Chapter 11: Goodnight once more
(Y/N)'s P.O.V.
November 6th, 2038
08:17 pm
After a while, we arrived at the location of our new case, me stopping my car. Since Hank was still drunk to a certain extent, we decided to let me drive, just to be safe. I turned off the engine and looked outside the window.
"Aw... Feels like somebody's playing with a drill inside my skull..." Hank grunted, holding his head.
"So this is the correct place?" I directed my question at Connor, who sat in the back of the car.
"It's the address in the report."
I nodded and opened the door on my side, stepping outside.
After inhaling some of the cold night air, I stretched my arms, feeling exhaustion from all the exciting events that happened in the past few days washing over me.
"Right... Okay... Let's get going." I heard Hank say, as he slowly got out of the car, accidentally hitting his head on the vehicle's top.
"Jesus..." He muttered, causing me to slightly grin. Despite the fact that I now knew about is deceased son, the grey-haired man's behavior was too hilarious to completely ignore. Connor exited the car as well, whereas I locked it.
We approached the entrance, making me stare up at the brightly shining purple sign above. "Eden Club, huh?" I whispered to myself, having heard of this facility before.
Its function was equal to prostitution, yet no one bothered the ambiguous aspect about it, since only androids worked here. I bit my lip, bothered by the fact that people did solely regard the machines as servants for their own good. I honestly understood why a deviant would go mad here.
"Sexiest androids in town... Now I know why you insisted on coming here Connor! I guess you're into that shit as well (Y/N). Hm, not surprising since you seem to love androids anyway. Oh, boy..." I pouted at Hank's comment. As if I would ever support such an organisation...
My glance shifted to Connor, as we entered the club, curiously observing his behavior. He appeared unaffected by the whole atmosphere and the almost naked androids behind glass walls in the first room. Shivering, I lowered my head, feeling sorry for all the people that had to work here. I doubted it was of their own, free will.
As soon as we walked through the next doors, there was a pole-dancing female android right in front of us, her curves evidently emphasized by the extremely short clothes she wore. Feeling uncomfortable, I hurried over to Hank, who addressed officer Collins.
"Hey, Ben. How's it goin'?"
The officer spotted me and shortly nodded. "It's good to see you again detective (L/N)."
I weakly smiled at him, still intimidated by the almost naked androids all around us. "Yes it is."
Ben Collins turned to direct his next sentence at Hank again. "It's that room there." He said, pointing towards a door next to us. For a second he seemed to hesitate but then added, "Oh, uh, by the way... Gavin's in there too." I clenched my fists as soon as I heard that.
"Oh, great! A dead body and an asshole, just what I needed..." Hank cursed, which I fully agreed on. No need to have to deal with that man again.
Once we entered the room, Gavin partly moved his head, looking at us over his shoulder. "Lieutenant Anderson, the rookie and their plastic pet... The fuck are you three doin' here?"
He appeared just as annoyed as I felt. Connor answered as neutral as ever, "We've been assigned all cases involving androids."
Gavin stared at the corpse for a second and then replied, laughing a bit, "Oh, yeah? Well, you're wasting your time. Just some pervert who, uh, got more action than he could handle."
I glared at him, not amused at all by that tasteless joke.
"Your deduction skills must be amazing if that's what you discovered." I retorted, sarcasm dripping from my voice. The asshole detective now angrily stared at me but before he could say anything, Hank interrupted him.
"We'll have a look anyway, if you don't mind."
Obviously defeated, Gavin turned around and started to walk away, shortly addressing Chris. "Come on, let's go..."
As he passed me and Hank he grimaced and expressed disdain. "It's uh... starting to stink of booze and unnecessary self-esteem in here.."
I merely squinted my eyes, clever enough not to respond. That disgusting man took a step past us and forcefully pushed Connor aside with his shoulder, finally leaving the room.
Awkwardly, Chris followed him, directing one glance at Hank and I. "Night, Lieutenant, detective (L/N)."
As our team was alone in the room, I exhaled. The grey-haired man shot a glance at me before focusing on the corpse. I saw Connor moving next to him. While they inspected the dead body, I let my gaze wander across the dresser at the side of the small place, finding the victim's pocketbook.
