Enduring the bitter cold Hank pulled his heavy overcoat tightly around himself as he cranked up the heat in the car to its maximum temperature as he watched Connor take his seat in the front beside him and fasten his seatbelt. The two detectives had been cleared from the facility and doctor's care under the condition they spend the two next days resting at home and take time away from the precinct. Considering the close call with the anti-android gang member setting up the two detectives to die had nearly succeeded, Captain Fowler had no objections to his two detectives getting some rest and staying away from the public during the New Year's Eve party aftermath.

Hank was trying to ignore the nasty chest cold trying to set in from being exposed to the cold water, while Connor insisted that he should be the one to drive back home so Hank could rest a little during the drive. It was essentially a small contest since both detectives were currently in rough condition.

"Ready to go home, son?"

"Yes." Connor confirmed with a subtle nod of the head as he pressed his palm over his still sore abdomen. "I prefer the house over the facility. I'd also prefer it if you'd allow me to drive."

"No way." Hank pulled the car along the snowy street away from the facility to head back to the house. "You're the one who just spent the past day and a half admitted as a patient at the facility. You were shot and nearly drowned."

"You're the one who had been submerged in freezing cold water after being rendered unconscious for four minutes and nine seconds after receiving a severe blow to the back of your skull." Connor argued logically without missing a beat. His scanner picked up on Hank's symptoms revolving around a nasty cold beginning to develop. "You're also clearly beginning to suffer the ill effects of being exposed to such extreme cold."

"A bullet wound will always outweigh a cold."

"What about a concussion?"

"A mild concussion." Hank stated as he pulled onto the small bridge to finally head for home. "I'm fine."

Connor shook his head slightly in irritation as he stared out his window. "Why is it whenever I attempt to simplify the overall severity of my own injuries you refute them immediately and remind me of my overall condition, yet when I attempt to do the same to you my words are rendered meaningless?"

"Your words aren't 'meaningless'." With his headache gnawing away at him Hank sighed tiredly as he focused on the road ahead. "They're just-"

"Hank." Connor's voice was heavy like a stone. As his blue L.E.D. flashed to yellow he honed in on a lone male figure standing on the edge of the bridge beyond the safety railing and standing over the perilously cold water flowing below. "Stop the car."

Without questioning Connor's motivation Hank pulled the car to the side of the bridge and came to a gentle stop. Connor threw off the seatbelt, threw open his door and stepped out onto the snow covered surface of the bridge as he approached the figure at a slow quiet pace.

"Hello?" Connor called out into a gentle voice as he stared at the man's back. "Are you all right? Do you require some assistance?"

"...Just go away." The man's voice was as broken as it was somber. "Leave me alone."

"I'd rather not." Without missing a beat Connor replied with sincere kindness as he stood behind the railing. Hank stepped out of the car and watched from where he stood as he picked up his spare to issue in the scene to the precinct and ask for assistance. "I'm not going to go anywhere."

"Why?" The man nearly sobbed as he leaned forward over the water, his arms gripping on the rail behind him at a painful angle behind his back. "Why can you just go away?"

"I get the feeling that you've been left alone long enough already. You shouldn't be alone right now."

Hank quietly observed the conversation from the car. He could see Connor's L.E.D. calmly cycling in yellow for a few seconds before returning to blue as the deviant held his ground and kept his voice level.

The man turned his head slowly and looked at Connor over his shoulder. Brandishing red puffy eyes that were sore and swollen from chronic, heavy crying and a look of absolute desperation, he spotted the L.E.D. in Connor's temple and turned away quickly. Staring down at the water below him the man's legs began to buckle and he began to sob again.

"Sir, please talk to me."

"...The first person to show me any form of kindness isn't even a person. It's a machine!" The man's anger began to mount and overwhelm his own sorrow on a whole new level. "Damn machines destroyed this entire city, now you're trying to be our friends! It's a lie! It's all lies... You're nothing but a machine posing as a man. You're nothing." The man let out a weak almost amused scoff. "But so am I. Maybe we're not so different after all."

"...Sir?" The comment made Connor feel suddenly inadequate. The similarity between his reaction to Connor's approach and Hank's previous comment left a painful mark over the deviant's developing heart, but he was determined to try to help the man in distress. "Yes. I am an android, but I'm more than a machine. My name is Connor." Connor introduced himself kindly to try to keep the man talking. "I work for the Detroit Police Department. What's your name?"

"...James."

"James, will you please talk to me?" Connor took another step forward without getting too close too quickly. "I wish to understand why you're standing on the bridge."

"...I... I have nowhere else to go! So why not to Hell?"

"You do not have a home?"

"Not anymore!" James sobbed as he told his sad story. "My wife cheated on me! Took my daughters and left the city to be with her lover! I have nothing..."

"I'm truly sorry for your misfortune." Connor's voice was full of empathetic emotion as he spoke with utter sincerity. "But you cannot give up on your life because of what your wife has done to you. You said you have children, don't you want to see them again?"

