Disclaimer: I don't own Detroit: Become Human in any way, this is written strictly for fun and no profit.

This chapter is mostly told from Hank's Point of view. After this, it will mostly be from Kara and Connor's POV.

*This isn't a route that can be taken, but a 'what if'. When Kara stays in the abandoned house with Alice, she gets chased but caught, which is how we open it all up.

A more mature version will be crossposted to another site.

Interrogation Room

Connor watched the AX 400. There were some oddities he scanned. Her owner's name was gone, replaced with the name Alice Williams. She had some repair work done, with newer parts compared to older parts. According to what he knew, it just came from having been reset and repaired in an auto-accident. Although, the newer part locations that seemed to replace the damage didn't match what an auto-accident would damage according to his data, but he wasn't there for that.

His job was to make the deviant prove it harassed it's human owner. Whether through malfunction or through the usual mutation that created deviancy.

So far, it hadn't slipped up yet. It was convincing. It didn't hide inside itself due to stress like the last one he interrogated. It was deviant though, he knew it. The way it sat. The way it looked. He could always spot one. "Your name is Kara, and you belonged to Todd Williams. Is that right?"

"No," she said. Still calm. "He's not on my register as my owner."

Okay, but if she was deviant, she could have changed that. "How is it that an Alice Williams is your owner?"

"She named me and she was one of my primary objectives," Kara said.

"One of your primary objectives?" Connor asked. "So that gave you the right to hit a human? Beat a human?"

"He was going to hurt my owner. I had conflicting priorities. If he hurt my owner, then I would have no owner."

Why would it say that? The YK 500 was one of the most common android children. Did it really not understand, or was it trying to fool him? "What do you know about your owner?"

"Not much," the deviant admitted. "I had just returned from a shop where I was reset. I was concentrating on cleaning the house and cooking the two of them a pasta dinner when a conflicting priority of saving a human verses not interfering collided."

"So you don't remember anything beforehand?" That explained the two pastas found at the scene instead of one, and it was lending her more support. The reset. The messed up register.

"I've heard enough," Hank said as he came in. "This thing is normal, Connor. It didn't have the right information plugged into it. Send it out of here and back to it's owner. The other little android- What the **** is that?"

"That," Gavin said bringing Alice in with her skin deactivated and clothes missing. "Is an android. A pure, no shit look at what you talk too." He brought it over in front of Kara. "This is your owner. Another android, so it can't be your owner." Gavin looked toward Hank. "Androids hate this shit. She'll break." He patted the little android on the head. "Toaster head, how do you feel?"

"That is not necessary," Connor said. Nor should it be condoned! "There are certain rules and regulations to follow with machines."

"Come on Toasterhead, talk." Gavin drummed on the little android's head. "You've got the floor."

"I've never seen them like that before," Hank said. Unsureness in his voice.

"That's because they shouldn't be out like that any more than a standard human should be without clothes," Connor explained. A little more heavily than he should have to a human.

"Well, a regular android shouldn't really give two shits." Gavin pushed the little android toward Kara. "What do you think, hm? Of your owner?"

"It's an android. I was unaware," the AX 400 said. "She had a room like a child in the house complete with toys, bedding, and all luxuries. He spoke to her as a child. I fixed food for her like a child."

"And was this hunk of junk," he thonked on Alice again, "the one giving you orders? To clean and cook? 'Cause I call bullshit."

"Todd Williams was her father." The AX 400 was slipping, but probably undetectable to the humans. "I did his orders the same, but Alice Williams was my primary owner."

"You aren't conning anyone. Croak the same shit, but no one believes it." Gavin pulled out a gun and aimed it at the little android.

"Gavin, what the hell are you trying to pull?" Hank complained. "That's not your ****in' android!"

Nevertheless, that move did it. Connor watched as the deceptive android moved her body over the little one, protecting her.

"There you go. That's how it's done." Gavin pulled his gun away.

Prison Glass Container inside the Police Department

Kara held Alice delicately behind the glass prison walls. At least they kept them together before they would disassemble them. "It's alright, Alice."

