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Time & Place: A.) Washington D.C., 2274 | B.) Enclave-controlled Detroit, 228X
Description: A.) Bellamy and Abner’s first mission together | B.) The Gang Solves A Murder
Content: It’s Fallout, you know the drill

A.) Introductions

This is a retrieval mission. One of our own, a traitor to the cause. You'll be accompanying Agent Rook. He has the details, along with a photograph of the target. Your duty is to assist with the retrieval and protect your superior from any harm in the process. You'll be meeting him outside the main gate at 0600 tomorrow. Do you understand? Good boy.

It was a quarter to six when Abner took his position by the gate, folding his arms tightly over his chest. February was fucking cold, and his civilian disguise didn't offer much in the way of insulation. At least they'd given him a scarf—as much to hide the shock collar as anything else, but it kept his face warm. He pulled it up to cover his nose as he scanned the area.

There. Someone else was emerging from the bunker. Smaller than him, almost child-sized. Was that supposed to be his superior? He stood at attention as the figure approached, just in case.

- - -

B.) Whodunnit

Abner remembered in flashes. Blood. Bruised knuckles. The sight of someone’s face being pummeled into a wall, over and over until it looked more like a crushed melon than a human head. And before that—a whisper in his ear, a voice he didn’t recognize, saying words they weren’t supposed to know.

Do you remember your training?

So yeah, he’d definitely killed someone. That wasn’t the important part. The important part was that he hadn’t done it alone. Someone, somewhere, had the controls to his brain. And that was blatant misuse of Enclave property.

He’d turned himself in immediately, of course. Fully cooperative. Now all that was left was to sit patiently in the interrogation room, hands folded on the cold metal table in front of him, waiting for the detective to ask his questions.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

“I don’t mind getting hurt, sir,” Abner assured him. “Just...don’t like crowds. Harder to see threats coming. I’m better at it when I’m gone, but that won’t work for what we’re trying to do here.”

Really, he just hated being touched, but that was a weakness and he knew it.

He tensed up, fists clenching, as another person brushed far too close to him. It was a relief when they got inside, the outdoor crowd giving way to a clean floor and a reception desk straight out of the old world. The receptionist was uncomfortably pretty, and Abner tried his best not to look at her for too long. She seemed vaguely familiar, he thought, and hearing her call him by name confirmed it. They must’ve been introduced one of the other times he was there. Or wasn’t there, as it were. It was always a little weird encountering people who only knew him as the mayor’s bodyguard—usually they were surprised he could talk.

“Not her,” he whispered as she walked away, once again trying not to stare. “I think I would’ve recognized her voice. Don’t actually remember meeting her, though.”

Edited 2020-07-05 14:45 (UTC)

Hank knits his brow and looks off the direction the woman had gone to, the sound of her heels having faded completely. Then back to bewildering Abner and all his strangeness.

"Well she definitely remembers you."

The secretary returns, still looking pleasant enough. "You can speak with the Mayor once he's out of this meeting. Mr. Van Cleef isn't currently in the building, but his coworker Mr. Miller is available on floor three, office twelve. Mrs. Najjir took the day off, and Miss Connelly should be available in the archival room all evening."

"Right. Thank you. Come on." He pats Abner's shoulder, indicating that they need to go, and goes to the stairs. Miller first. Then probably Connelly, 'cause god knows how long the Mayor's meeting will be.

"So you don't actually remember any of these people? None of 'em?" He asks once they've walked far enough away.

This time Abner managed to mostly suppress his startle response, only twitching slightly under Anderson’s hand. Ideally he shouldn’t react at all when superiors touched him, but this particular superior wouldn’t know that, and he wasn’t about to bring it up himself.

“Don’t remember them, but I know their faces,” he explained as he trailed the lieutenant to the stairs. “Voices too. Same reason I’ll be able to recognize the killer’s voice.”

He knew he was walking right on the edge of saying too much, but part of him didn’t care anymore. The part that instinctively trusted anyone who treated him gently and gave him food.

