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Chapter 12: The Bridge

Like last timeline, the lieutenant insists on stopping halfway through the journey, getting out of the car and sitting on a bench drinking a beer. While Connor would usually question if drinking really helped with a hangover, he also knows that the lieutenant probably doesn't care, and that drinking for him is more of a coping mechanism than anything else, a way of dealing with his grief. It's a sad thought, and Connor makes a note to himself to do something about it should this crazy time travel plan somehow work, and androids win the revolution.

He leans on the railing, overlooking the dark water and contrasting brightly lit city, hands clasped in front of him, legs crossed, and forearms resting on the metal. It's peaceful. The combination of the sound of the water underneath, combined with the gently falling snowflakes around him, soaking into his equally white shirt, since he still didn't have a replacement jacket ordered yet, is nice. Connor likes snow too. Maybe not as much as rain, since it doesn't make as soothing a sound, but it's very pretty, and Connor likes to observe the white flakes dance through the air on their way to the ground. Plus, while living in Canada, snow had been pretty common, and so he was more used to it than he was with rain.

Last timeline, Connor had talked about the case with the lieutenant, lamented on how they weren't getting anywhere. But this time he's content to just enjoy the sounds of the water and the city in silence, to try and sort his thoughts out. He'd thought he was calm, but it had become apparent in the car after the club that something was weighing him down, not that he's quite aware of what it is yet. The same dark, worming feeling he felt in the Eden Club when he had seen Viola's limp body is back and simmering around the edges of his consciousness, slithering around his internal circuits and tightening around his thirium pump. It's not anger, though he is still both angry and shocked by how androids are generally treated by humans, what the owner had said to him when in the club. Maybe he's scared, scared of the future, scared of how he's supposed to change people's minds about androids when they legitimately see them as nothing more than something to use and throw away. Or, maybe he just really needs some time alone to think because he's teetering on the edge of a cliff and he can't see how long the drop is. He loosens his tie a little, it suddenly feels too constricting around his neck.

"Nice view huh?" Lieutenant Anderson suddenly says from behind him, and Connor turns around, curious. He gets the feeling that the man isn't looking for an answer, but he walks forwards anyway, hearing the crunch of the building layer of snow beneath his feet, until he's standing just a few paces in front of the man.

"I used to come here a lot before..." He stops, taking a drink of his beer, and then not continuing. Connor knows that he's talking about Cole, but he feels that the lieutenant might not want him to bring it up, and so he doesn't say anything about it. Last timeline he had talked about the man's drinking habits, something that the lieutenant hadn't really appreciated. So this time he goes for a different approach.

"Can I ask you a personal question, Lieutenant?"

The man lifts his head to meet the android's eyes. "A personal question? Sure. Go ahead."

"Why are you so determined to kill yourself?"

The weighted question hangs heavily in the air. Connor has an idea of why the lieutenant does it, but he wants to hear it from the man himself. Anderson looks at him for a second before dropping his gaze to the ground in front of him, not meeting the android's eyes as he talks.

"Some things" the lieutenant says slowly, "I just can't forget. Whatever I do, they're always there, eating away at me. I don't have the guts to pull the trigger... So, I kill myself a little every day." He scoffs, taking a small drink before continuing. "That's probably difficult for you to understand though huh Connor? Nothing very rational about it."