Chapter 1

In the end, he had failed them all.

Failed them as their leader, as their mentor, as their friend.

He had failed them - and Data had died. Data, who was the best of them all, the noblest, the purest, the wisest and the most innocent, the smartest and the least educated of them all; Data, who could have lived forever, who could have carried their hopes, their dreams, their successes - and their failures - into the future, who could have ensured that all they had worked and strived for would have meant something to the generations to come - Data had died.

Data had died - to save him.

It should have been me, he thought; I should have found the strength to pull myself free from Shinzon, to fire the phaser, the save them all - but I couldn't; I didn't - and we all would have died, if he hadn't been there.

I didn't even protest, he thought. I didn't say a word to stop him. I could see from his expression what he intended to do - see in his eyes the love he had for us all; I could see that this was no sacrifice for him - just the final - the ultimate - manifestation of his humanity - a humanity that deserved the chance I didn't give him - and I did nothing - nothing! - to stop him, to save him.

I didn't thank him; I didn't even say, "Good-bye," he thought.

He died for me.

For us all, he conceded a moment later; Data would have done what he did for any of us - or for none. There was too much at stake - the survival not only of the small group that called themselves his friends, but of the crew, the ship, indeed, the survival of the human and Romulan races depended on one of them doing what Data had done.

But it should have been me, he knew.

Of all of us, my life was the one that could have been sacrificed most easily, with the least real loss; I've had a long life, a good life... while Data had a life - a thousand lives - ahead of him.

It should have been me.

It should have been me - and we all knew it.

No one blamed him, of course - and yet everything had changed. From that day on, nothing had been the same.

Part of that change was inevitable, of course, he knew - and not all of it had stemmed from Data's death. Will and Deanna had already married, and their transfer to the Titan was already confirmed when the ship had been sent on the mission to Romulus; Beverly had already accepted the posting as the head of Starfleet Medical; Worf had already decided on his full reinstatement with Starfleet.

Still...

Still, there was an undercurrent of uncertainty in their relationships that hinted at the unexpressed emotions they all felt after their friend's death, a blame, an accusation of unspoken guilt that none would admit - but that they unquestionably felt.

Will and Deanna had remained cordial - at least on those rare occasions when he had seen them - but despite the outward expressions of friendship, he could see the tension clouding the Betazoid's eyes, even as she had smiled at him, seen the reticence, the hesitancy in Will's expression and comportment - and they had all seemed relieved when he had cut those reunions short.

As he had been relieved when Worf had accepted Will's offer of a position on the Titan, he reminded himself. Perhaps it was simply in the Klingon's nature not to discuss those who had died - he never discussed Tasha Yar or Keyh'ler or Jadzia Dax, so perhaps it was not unexpected that he didn't discuss Data either - but he could never meet his new first officer's eyes without sensing the doubt the man felt about his superior officer, the unspoken question of when he, too, would have to sacrifice himself. As a Klingon, he would never question the necessity - but as a sentient being with a full life ahead of him, how could he but wonder at the waste, a life with so much potential given up for a life that had already been lived?

And Beverly...

Beverly had commiserated with him, grieved with him, mourned with him - all that he could have asked or expected of his friend in those first few days. But duty had called, and in the weeks that had followed their return to Earth, Starfleet Medical had made more and more demands upon her time and energy. The dinner dates had been postponed, rescheduled, postponed again, then finally cancelled altogether, until they had realized there was only a chance for a quick lunch together before he shipped out once again - and even that had been awkward, strained, uncomfortable. They had separated quickly, farewells said across subspace, with promises to get together in the future well-meant - but never fulfilled.

No, he amended, that wasn't accurate. They had met, on more than one occasion, when time and happenstance brought them to the same place, making plans to get together, to spend time renewing their friendship - only to cancel them before they began.

Oh, there had been that weekend in London, he conceded, and the brief holiday in Paris, when the past and the pain had been forgotten, pushed aside for a moment - but every arrangement they had made to spend more than a few hours together, every time there was a chance at reestablishing what they once had - or hoped they had - ended before it began, duty calling at each of them with uncanny precision.

If it was duty, he added; Starfleet Medical was out of the purview of his authority; if Beverly claimed an emergency, he was in no position to check up on her to verify the fact, short of calling in a personal favor from an old friend - and there was no way he could do that without appearing the fool. And if she was deceiving him...

If she was deceiving him, it wasn't done in order to hurt him, but rather the opposite: to preserve his feelings, to safeguard his self-esteem without forcing him to face the truth: that whatever she had felt at one time had long faded, lost to his reluctance, indifference - or, he added, by the realization that what he was - what he truly was - was simply not the man she had once thought she admired.