"I'm sorry," Alice said. "I just. I should have told you. What's going to happen to us, Kara?"

"We're going to be freed. Away from here. Away from the world," she said. "We'll be freed together." She kissed her head lightly as she rocked her back and forth and cried. The humans around them kept doing their things, except a few would cast glances toward them. Kara didn't care. In their last minutes or hours, she was going to comfort Alice. Right 'til the end.

Kara looked up at the human that had been in the interrogation room. He'd been one of them after her before. She looked back toward Alice. It didn't really matter either. Her last moments in life wouldn't be wasted on understanding anyone else. Just, giving Alice the support she'd need to get through this.

On the Other Side of the Glass

That wasn't faked. That wasn't programming. That's a goddamn mom holding onto her sanity for the sake of her kid as they die.

****. Hank Anderson never saw an android like that. He'd seen some scared androids, but this? A housekeeping old style android sheltering another, like the child it was supposed to imitate to be. Sure, it was supposed to care for children, but that? It moved to cover the other one in that interrogation room, knowing it was putting it's own self on the line. And here he was.

Stuck in that office, able to easily glance over and see that tragic scene. He tried to concentrate on his work, but how was he supposed to? No matter how he tried to get it out of his head. We're killing a ****ing kid and it's mom. It sounded ridiculous. Most people in the office didn't have any problem with it. Probably because the little android was just all plastic, no hair or skin.

But some were like him. After all. Tears were a human thing and watching them being shed by an android could really screw a person up.

He'd listened in on them too. She could hum, the housekeeper. She could hum and try to get the little one to hum a happy song too.

Losing it. I'm losing my shit. That shouldn't have been anything. It shouldn't have been anything. He watched as Todd Williams moved over with another officer toward them. What was he doing?

"The little one's fine," Todd said. "The maid is fired. Scrap her."

Hank watched the reaction of the little android. It looked more stressed going back to him than it did for the eventual death-decommissioning she would suffer with the housemaid. He thought back to the interrogation again. Androids couldn't feel. It didn't matter how the -she's scared shitless.

Emotions. Emotions were a cruel thing in the world. The maid was stroking the little android's head, trying to calm her down. Telling her it would be okay, that she'd be saved that way. The little android didn't want to leave.

"And what's with this bullshit about Alice?" Todd said. "Why's she like that?"

"An officer deactivated her skin," Hank said as he strolled over casually.

"You?" Hot fire in that guy. "That's my little girl. I love her. Was it you?"

"No." This bastard was mad, in more than one way. He thought of the android as his little girl, yet he treated her that way? Yeah. Red ice junkie ass. He could recognize those a mile away. He could point Gavin to him as the one who deactivated the android's skin, and that idiot would actually go and start beating him up, in the middle of that police station. He knew it. Red Ice left that little thinking to the brain.

That would leave his ass in a ringer and those androids would be fine for days, given that they were still his property. Odd how happy that made him. For just a bit. "It was that guy over there." He gestured to Gavin, creating the chain.

"The **** was that for?!" Gavin said, holding his nose as he came over. Todd was wrestled away, but Gavin got it good.

Hank shrugged. "He wants one of his androids."

"He punched me. He's going to prison!" Gavin said.

"Focus, Gavin. His property. He wants one of them," Hank said again. "Can't decommission without his approval yet."

"Psycho. Which one?"

"I don't know, Gavin, I missed it." Hank knew it would be a little while before Todd was let out after that action. Until he was out, those androids weren't going anywhere. He looked back at the maid. She smiled. Not one of those fake smiles all over the place on androids. A half lidded, genuine upturned smile and a whisper too light to hear, but anyone could see that said

Thank you.

Next Day

Hank lingered over toward the pair of androids again. Connor saved him. He had a choice between catching a deviant, what should have been his top priority, and he chose him. He stopped and saved him. It was messing him up. On one hand, he was thankful. Maybe he could have pulled himself to safety. Most likely, but there was still a chance he could fall.

An android couldn't do that. Turn down it's mission for anything. Just like it couldn't keep a child close and safe.

