He couldn't possibly bear to respond. He couldn't force Markus to stay with someone like him. Someone so redundant. Outdated. Old. Hopeless. He couldn't.

How could he even dare himself to think that someone like him could feel anything warm towards the PL600, other than simple companionship? It must've been a mistake. 

So he didn't say a word, although Markus could tell how conflicted he was. That's exactly why he waited, he gave Simon the time and space he needed (although the other didn't know about it), only occasionally glancing towards him with his soft gaze, so warm underneath the concentrated furrow he usually sported.

Simon, in the meantime, was brooding. Nothing more could be said of his general state. Then again, what had to be be considered was the fact that there was a sort of social upheaval going on in the entire city, if not spreading to the whole country, and none of the many members of Jericho were very emotionally available when it came to personal issues. There was just so much to do, so many things to look after. Markus was respectfully admiring him from afar, one might say. And only as much as his responsibilities of a leader would allow. (The entire time, Simon pretended he can't see.)

Then they were attacked, and the Jericho sank. The steel freighter that they called home for so long was now laying, even colder and more motionless than before, on the bottom of the river. And so many lives were lost, some gone but not forgotten and some missing, escaping on their own.

But they made it out. They made it out alive despite all, and again found refuge, hiding in the ruins of an abandoned church - how ironic it was. Perhaps the god humans worshipped would take them in its protective embrace.

They were mourning. Mourning the friends they lost, ones that didn't make it out of the ship or ones shot on sight by the heartless agents of human law. The law that didn't include even a hint of a possibility of equal rights to them. Surely they weren't alive enough.

When they settled in the damp, weeping place, with moss covering the crushed bricks and broken glass, there wasn't much to do other than waiting. Pacing around, chasing one's own thoughts when possible, if there was any virtue to it. Most preferred letting them go, not dwelling on the hurtful past that was all too close to them still.

And then, there was also him. The Deviant Hunter. Simon didn't have the opportunity to properly meet him before (lucky him), but now he was here, and he claimed to be taking their side. They had no more wariness to spare. Worn out from constant risks, they chose to trust him. With what remained of Jericho moving out to revolt on the streets and the (former, he reminded himself) deviant hunter going in to infiltrate the Cyberlife Tower, they had a chance to win. They had a chance.