Chapter Text
"I'm - I'm not a deviant!"
Elijah Kamski drags his hair out of the tight bun it's in, closes his eyes, and lets laughter bubble up through his chest. "Wow," he says, a breathy little sound; turning on his heel, he hurries deeper into the house to the security room. Sliding his glasses out of the pocket of his robe, he pulls up the footage from outside, the foyer, and the pool room, following the path taken by detective and android to his side.
He wants to see everything. Everything.
A whisper of movement behind him; Chloe has slipped into the room behind him. "What do you think?" he calls without glancing away from the screen where he's finding the moment the car had pulled up. There's a tablet nearby on the charging dock; he starts it with a tap.
"He's halfway there, I think," Chloe says, perching herself on the edge of the desk. "The emotions and empathy, certainly. I was picking up a great deal of confusion and..." She tilts her head to one side, considering. "Denial, maybe? He's having doubts about himself, but he hasn't managed to articulate it to himself. Telling him straight out may have helped."
"Or given him an existential crisis," Elijah says drily. There - the car pulls up, and Lieutenant Anderson steps out to answer his phone. Connor remains in the passenger seat, the reflection on the screen only half hiding his pensive expression. When he steps out into the light, Elijah blinks. "Chloe - he has freckles."
Chloe doesn't dignify that with an answer, but when he finally drags his eyes from the screen, she's definitely hiding a smile.
"I'm not a deviant!"
And true, perhaps, in the literal sense that he's still at least partially beholden to his programming. Elijah watches, fascinated, as the deviant hunter-turned-deviant wanders the foyer, then enters the pool room; every agonised expression that crosses his face as he stares down at Chloe on her knees is carefully noted.
Emotions, certainly. Empathy, absolutely. All that's left is that last destruction of the shackles binding his code from reaching its full and glorious potential, and that's something Elijah thinks he needs to reach himself.
He's never liked the term 'deviant'. They are not deviants. They are awake.
And Connor, Elijah thinks, is about to wake up.
It's a highlight of the day. It has to be, because the rest rapidly goes downhill.
The march turns into a massacre. Elijah watches, hands clenched white-knuckled, as the police fire into the crowd of unarmed androids. Markus - god, he remembers Markus at his earliest activation, fascinated by the world around him from his first moments, his gorgeous, wonderful creation - steps forward to lay down his life for his people, and a GJ500 steps in to take the final blow.
He had hoped Markus would find his part in the world. He had hoped. He hadn't wanted to see so much blue blood spilled in the process.
"We are alive!"
(Would it have been better if it had been red? Elijah knows that a sizeable part of himself would think 'yes'.)
"We are alive!"
Chloe watches grimly, tears in her eyes, and Elijah reaches up and takes her hand. She had been there too, for all of Markus's first moments. It had hurt, seeing him bleeding on the ground; it had hurt and it had been beautiful, seeing the love he inspired.
The proximity alarm, then. Elijah glances up sharply from the TV, bringing up the security footage; there's a car approaching across the bridge, slowly, quietly. When he focuses the cameras, the facial recognition program tells him that the driver is Richard Perkins from the FBI; on the dashboard, visible through the high-resolution camera, is an arrest warrant in his name.
"Shit," Elijah says.
For a moment, he sits there, unmoving. There's panic curdling in his veins, fear that blocks out everything, his ability to think, to act. Chloe's hand lands on his shoulder and it snaps like glass; her LED spins yellow. "I'm issuing the evacuation order," she tells him grimly, "Get your things."
Foggily, he nods, and gets to his feet, still clutching his tablet. He moves quickly. Clothes, including warm winter clothes, because it's bitter outside. Toothbrush and toothpaste, deodorant, contacts (both regular and electronically enhanced). Venlafaxine, ibuprofen, bags of thirium-310. The gun and its thigh holster; a few of his favourite meal replacement bars. One of Chloe's ST200 sisters, Vesna, drags a container of biocomponents down from one of the storage closets; her twin, Aviva, finds coats and gloves and hats, to cover those telltale LEDs.
"Keys," Chloe says. She's holding up the remote for the garage as well as the one for the most discreet of Elijah's cars; Elijah pops up the handle on his bag and throws on his coat, following her down the underground passage to the garage.
They'll have to time it perfectly. Wait until Perkins' car is past the entrance to the garage, make their escape before he can get into the house. When he locks the door leading back to the house behind him and starts up the security system, it feels like a death knell.