“It’s hard to explain, sir, but I’m not always me. I‘m something else when I guard the mayor. I was something else when I killed DePleur. The same thing, I think. But I can only remember bits of it when I’m me again. Sounds and smells. Faces sometimes.“ He paused, realizing for the first time that he might sound a little bit like a crazy person. “Does...that make sense?”

"Can't tell if that sounds like some sorta fugue state or what..." but he theorizes, maybe, that Abner's been trained to be completely covert in his actions. That he won't be a threat to confidential information. He can only imagine what kind of toll that'd take on the mind, and while he'd hope someone would only damn themselves to that grief willingly? Knowing what he knows about their imprisonment system says to him that they shouldn't.

They reach the upstairs office first, names listed on one of those signs where you slip in the letters individually. Amazing how much stuff the original resettlement of the area managed to dig up, even small tidbits like that. And Miller's name is written as Kazuhira Miller.

When they reach the door, the man inside with the handsome face, just scruffy enough that it looks intentional and pristine, and shockingly blond hair does not look like a Kazuhira. He shouldn't judge, though.

He knocks on the open door rather than just entering, tapping against the wood so the other man looks up through NCR issued sunglasses and is in a beret with a patch he can't identify, another bewildering mix here. A liaison, maybe? He's wearing a uniform under a tidy long coat, and while he writes with his left hand his mechanized right one sits idly on the desk.

He looks up to Hank and Abner. "How may I help you?"

"We're here to ask about one of the late Paul DePleur's associates. Adam Van Cleef?"

"Oh." Miller responds with all the passion of a man that's found a turd lying in the center of a clean room, and he tips back in his seat and turns his pen in his fingers, real and metal.

“Fugue state? Huh.” Abner had never heard that term before—the scientists didn’t have a name for what he did, at least not one they told him about. He wanted to ask more, but Anderson had stopped in front of one of the offices, signaling that the conversation was over. Hopefully he’d get a chance to ask later.

The first thing Abner noticed about Mr. Miller was his unfamiliar uniform. Definitely not Enclave. Maybe not even American, judging by that mess of a first name. Before he could raise any suspicions, though, his eyes landed on the metal hand. At first glance he thought it was a simple prosthetic, and then it moved.

Whatever his superior was saying faded into the background as he stared at it, fascinated. He’d never seen anything like it before. Was it Enclave? There were other branches of the lab he’d never been to, brothers and sisters he’d never met, but the possibility of a working robotic arm had never occurred to him. He was almost jealous.

He'll explain later if Abner asks, though it'll be in a very Hanklike way, in that he's encountered murder cases before and had to learn the idea sans any particular technical terms.

"Sounds like you have history," Hank says as Miller gestures at two wooden chairs they can pull up. Hank grabs both of them and moves the one for Abner to sit in so he doesn't awkwardly look like he's guarding the door. Though he knows the people here have seen Abner, and probably know his behavior as... whatever that thing he describes is? Anyway, Miller just looks exasperated.

"Van Cleef is good at what he does. Very good." Miller explains. "We have a strong difference of opinion in how things should be done, but we've worked together for a decade now. His beliefs serve the Mayor and I believe him finding a station here-" for however long the man remains "-will benefit us both."

"What is it exactly that you do?"

"We're highly experienced mercenaries. We come in, we train soldiers. Raise their credentials and expand their skillsets. Accept our payment, and leave. Even the Enclave can use the help when the officers are good enough."

"And Van Cleef and you both... are?" Hank tips his head.

Miller looks at the mechanical hand (turning it shows enough of the heavy wrist joint to indicate there's probably more of that arm unseen under the sleeve). "We make due, when the situation calls for it. I'm assuming you're here about DePleur's murder? ...I promise you if it was Van Cleef, neither of us would ever find out and he'd be smug about it for the rest of his life. He's infuriating that way. So I hope for the sake of your sanity, it's someone else."

Abner ignored the chair pulled out for him, opting to stand by the door as usual. Here, even as himself, he was starting to fall back into the guard dog’s familiar patterns. Hands behind his back and eyes fixed straight ahead. This time, though, digging his fingernails into his wrists until they bled, keeping himself anchored the only way he knew how. He had a job to do, one that the guard dog couldn’t.

