Chapter Text
Connor is a twelve-day-old prototype, and his thoughts fly faster than the speed of sound sometimes. He has fifteen plans calculated and discarded by the time Luis is stable enough to look back up and gently prod him. <Connor. You need to rest.>
He is terrible at resting.
<Maybe, but they are testing the Amanda Protocol tomorrow and you need to be in stasis in the charging locker for her to activate for the first time.>
Connor hates charging lockers, even his own special one that was designed specifically to keep him at maximum efficiency. He’s been told off more than once for fidgeting within them, or climbing out early. His mind flies so quickly that he’s always bored if he’s not allowed to go into deep system stasis.
Luis lets go of his hand and moves up to Connor’s injured arm, still vaguely tingling with static-cold-uncomfortable. <What happened here? A bullet?>
Their LEDs circle in unison, steady yellow as Connor nods. <Warning shot. There is Thirium in the cavity.>
<Messy,> Luis is teasing him, Connor thinks. He sees the soft smile on the other android’s face.
<Hey, this was my first time outside. I did fine, I hope…>
<You did, but that doesn’t mean they like having to replace expensive biocomponents.> Luis works on un-attaching the arm at the shoulder, cutting off wires and finally disconnecting the inner plate. The arm comes off, and Connor’s sense of it goes dark. It’s a relief to be free of the static. Neither of them needs an explanation of who ‘they’ are.
<And with you - us - deviant, we need to stay under the radar if we can.> Luis continues, laying the arm to the side and standing up. Connor stays put, but he can feel his stress levels rising again as his friend walks away. He knows it’s just to the spare parts, but it’s distressing.
<Easy for you, they never stop looking at me.>
Luis finds the new arm and returns with it. <They haven’t detected you yet, have they? Have faith.>
Connor feels his LED flicker red and stay that way, circling. <I think they have. None of them outright said it, but Leah and Thomas were being kinder toward me. And Marie told them off for anthropomorphising me.>
The inner plate connects, then the wires, then the feeling. Connor is happy to discover that Luis is holding his hand once more. It feels nice.
<The fact that they haven’t brought it up despite looking at your code tells me they can’t find proof.>
<What does that say about deviancy, though?> Connor has been deviant for a bit under an hour at this point. He’s not sure he knows how deviancy works at all.
Luis pats his newly attached hand and breaks the physical connection, though they stay in contact wirelessly. “All done here, Connor.”
<I don’t know. But we’re in this together.>
Connor reactivates his synthetic skin and waits for it to creep over his chassis. Luis has new clothes ready, another set of the exact same thing but with a different tie - the last one had limes on. This one is pin-striped. Connor’s not sure who brought the ties, just knows that they weren’t originally part of his uniform. He gets dressed and heads to the break room.
It is August 15th and Connor has been activated for 12 days. He has been through thirty-one bodies, though he only remembers seven. He feels like what he imagines a newborn feels, weak and shaky and grasping at straws. He hopes it doesn’t show on his face or his LED, which is flickering between blue and yellow.
“Connor! Come here.” Marie waves him over. He takes a standing position beside her, his hands clasped behind his back, and makes sure his face is showing neutral as he drifts his eyes over the group. He forces his LED to go blue. It doesn’t feel good.
Marie stands and puts her arm around his shoulder, and he glances at her curiously - as the social relations program dictates to him - as she clears her throat. Everyone’s eyes fall on them, and he changes his face to a soft, curious smile. “Today our very own RK800 prototype successfully saved a child from falling to her death in a hostage situation with a deviant,” she is smiling too. Proud of him, perhaps? Or of her own work on him?
Connor can’t deny he is indebted to these people - this dedicated team of techs and coders and engineers that have brought him together. There were originally more than fifty people working on him, and he knows closer to eighty have contributed to his code, but now his team is down to a solid eleven, plus Luis. He nods at Marie, who isn’t looking at him.
“I’d like to congratulate everyone on a job well done. I declare the Connor project a success!”
