Partners [Path Unlocked 🔓]

Chapter 23 - The Wall Between Us

A noisy crash startled Hank out of his thoughts, the sound of something weighty smashing into the ground below followed by the shattering of glass meeting his audio processors and drawing the robot's attention towards the table where the sound seemed to have originated from. There, atop the wooden structure perched Connor's cat, lapping disinterestedly at a paw before brushing it over one of her ears in a perfect display of innocence that might've been believable if not for the overturned picture frame on the ground below the feline's perch.

Hank didn't hesitate before strolling over to pluck the fallen item from the ground, thinking little of it as he took the picture in his hand and pulled it up to place it back on the table where it belonged. However, as the android flipped the frame over to place it back upright, he paused, LED cycling a thoughtful yellow as he eyed the image. The picture was of a boy, who, for a long moment, Hank mistook to be Connor - But, closer inspection proved this not to be the case.

The guy looked nearly identical to the young detective - Even the android's facial scan mistaking the unknown person for his human companion for a brief moment, trying to bring up the already familiar details of one Connor Anderson before correcting itself. However, the boy's hair was a few shades lighter than Hank's partner's and laid flat rather than bounce in soft curls like Connor's. His features didn't hold quite the same softness as the detective's either, a certain harshness to the hard build of his brows and the flat line of his lips that wasn't present in Connor's gentle face and warm expression. Besides that, the person in the picture was broader than Detective Anderson, his shoulders set much farther apart and everything about him overall bulkier than the lean framed detective.

The most glaring difference though, were the boy's eyes. While Connor's own orbs were wide and open, mahogany brown, soft and inviting to give the man a trustable look, the person in the picture's eyes were nearly the exact opposite. Pale blue and ice cold, there was no trace of the of constantly visible emotion swimming in Connor's hopeful eyes, an unfeeling brick wall where Hank's human presented a window straight to his core. Even as the boy in the picture's nearly straight lips peaked up in the beginnings of a smile, his eyes remained unforgiving and piercing, leaving Hank feeling as if he were staring straight into an ice bath rather than someone's companionable gaze.

Niles Anderson. 

Birth Date: November 12, 2008  

Criminal history: Underage smoking. Physical altercation involving club owner, Elijah Kamski - Incident dated January 1st, 2025.

Deceased: January 1, 2025. 

"Do all androids snoop this much," Connor's familiar lilting voice met Hank's ears, startling the android out of his thoughts before he could get too far into them. "Or is it just you?" The man chided but his words held no malice, rising and falling softly over the jest in a gentle wave that dipped lower than usual as the sound of his light footfalls approaching joined the serenade.

"Your-!" Hank defended hasily, hands tightening unintentionally around the wooden frame of the picture as he searched for words without much success. "Your cat knocked it over!" The android protested quickly, alerts blinking through his vision without slowing long enough for him to actually view a single one of them as his gaze finally snapped up to fall on Connor only to lose whatever train of thought he'd been pursuing the moment his orbs landed on the man.

Detective Anderson had donned the long, dark trench coat that Hank had brought him, though the guy kept shoving his hands into the front pockets of the thing and pulling it tight around himself only to let the two sides fall open once more before beginning the whole process all over again. Under it remained the button up undershirt, left to hang untucked past the man's dark jeans so that it wrinkled down the front and caught at the waistband of his pants on one side to ride up the slightest bit. Paired with the thin back tie done almost correctly, the detective actually looked...