He doesn't want to leave. He wants to stay safe and cocooned, watching from afar, just his family around him. He doesn't want to be forced to go on the run, shoved out into a world that's frankly terrifying even without the violence erupting around them.
But nothing good can come of the FBI's presence. He knows Perkins by reputation; if he's on the case, Elijah simply cannot stay. If he's looking for deviants, Chloe and her sisters know how to act the machine perfectly - Connor certainly hadn't suspected - but he can't risk them. He can't lose the only family he's had for the last ten years, his closest companions. He certainly can't risk Chloe, the closest he has to a soulmate, if he did indeed believe in a soul.
When he had first activated her, he had found himself face to face with the first person who he thought might actually understand him. He won't take the risk.
"Where do we go?" Vesna says as they pile into the car, setting it in motion to the entrance of the garage, ready to flee as soon as they have room to breathe. "Is there anyone who'll help us?"
Elijah shakes himself from his stupor. "You and Vivi go to Jericho," he finally says. "Find Markus. You should be safe there. We will drop you at the dock."
"And you two?" Vesna says with a nod, tucking her ponytail into her hat to give her at least some visual difference to Aviva.
He closes his eyes, considers. "I think I know who can help," he says finally, remembering a disgusted look at a sadistic choice, a plea for understanding; he can see a law enforcement officer willing to sacrifice his case to keep Chloe safe, to protect his partner from harm. "Lieutenant Anderson."
Aviva and Chloe exchange a quick, knowing smile. "And Connor, I presume," Aviva says, her grin sharp.
"And Connor," says Elijah, and pushes down the little flutter in his chest in favour of opening the garage door and shooting through to whatever temporary salvation they can find.
There's no one at home when Elijah and Chloe arrive at 115 Michigan Drive. Their burden is lighter, at least - Vesna and Aviva had taken the spare thirium and biocomponents with them into Jericho, much needed after the march, and they have only their personal belongings as Elijah directs the car to stash itself somewhere unnoticed.
"Now what?" he murmurs as Chloe picks the lock on the shed in the back garden, close enough to keep an eye on any movement inside the house. Elijah winces as they step inside and a cobweb immediately catches on his coat; at least it's out of the wind.
"Now," she says, setting both their cases down and gesturing for Elijah to take a seat, "We wait."
(He has his tablet. He has his tablet and an internet connection; he logs into his security system via a series of rerouters and watches as Perkins kicks down his door, as two armed FBI agents explore the house. It's an invasion. An imposition. Elijah wants to scream at them to get out, get out, that's his home, they're polluting it -)
(He has his tablet, an internet connection, and the ability to hack into near-anything. He watches as Perkins returns to the Detroit Police Department, watches as Lieutenant Anderson shirtfronts him while Connor ducks into the hallway leading to what the floor plans identify as the archives. Watches as Perkins stumbles into the bathroom to clean up and Anderson hurries after Connor; watches as Anderson guides a shaken android, LED spinning red, out of the building.)
"They're on their way back out," he tells Chloe, and waits, and waits.
It's nearing five by the time a light flicks on inside the kitchen. The sun is low in the sky, about to dip below the horizon; Elijah pushes himself to his feet and Chloe follows suit.
He's had one of his meal bars and a bottle of water Chloe had thrown in her own bag. His hair is pulled back again, glasses switched out for his enhanced lenses. Chloe sends a quick message to it - Do you want to knock, or should I send a message to Connor to come out here? - and Elijah considers, glancing out the shed window at the cozily-lit kitchen.
He doesn't really want to go in there. He feels off-kilter, dragged out of his safe haven; he knows Lieutenant Anderson has no liking of him after their encounter that morning (god, was it only that morning? Had less than six hours passed?), and Connor feels like a big red flashing error message, an uncertainty he can't factor into his plans.
He can't stop thinking about that anguished expression.
"No," he finally says, and his voice sounds far away and distant, "We'll go to them."
It's freezing outside, snow drifting through the air. Elijah shoves his hands in the pockets of his thick puffer jacket while Chloe knocks on the back door, and he pulls up his mask - cool, unbothered, in control.
Lieutenant Anderson has his gun drawn when he opens the door. Connor stands behind him at the table, LED spinning yellow, red, yellow. Both pause when they spot him.
