Connor was still standing in the middle of the bullpen when a very grumpy, slightly hungover Lieutenant Anderson walked in and almost brushed past him, before he noticed that it was weird for the android to just be standing there.
“The fuck are you doing there?”

He hadn’t exactly been on the best terms with the Lieutenant yesterday and he still wasn’t certain where they stood now, he was kinda concerned about just having become a deviant, and oh yeah, Gavin was definitely pissed at him. So, excuse him, if he panicked.

“I, uh, well, huh...” Connor stared blankly into the distance, eyes flitting around, looking for an exit? A hiding spot? Something. Definitely looking for something.

He gently took the Lieutenant’s arm and led him over to his desk.

He had literally just turned deviant and he couldn’t tell anyone about this. Okay, maybe he could tell the Lieutenant about it. He seemed to be fine with these things?

“Listen.” Connor glanced over his shoulders to see that no one was eavesdropping on them, while Hank sat down in the chair at his desk. “It’s a secret, okay? I-”

“Where the fuck is the plastic asshole!?”

“Oh no!” Connor’s head whipped around, looking for an escape, that wasn’t there. “Hide me!” he yelled, throwing himself to the floor and crawling underneath the Lieutenant’s desk.

“Where’d it go?” Connor had just scrambled into place, when he saw Detective Reed’s shoes appear right in front of the desk, and uh, well, he didn’t sound too pleased.

“Where’d what go?” Hank asked calmly and with a hint of contempt.

“The plastic bitch” And wow, okay, rude. “It’s supposed to be working with you and I saw it walking over here.”

Hank leaned back in his chair, arms crossed. “Nah, can’t say I’ve seen him today. You would have known by the yelling.”

Connor just so managed to pick up some displeased grumbling from Detective Reed.

“What did he even do?”

Connor watched Gavin’s feet shift in front of the desk. “Fuck if I know. It did something to my coffee.”

Is that how the other androids had felt? Deviating, doing something to mess up, and then immediately finding the next best hiding spot, just waiting to be found?

“Huh. Well, I haven’t seen him, but I’ll direct him to you once he shows up. It’s not like he ever stops following me around.”

Then again, it’s not like other deviants usually had humans sticking up for them. Although he wasn’t quite sure what had sparked the change in their relationship? Could it be a response to Gavin’s outwardly negative feelings towards him? Connor thought it might be.

“Yeah, sure.” Gavin didn’t sound any less annoyed as he walked away.

Hank watched him a bit longer, before he leaned down towards Connor.
“Did you mess with his coffee?”

Connor looked up at him with big eyes. Was this it? Had he messed up now? He nodded anyway.

Hank cocked his head and wrinkled his brow. “What did you do?”

Connor had the decency to look at the floor, ashamed. “Spat in in it,” he murmured.

When he glanced back up, he saw the Lieutenant’s face twisting up, trying not to laugh. Hank^^^ Warm

“Did your programming tell you to do that?”

Connor startled at that. Did he know? Was this bad? Fuck it. “It decidedly did not.”

“Huh? What’s that supposed to mean? Did you deviate?” There was still humor in the Lieutenant’s voice, but Connor couldn’t help but feel like this was the worst possible outcome.

“Uh, that’s a secret!”

Nailed it.

The Lieutenant rested his chin in his hand and looked at Connor thoughtfully for a moment. “Aren’t you specifically designed to hunt deviants?”

“Yeah.”

“Wouldn’t they have built you so you wouldn’t deviate?”

Connor steadily held his gaze and shrugged. “You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But, well, here we are.” Hank^

The Lieutenant stood up and looked around the room. “Come on.” Deeming it save, he beckoned Connor out from under the desk and out of the building, towards his car.

“Where are we going?” Connor asked once he was settled in the passenger seat.

“Nowhere.” Hank leaned his arms against the steering wheel and turned his head to look at Connor. “So, you turned into a deviant. And the first thing you did was spit in Gavin’s coffee. Did I get that right?”

“I wasn’t designed with the ability to spit, but I did what I could.”

The Lieutenant scoffed, with a smile on his face, and buried his head in his arms. Hank^

“Lieutenant, I’m... kind of concerned about the whole deviancy thing. If people find out about this, I’ll be sent back to CyberLife for deactivation, and I just so happen to have this new found fear of death.”

The Lieutenant lifted his head and twisted in his seat, to face the android directly. He gave Connor a thorough once-over, and held Connor’s eyes with a look that bordered on fond.
“Well, I can’t speak for you, but I’m supposed to be catching criminals. And I don’t know how much of a crime spitting in someone’s coffee is. But it sure as hell doesn’t require deactivation.”

“I don’t think CyberLife differentiates in that matter.”

“They probably don’t. But I do.”

Connor looked out the windshield into the empty parking lot, trying to process the information, before turning back to the Lieutenant. “You won’t hand me in?”

“Of course I won’t.”

Connor’s lips twitched up into his first ever genuine smile. “Thank you, Lieutenant.”

The Lieutenant looked to the side, and opened and closed his mouth, at a loss for words. He reached over to pat Connor on the shoulder a bit roughly. “Don’t mention it, kid.”

Hank^^^ Friend