In pain and barely able to walk under his own power, Connor leaned heavily against Hank's shoulder as the senior detective supported his weight almost entirely as they stood inside the ascending elevator together. What had been a routine drug bust had gone awry when Connor had sampled a fresh batch of 'red ice' crystals only to have a large portion of the crystalline drug break off under his fingertips and fall down his throat where it had become lodged in the coupling attached to the top of his artificial stomach. Despite his best efforts to engage his emergency expulsion program to remove the potent toxin from his system, the crystal had become lodged in the metal coupling and could not be removed via Thirium expulsion.

Hank tightened his grip around Connor's waist as he helped his pained partner and adoptive son out of the elevator and down the hallway to his own apartment to get some help. Seeking privacy, Connor wanted only to see Lucas and let his little brother aid him in his time of need to avoid having to fill out any embarrassing incident reports back at the precinct.

"How're you holding up, son?"

"...It hurts." Connor confirmed as his L.E.D. pulsed yellow slowly. He had one arm wrapped around Hank's shoulders and the other arm protectively wrapped around his pained stomach. "The crystal is wedged in the valve of the biocomponent that allows Thirium to be consumed. Fortunately, the crystal is too large to fully enter my artificial stomach."

"Why's that fortunate?"

"If the 'red ice' were to enter the biocomponent my system would automatically begin breaking it down, effectively allowing the drug to enter my system." Wincing a little as he stood before his apartment door Connor's yellow L.E.D. flashed to red and then back to yellow in pain. "I do not know how 'red ice' would affect me, but I imagine it would be quite destructive."

"Lucas should be able to help you, right?"

"Correct." Connor outwardly flinched as he pressed his exposed palm against the electronic lock beside his closed apartment door. There was a flash of green light under his palm as the appendage was scanned, and an audible 'click' as the recognition unlocked the apartment door. "Lucas is the most skilled android technician in the country, and as such he will undoubtedly be able to assist me."

"Then let's get you taken care of." Hank pushed open the door as it unlocked and helped Connor to walk inside the apartment over to the lone blue couch against the far wall of the livingroom to rest for a moment. "Don't move too quickly. Let me help you."

Lucas was standing in the opposite corner of the livingroom with a large canvas perched on an easel, a wooden palette of multicolored paint in one hand, and a long bristled brush in the other hand. Turning to look at Connor as Hank helped the distressed deviant to lay down on his side on the couch, Lucas put aside the paint and walked over to his older brother with a mixture of concern and confusion on his face.

"What's wrong?" The deviant technician asked as he pressed his hand down against the center of Connor's chest to count his pulse while also feeling the physical exertion of his Thirium pump courtesy of the obvious discomfort. "Are you damaged?"

"No." Connor admitted as he gracelessly slipped his arms out of his gray blazer and loosened the black tie around his neck. "I'm not damaged."

"He's right." Hank explained things on Connor's behalf as he took the blazer from the ill deviant and hung it up on the hook by the front door. "He accidentally swallowed a large crystal of 'red ice' while running a sample and now he can't get it back out."

Lucas performed a cybernetic scan over Connor's body and located foreign substance trapped in the singular coupling valve of biocomponent 's8001'. The biocomponent itself was located toward the center of Connor's abdomen just as a human's stomach would be located in their own torsos. The biocomponent's placement was easily accessible to a technician for repairs and would only be mildly invasive.

"Are you in any pain?" Lucas asked next as he knelt beside the couch and pushed on Connor's shoulder to roll the deviant over from his side and onto his back. The silent nod of Connor's head answered one question as Lucas asked another. "Can you pinpoint it's exact location?"

"...Yes." Connor admitted as he pulled his arm away from his pained stomach. "My expulsion program has proven ineffective and cannot remove the obstruction, which has been causing me physical pain right here." Indicating the source of his pain by pressing down his palm over his stomach Connor let Lucas assess his condition and treat him accordingly. "It's nearly debilitating at this point."

