Ecstasy - Connor x Reader Detroit: Become Human

Chapter 7: Pressure (2 of 2)

"My associate and I have to provide... unfortunate news," A woman, dressed in a grimy lab coat, jittered upon entry. The other person accompanying her is forcefully driven inside by a guard. They tremble at her stillness. Damira is seen composing constant observations, steadily imitating a printer.

The towering desk chair covers majority of her figure, and only her tirelessly moving arms are exposed. "Spit it out, you're interrupting my progress," she hisses, drawing sketches of projects. "Wasting precious minutes here."

The pair hesitantly glance at the other, "Would you rather us to hand you the lists instead?" Damira shifts in her seat, "Lists?" She bellowed, slapping her pen on the mahogany surface. Shit, she ruined a decent pen. Although she kept a reasonably clean appearance, her exhaustion worsened.

"Read it to me, now," Damira scowled, swiveling her chair to face them. "To put it shortly, it consists of shipment delays and damaged equipment," The woman pressed her glasses and held the parchment firmly, "The rest are details concerning those categories."

"We came to propose a few ideas on how we could fix this, respond to these incidents and change our methods so that-" Damira's gaze bore into the lady that enraged every fibre of her being. CyberLife is under her control, not her colleague's control.

"You dare report a list of problems you created and defy how I manage CyberLife straight after?" Damira patently misinterpreted her intentions. Fatigue warped her analysis of their objectives and sprung to her defence mechanism.

"There is no place for mistakes here. If you continue being excruciatingly incompetent, I'll discard you myself." The associate keeps his mouth shut, praying on his life that he's not next. Any employee that approaches Damira to declare failure dealt with the grim consequences of being the messenger.

"Miss Stern, I came to bring your attention to this matter and recommend solutions, I'm not here to argue." The figure steadily rises from her seat, sweeping the cold tiles to seal the distance between them. Bony fingers wrapped around the staff member's throat, the woman lost the ability to breathe and struggled under her grip.

"CyberLife is not to be taken so lightly, and I will not afford our company to be dragged across the dirt because you failed to abide by plain instructions. Our structure is perfected, our employment is not. And you, my dear, are one of thousands who are far from attaining excellence."

Damira established a workplace built of censorship out of Kamski's present. Workers depend on concealing their true opinion to guarantee an anchored position and a cherished salary. Whoever opts to alert her to problematic issues, they're up for suicide.

Very few can deliver reports unscathed. Chloe frequently roams the highest level of the building and employees are prohibited from speaking to her. The rest who are conscious mostly prefer approaching the RK900 instead. Spotting it being available and isolated is an added struggle given that it has no concrete schedule at CyberLife.

"Will you listen to me?" She breaks Damira's powerful grip, reclaiming her strength. "I want to help you and suggest ideas to you. Everyone has desired to improve this organisation and you despise them for trying," The worker grumbled, rubbing her neck to locate evidence of fresh bruising.

The innocent employee initially anticipated that her interaction would lead elsewhere. Foolish of her to rely on unrealistic odds. A mistake is a mistake, and she couldn't change that by projecting notions onto Miss Stern to stifle its effect.

Damira yawned and walked backwards to sit atop the desk. "Fine, humour me. What is this grand plan of yours?" It's all over the employee's face. She instantly grasped that she'll grant useless information that's already heard of.

"Well, I suggest installing more guards and cameras by our shipping areas. Two or more figures were found disrupting our products, hence the damaged equipment." Damira takes mental notes and crosses her legs. "And the shipment delays?" She queried, fitting her earrings.

"Again, they were sabotaged by organised groups. Cameras weren't installed so we can't determine the amount of people who assaulted the teams," She adjusted her glasses again, trying to be confident. "Do I want to know how many ships were attacked?" The associate glowered at the colleague and implored her to lie about the numbers.

"Eight in total, ma'am," she admitted, unable to hold the paper steady. Underneath the table, Damira snatched a suppressed pistol, "Tell me, why didn't we have cameras in the first place?" She snapped, cocking the gun that aimed at the quivering girl.

"You didn't-"

Blood splattered onto the colleague, and the girl collapsed to the tiles. Tears ran down the other colleague's face, kneeling to comfort her last gasps. "For your information, I paid security handsomely and placed my trust in them," Damira states, preparing her following bullet. "It was their fault for being as useless as you."

The woman had her back pressed to the ground and fiercely scowled. Incapable of spitting a retort from drowning in her blood, she lay at the mercy of Damira. "I'm gonna... I'm gonna call the police," the worker sobbed, searching his coat pockets.

Damira steps toward him and crushes the muzzle into his head. "Go ahead, see where that gets you," she snarled. His eyes widen, holding onto his dying co-worker. Battling his moral inclination, he raised his hands. "Good choice."

She smirks, returning to the table to lean against it. "Now that I'm aware of these mistakes, I've got chores for you to do." Her legs cross again, and she sits the pistol beside her thigh.

"Identify the aggressors and replace the ships by the end of the week. Also, notify security about the incidents and tell them to get it together," Damira switches her gaze and sinks a second shot into the suffocating girl, smothering her completely.

"Do I need to repeat myself?" He stares blankly at the corpse. Half a minute, he delayed himself staring at a girl he became fond of during their shifts together. "Right away, Miss Stern," he reluctantly obeys, placing the carcass on the ground softly.