"Driver's license says: Michael Graham... A credit card, cash in the wallet... Picture of his wife and two daughters..." I frowned upon seeing the image, feeling sad for the mother. Her man had visited a pleasure club and died in there. What a horrible fate.
"I wouldn't want to make that call..." Hank mumbled. I nodded in agreement.
"He didn't die of a heart attack, he was strangled." Connor interrupted my trail of thoughts, making me turn around.
"Yeah, I saw the bruising on the neck. Doesn't prove anything though. Could've been rough play..." Hank commented, deep in thought. I scanned the corpse with my eyes, thinking about both possibilities.
"We're missing something here..." Connor ascertained, turning to look at the female body on the ground.
"Hey Connor, you could try to read the android's memory!" I asserted, facing him.
His brown eyes seemed to light up, hearing that proposal. "I will try." He replied, kneeling down next to the female android.
As usual, he first analyzed the blood, causing Hank to cry out, "Whoa! Hey! Hey! Hey! Argh, Connor, you're so disgusting... Think I'm gonna puke again..."
He stared at me, frowning. "How can you watch that (Y/N)?!"
I shrugged my shoulders, answering, "I've seen it before so I guess I'm used to it."
The grey-haired man was about to grimace but out of nowhere, his expression went solemn. His intense gaze made me feel insecure.
"Is everything all right Hank?" I carefully questioned, tilting my head. The lieutenant opened his mouth, seeming partly conflicted.
"Say (Y/N), you said that you're used to dealing with android's, could it be that-" His sentence was interrupted by Connor, who apparantly hadn't noticed our conversation.
"The only way to access its memory is to reactivate it."
Hank growled but dismissed his question, making me sigh due to relief. I knew he was about to ask me something regarding my past, which was not good at all. After all, CyberLife needed me to keep my relationship with them a secret and I honestly was unsure if I could've convincingly lied to my partner. Thankful for Connor's disruption, I turned to him.
"Do you think you'll still be able to do it?"
He touched the android's stomach, making its skin switch to white. "It's badly damaged... If I can, it'll only be for a minute, maybe less... I just hope it's long enough to learn something."
As he opened the compartment embedded in the female's skin, I pressed my lips onto each other. This once again reminded me of how different androids were from us but was that truly a reason to shove them around like toys? I certainly did not think so.
As soon as Connor connected the cables inside the android's body, she opened her eyes, her LED blinking red. As fast as possible, she stumbled and backed up against a far away wall. Connor moved his hands in front of his body, inching closer and getting onto his knees. He softly reassured the other android.
"Calm down...everything's all right. All we want is to know what happened."
The woman's LED now turned to yellow, as she hesitanly gazed at the corpse. "Is he...is he dead?.."
My partner pressed on, "Tell me what happened."
The female android partly lowered her head, recalling the prior events. "He started...hitting me...again...and again. I begged him to stop, but he wouldn't."
Connor kept talking, "Who killed that man if it wasn't you?"
The female android now appeared to panick even more. "I... I don't know, I was in shutdown, I... I didn't see anything..."
The brown-haired man urged the badly damaged woman to continue. "Were you alone in the room? Was there anyone else with you?"
She breathed heavily, responding, "He wanted to play with two girls... That's what he said, there were two of us..."
"Where did the other android go? Did it say anything?"
Immediately after Connor had posed that question, the female froze, her LED losing its color. I quietly gasped, slightly shivering. She had died a second time. Now right in front of us.
"So, there was another android... This happened over an hour ago, it's probably long gone..." Hank claimed, as Connor got up. He shook his head, turning to the lieutenant.
"No... It couldn't go outside dressed like that unnoticed... It might still be here."
Hank asked, "Think you could find a deviant among all the other androids in this place?"
Snapping back to reality, I answered instead of Connor. "There is no specific method to be able to detect deviants." So what other chance did we have?
"Ah, shit... There's gotta be some other way... Maybe an eyewitness? Somebody who saw it leaving the room... I'm gonna go ask the manager a few questions about what he saw. You two let me know if you think of anything." I nodded as Hank left the room.
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