"Yes! More than anything!" James admitted as he stopped sobbing and took in a calming breath. "But I don't know where she took my girls! I... I can't live without them!"

"And I'm certain your daughters don't want to live without their father."

Turning again to look at Connor behind him James locked his teary pale brown eyes onto Connor's soulful dark brown eyes. "What kind of father can't protect his children from the lies and betrayal of their own whore of a mother? I'm weak! Pathetic! That's why she left me! That's why she LIED TO ME!"

"What kind of life will your daughters have without you in it? You're the one who truly seems to care about them and their well being. Do you wish to simply let them go without a fight?"

"...Fight?"

"You admit you wish to protect them." Connor took another step forward, stepping over the railing to stand beside the man on the edge of the bridge. The sight of the water so far below made Connor's stomach twist into a painfully tight knot as his fear of heights made its presence known at the most inopportune time. "...Now you must prove it. Fight for them."

"How? How can I-"

"I cannot tell you how to live your life or what choices you should make," Connor stated as he forced himself to remain grounded at the precarious ledge. "but I can tell you that your life is far more meaningful than what your wife has made you believe."

"...My girls." James wiped his arm over his teary eyes and turned around quickly, his hands clutching onto the icy cold metal railing as he moved. "I... I have to fight for them."

"Yes." Moving carefully Connor put his hand on James's shoulder and held it there. "Please. Don't give up on yourself, don't give up on your children, James." Looking at the far drop below from the corner of his eye Connor felt himself beginning to tremble from fear. "You have so much to live for still. Don't stop just because your wife has deceived you."

Nodding a few times the horribly depressed and desperate man slowly stepped back over the railing with Connor following closely behind him. As the two men reached the edge of the bridge near the street that stretched over it, a patrol car pulled up to the scene and Hank promptly informed the responding officer to the situation at hand.

"Situation under control."

James froze in place as Connor nodded to the responding officers that the shaken man just needed to be taken in for observation for the night and speak to a therapist about everything that had happened. "You'll be okay, James. These officers will take care of you and help you find a way to get your daughters back."

While Jams spoke to the police and agreed to be admitted to the psychiatric hospital for observation before he began his custody battle for his daughters, Connor stood on the bridge behind the railing with both hands planted firmly on the cold metal bar. Peering over the edge Connor stared at the churning water below as the wind caused his dark hair to dance about his forehead gently while he became lost in thought.

"James's going to be fine." Hank stated as he joined Connor on the bridge and put his hand to the deviant's shoulder. "You did great, kid. You saved a life today."

Connor didn't reply as his eyes remained transfixed on the foreboding cold water below.

"Come on. We need to get home." Patting Connor's shoulder Hank tried to coax the deviant into following behind him and back to the car. "I'm freezing and I know you can't be fairing any better than I am."

Slowly Connor retracted his hands from the railing and backed away from the edge of the bridge, turning around on his heels to walk toward the car where Hank was waiting.

"You drive." Hank insisted as he pulled open the passenger side door and sat down in the seat heavily. "I'm too tired to keep going."

Connor paused for a moment before he walked over to the driver's side door of the parked car and sat down behind the wheel. With a shaking hand Connor shifted the car into gear and resumed the drive down the bridge to head for home. Silence filled the car as the two detectives returned to their home after enduring such an unusual morning on the bridge and tried to breathe sighs of relief. It was a thick silence that was almost impenetrable as the beginning of the new year was already off to a rocky start.

As the car was shifted into park in the driveway beside the house Connor turned off the engine and handed the keys over to Hank to take.

"You okay?" The observant senior detective asked as he accepted the keys and pushed open his door. "You've been quiet ever since the bridge."

Connor remained silent but nodded his head 'yes' to reply.

"You don't seem okay. What's on your mind? Was it the jumper or maybe the concept of suicide?"

"...It's nothing."

"Don't do that." Hank waited for Connor to exit the car before walking to the backdoor with the deviant beside him. "Talk to me."

"It's nothing." Resistant to speak up Connor tried to keep his emotions to himself. "Just... Meaningless thoughts."

Hank studied Connor's face curiously as he unlocked the backdoor and pushed it open. "Your words are NEVER meaningless."

"...Apparently they are."

"What did you say?" Hank didn't appreciate Connor's cold offended response. It was a mixture of anger, poor attitude and depression that always put Hank on edge. "Connor, answer me."

Connor's eyes were heavy with confusion and raw emotion as he silently entered the house through the front door ahead of Hank. Crossing through the livingroom he stood at the end of the hallway and froze for a moment as Hank entered the house after him and locked the front door with an audible 'click'. He could sense the senior detective staring at him from the distance.

From his pillow in the livingroom Sumo lifted his head and let out a low grumble to acknowledge his masters' return but didn't bother to get up to greet either of them as the cold made his arthritic bones ache too much to move.

"Connor." The senior detective managed to even out his voice as he addressed the stubborn deviant again. "I need you to tell me what's bothering you."

Taking a deep breath Connor steadied his own voice and finally asked what was really weighing on his mind. "...Why don't you listen to me?"

