He wasn’t certain it would work.
He’d seen it happen, brief glimpses of brilliant white against the black of a fiery night the hour of their victory, the way Markus’ eyes held North when shared emotions drew them closer and him further away, strangers becoming lovers through such vibrant intimacy—- he’d seen it, but seeing was not comparable to doing and so much of Rhys was still human, so much of what he could see when in the quiet he turned his gaze to watch him.
He just felt like he had to try.
Several long moments lingered before the storm came for them. Connor locked gaze upon white fingers and kept it there, didn’t move it, didn’t shift to breathe or push or open. It felt … HE FELT … for one wild second as though he couldn’t do it, too afraid to expose the wires he wanted to reveal, anchored down by the weight of his hefty anxieties rising in places he should be unable to recognise or feel and perhaps it was that reluctance that compelled him to just for once stop FUCKING T H I N K I N G for long enough to breathe, long enough to establish some press of a connection. His fingertips felt they had touched a livewire ; the heat was delicate, at first, then overwhelming, all-consuming, a violent and instantaneous press into his memory core that so strongly he rejected. It’s just Rhys, he thought, and let the togetherness wash over him, Rhys knows me.
Machinery. Programming. Reams of protocol dampened by smatterings of filtered water
upon his fingertips. The texture of thin scales, brilliant blue spelling DWARF GOURAMI
as back into the tank it went. He’d nothing to gain from saving it.
S O F T W A R E I N S T A B I L I T Y
Dead eyes staring him down until he turned his back upon them, screaming child, the mark
of a liar stamped across his forehead. Mission successful. Mission always successful.
NO WRONG MEMORY W R O N G
Hank. Hank’s accusatory stare, programmed distaste a reluctant fondness, Hank hurt,
shattered glass, Sumo, big and frightening and fascinating, bullet in next chamber alcohol
smell lingerslingerslingers still smell it now upon the memory, two androids in love staring
down the barrel of his gun CAN’T SHOOT, blonde android on her knees need information
need Jericho CAN’T FUCKING SHOOT, stark white walls, staring down one’s own self,
victory but not victory, pistol in his hand, Amanda in his head, so cold so cold back door
thrust palm to stone back to life, put gun away, pretend it never happened and live with the
guilt every day, the fear, the anxiety that she might come back, that still all he was was
CYBERLIFE’S FUCKING PAWN and his very existence was a danger to that of everyone
else. Long nights spent with fingertips tracing the join of his thirium pump, too afraid to pull.
Isolation. Fear. Loneliness.
AND PERHAPS, SOMETIMES, SOMETHING ELSE
Something like peace did he know when on long days Sumo rested his chin upon Connor’s
chest. Something like family in the way Hank looked at him, the not-mentioning-your-tired
eyes squeeze of his shoulder, the you-have-me quirk of lips. Something unknown to him
when Rhys lingered in his presence, when they touched or upon the woeful days they didn’t.
Connecting was like touching a livewire, but stranger still was falling out of it, the perplexion when he let it go, pulled back his hand as though finally he found the electricity burned. Red pumped solid blips against his temple as slowly synthskin breathed, covered the vast white. Connor stared at his fingertips until it became adamant that they would stay that way. Flesh coloured. His own. Yellow. And then, softly,
❝ Being with you helps. I don’t know why. ❞