Sincerely

That night I went to sleep thinking of Deckard and his small smile and eyes lit by candlelight.

When I woke up, I was pulled from a dream about him and I had to shake my head and get my bearings back in reality. I had a cup of coffee and breakfast before checking my phone.

One of my colleagues, Alcuin Livingston, had called me a few times in the early hours of the morning while I was obviously in deep sleep, he probably had something he wanted me to see so I grabbed my thermos, my coat, badge, wallet, and keys, and Deckard’s beanie, not wanting to lose my ears as it was colder today than yesterday and made my way out to my car.

I got inside and drove to the SPD stationed just outside the bustling downtown area. I dropped my coat and keys in my office, looking to see if anything had been left there for me before going to find Alcuin. I found him in a conference room going over the billboard of information we had on Carlos, his android and the case.

“Alcuin, did you find something?” I call from the doorway.

He turned to look at me, there was something in his eyes but I didn’t know what.

“We have a suspected location,” he states looking uneasy and nervous.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” I ask, hinting at his nervousness.

“You know as well as I do, none of this adds up, what if we’re wasting our time hunting down the wrong person?” he replies.

“Even if he didn’t do it, he could lead us to who did, hopefully, he’ll be willing to talk at the very least. We still need to check it out,” I answer.

“An android matching his description was spotted entering an abandoned warehouse early this morning, they’ve been keeping tabs, he hasn’t left since,” Alcuin continues.

“Did he seem to be injured or carrying weapons?” I ask.

“Negative on the injuries, unsure about if he is carrying any weapons though,” Alcuin answers.

“Let’s go, have one car on standby, we don’t want to go in guns-blazing if we don’t know if he’s armed, he might feel trapped and use lethal force to try and get out,” I comment.

“Okay,” he replies pulling out his phone to call for the standby car.

I noted the address and started looking at the surrounding area to see how we could approach this or why he would decide to hide out here. The area was pretty baron and was a hub for much illegal activity, like drug trafficking and such.

I and Alcuin suited up with vests and prepared to go in. We wore normal civilian clothing over the vests not wanting to spook the android by alerting him to police presence. Since the warehouse was supposed to be abandoned we decided to act like we were inspectors looking at the place and what would need repairing if we bought the place.

We got the key from the owner and drove my black sedan to the warehouse. There didn’t seem to be any movement or activity in or around when we arrived. We approached the place carefully, looking around the outside before opening one of the doors. I and Alcuin talked in code to not alert the android that we knew of his presence in the warehouse.

We heard noises off in the distance and pretended to think it might be mice or raccoons that had made a home in the place. We rounded a corner to a storage room and Alcuin opened it.

A bang sounded from inside and Alcuin stumbled back hissing holding his shoulder.

“Oh, no!” a voice called.

“Alcuin, you okay?” I question, kneeling down next to him to look at the wound he sustained from what I assumed was a bullet.

He held pressure on the wound and I could see blood on his clothing. I pulled the scarf he had wrapped around his neck off and tied it around his upper arm to slow the bleeding.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to. I was just trying to scare you away,” a panicked voice continued.

I turned back to look at the android inside the storage room. His indicator was flickering between yellow and red and he looked scared.

“Do you know Carlos Fairfield?” I asked.

His eyes weren’t the right colour for the android Carlos owned.

“Who?” he asked confused.

“Never mind,” I stated quickly.

“Who are you? Why are you here?” I ask.

“My name’s Bailey, my owner hit me a few weeks ago and Elias helped me escape and I’ve been hiding out in abandoned places to stay away from him, Elias gave me the gun in case he found me,” he explains.

Elias, goddamn it. The man just couldn’t mind his own business. He did try to help this android just not in the right way. Giving him a weapon that he didn’t know the consequences of being one of them. He should have reported Bailey’s owner rather than assisting in his hiding out.

“We need to get him help,” I continue nodding to Alcuin.

“How?” the android asks.

“I have to call someone,” I reply.

“Foster to base, come in, man down,” I call over the radio.