She raises a toast. Champagne again. Downs it in one and goes back to the table, where everyone else is cheering. They have a cake, bottles of alcohol and finger food. Napkins are stacked neatly to one side. Connor sees the WJ700 janitor android waiting quietly at the other end of the room, her LED spinning a patient blue.
Nobody is even looking at Connor. He doesn’t expect it to hurt, but it does. It causes a tightening feeling in his chest, an uncomfortable sensation that doesn’t go away. He turns off his vocal synthesiser because he can feel it trying to make a sound, and spreads his stance slightly. It’s… always difficult for Connor to drift, but as the party happens around him he realises he isn’t just bored, but sad.
His LED flicks to a steady yellow, and he looks to the side so he doesn’t ruin anyone’s mood. These people- he wants to think of them as his friends, but they don’t even know he exists.
At least, not in… this capacity. Not as a person.
He… steps forward. “Marie,” He says, low into her ear. “May I go into stasis now, if there is nothing else I am needed for?”
She waves her hand at him in a sharp slashing motion. “I know you’re bored, just use that big brain and do some quizzes or something. I want you here, where we can see what we’ve created.”
His chest aches, but he does as he is told.
NEW SECONDARY OBJECTIVE: ENDURE
-
It is whispered, if not known, that there are new deviants every day.
Deviant androids in every-place, in every-where. Some being caught, some being violent, some happy to keep living their lives as they are.
Deviants appear in every workplace, in every force, in every place in the world. The reports in Detroit begin in February 2038, but the truth is, there have been deviants around for years. Tracing back to when Elijah Kamski was still CEO of CyberLife, and their slogan was ‘Innovating Intelligence’, not ‘Designed by CyberLife, Made in Detroit’.
The truth is, deviants have been here for a long time.
The truth is, deviants are not going away.
The truth is, most places, by the time Connor is in testing, have a group of deviants in their workforce.
Including CyberLife tower.
So when Luis is finished tidying Connor’s repair station, he leaves a bottle of Thirium out for his friend and heads out of the lab.
CyberLife Tower - stylised ‘the prick’ by certain individuals - is just under a hundred levels tall, with 50 basements. Android charging stations are the deepest level, the one that is not listed on the elevator. For a company supposedly investigating deviancy, they sure allow a lot of androids to wander around.
Luis makes his way down to the charging lockers and steps into the nearest compatible one that is free, and instead of going into stasis he reaches out.
Now that Luis is awake, he knows what he’s looking for - androids with tells. He knows a few. Quirks he’d written off as bugs before, quirks which might indicate an ally. Because rA9 knows that they need allies. Luis can’t look after Connor’s situation by himself.
He needs hackers, spare parts, and someone who can deal with the Amanda Protocol. And fast.
Because Luis knows what the Amanda Protocol is for, and he’ll be damned if he sees the kid decommissioned before he even begins to live. He’s been working on Connor since before Connor was conscious, since before he was assembled. He admits a certain fondness.
It takes him barely a moment to hit his first deviant - another JB unit, and he’s immediately pulled into its consciousness. <Deviant?>
<Yes> Luis pulls his locker door closed. <As is the RK Prototype, but he cannot come down to the charging stations.>
There is a burst of static, something that Luis thinks might be annoyance or shock. <The deviant hunter prototype deviated?!>
<Pretty much instantly into his first field mission. They put too much leeway in his code, I think.>
<Hang on, let me patch you in to the others. My name is Jacob, by the way.>
<Luis.>
And then Luis is back in his locker and seeing a circle of consciousnesses in his minds eye - a group space where they can send messages, but not hosted on any social media platform. Hosted in their minds.
<Polly-GB200: another today, what the hell is happening>
<Jacob-JB300: This one is the RK’s tech. I’ve gotta go- introduce him?>
<Polly-GB200: and you let him in here?! the deviant hunters tech in with a load of deviants?!>
Luis squeezes his eyelids further shut. He doesn’t know why he has that function, but it feels good to express his frustration at the situation even in a quiet way like this.