Of them all, only Geordi had remained behind, staying with the ship even as the others had found places on other ships or in other roles - but he knew full well that the engineer had stayed behind not out of some loyalty to him but rather out of his own loneliness and his own inability to find a life outside of his work - and, he had come to realize, for reasons of his own.

And yet, of them all, he had never seen an instant of doubt or uncertainty in the engineer's eyes; he had killed Geordi's best friend - and yet, of them all, Geordi was the only one he knew never blamed him.

Or perhaps he wasn't quite the only one.

He stared at the ceiling of the dark room, remembering.

It hadn't been until after the chaos and emotional tumult of Data's death and the destruction of the Scimitar had faded that he had remembered Tiron, the Romulan who had had served as ambassador during the treaty negotiations - and remembered that the man had been given a post on the Romulan Senate - the Senate that had been virtually destroyed by Shinzon and the Reman sympathizers. For several frustrating days as the ship limped back toward the Romulan homeworld, the crew had tried to find out the fate of their friend, only to be stymied by the general chaos and disarray that had taken the place of the usually well-organized government. Even when they had finally reached the interim government communication office, no one seemed to be entirely sure who had been in the Senate chambers during the destruction wrought by the thalaron radiation.

It wasn't until the Enterprise had finally reached Romulus and a degree of order had been restored to the shattered government that a list of losses - and survivors - had been posted, and Tiron's name had been on that latter list. That knowledge had been far from reassuring, however; those who had survived were instantly implicated in the plot to destabilize the government, and more than a few had been killed by the families and political allies of those Senators and guards who had died before a degree of rationality and normality returned to Romulus.

Tiron had been neither, as it turned out - though the reality of where he was had been equally troubling: he had been off-planet the entire time, the Emperor himself having granted the man special dispensation to take leave from his duties so that he might take his gravely ill granddaughter to the Briar Patch in hope that the metaphasic radiation there might heal her.

Tiron's granddaughter.

Andile.

He closed his eyes, chastising himself for this failure as well. Escaping to Romulus should have been her salvation, he told himself; there, under Tiron's care and away from the dangers of Admiral Thaddeus Czymszczak, she should have flourished, Tiron's resources and her own innate healing abilities allowing her to finish the recovery she had begun on his ship.

How foolish I was, he chided himself; how ignorant. Yes, Tiron could offer her physical safety, even exceptional medical care - but he could not give her the most important part of her recovery on the Enterprise, the one component that done more to aid in her recuperation than even the finest, most sophisticated treatment that Beverly could offer her: Data's love.

I should have kept her here, he thought; I should have found a way to protect her, to keep her safe while Beverly found a way to restore her physical health while Data's love restored her soul. But I failed her in that, just as I failed the others: I forced her away from the man she loved.

How do I tell her now that that love is gone forever? he had wondered in those long nights that had filled the trip back to Earth.

How do I tell her that I was the one who killed him?

In the end, though, he had been spared that task; news of the Romulan disaster - and the Enterprise's involvement in the eventual destruction of the Shinzon and the Scimitar - had been relayed to the Romulan Senator - along with the Emperor's personal condolences at the loss of the Senator's friend.

He had been spared the task - but not the consequences; even across the depths of space, he had felt the stunned astonishment as the news registered in Andile's mind - and then felt his mind - his very soul - reel with the pain of grief.

But even from her, there had been no accusation in that pain; no blame, no censure, no recriminations - only a moment of loneliness that verged on the unbearable - and then... nothing.

For so long - nothing.

The empty silence echoing in his mind, Admiral Jean-Luc Picard sat up, then swung his legs over the edge of the bed, resting his head in his hands, chasing off the remnants of the thoughts and worries that had filled his mind every night since the day of Data's death, more than four years before, wishing the guilt that filled him were as easily pushed away.

I failed you, Data; I failed you, Dee, he thought to himself, the shame welling up in him once more.

I failed you all.

I should have been better, he thought, better at all those things they had expected of me, better at all those things I had promised I would do - but time and circumstances always seemed to get in the way.

And I let them, he admitted; I let them stop me, delay me, postpone me time and again from doing all that I had told myself I would do - until it was too late.

He drew a long breath, fighting back the pain - then shivered, the cool of the cabin's air cutting through his sweat-soaked night clothes. Reaching for the robe that was stretched over the foot of his bed, he rose, pulled the robe on, and stepped toward the nightstand and the carafe of water that stood there.

Removing the inverted glass that rested atop the bottle, he poured a glass of water, drained it quickly, then started to set the glass back on the table when a flicker of movement caught his eye.

It was nothing but his own image reflected in the mirror over the table, he realized at once - but nonetheless, he took a moment to stare at that image, to study the man who looked back at him.