"I can locate the obstruction and have it removed without needing to go to New Jericho Tower." Skills and talent allowed Lucas to perform nearly every technical procedure without needing to rely on assistance from another technician. "Is there any protocol I should follow as this item is considered drug evidence?"

"Nah." Hank grinned a little and shook his head as he rejoined the two deviants at the couch. "There was plenty of that shit back at the warehouse. What's stuck inside his system just needs to be destroyed before it hurts anyone else."

"I can do that." Lucas replied as he rose from his kneeling position and stood upright. "I just need to get my equipment from my bedroom."

While Lucas disappeared down the hallway to retrieve his satchel containing his emergency technician tools Hank walked over to the nearby armchair that had been purchased specifically for him during his visits and sat down to keep his deviant son company. In spite of his best efforts Hank couldn't keep the cheesy grin off his face as he realized how unusual their predicament was at the moment.

"So..." The Lieutenant began innocently enough. "How'd you end up swallowing that junk anyway? You're too sharp for that kind of slip-up."

"The crystalline had unexpectedly degraded under the applied pressure from my fingertips." Explaining things simply and logically Connor looked over at Hank sitting near him and tried to ignore the persistent pain in his stomach. "It broke off in my mouth just as I initiated the analysis program and was unable to spit out the crystal before it fell down my throat."

Hank was smiling again, his hand covering his mouth as if trying to restrain a laugh.

"Is something funny?"

"It is to me." Hank admitted as he leaned back in the chair and dropped his hand from his face. "It reminded me of when I told you NOT to stick anymore evidence in your mouth during our first investigation. I told you to knock it off because it was gross, not because I was worried that you'd accidentally swallow it. Now it reminds of the time Sumo chewed on the plastic flashlight I kept in the garage and swallowed the batteries when he was still a puppy." Shaking his head in response to his own story, Hank recounted the memory and gave Connor an amused glance. "I had to take him to the vet, and eight-hundred dollars later I had a pathetic looking mess of brown fur scampering over the floor with a plastic cone for three weeks around his neck after having the batteries surgically removed from his stomach."

"I still fail to see the humor in this."

"Sorry. What was so funny to me is how I was just imagining how you'd look with a plastic cone around your neck."

"It's not-" Connor closed his eyes as he tried to hide his own amusement at the ridiculousness of the entire situation, his L.E.D. flashed to blue for a moment before returning to yellow. "It's not that funny."

"Yes it is." Hank argued as Lucas returned to the livingroom with his satchel slung over his shoulder. "If I need to go get a cone to prove my point, I will."

Moving with a calm precision Lucas opened his satchel as he set it on the floor beside the couch and located a specific tool secured to the interior pouch of the satchel itself. It was a pair of long metal forceps designed for intricate work involving android biocomponents and Thirium lines.

Connor looked a little nervous but didn't say a thing about the impending procedure.

"This should only take a moment." Ever calm in the face of a technical procedure, Lucas prepared for the task at hand. "Please open your shirt and retract your skin from your abdomen."

Obediently Connor let out annoyed and pained breath as he pulled open his white dress shirt and retracted the artificial skin as requested. Using his own hands to open the white plastimetal panel in the center of his abdomen Connor leaned back against the couch to lay flat and waited for Lucas to locate the crystalline substance uncomfortably wedged in his artificial stomach's main coupling.

Lucas trailed the valve to the top of the now exposed biocomponent and saw a block of a foreign red substance caught in the opening of the valve within a transparent hollow tube that connect the biocomponent to the Thirium intake line and the analysis sensors located in Connor's mouth. The bright red coloration of the illegal substance made identification surprisingly easy.

"I'm ready." Running a self-diagnostic, Connor noted his system wasn't detecting any serious errors and was relieved to know he wouldn't need a trip to a facility after the procedure. "What needs to happen?"

"I need to disengage the biocomponent before I can remove the obstruction. Temporarily shut down your Thirium lines leading to the biocomponent to prevent the loss of any Thirium."