That wasn't what he truly felt. He wants to resign from this nightmare and throw obscene language at her devilish disposition. Temptation rose at the bottom of his throat, pained by remaining stationary. Intense desires clawed at his lab coat, inviting him to open his mouth.

"You are dismissed."

Damira snapped her fingers, "Guards? Clean up this mess, I don't want filth on my tiles." On cue, armoured men shove the detached colleague out of the office and pick up the body. They've performed this bothersome task for months on end.

She returns the pistol underneath the desk. One of the guards summon an android from the hallway and it begins to mop the floor energetically. Damira waits for the commotion to disappear by peacefully retreating to her inventive sketches.

Designing is one of her main talents. She found it enjoyable, and often turned to it when writing endless sentences grew drastically tedious. Her life depended on her work. CyberLife is all she's ever dreamed of the moment she took Kamski's keys.

Guilt tugged and prodded at her, yet she wouldn't have any of it. Day by day, she has brainwashed her mindset. For the future, this is how she intends to set things right. Whatever it costs, even if it means burying bodies on her journey.

Taunting laughs echoed in her skull, recreating sounds of troubled youthful years. Damira searches for medication from a specific cabinet and tosses it beside a water bottle. The sketches are completed, and it doesn't satisfy her. This design is tragic, it needs to be better, she thought, swallowing two red pills.

Why are there flaws? Judgmental criticism enters the room, composing blasphemous words on the walls, screeching at Damira in a liquid ink cage. "Quiet!" She snaps, ripping the sketch to shreds.

"Were you talking to me?" A voice wavered.

She faces the voice to recognise the visitor. "God, you frightened me, Connor," she exhaled, holding a hand over her chest. "Apologies, Damira."

"Would you like me to leave?" The RK900 offers, briefly scanning the tiles suspiciously. "No, no, please stay," she pleaded, tucking the medication into a cabinet. "What have you been up to?" Connor strolls to the oversized window, searching the skies.

"I've been interrogating different kinds of suspects and found no correlations. Also, I've verified the location I gave you, and I've seen the mayor snooping by a few freighters. Androids already abandoned the site when I commenced my infiltration," Connor scrunches its eyebrows, displeased.

"Didn't I tell you to wait?" Damira yawned, turning away from her project. "Yes," Nines replied, not knowing which program to use. "So why did you infiltrate the site?" It fixes his suit and lowers its sight to the colourless sea of rooftops. "Because I saw an opening and acted upon it."

Damira studies the robot meticulously and kept pushing it for more responses. "What else do you have on the mayor?" It shrugged, not looking over. "General knowledge regarding his position, nothing else."

"Miss Stern," Connor interrupts boldly, shattering her rhythm of open-ended questions. "You need rest, you've been in critical condition persistently." Damira swipes her monitor to examine her reflection, she knows it too. "I'll arrange for Chloe to guide you to bed."

"Don't," Nines blinked at her, whirring its yellow LED. "She's... busy assembling team schedules," she fumbled, placing her arms on the desk. "Oh, would you rather I escort you instead?" Damira sleepily nods, straying away from mountains of unfinished concepts. They head for the elevator.

The grey stretched hallway, sporadically had numerous paintings hanging off the walls to reduce its plain emptiness. There were no photographs in sight. She wasn't the kind of woman to keep sentimental objects. Apart from a few.

A photograph she kept was of Kamski, Amanda and her celebrating a humorous 10th birthday. Kamski holds the other version where he jokingly shoved Damira to meet a face full of cake. They keep snickering at it and the poor quality it has.

She wished to have a photo of her father too and has never admitted that to anybody before. Unfortunately, she was an IVF baby. Her supposed father roamed miles south of Detroit.

At one point, she did meet up with him. Started awkwardly of course, then after investing time, it got somewhere. Now they're comfortable talking whenever. It's a shame Amanda didn't continue talking to him. They could've been friends.

Inside the moving elevator, Damira tiredly leaned her head on Connor's shoulder. It keeps its posture and doesn't budge. The elevator slides to a halt, and she waits there, keeping her weight on the android. "We're here," the RK900 announced. It shakes her shoulders, demanding a conscious reaction.

Confusedly, she squints. "We're here?" Her hand rubs beads of sweat away and starts for the exit, relying on the walls to hold her as she walked. The android stares, processing its options. Before stumbling to the carpet, Connor catches her, and directs her to the bedroom.

"Thank you, dear," she murmured, plunging into the mattress. Knocked out in a second. Connor automatically tucked her in the white linen, positioning her properly. Golden eyes fly open, fighting to stay awake. "Connor," she gasps, and it kneels to inch its face closer.

"Yes?" It stammered, pulling a sheet to cover her shoulder. "I'll talk to you, first thing in the morning about the RK800," Damira mumbled, losing consciousness. It stays there, kneeling to look at her, and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. "Of course."

LED glowing red, its eyes won't stop staring.

Memories flicker across its vision, recalling fleeting moments of intimacy with those honey longing eyes glued to it. The android subconsciously bends forward until it stops itself from getting any nearer.

Blue thirium rushes up to his cheeks, realises this, then it abruptly slashes its connection. Chloe stands by the ajar entrance, narrowing its eyes, and vanishes down the corridor soundlessly.

"Goodnight, Damira."