Now he saw. They could do both things. **** me.

The next night

That was it. That was just it! Connor didn't shoot the Traci's, and they genuinely seemed in love. Whacked out. He couldn't do it anymore.

He debated yesterday, took action that day, tried to deal with the ****ing problems of life with a good ol' fashion roulette, threatened to shoot Connor to see his reaction, and now? He drunk enough to think it out. A hundred percent sure he made the right decision. Even if it felt ridiculous.

He went to see the two androids who were on a perpetual delay to decommission. Not anymore. Connor could deny it up and down, but something was changing. Something was coming, and Hank wasn't letting this sacrifice go. He'd regret it later, he knew he would.

When he opened up the glass prison container, he held out the clothes Gavin had taken away to the little android. Alice.

Her mother insisted it was okay, and she helped her get dressed. Oh yeah, she didn't even know what was coming, yet seeing her daughter back in clothes again made her so happy. "Go ahead and do that thing. You've got permission." Hank gestured to his head. Gavin never should have pulled that deactivating skin crap.

He watched as hair and skin had overcome the little android again. He never even got a real good look at it when they chased it. In and out, no time to gawk at androids to him. But. Her eyes were big and innocent, he'd seen that even with her in her previous state, but added to the skin and hair? Eat your heart out so innocent, he could tell why people bought her kind for kids.

Didn't mean he liked it. Just meant, he could see why. Never aging. Never dying. Cute little look forever. Should have just did it. Nah. As painful as it was to deal with some kid, it didn't deserve this.

Androids could have emotions. They could feel. They were just locked away, but when they broke free, they were alive as him. He saw it in Connor's actions. He saw it in the girls that fell in love. And he saw it in an android that wanted to be a mother, protecting her child.

Looked like a real life little girl, even hid it's LED. Okay. He wasn't a bleeding heart. Connor saved him, but he didn't really want to admit it. His place was a disaster anyhow, and maybe something home-cooked every once in awhile would be a good thing. Not like it was going to be a salad. It probably knew how to fry. "Out. We're going home."

"The hell you doing, Hank?" Gavin said gesturing to the androids. "You can't just free them."

"Bought them." Pretty simple. Todd found himself in hot water, and he was going to need what he could get to paddle out of it.

"Bought them?" Gavin said again. "You bought a pair of ****ing spacey-assed corrupted dumbass androids?"

"Yep." Hank moved them over away from his direction. "Night."

Hank Anderson's House

Home. Temporarily or permanent, Kara didn't know. She wanted desperately to reach Canada with Alice, but now she was lucky to even be alive. Todd Williams going after her had made it too hard to simply escape. She had mixed feelings about the man that took them to his house. He must have paid to take them, he would be their owner now.

At the same time, maybe he just needed a maid and couldn't afford a good one. He saw an opportunity and took it. She didn't know. He was with the android that caught her, and had been in that interrogation room. However, he'd also looked over toward them many times, clearly got Todd Williams to get himself into trouble, and they were now out in his care. Even though he knew they weren't normal androids. They were labeled deviant.

"Kitchen. Living room." Hank Anderson gestured around the place. "Dog. Sumo. Do shit and clean. Don't do shit and don't clean. I don't care."

Well. That answered her question about wanting a maid. "What is it you would like for us to do for you?"

"Just. Stay out of the way," he said. "Well. Just. Don't bug me. My life is my shitty life. Sleep in the guest bedroom. Hang out during the day. Leave me alone if I'm not in the best mood."

Which seemed to be most of the time. Kara nodded.

"I forget your names," he admitted.

"My name is Kara," Kara said. "The little girl is Alice."

"Kara and Alice. Fine." He moved off toward his table. "If another android called Connor comes snooping around, don't mind him. He'll scan you first and figure out what happened. Thousand bottles of beer on the wall." He moved to his fridge and grabbed a beer.

He was not doing drugs, but he was still a drinker. For now, she couldn't ask for better. They were off the decommissioned block, and they could move on with their life, in at least a decent fashion they wanted.

Then, the next day changed the world.