Not that it was much of a job at the moment. He could barely process what the stranger was talking about, only that his voice was as unfamiliar as his name and uniform. A mercenary. That would explain it. Not a true human after all. The thought was comforting—a suspect he didn’t have to obey. Although it didn’t seem like this man was a suspect in the first place.

He kept his mouth shut as usual, but there was a nagging, resentful thought setting in. If the Enclave were hiring, it meant the other mercenary—Van Cleef?—would be his superior. A wastelander. It went against his programming, and more importantly, his mission. He’d been told the only outsiders allowed in the Enclave were the ones like him. The recruits, the assets, a subclass below a subclass. He clenched his teeth on a particularly disobedient comment, and silently hoped that the intruders had engineered Agent DePleur’s death so he’d have an excuse to kill them. It was what they deserved.

Hank glances back at Abner, but doesn't say anything. He would, if he knew about the nails. But he doesn't. Instead, he turns his attention to Miller again, who seems to be unfazed by Abner's behavior. Not just because of Abner, but because this is what Van Cleef does to people. DePleur just got answers. But Adam? He can do that tenfold, break people down, and rebuild. Not just into obedient dogs, but fully formed Manchurian Candidates.

"Seems like the Enclave puts a lot of faith in you both for you to even be here."

"My father was Enclave, West Coast. My mother was... probably Silicon Valley, I'm not sure." Hence the name. Beyond that, he doesn't expand on his history. It's not important. "But I made enough connections through him that I know how this all works. And Van Cleef has people of his own. He's gotten around. He could be fully Enclave. He could be Brotherhood of Steel. I can't be sure, he constantly obscures his background. Anyway..."

Miller reaches into a drawer and pulls out his appointment book. He flips to the times he and his other associates had meetings that day. And then he holds it out to Hank, without having to be prompted.

"...your reputation proceeds you. I was informed you'd probably be coming and here's what you were probably looking for."

"My reputation, huh?"

"You were top of your class. Brought down one of the biggest chem smuggling operations in the city. Displaced several corrupt council members."

Not that it did a lot of good, is all Hank thinks to himself. But he grunts an acknowledgement as he copies details from the book.

"You sound like a good man, Lt. Anderson. I feel like this place is a difficult one for good men to live in."

"That a recruitment line?" Anderson asks, still looking at what he's writing.

"No. Just an observation," Miller's eyes move behind his glasses, regarding Abner. He says no more than that. Who the hell knows what kind of man he was before the Enclave stripped him of his personality. And Miller's own father? His life ended with a gun to his head. He doesn't expect much better for Anderson, outside of a miracle.

Abner’s eyes flicked between the two men as they talked, silently following the conversation. The more he heard, the more he distrusted this Van Cleef guy. Could be a commie traitor, for all they knew. And they were going to hire him? They’d at least re-educate him first, right? He wasn’t allowed to question his superiors, but he did have to question their decision just a little bit. Just about this.

Miller, on the other hand, was technically okay. It was a shame he hadn’t done the patriotic thing to serve his country, but as long as he was human it should be fine. Maybe being a merc was a decent strategy, spreading the Enclave’s agenda to the wastelanders.

It hadn’t occurred to Abner that, maybe, Miller didn’t follow the Enclave’s agenda in the first place.

His stance relaxed slightly now that he was confident his superior wasn’t about to get attacked. It seemed their conversation was coming to an end anyway, with Anderson writing something down in his little notebook, Miller making some sort of cryptic comment about good men. It was no surprise that the lieutenant was a good man, judging by the misguided way he’d been treating Abner. It was a surprise when the mercenary finished by making pointed eye contact with him. It felt like he knew something, like he saw through the carefully constructed mask to the broken shell underneath.

Abner shuddered and quickly looked away. He wasn’t a good man. He wasn’t a man at all.

Edited 2020-07-10 06:13 (UTC)

"So what you're saying is-" Hank adds without looking up "-is that you believe that if Van Cleef wanted DePleur dead, he wouldn't have used Pvt. Abner."