I'm old, he thought as he studied his own image; not getting older, not getting old - I _am_ old.

Hair that had been a dignified silver-grey only a few years before was turning pronouncedly white; the taut flesh of his face, still reflecting his lean, muscled frame, had grown pale and colorless, giving him a faintly unhealthy, gaunt appearance - and the lines that marked that flesh had deepened with time, marking him as a man who had spent too much time frowning and worrying - and too little time smiling and relaxing.

I am old, he repeated to the man in the mirror; I'm seventy-nine - almost eighty - and I'm looking every hour of every year.

He was still staring at himself, frowning, wondering how he had come to this, wondering where the time - and all his plans for his life - had gone when the door to his quarters slid back, startling him back to the present. Straightening, he tightened the belt of his robe as he turned to face the intruder.

"You know, you don't have to bring me tea just because I woke up, B-4," Picard informed the android as he entered the room, a porcelain cup of the stewing brew in his hands, just as he had informed him virtually every morning for the last four years.

"Yes, sir," the machine replied, its voice as stilted, as uncolored by emotion or intelligence as it had been the first time Picard had heard it. Without further comment - and most likely, without further thought - the android placed the cup on the table, then stepped back, waiting.

Picard smiled to himself. How B-4 had come to decide that Picard wanted a cup of Earl Grey tea upon waking he had never fully determined; most likely it was some vestige of Data's memory that had transferred itself to the more primitive android's brain - and there it had remained ever since, firmly and unyielding affixed.

It had taken a few weeks, and quite a number of awkward moments, before B-4 had come to understand - if B-4 could be said to really understand anything - that the act of waking and the desire for a cup tea were not always directly related. After a few experiences of getting up in the middle of the night to relieve himself only to find the android waiting with the obligatory cup of tea, Picard had finally given the android directions to wait until he heard at least ten minutes of sounds indicative of his full waking before preparing the tea.

A few months before, when the first nights of restlessness and troubling thoughts had begun to wake him in the small hours of the morning, he had considered amending that direction once again, suspecting the cup of strong tea was not conducive to returning to sleep - but sleep, he had come to learn, was not his to command, unwilling to be ordered to come and go at his direction. After a few nights of lying in his bed, waiting for sleep to return, he had come to welcome B-4's interruption and the tea, and resolved to use the otherwise 'wasted' time to some useful purpose.

Most nights, that useful purpose was related to his work; in the last few weeks, it had been focused on preparing his notes and equipment for the upcoming dig - but for the last few days, he had had another use for this extra time.

"Thank you, B-4," he had told the android, finishing the cup and handing it back to the android. "I'm going to get dressed now," he added, gently dismissing the android from his private space.

Still, the android seemed to hesitate. "You are going... there?" he asked.

Picard nodded. "I'm going to Engineering, yes," he answered quietly. "Did you want to come with me?" he added, though the suspected he knew the answer.

B-4 looked at the man with a perfectly blank expression - but after four years together, Picard knew the android well enough to know when he was troubled by an idea.

"No," B-4 replied at last. "I... do not like that place," he explained - though why the location bothered him, he was unable to explain - if he even understood the reason for his hesitancy.

Picard did, however, and he nodded gently. "You'll stay here then?" he asked.

B-4 considered. "May I visit Commander Troi?" he asked.

Picard smiled. "It's two in the morning, B-4; that's a little early for visiting." And, at almost five months pregnant, Deanna was probably in need of as much sleep as she could get, he added; entertaining a lonely android in the middle of the night was not what the mother-to-be needed. She would have her hands filled with that task for the next four weeks, he added, wondering once again if he should have found other arrangements for B-4.

Arrangements for B-4, he mused, wondering, once more, exactly how he had come to be the guardian for Dr. Noonian Soongh's prototype android. Certainly there were a half dozen institutes that would have been a better place for him, places that might have helped him to integrate Data's knowledge into his own matrix - and, perhaps, in time, have allowed him to make more use of the vast wealth of knowledge.

Or not, he conceded; perhaps B-4's postironic net was too primitive, or perhaps there was some basic incompatibility between the two memory systems - but the sad truth was that, with a few exceptions, a few flashes of Data's personality and memories, B-4 was - and probably would always be - only a pale shadow of his younger brother.

And yet there was something in his innocence, his simple naivet , that reminded Picard of Data in his younger days; though B-4 would never have anything approaching the intellectual capacity of his sibling, there was something endearing about the limited being.

It was those limitations, however, that had presented the greatest difficult in the months that had followed the ship's return to Earth; if B-4 were less intelligent than Data, was he sentient - or was he simply a machine? And if he was sentient, was he mentally capable of choosing his own path? And if he was just a machine, to whom did he belong? And - most importantly - who was to decide?