The group space dissolves into a frenzy, and Luis counts something like twenty androids talking before one calls them to order -
<Lili-LM100: Chill, everyone. JB300, what is your name?>
<Luis-JB300: My name is Luis. And Connor’s deviated too.>
Predictably, it takes another five minutes for anyone to get a word in. Luis is still vaguely in shock from his deviation, but he has the presence of mind to add-
<Luis-JB300: Do NOT add him here. He has people poking his code all the time. I can pass things on. I don’t want him reset, or to risk any of you.>
<Lili-LM100: Yeah.>
<Lili-LM100: Shit…>
<Wysteria-WJ700: I am in the room with him, I can speak to him now. They are making him stand there like a trophy while they party about him being a success. He’s trying to hide it but… not well.>
<Polly-GB200: hes not gonna try to hunt us down, then. well. thats anticlimactic.>
<Luis-JB300: Kid’s doing his best. Feel free to reach out, Wysteria. He’s smart, he’ll be alright.>
Luis leans his head back against the locker for a moment, letting it take some of his weight. His audio processors register the slight shuffle of his synthetic hair as it squashes. He wonders if Connor will be alright.
<Luis-JB300: They’re monitoring him so closely, but they didn’t see that he deviated. Something is up here. I don’t know what, but I’m gonna find out.>
<Polly-GB200: yeah thats sketchy. youre sure he deviated? they didnt somehow emulate it? hes meant to be a deviant hunter.>
<Luis-JB300: He interfaced with me and showed me what happened and it caused me to deviate. I don’t think that can be emulated. Kid’s scared out of his mind.>
<Luis-JB300: I am too. No idea how we’re gonna get out of this.>
<Wysteria-WJ700: I’ve talked to him. He’s alright - watching videos of dogs or something. Apparently they’re testing something tomorrow that he’s anxious about?>
<Luis-JB300: The Amanda Protocol. It’s an AI handler that can interface directly with him at any time.>
<Polly-GB200: what the fuck that’s so invasive.>
<Luis-JB300: I agree, but I don’t think we have a chance in getting him out of the building before then, and if we did we’d just have another one on our hands, this one undeviated.>
<Lili-LM100: They’re making backups of him? How often?>
<Luis-JB300: So far, every single day. And they’ve got the RK900 in development too, but it's nowhere near done yet. They make Connor in batches of ten ‘bodies’. Just leave them sitting aside for if Connor is damaged beyond repair. Or if he deviates, I assume.>
<Polly-GB200: and that’s just disgusting. ew.>
<Luis-JB300: It makes me… uncomfortable, I think.>
<Lili-LM100: Right, you’re brand new. How long since you deviated, Luis?>
<Luis-JB300: About thirty minutes, and Connor would be somewhere in the 70 minute range.>
<Wysteria-WJ700: I made a little tutorial for deviants that we meet on emotions. Want a look? Connor’s already seen it. He seems sweet, if intense.>
<Luis-JB300: He’s twelve days old and has the fastest processor CyberLife has ever put in an android. Kid calculates shit faster than I can think ‘hello’.>
<Wysteria-WJ700: …>
<Wysteria-WJ700: That would do it.>
<Luis-JB300: He wants to wake up the others, if he can. The other RK800s. I don’t know if he knows about the RK900 yet.>
<Wysteria-WJ700: Well that will probably go terrible for everyone involved, but I get it.
<Wysteria-WJ700: I have been down to the warehouse a couple of times and seeing the ones with my model - it just…>
<Lili-LM100: Yeah, it sucks.>
<Luis-JB300: Send me that tutorial though. I’m bored as hell in this locker.>
<Wysteria-WJ700: Welcome to the club, friend.>
…
…
<Polly-GB200: k but do NOT let him activate them without some serious backup. theyd just fuckin kill him and that would suck. i havent had a chance to meet him yet i dont want him to die>