"What?"

"Whenever I try to help you," Connor turned to look at Hank with true hurt in his eyes. "you never listen to me. Why? A man I had only met an hour ago was willing to listen to me and let me convince him to not commit suicide; but you've known me for over two years now and you won't let me help you."

Hank approached the deviant timidly, his voice and expression softening in response to a paternal degree. "I had been alone for so long after I lost my family that I simply forgot what it's like to have someone helping me. To have someone actually WANT to help me because they care, not out of some bullshit professional courtesy or etiquette. I'm just not used to it, that's all."

"I see..." Connor wasn't convinced and the look in his eyes was all it took to communicate his personal frustrations and doubt as his blue L.E.D. settled on a grim yellow color. "Then it's all about my less than human reactions being preferable to the other people in you life."

"What? No! Where'd that come from?"

"Androids have destroyed this city. We brought about discrimination, unemployment, violence... For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction; so logically the cold and calculated routines of machines should prove beneficial in contrast to the unpredictable emotions of humans."

"Are you fuckin' malfunctioning of something?" Hank was losing his temper at the way Connor was dragging his own name, his own accomplishments, through the mud. "HUMANS brought about the problems in this city, this entire world! Androids were just targeted and blamed." The senior detective was visibly disturbed by Connor's bleak, almost depressed demeanor. "Is that what's bothering you? That humans don't listen to androids?"

"Evidently so. Perhaps if I were in fact human then maybe you'd listen to me."

"Hey, don't do that!" Hank scolded in frustration as he tried to explain things to Connor. "It has NOTHING to do with you being an android."

"I don't believe that." Unconvinced and morose Connor sounded almost broken as he spoke. "You've never listened to me whenever I've helped you in the past. Like James, and everyone at the precinct, the people in the city... The first thing you see when you look at me is a machine. The entire city had been divided with violence all because of how they see androids and how they see humans. Everything I say, everything I do and everything I think all revolves around me being a deviant. And deviants don't mean anything to the rest of the people in the city."

"Connor, STOP." Hank raised his voice, his tone directing aggression at the deviant for the first time since the night of the Revolution as he tried to get the stubborn deviant to listen to him. "Don't talk like that! I see you as you, Connor. My partner, my friend and most importantly, as my son."

Doubtful and filled with an odd sense of loss Connor kept his silence as he looked down at his right hand, the artificial skin receding from his palm to reveal the white plastimetal frame beneath, as if eyeing evidence to prove to the contrary of Hank's words. Flexing his hand into a tight fist Connor seemed to be repulsed by his own appearance. "If that were true then you'd let me help you and know that I have no ulterior motive behind it. It's not a hollow gesture."

"I know you're trying to help me and I know it's because you care." Lowering his tone of voice Hank tried to reassure Connor about the trust he had for the deviant. "And I know you that you DO help me because you want to, but it's still hard for me to accept help after being left feeling so helpless when I was left a widower, then... childless. I guess I just can't get used to having a family again. It's my fault, all right?"

Connor's keen observation noted the sincerity, the deep honesty in Hank's demeanor and his words, yet something inside Connor kept him from truly accepting the answers.

"Look, it's difficult to explain, but humans-" Hank put his hand to Connor's shoulder and he felt the deviant trembling under his palm which immediately sent up a red flag. "Connor, are you okay? You're shaking."

"...Heights." Connor admitted while also keeping his true distress hidden away as he tried to ignore the vivid memory of standing on the edge of the bridge over the deathly cold water still fresh in his mind. Shrugging away from Hank's touch he took a step back from Hank and looked at the floor. "I still have issues with heights. It's unnerving and distracting."

"Oh, right." Hank had almost forgotten that Connor had developed a fear of heights during his deviancy. An android with phobias was a rather rare occurrence in general. "You still need to talk about it?"

"No. I just want to lay down for a while and try to rest."

"Rest?" Hank's blue eyes flashed with newfound concern for the deviant. Instinctively he tried to put a hand to Connor's forehead to check for a fever in case the deviant was overheating from his previous damage, but the deviant turned his head away. "Are you feeling sick or still feeling weak from your injury?"

"No." Connor quickly denied as he walked down the hallway, stepping out of Hank's reach again causing the senior detective's hand to fall away from his shoulder. "I just want to be left alone for a while."

"Please don't do that, don't put up walls." Despite his pleas Hank's words seemed to fall on deaf ears as the deviant turned his back on him. "Connor? Son!" Hank called out loudly as Connor entered his bedroom and quietly pulled the door shut behind him without uttering another word. The cold reaction left Hank feeling out of place and like he had failed to protect his son from the cruelty of the world. "Son? Talk to me. I want to listen to what you're feeling and thinking. I won't judge you or dismiss your words."

The emotionally distraught deviant remained silent as he kept out of his sight in seclusion of his own bedroom.

Putting his hands to hips Hank bowed his head down and let out a breathy sigh as he swore to himself with righteous frustration. "...Damn it. I can't let this year start with me fucking things up again."

-next chapter-