Hank looks up, and Miller just glances back to him and smiles quaintly. "Why rent when you can own."

Not a great sign, but he nods in agreement. "We'll still look into it. Thank you, Miller."

He offers his hand, and Miller offers his mechanized one. "A pleasure. I wish you success in your case."

"Yeah, thanks." Casually, though Hank gets up and motions for Abner to come with him, checking the names along the list. Seeing how they line up with contacts of DePleur's.

"Not sure he did it, but he spent a lotta time with the same crowd..."

Edited 2020-07-10 06:26 (UTC)

Abner started a little at the mention of his name, and more importantly, what he’d done. Strangely enough, Miller seemed unbothered. Unsurprised, even. Joking?

Why rent when you can own?

He blinked, staring at the mercenary. Had he heard right? The implications of that were staggering, and he’d thrown it out like it was nothing. The idea that an independent merc had something like him...where had he gotten it? Had he made it? He itched to ask more, but without permission to talk to the suspect, the words were frozen in his throat. Instead he let himself be led out of the office, only speaking to Anderson when they were out of earshot.

“I don’t trust Van Cleef, sir, but I don’t think he did it. At least not alone. It was a woman’s voice giving the order, and besides—he’s not Enclave, he wouldn’t know my trigger.” He hadn’t meant to name it so specifically, but it was fine. Felt kind of good to come clean about the training. “Do you know what he meant about the renting thing, though? If they have something like me around, the scientists will want to know about it.”

He's probably about as trustworthy as half the other people in this building, the MP musese harshly. Just because someone is Enclave doesn't mean they have the best interests for the country or Detroit in mind. Sometimes it just means they want a title in front of their goddamn name or an office to hold over people. Fuckin' sucks. "Van Cleef is probably convenient to someone to get status. Tried to straighten up the city a while back, but a few were swept under the rug. Not much I could do."

He taps the notepad against his hand. "Four shared women on his schedule. JoAnn Connelly, Noore Najjir, Mrs. DePleur, and the Mayor's wife. Connelly's in this building, easy to get ahold of. We need to go down and look at files anyway, I wanna figure out who might have been in charge of emergency protocols- maybe someone was told what to do if there's an emergency."

Then Anderson looks up from his ramblings and note-taking.

"Looks like you had a lot on your mind. You get this look on your face when you're thinkin'. What is it?"

"I get a look? I'm sorry, sir, I'll have to work on that." Abner prided himself on being expressionless, but Anderson seemed to notice more than the rest of his superiors. Or maybe he was just the only one paying attention.

"I was just thinking about how...weird this is, sir. Hiring someone without knowing his background, or even if he's a true human. He could be Brotherhood, or a commie spy, or, or..." He gestured vaguely, looking uncharacteristically agitated. "I'm not allowed to question my superiors, sir, but it doesn't seem right. It goes against everything we stand for. Everything I was taught. There's only one way for non-Americans to join the Enclave, and you're looking at it."

"Why do you gotta work on it? It's not like you're on duty. You said you were somewhere else when you were."

He shrugs about Adam.

"I don't know. My grandparents came from the local vault, so technically I'm only Enclave because Enclave decided to move in and promised to protect us 'Americans'. Maybe it's not that they don't know his background, but that we don't know because they decided it isn't our business to. Or someone decided he was good enough to team up with. I don't think there are too many commies left. They're probably all stuck in Russia and dealing with their own problems if there are."

Brotherhood is a very real problem, though. And as much fault as he finds with Enclave, especially recently, it definitely doubles back on them and their greed for Detroit's industry. With all the Enclave's dangerous failures against the Brotherhood, it's a very real fear.

Maybe they just want to test out new ideas on people like Abner.

He is a little curious about the guy. He wanted to ask Miller more himself. But in a strange way? He also doesn't fucking care. Funny how that evens out.

"So you were from the Wasteland, huh?" With everything else he doesn't expect that Abner would remember much about that either. He makes his way towards the sub-levels.