Connor's already yellow L.E.D. blinked rapidly as he cybernetically cut off access to the Thirium lines for the moment. "Done."

Lucas nodded as he carefully slipped his hand around the circular biocomponent and twisted it from its connection port at the base of the tube. As he pulled the vital biocomponent from Connor's torso Lucas easily inserted the forceps upward into the opening of the coupling and took hold of the red tinted crystal. With a firm pull he removed the obstruction from the biocomponent with ease and held it out for Hank to see between the tips of the forceps.

"That easy, huh?" The senior detective remarked somewhat incredulously at the sight. "Damn."

"It's your call, Hank." Lucas reminded him as he kept the forceps outstretched toward the senior detective. "Would you like to do the honors?"

"Yeah, I got this." Hank rose from the chair and took the forceps from Lucas's hand. Walking down the hallway of the apartment Hank entered the bathroom and dropped the crystal into the toilet and flushed it away out of the apartment. "Right where it belongs, with the rest of the shit."

"Just one more moment." Lucas returned the removed biocomponent to Connor's torso and easily clicked it back into place. "Resume your Thirium flow."

Connor's yellow L.E.D. flashed quickly as he rebooted the Thirium flow as instructed. Once the biocomponent resumed its normal function his yellow L.E.D. cycled back to a calm blue in response to his system returning to one-hundred percent functionality.

"Any errors?" Lucas asked as Hank rejoined the duo in the livingroom and handed the forceps back to Lucas. "Are you still experiencing any pain?"

Connor performed a second quick self-diagnostic on his system and no errors had been detected. "Negative."

"Are you experiencing any discomfort at all?"

"No. The pain has subsided entirely."

"That's good." Nodding Lucas closed the panel over Connor's torso before he began repacking his satchel to put away. "You're in the clear. You may now resume your investigation."

"Thank you." Quickly Connor's artificial skin regenerated over his abdomen and he rebuttoned his white dress shirt before her tightened the knot of his tie around his neck. "Hank, should we resume the case?"

"As long as you don't eat anything else while on the job."

"It's still not funny." The recovered deviant detective gave Hank a somewhat irritated but still amused stare as he rose from the couch and walked over to the door of the apartment to reclaim his blazer. "If you stop commenting on my 'diet', I'll stop commenting on yours."

"Great!" Hank liked the idea of being able to his eat his lunch without Connor reminding him of how bad for his health his preferred meals were. "Sounds like a deal to me. Starting right now too."

"Good." Casually Connor slipped on his blazer and opened the door with a swift motion as he eagerly anticipated returning to the precinct. "We should go. Thank you again for your help, Lucas. I'll return at my usual time tonight."

"You're welcome, brother." Returning to his painting Lucas waved to his family as they left the apartment. It seemed that Lucas was having a difficult time in keeping an amused smirk off his face now that he knew that Connor was going to be just fine. "I'll see you later."

Chuckling softly to himself Hank could help but find Connor's entire demeanor amusing. The deviant detective was all about having a good image and knowing he had been sidelined by a tiny piece of 'red ice' and couldn't bear the shame of admitting to it was surprisingly human.

The two detectives walked outside the door, locked it tight and walked down the corridor toward the elevator at the end to take their leave as quickly as they had initially arrived. Wanting to change the subject as they stepped inside the vacant elevator car Connor looked to Hank beside him and asked him a simple question.

"Should I drive?"

"Sure. But first we have to stop for lunch." Giving the deviant a sly grin Hank let Connor know exactly what he was thinking. "I'm suddenly in the mood for a burger with everything on it. The largest, greasiest burger in the whole city..."

Biting his tongue Connor kept his word and didn't make a single cautionary comment on Hank's chosen meal.

"What do ya' have to say about that?"

"Please be sure to request extra napkins so I can drive without needing to worry about being drowned oil and grease. I'd hate for anything bad to happen to either of us during our lunchbreak. Or worse, dripping onto your floormats and ruining them."

"You got it, smartass."

-next chapter-