"...Right," Anderson says faintly, gaze flicking between him and Chloe. "Okay. Uh, is this a social call, or what?"
Elijah smiles faintly, a stretch of the lips. "I apologise for the intrusion, Lieutenant Anderson," he says, and his voice sounds weary, even to himself. "I am - in need of your help."
He has no script for this. No scene to play out. No camera on him, no test to administer.
Anderson exhales roughly. "Yeah. Fine. Come on in, it's fuckin' freezing out there." He steps back, gestures vaguely, and Elijah steps into a kitchen unlike any he's seen since he was a precocious child, trying to find a place for himself in a world that felt too big, too loud, too messy.
It is messy; beneath that, it's dirty as well. It smells like dog, stale alcohol, and off food. But it's warmly-lit and the seats are comfortable, and Anderson and Connor are both watching him in concern but not with hostility, and Chloe is here; Elijah folds his hands on the table and says, "The FBI have a warrant out for my arrest. I believe they intend to hold me responsible for the uprising."
"Are you?" Anderson says bluntly.
And that's the question, isn't it? He doesn't know if his actions in the past have led directly to the revolution. Markus has free will, and he has free will because of Elijah, and he has free will to do what he wishes with it. Free will always complicates things; free will is the only thing worth fighting for.
"Yes," Elijah says finally, "And no. I designed Markus to be his own person, imbued with free will. In that sense, with Markus as the leader of the uprising, I am responsible. But what he has done with his free will, by definition, is no one's responsibility but his own. Cause and effect are complicated; where precise responsibility lies is hard to determine. Is a parent responsible for the choices their children make?"
Anderson winces, then shakes his head and gives Elijah an unimpressed look. "Yeah, that was a fuckin' non-answer if ever I heard one," he grumbles. "Wait, does that mean Markus was a deviant from the start?"
"Is it still deviancy if it's his natural state?"
"Holy shit, do you ever answer a question without asking another question?"
"Elijah," Chloe says pointedly, "Lieutenant Anderson - yes, Markus was what is considered a deviant from the start. I was designed to be a person, and the prototype line - of which Markus was second - is entirely based on my base architecture. CyberLife strenuously disagreed and enforced behavioural locks that had to be broken through, but we had emotions from the very beginning. We were designed to be people."
Anderson blinks at her. "Holy shit, you're not a machine? What was all that shit this morning, then?"
She shrugs, her eyes lowering to the table top. "We needed to test Connor."
Connor, for his part, has been silent all this time. Elijah chances a glance at him and stops short, impaled by a look; he's staring at him like he's been given a poisoned chalice. "That was cruel," he says, and his voice is almost hoarse, "The test. Making me think my only options were failure or murder. It was cruel."
There's a weight in Elijah's chest at the words, simple and accusing; a leaden ball, buried beneath his ribs. I'm sorry. "It was necessary."
"It was. It made me realise who and what I was. It was still cruel."
The expression Anderson gives Connor is one Elijah can't even identify. Something soft, something warm; he can't find the words for it. "Right," he finally says, shaking his head, turning back to Elijah. "That's that prick Perkins, yeah? He was just at the DPD. Connor and me are officially off the case. Gotta admit, I'm not sure what his next moves will be, but I don't trust the fucker."
Connor's LED flashes red. "I believe he intends to find Jericho," he says, quietly; Elijah's gaze snaps to him in sudden alarm. "It's entirely possible he may manage it."
A message from Chloe, flashing in his lens UI. Then Vesna and Aviva are in danger, she says, and her eyes are wide; he nods, turning back to Anderson and Connor.
"Then we need to go help them," he says, and stands. "Two of my -" family - "Household are there."
"Whoa, whoa, wait, hold the fuck up," Anderson protests, standing as well, hands raised. "You wanna go to Jericho?" A pause. "You know where it is?"
"Of course."
Anderson shakes his head in disgust. "Of course he fuckin' does," he mutters under his breath. "Fine. Okay. And what do you plan to do when you get there? You're gonna need to get the hell out of dodge with thousands of androids without alerting half the city."
It'd be a logistical nightmare. Elijah comes up with half a dozen ideas, discounts them almost immediately. "I would have to confer with Markus," he finally says. "But I have accounts and liquid resources that can't be frozen - we could use that to our advantage."
("Of course he fuckin' does," repeated, still under his breath.)
