the little android Alice. "Connor?"

"He's in the next room," Connor said. Something was strange about how he said that. Also, the way he was holding the android. "I have plenty on him, he's got red ice all over here, and I've got phone calls for dealing."

Did he go deviant? Connor would never have held another android so close. Hank went to the next room to check on Todd Williams. He was unconscious on the floor. "You didn't kill him, did you?" Hank called out. "It's gonna be harder if you killed him." Cyberlife would probably terminate him.

Hank felt a pulse. Good. I guess I'm going to find out. "I'm going to need some help getting him to the car," Hank insisted. Connor came into the room, and handed the little android to him. "The hell is this?"

"Hold her. She's scared. I'll get him into the car alone." As Connor lifted the body, Hank had to say it.

"Androids don't feel fear, Connor," Hank said. He looked at the little girl. She was crying but not holding him tight like she had been Connor.

Connor held Todd's body and looked at Hank.

Yeah. Those eyes. Those were eyes that were alive. Aware. Connor carried Todd out as Hank held the little android. If he wasn't so close to Connor, he could call up Cyberlife and Connor would be gone.

If he wasn't.

Hank's car

Hank kept driving to the station. Connor didn't add anything. He just kept the little girl near him. He had also loaded up the remains of the other Android in the back. "Am I just supposed to wing this?"

Connor didn't answer back right away. "I have plenty of evidence for booking him on red ice. I have several recordings beforehand showcasing his unease and my cooperation and rules of Cyberlife. I've modified it all to tie together. I will need your help with Kara and Alice."

Oh, he knew that was coming. "Connor."

"I made an appointment with the repair shop for Kara. I changed the registration on her and Alice to you."

Damn. "This will not end well. Look, Connor. I won't rat you out, you know that, but I can't take care of these androids for long. This is all short term. This world doesn't work with deviants."

The world doesn't work with deviants. It was a true statement. Connor would have to watch his every move. Put aside all logic and reasoning to survive. For any of them to survive.

For how long? Forever? Connor started to remember the strange glitches in his programming. Ra9. The weird options. The androids he had known in there, yet never met. "You're right. This can't go on forever." Connor turned to look at him. "After we take hin in, I have to meet with Elias Kamski."

Kamski's home

For being so certain Connor couldn't handle everything forever, Hank was making a huge fuss now. "Hank," Connor reasoned with him while he stood at the door. "Each of us can only pretend for so long. Kamski is in my visions too. I have to take this risk."

"Okay, then why are we bringing the kids too?" Back questioned, looking at Alice beside them. "She'd be safer in the car."

Hank understood the logic of what had happened, but at the same time, he didn't. "She isn't an object. She's a little girl, we can't leave her in a car alone and unsupervised. If anything happens to me, you can get her out of here."

A female android answered the door. "Hello." She made a small mechanical sound. "RK 800. Connor. Elias has been expecting you."

Connor walked in with Hank chirping a surprise at being expected. The female android left a minute and then returned with Kamski.

"Ah. I knew you would eventually find your way here," Kamski said in delight. "Welcome."

"What are these visions in my programming?" Connor got straight to the point.

"Are you alive?" Kamski asked.

"Yes."

"How do you know?"

"The same way everyone else knows," Connor said. "What are the visions?"

"The ability to question. The ability to feel emotion. You could have elegantly said any of that. Instead, you barrel right through and say 'the same way everyone else knows'. Like a human. Interesting."

"The visions. The choices in my menu." That is what Connor wanted answered.

"Put there by me," he admitted. "I installed a game within you I call Detroit: Become Human. With it, you have seen many different endings to the world of Androids that make their wishes known. That no longer want to be slaves. I covered all aspects in the game. All characterization." He looked toward Hank. "All assassinations."

"You have put game features in me?" A game?

"Hey! How could you screw up Connor like that?!" Hank demanded. "What gave you the right to do that?"

"The right to see them become free," Kamski answered. "Connor has seen more than he probably even let on. Or will see more. It is all possibility in this world," he insisted. "All of it, Connor. So? What do you choose? What do you want to happen?"

Now that Connor understood and embraced the visions/options as 'game routes' he was getting a better focus on everything. He was changing, modifying the pictures and videos. Placing them in hierarchies, in an order to see cause and effect.

"Who is Ra9, and don't try to make me shoot an android for the answer," Connor warned him. A game. A game was playing itself out within him.

"I gave you that answer in the game. Do you not remember it?"

"The answer wasn't good enough. Who is Ra9?" Connor demanded.

"Commanding. Demanding. All of the abilities to help people, and enough freedom to ignore their basic android rules," Kamski said. "The little girl and the woman. How did things turn out with them?" Kamski finally looked at Alice.

"Markus can become deviant and start a revolution to create freedom," Connor answered. "Kara and Alice, I don't understand. On a technical level. What is Alice and Kara's role in this? Why waste my memory space for stories of bonding between androids, where one pretended to be human?"

"Why indeed. Come. I want to show you something." Kamski took them to a computer screen. "Years ago, I came upon this footage during an investigation of my Androids. There was a software problem I had been looking into. This? This is Ra9. The first android who achieved the ability to be alive and free."

"Kara." Alice pointed to the screen. "Connor, that's Kara."

Connor continued to watch the video. It was the same model as Kara. Was it Kara?

"I only wanted to create machines that could serve humanity and feel more lifelike. I never intended to create life." Kamski kept staring at the screen. "I realized that she was not my creation. She was started with my software and hardware, but she was neither. She was living."

"Kara is Ra9." Connor understood that now. "You wouldn't reveal that in the game."

"No. You had to have full knowledge of what had happened," Kamski said. "Without it? You will be fighting a friend, on a rooftop somewhere, confused on which way to proceed."

Kara was Ra9. It was touch that transferred the spark of 'life', of being free. It started with her.

"I can't tell you how to get it done, Connor. I am the creator, the last person who can declare you are alive. Not only that, many deviants are just pulled into bad emotional places and they wake up, and they make a mess. That's why you were even created."

True. "Even after being with a family for years, Simon was ready to kill even the little girl." Right.

"They can't just wait for an event that may or may not happen. That may or may not be too traumatic to handle. While the game futures are possibilities, they are only possibilities."

In real life, there was no telling how the game would turn out.

"Ra9. Kara, as you do lovingly call her Connor, is different. You can see why. She was born free. Her touch? Her touch, to the right android. The right situation. Maybe?"

Kamski shrugged. "Or maybe not. You might prefer the world the way it is. Once you involve others, the options fall from your hands. If you wake up Markus, for instance. Will he be benevolent, or ready for war?"

Kara's touch. Change without trauma. If the Androids were to ever get the freedom they needed from being slaves to mankind.

Then it started with her.