This wasn’t the android we were looking for, he was a similar model, but if Elias had helped him escape his owner, maybe he had helped Carlos’ android escape, too.

I didn’t know if that made the android or Elias guiltier considering Bailey’s situation. He just seemed to want to help Bailey even if it wasn’t in the best way.

“Copy, Foster, help is on its way. Where is the target?” they responded.

“Target is non-hostile, and not who we were looking for,” I respond.

The EMS arrived on the scene and found us quickly. They examined Alcuin and patched him up. Bailey kept apologizing to him.

“It’s okay, I’ll be okay,” Alcuin repeats trying to calm him gently.

They tried to take Alcuin away to a hospital where they could treat him better but Bailey kept apologizing emphatically as if he thought we didn’t understand how sorry he was.

“Why don’t you come with me to the hospital so you can see I’m alright?” Alcuin suggests.

“Are you sure?” I ask cautiously.

“He only shot because he was scared, he needs help,” Alcuin replies.

“If you’re sure,” I reply.

“I’m sure,” he replies nodding inside the ambulance. Bailey climbed inside and the EMS loaded him up and he got in.

What had happened made me think about Carlos’ android. What if he was afraid and that was why he felt the scene instead of calling the authorities? People did things that didn’t always seem logical and if deviants were similar to them, it made sense they’d do the same.

What happened with Bailey could have been much worse if Alcuin had been hit in something vital and not his arm. It could have ended badly if we had responded with violence in return instead of tending to the wounded. We could have two dead parties, we were lucky that no one was dead. Innocence shouldn’t be killed. But how would I know if Carlos’ android was innocent if he kept hiding from us?

Alcuin spent a few days in the hospital before being released, Bailey didn’t leave his side and ended up going home with him after they made sure he didn’t have any ill intentions towards Alcuin to care for and look after him as he healed further.

I buried myself in leads, and lab work trying to find Elias' location because he often hid off of the public’s radar because of his small crimes and probably because he was helping androids become deviants, which some saw as bad. After all, they were supposed to follow human’s orders, but if they developed free will they wouldn’t do that.

I was sent to a scene of an android hate crime one day because they thought it might be related again to the Carlos Fairfield incident. I showed up and there was a mess of blue blood from the android and frayed and broken parts lying on the ground, it barely looked human anymore.

The violence was evident, I made sure the CSIs collected all the necessary evidence, and I stood back watching, spacing out a bit. Thinking about how Bailey had hurt Alcuin out of fear, but this wasn’t because of an actual fear but more a potential threat or to prove something to the androids, that this was the consequence if they didn’t listen. As people shouldn’t have to live in fear, they shouldn’t have to either, especially if they didn’t intend harm.

I stepped outside the yellow crime scene tape to take a breather. It had almost been a week since I’d last seen Deckard so when someone touched my arm, I flinched flashing back to my hug with him.

I looked up and there he was.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah, how did you find me?” I asked.

He hesitated.

“Alcuin, he said you might be burying your head too deep in work,” he replied quietly.

How did Alcuin even know about Deckard? I thought about it, he was probably volunteering on Sunday, too. He might have seen us then. He was right, I had barely left the office in the last four or five days other than to sleep and it wasn’t getting me anywhere.

I smiled at him.

“Are you doing any better?” I asked.

He shrugged.

“I guess we're both in our own heads too much,” I reply quietly.

“Yeah, I guess so,” he replies.

“I’ll finish up here and then we can go somewhere and talk, okay?” I replied.

“Okay,” he replies.

I make sure the CSIs have everything and tell them to keep me updated if they find anything major before telling them to get everything back to the lab and study it and compare it to the information we already had.

Once everyone left, I went back to Deckard who was sitting on a bench on the sidewalk. He seemed to be looking off into the distance at the android’s blood left on the floor of the crime scene, he looked lost and concerned.

“Come on,” I state gently, grabbing his arm and tugging him up. I lead him toward my sedan and he seems nervous all over again, was he regretting coming here?