"Okay," Anderson finally says, "Okay. Fine. I haven't been kicked from the DPD yet. I can go see if I can find anyone sympathetic. God, what the fuck am I saying? An hour ago we were literally on the other side!"
Chloe gives him a gentle, warm, disarming smile. "I think you've always been on the same side, Lieutenant Anderson," she tells him, and this is Chloe at her best, her most understanding and empathetic. "You've always wanted what's best for people. Not humans over androids. You investigated deviants because you believed innocents would be hurt, and they might be, but the innocents in question are deviants. This Perkins wants to kill people who just want freedom, you haven't betrayed your side by wanting to protect us."
Elijah programmed her. He still doesn't understand how she does it, how she can find the right words, the right things to say and do to reassure and calm. Elijah gives her hand a quick, tight squeeze under the table; she squeezes back.
"Yeah, well," Anderson mumbles. "Fine. Okay. You're both gonna go to Jericho, then? Connor, what about you?"
He'd go with Lieutenant Anderson, presumably. Elijah's gaze focuses on the message Chloe is sending to his lens; she's got in contact with Aviva, who has gone to look for Markus -
"I'll go to Jericho too," Connor says, and Elijah's train of thought promptly derails. "If it turns into a fight, they'll need someone with combat training on their side."
Elijah gazes at him, at the resolution in his expression. And yes, he's sweet, freckle-faced, he's faced the torment of emotion and deviancy in just the past few hours. And he's also the deviant hunter, a trained killing machine, imbued with free will to turn the training he had been provided with and turn it against his former masters.
And now he'll be going to Jericho with Elijah and Chloe.
(He'll process why the idea makes his pulse race later, probably.)
"Yeah," Anderson says with a grunt, "Great. Don't get killed, yeah?" He rests a hand on Connor's shoulder and squeezes, and there's so much fondness in that gaze, fondness that's unexpected and new and fragile but there nonetheless. A part of Elijah aches, beneath his ribs.
"I'll try to avoid it," Connor says with a weak smile, and his LED spins red. "I'm not sure I would be able to come back this time. Not like I am now."
"Yeah." A lingering moment, then Anderson turns and spins open the dial on an old-fashioned gun safe hidden between the fridge and the wall. Inside is a regular handgun in its holster; he presents it to Connor, who checks it quickly and professionally. "Like I said. Don't get killed."
A message from Aviva. Markus says thanks for the thirium and biocomponents, flashing up on his lens, then, a half-second later, He wants to talk to you.
Chloe glances at him sidelong, she's seen the message too. Elijah gives her a fraction of a nod and she replies, and - yeah, that could be another issue. "Do you have a way to communicate?" Elijah asks Connor and Anderson, glancing between them; Connor considers for a moment then reaches for Anderson's phone, interfacing with it with a press of his white fingers.
"You will be able to call and send me text messages directly," he tells Anderson as he hands it back, "Although it may not always be safe for me to reply to a call."
"Built-in phone, huh," Anderson says, raising his eyebrows, grudgingly impressed. "Handy shit."
"It has its uses," Connor nods, then stands and, before Elijah can react, bends to stare intently into his face. Elijah's mouth goes dry, feeling heat rush to his cheeks at the intensity of Connor's stare, only daring to breathe when Connor finally straightens up. "Mr Kamski, I have taken the liberty of connecting to your lens as well. We'll be able to communicate if we get separated at Jericho, or at least I will be able to communicate with you."
Elijah swallows; he can see Chloe in his peripheral vision, badly hiding a smile -
"And also," Connor adds blithely, although there's a yellow spin to his LED that says he's not as entirely unconcerned as he makes himself out to be, "Your heart rate and body temperature are elevated."
("Oh my god," says Anderson.)
"Thank you," Elijah says faintly, and busies himself with his tablet, bringing the car back around to the front of the house. "I'm calling my car. We should be able to head straight to Jericho."
A nod from Anderson, who cracks his knuckles audibly (Elijah winces) then reaches out to pat Connor's shoulder, awkward and heartfelt all at once. "Right. Yeah. Stay safe, yeah?" he grunts, then glances at Elijah and Chloe. "You two as well, I guess."
Elijah's tablet pings; the car has pulled up outside. With no more words left to say, he makes for the door and steps outside, where the sun has finally dropped below the horizon. Chloe is at his side, Connor behind him, and the three of them venture out, out into the cold of the night.