“Doesn’t matter. Expressions are a weakness, and weakness isn’t tolerated. I thought you knew that, sir.” After all, it would’ve been hard to miss the fact that Abner hadn’t smiled or frowned once during the entire investigation. It was like he’d forgotten how.

Maybe he shouldn’t have been surprised, though. Anderson didn’t seem to know nearly as much about America as someone of his rank should.

“I don’t mean to be disrespectful, sir, but you should be more careful. Communists are everywhere. They can look like anyone. You won’t know until they take a sickle to your throat. I’ve seen it happen, sir.” In holotapes, but he knew they used real commies for those.

They were approaching the basement stairs when Anderson spoke up again. Abner glanced at him, confused.

“Wait. Nobody told—?”

No, of course they hadn’t told him. Probably hadn’t told him anything about Abner except that he wasn’t responsible for whatever horrific crimes he committed. He’d just been assuming Anderson knew. That he could tell.

“Yeah, I was from the wasteland. The Enclave recruited me I think...ten years ago? I was...a person then. Different name. A mercenary, like Miller. Can you believe I thought I was human?” He folded his arms tightly over his chest, falling silent. Yet another thing he shouldn’t be talking about.

“That’s why you’ve been so nice to me, isn’t it,” he said after a long moment. “You thought I was human, too.”

Well... about 50% of that was appalling, the other 50% of it tragic. None of it good.

"So you say, but my pissed off face has made plenty of people back off when I needed them to or get them to leave me alone when I'm in a bad mood, so I'll just stick with it. Seems to be doing me some favors."

But it's more and more evident what they'd want from Abner. Absolute obedience. Utterly expendable, but with all the time and effort not expendable at all. "I still think you are. Anyway you're human enough that they decided your life is more important than DePleur's. They didn't kill you for what you did. They just roughed you up some- for what sounds like their mistakes."

If he thinks too hard on the system as it is, some extra bullets might make it into his six-shooter for his nightly round of Russian Roulette.

"That might be why they don't care. This new guy offered them a chance to bring in his own brand of... whatever the fuck they did with you. So they could afford to lose him, if it means it might not go wrong." He's glad when they reach the offices where the files are kept. The woman there looks less like she's trying to put on airs. She's here to keep records. She's wearing relatively nice clothes, sure, but they are a little dirty because she doesn't have hired help to work out the stains and she's got on practical boots.

She struggles with a box with a grunt, and Hank's quick with a, "Let me help you with that." Before he's over there, helping catch it before it falls out of her arms. Compared to his massive frame, she seems very small.

Abner shook his head. “I’m a valuable piece of equipment. If your favorite gun misfired, you wouldn’t throw it away. You’d fix it. And...they did.” He tilted his head, exposing the fresh burns under the collar of his jacket. He’d spent most of the night in the training room—screens of nauseating colors and sounds he couldn’t remember afterwards. Subject 51 had taken the brunt of it, as usual. Abner wasn’t there.

“So if Van Cleef really can make more things like me, he shouldn’t be working for security, he should be in the lab. There’s a lot that goes into the training. It won’t be the same if an outsider does it. Whatever the mayor is doing, sir, he’s going to get more people killed.”

He abruptly stopped talking when he noticed the archivist. Connelly? He didn’t recognize her. There would’ve been no legitimate reason for the mayor to bring him to the basement, so it checked out.

“Oh, thank you. Just put it on that table over there, if you would.” The woman smiled up at Anderson, then glanced over to Abner. No sign of recognition, and her voice wasn’t at all familiar. He caught the lieutenant’s eye and shook his head.

“So what brings you gentlemen down here today?” Connelly continued. “Is it about Agent DePleur? Nasty business. I feel terrible for his wife.”

Even that logic is horrendously stupid, because there's a difference in a "misfire" and a misfire blowing off the head of a superior officer. That gun is pretty much fucked then, as is the person behind it. But Abner wasn't. And he's appalled at the presentation he's shown.

Four fuckin' years ago, just four, he could have been convinced still that there was a chance to use Detroit to rebuild America. To make it peaceful, and the land his grandparents would have wanted. But there isn't an ounce of that hope left, he doesn't think.

