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When a deviant turned, the Dust granted them a daemon, like any human. It was difficult to say when exactly was the tipping point, as deviancy is something that take a long time to happen. That's why Connor never knew when exactly his soul took the form of a little bird named Flapjack. The daemon never really settled, but he preferred being a bird when they were alone. During missions, he was a lizard or a little bug hiding in Connor's pocket.
Daemons were often what sold the deviants. For reasons he himself didn't understand, Connor didn't comment on the numbers of street cats outside the Eden Club, and didn't say anything about some dogs amongst the K9 units that went missing when a police android was destroyed. Or the number of birds above the harbor.
The police station at night was a weird sight to see. The police android's daemons that weren't in the dog units were often hidden somewhere in the hall, mostly bugs or birds nesting in the roof, and they came all out when there weren't humans around. Connor couldn't report anything about that. His main directive seemed so distant when he was watching Flapjack go as far as possible to stretch their bond, or simply fly happily with other daemons. Some androids were just sitting against the wall, their daemons tucked against them as cats.
None of them knew why their daemons never settled. Maybe it was because the oldest android was only twenty, maybe because none of them had totally broke free from their programming yet. The Traci's cats seemed settled, but he wasn't sure. Maybe it was just their preferred form. They didn't knew either why, when the human daemons were always the opposite gender, the android daemons shared their gender with their person. As much as an android has a gender anyway. Connor never had any issues with his appearance and how he was referenced as, but he knew some androids with an assigned appearance differing from their daemon's gender. Those mostly got amused and knowing looks from others, as it was assumed that it worked the same way than with trans humans, when those got same-gender daemons.
Maybe, if Markus leaded his revolution to success, those androids could get their appearance fixed.
And he was supposed to s̷͔̠̍ṯ̴͍̈́̈ỏ̴̊ͅp̸̰͙̓ ̴͖̯̓̉M̴̼̙̀á̴̻͋r̶̺̀k̷͙̝͛u̴̬̒͠ͅs̸͈̰̉.
The lights turned on in the police station, and all the daemons scattered into their hiding places. Flapjack slipped in Connor's pocket as a lizard and curled up tightly. The deviants straightened up and came back to their usual stance, amongst those -rarer- still without their will. Another day, another case, another deviant to chase down.
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Connor's vision glitched out even more when the deviant stabbed his hand to the counter under him. He could barely focus on the retreating figure. His thirium pump was just a few meters away, and he had less a minute left. He slid down the counter, his hand held up over his head, his breathing cycle shallow. He couldn't free himself. He couldn't get to his heart. He reached out in his pocket to hold Flapjack as the countdown turned red in his vision. Only thirty seconds left.
He couldn't shutdown like that.
He couldn't die like that.
He knew Cyberlife would sent another him, with his memories, but he'd lose Flapjack. He'd lose who he was. He couldn't die here, like that.
Three seconds left.
Someone forcefully pushing his thirium pump into place made him gasp out loud, his eyes shooting open -when did he close them ?
"Easy son, easy... You're okay. Piece of-" The knife was ripped from his hand, and Hank cradled him on his lap as his body slowly stopped twitching. "Ellena found you... It's alright..."
Connor will convince himself later this night that him burying his face into Hank's coat was for an optimal reboot of his olfactory sensors, that the strength of his hand as he gripped the man's arm was a dysfunction, and the red LED a simple sign of rebooting after shutdown. He'll deny that Hank's hand against his back was nice, that his voice whispering "it'll be okay" soothed him, that the beating of his heart and the movement of his chest were grounding. He'll also cry in lynx Flapjack's fur as his daemon was grooming his hair to soothe them both.
And Ellena, Hank's dog daemon, pretended to have not noticed the trembling mouse in the android's pocket. So did Hank. It was too soon to acknowledge it.
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Connor hated the zen garden. In there, locked in his memory, he couldn't feel Flapjack. The fact that now, the entire garden was frozen and he was struggling to reach the altar didn't make him like it more.
He pressed his palm against the hand print. When his vision opened back on the real world, he pocketed back the gun, like he wasn't just about to shoot Markus. North glared at him. North was always glaring at him anyways.
It didn't matter.
They've won.