Partners [Path Unlocked 🔓]

Chapter 10 - First Assignment

"Holy fuck!" Connor's startled cry was the first thing that met Hank's audio processors as the android jolted back into reality as the humans knew it, mechanical body jerking into alertness and stormy blue eyes shooting open without so much as a flutter to ease them back into the world.

The detective reeled back from where he'd been hovering all of about two inches from the machine's face, assumably searching for the cause of the abruptly induced shut down as his hand still lingered in the air between them, long fingers extended as if to brush over the creation's LED they now simply hovered motionlessly above. Connor let out a strangled exclamation that was indiscernible even to the highly advanced prototype's keenly attuned sensors, heart rate stuttering in a quickened rhythm of distress and pink lips remaining tugged downwards into a firm frown as he jerked back into his own car seat, though his left arm remained resting against the middle console where it had been positioned to lean across the car to leave the man facing the android - Hank felt it a safe assumption to lay the reaction on the fact that his sudden reactivation had taken the detective off guard. It made sense.

Though Hank's newly reawakened optical sensors had previously been obscured by a curling mop of messy hair and a concerned face pushing into the android's space and leaving little room for anything else in the machine's eyes, the robot could now determine his location to be the vaguely familiar interior of Connor's car. On a much more concerning note however, the android found the vehicle to be parked worse than usually against the side of the road where barely so much as a shoulder existed to allow the car distance from where other drivers raced by at an alarming rate, fierce wind whipping the small hatchback into shuddering with each roaring pass.

"What are we doing here, Detective?" Hank inquired evenly as Connor's heart rate finally began to subside to a safer range and adopted a more stable rhythm, though the detective's uneasy frown stayed firmly set in place even as the man averted his gaze, tongue bit gently between his teeth. "This is a hazardous location to remain in." The android pointed out informatively, well prepared to go into the details pertaining to the exact speeds of the cars racing by and the unacceptably minuscule distance between the highway and their own perfectly destroyable bodies.

"I see the cars just fine, Hank." Connor snorted humorlessly with a slow breath blown between his lips to finish the satirical statement. "It's just that," The detective began unsteadily once more before letting his uncertain words trail off with a stressed sigh, silencing any argumentative facts the android may have been collecting in short term storage about the number of deaths caused by traffic incidents or the likelihood of a car swerving an inch or two off the road and adding a number to that steadily growing list.

"You just," The man began uninformatively, gesturing vaguely with his restless hands to no real purpose. "Crashed in my damn car seat!" Connor finally balked incredulously, heart rate keening back up a notch or two as if relaying the information had somehow made it all the more unpleasant. "I didn't really feel like waiting 'till the next gas station to see if you were still among the living. " The detective snorted sarcastically, voice high with forced ease but yet betraying a touch of anxiety rooted deep within Connor's lilting tones no matter how casual the man might've made himself appear with his arms crossed easily over his chest and a coy smile tugging at one lip.

Hank distinctly remembered being in the furthest most left lane of the five lane roadway the last he recalled and a concerning image of a panicked Connor swerving across four lanes of heavy traffic formed itself vividly in the android's mind.

"My apologies if I upset you, Detective Anderson." Hank offered apologetically - Rather than giving in to the compulsory command to remind the detective he was a machine and thus, in all fact, not among the living to begin with - the android's voice softened a touch in lieu of the new information, though the smidge of gentleness probably had the effect of a snarling doberman trying to give paw. Yet Connor still gave a stiff shrug and a dismissive wave for the machine's efforts, a tendency the robot had come to label as a habit for the young detective.