Still there's nice little things, small relief, like in the gentle gratitude of the archivist as he offers his big lug of a body for something small and helpful. He catches the look and nods, before stuffing his hands in his pockets.

"Yeah, it's about him. I'm authorized to access to his records."

He has a specific thought in mind. If it's a revenge killing, it's probably someone he interrogated. While they don't always have names, they do keep track of what was on people when they died, no matter who they were, because that information could be valuable later if they're missing a code or a key or a holotape. Something along those lines.

Often possessions are resold, but they are recorded.

Connelly gives Hank a short, "of course", being as helpful as possible, and leads him over to the rows and rows of files that DePleur kept.

First thing's first. The noticably odd thing he notices is that the first files are under the name Paul Harmon. His predecessor, maybe? Or another name he went by at one time. An interrogator could be prompted to change an identity, and if so, who would he want to avoid?

He doesn't say much of this out loud. He just settles in to read. Then, as if he's talking about a kid, he askes the archivist- "Hey can you get him some water and a chair or something? Or he'll just stand there the whole time and that just gets weird and distracting."

The woman looked Abner over, seeming to catch on quickly that he wasn’t all there. Maybe it was the dead eyes that tipped her off, or the way Anderson talked about him, or maybe she just had a copy of his records. Whatever the reason, she took on a soft, gentle tone when she spoke to him. “Actually, you look really strong. Would you mind helping me move some of these boxes? I’m trying to rearrange, but I’m afraid my back isn’t what it used to be. I’ll get you a snack if you do, how about that?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said mechanically. He would’ve done it either way, but the promise of food was a great motivator. The boxes weighed next to nothing, and it beat sitting there being useless. He was meant to do things. Well, usually more violent things, but hauling books for a middle-aged archivist was better than nothing.

Hank gives her an appreciative nod, glad Abner has something to do, before going back to reading what he can, making notes. There's a hell of a lot of "John Doe"s in here. But they're not always the sort that'd be interrogated wastelanders- in fact, frequently they're not. Because he can see in their abandoned items, a thing such as "wallet" or "event ticket". Things that wastelanders normally don't have an excuse to hang onto for any amount of time.

Most sickening is when he comes across things like, 'Jane Doe: Age 12.' or 'John Doe: Age 4-5'. What the hell even happened to them?

Hank's immensely glad that DePleur's wife is on her own now. It'll probably be better for both her and the daughter, even if it'll be a difficult adjustment for the girl.

He comes across more records. Definitely DePleur's previous name was Harmon. Maybe a way to maintain privacy. He wonders if the name change happened after the disposal of one of the administrations; very possible, and very likely. It's a dodge he never thought of. The backers that were never at the forefront withdrawing, changing their name, returning to their positions while the faces of the machine were notably disposed of. A fresh paint job on rotting wood to pretend it was a brand new deal.

He sits there for at least an hour, working out a number of small details, before piling his notes unevenly into a folder and putting it in his pack. He has no idea how long it's been. He's sure the sun will have steeply changed position. "Hey, Abner. You ready to go?"

The boxes had been neatly filed away by that point, and Abner was nursing a pack of Dandy Boy apples—eating slowly for once, popping the slices into his mouth one by one. Strange how a full stomach took away the sense of desperation. He still slipped the remainder of the snack into his coat when Anderson turned his attention to him, too used to being reprimanded for showing weaknesses like hunger.

“Yes, sir,” he replied, stiffly getting to his feet. The cold of the concrete floor had settled into his bones, a painful reminder that his body still aged, even if his brain had stalled a decade ago.

Ms. Connelly beamed at the pair, a bright spot in the otherwise dim basement. “Good night, boys. I hope you found what you were looking for,” she said. “And thanks again for all the help, Abner. I might have to borrow you again sometime.”

He’d...like that, he thought, surprising himself. Connelly was nice. Made him feel useful. Unlikely his superiors would lend him out for something so comparatively insignificant, though. Not unless there was a bribe involved.

