Afterburn (Connor x Reader - Connor POV)

North Star

The early hours of the morning were the quietest underneath Ambassador Bridge. Where the underpass lacked cheer, it was overly abundant in eerie desolation like time itself was afraid to pass. Melted snow mixed with freezing rain and rock salt, filling craters stamped by the hurried footsteps of those who dared to tread. The CyberLife Tower loomed ominously, its radiant glow casting an almost radioactive aura. Many cowered away from it as if contamination would claim them via unseen energies. Not Connor, though. It was the closest he could fly to the sun.

It was the closest he could get to her.

When she first woke up in the machine at 12:00am on December 11th, she told Connor and Elijah that she was alive. In that moment, it felt like those three words weren't as much a confirmation as they were a warning. He tried for hours to get her to say something again. Anything. Her only response was silence. It wasn't until the CIA informed him that they located a rogue RK800 unit that he found a good enough reason to leave her side. Then she spoke to the entire world.

For every second that passed since, he wished for nothing more than a sign that she still loved him. He prayed for one more chance to speak with her. She had him in a crisis of faith where he'd had none to begin with. Perhaps it was punishment for desecrating sacred ground. Sane rationalization was long dead – and he clung to lost traditions, fragmented as they were, like visiting a grave without a place to leave flowers.

He thumbed at the single tally he carved in the rifle. The stock lay between his legs, the barrel pressed firmly against his cheek as he leaned into it. Of mind and body, the weapon that once uprooted his life now steadied him. The indent in the metal clipped at his nail, his gaze was fixed on the black body of water rolling in front of him. Its small, gentle waves licked the ledge below. It was a dark void between the United States and Canada with Belle Island caught in the middle. The island's lights twinkled like fire on oil, driving the world to hold its breath in anticipation.

"I thought I might find you here."

Shifting in an instant, the reflective scene blurred and spun into one more refined: his hand, holding a pistol and pointing it at a woman. She lifted her hands in surrender, a smirk forming on her lips. More delayed than usual, he registered a face that he'd only seen a handful of times, and not in the most pleasant of circumstances.

North.

"Am I interrupting?"

Connor opened his mouth to answer, but the bridge's lights flickered above, the phenomenon spreading down the entire length from Detroit to Windsor. The one whose attention he fought so hard for was here. Listening, waiting...watching. While it seemed to make North uneasy, it filled Connor with joy.

"You feel her, too?" He asked.

"Always." She mumbled, "It scared me at first. She, scared me at first. I thought I'd be punished for how I treated her at the Stratford Tower, and Old Jericho...and yet here I am, inspired by her."

She found forgiveness where he still sought it. Solace. Peace. He yearned for those things in a way he imagined a starving man longed for food.

With a tone that parroted Elena's, North locked eyes with the beacon of Belle Island, her braid falling over her shoulder. She walked to the railing along the river, her hands wrapping over the steel bars.

"All this time, the men in my life told me I was overreacting. They told me I was too angry. They told me to fall in line and tried to bring me to heel. Simon. Josh. Markus..." Her voice trailed off, "But after what happened at the CyberLife Tower, the human I once looked down on uplifted me and showed me that I was right the whole time. My methods, my ideas, were justified." Her grip on the railing tightened, "Sometimes you have to light a building on fire to get people to listen."