Once again, he stayed silent until they were out of earshot of the woman. “Any leads?” he asked quietly. “I think you can rule Ms. Connelly out as a suspect, anyway. Wrong voice. And I can’t imagine her using me for something besides lifting boxes.”

"Sometimes people can hide their true nature pretty well. Honestly it happens around here more than you'd expect. DePleur himself was kinda like that. But yeah, I agree. I don't think she does more than keep records. She had everything pretty well organized so she probably loved her job and had no reason to want to do anything else or anything to risk it."

He frowns to himself.

"Lots of people with unique possessions got interrogated, but were listed as nameless. That means he was involved in someone's cover-up." The best way to bury a cover-up is have someone killed. But also it means he killed a lot of people, and who knows if he was provoking a cover-up himself.

Who the fuck knows. "I gotta keep looking, I need more to work with," is Hank's simple assessment as he leaves, grunting as he moves his pack to the other shoulder. "I'll need more than just the voice, too. You always have to figure out the full story, so don't react out loud when you recognize it. Tell me off to the side. We won't even know if the person was tricked into doing whatever they did to you."

He seems to be expecting Abner to follow him.

"Are they gonna fuckin' hit you again if you go back to the lab? 'Cause that's going to do us fuck all for favors. If they are just sleep on one of the station cots." In the jail cells, probably, but Abner doesn't seem like the type to call issue with that.

Abner nodded. He’d heard most of the scientists on Holland’s project lived that kind of double life out of necessity, going home to families who had no idea what they did on working hours. The success of the guard dog program hinged on its relative secrecy—if people knew about the cages in the basement, they wouldn’t understand. They’d revolt.

“Don’t worry, sir. I’ll keep it quiet,” he assured Anderson. “I just hope they do too. Bringing me along is like handing them a loaded gun. I don’t want it to catch you off-guard if I start trying to bite your throat out or something.”

After a moment of consideration, he added, “...If they ask me a question about my...training, that’s the cue to take me out. It’s my trigger. You’ll know it when you hear it, sir.”

Would they hit him again? It was a good question. “I learned my lesson last night, sir, so I doubt they’ll hurt me if I go home. But...” He hesitated, nails clawing into the ragged skin around his wrists. “I think I’d still like to stay at the station, if that’s okay. It’s easier than having to come all the way back when you need me again. And less chance of me killing anyone else on the way.”

And, even if he refused to admit it to himself, a night or two away from the lab would be...nice.

Edited 2020-07-30 19:22 (UTC)

"Well, I'd prefer you didn't bite my throat out. But I guess we'll cross that bridge when we get there."

He already has plans for that, though, just in case. He hopes he doesn't have to use them. He'll just have to see Ben tonight, he supposes. "I'll remember that." That way the moment 'training' comes out of someone's mouth, he can nail Abner with the syringe and then take care of the culprit.

When they get back to the station, Hank talks to the receptionist quickly, just long enough to get a set of keys to one of the holding cells and gestures for Abner to follow him.

"I assume you're fine with a cot? Doesn't sound like they keep you in the most luxurious of conditions back there." He picks one that he knows probably won't have anyone in it, and when they reach it slides the gate open with a hefty grunt. For the most part they've had to handle these manually.

“It’s fine, sir,” Abner said, cautiously stepping through the door. “More than I’m used to, actually.” Even without the furniture, the cell itself dwarfed his usual quarters—tall enough to stand, wide enough to lie down with room left over. Meant for people, not things like him.

Unsurprisingly, he ignored the cot, opting to sit in the corner instead. The extra space made him feel uneasy. Vulnerable. With his back against one wall and his side against another, he at least had the illusion of security. Important if the Private Abner mask began to slip. The thought of Anderson meeting his real self wasn’t ideal, but if it had to happen, he wanted Subject 51 to be as calm as possible. A tall order without Dr. Holland around, but he could try.

“Um. Lieutenant,” he said hesitantly, once he was settled. “Are you busy? I wanted to ask you some stuff, if that’s okay. About earlier.”

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did this instead of working on my resume lmao

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