In the end, though, B-4 had decided for himself, placing himself in Picard's quarters after one of the countless hearings to decide his fate, and declining to leave.

And he had remained at the man's side ever since.

It had taken Picard some time to make the adjustment; after spending the majority of his life alone, he had found the presence of another person - even a person as limited and quiet as B-4 - uncomfortable, and for a time, he had endured the presence of the android only out of a sense of duty to his late friend.

But the sense of duty faded, and a strange companionship had evolved in its place: not friendship, for B-4 did not have the emotional awareness to be a friend - but something different, something simpler. Picard smiled to himself; in so many ways, he mused, it reminded him of his relationship with his children, Maribor and Batai.

And perhaps that was not an inappropriate comparison, he decided; despite his size and age, B-4 was, after all, little more than a child.

And I, he realized, I am a parent... again.

A parent who was about to take an extended trip away from his child, he added - but there was no way to take B-4 on this dig, he knew equally well. Even if the Kvesterians would have permitted an android to accompany them - which they would not - he knew he would have spent more time telling B-4 what to do - and what not to do - and not focusing on the other aspects of the dig.

Not that the dig was so that important, he reminded himself, a brief pang of guilt welling up in him; the Kvesterians would undoubtedly ascertain the truth about the site with or without his help - but time, he thought grimly, was passing faster and faster every year; this dig might be - indeed, probably would be - the last one in which he ever participated. He wanted to enjoy this dig - and having to watch and worry over the android and his actions was not conducive to either his efficiency - or his enjoyment.

Then again, he could hardly enjoy himself if he wasn't certain that B-4 was in capable and caring hands. The problem had left him wondering - and worrying - about what to do, until Will and Deanna had offered - insisted, actually - that B-4 would stay with them while he was at the dig.

A little practice for raising a child of their own, Deanna had explained - but that had only been the official reason.

The real reason, they all knew, was that Will wanted to host his former captain - on his former ship. After all, Picard could hardly decline the offer of transportation to and from the dig site if his hosts were also acting as baby-sitter to his ward.

Picard smiled, in part at Will's manipulations, but in greater part at how everything had turned out.

Despite his enjoyment of his role as a Starfleet captain, exploring deep space was, he knew, a young man's game; that Starfleet Command had allowed him to retain his ship as long as they did spoke volumes about his abilities as an officer, a scientist and an ambassador - but it also spoke of the effect of the Dominion War on the up and coming ranks of junior officers. With no one truly qualified to replace him, they had allowed him to keep his ship far longer than any other previous officer. And, he admitted with more than a rueful grin, it spoke volumes about his tendency to be impolitic with the powers that be; he was not, and never would be, a man to play the games the Admiralty enjoyed - and they knew it as well.

But just as the ranks of Starfleet had been depleted for command officers, so it had been depleted for qualified candidates for admirals - and, as he knew it would, the call that so many captains had anxiously awaited throughout their careers had finally to come to a less-than-enthusiastic Jean-Luc Picard.

In truth, accepting the offer was not an option; he would either have to take it - or leave Starfleet altogether, but even so, the idea of giving up the Enterprise to another captain had been difficult.

Or rather, it would have been difficult to give her up to just _any_ other captain, he added with a smile.

But Will Riker was not just _any_ other captain.

He smiled, as pleased now as he was the day that he learned that Will, finishing up his tour on the Titan, had been offered the Enterprise - and had accepted. It had made his own promotion to admiral easier to take, knowing his ship would remain in good hands.

It had, however, taken a year and a half before Will could find an excuse to invite the man back as his guest - but when the Kvesterians had requested that Starfleet transport them and their equipment to Samarassia IV and the archaeologic site there, Will had quickly offered his ship for the mission - on the condition that the Kvesterians invite Picard as their guest.

Picard grinned to himself, knowing Will could not possibly known what he had set himself up for: Kvesterians, as a rule, were both extremely opinionated and obsessively certain about the correctness of those opinions - and Professor Femishar, Kvestera's foremost archaeologist and the dig leader, set the standard for his people in both behaviors. After a week of having them aboard, Picard knew Will would be seriously reconsidering any future offers to archaeologic teams - even if they were the only way to get his former captain back on his ship.

It wasn't, of course, Picard thought - but while a Starfleet admiral might have more privileges, they also had more obligations - and the privileges had to find their time and place around those obligations. But after almost five years without taking more than the occasional weekend leave, Picard had jumped at the chance to join the Kvesterians at the dig.

After all, Samarassia IV was long rumored to be the site of one of the proto-Romulan words, an interim world colonized as the Vulcan dissenters searched for a new world of their own - and the multiple topographical and geomagnetic anomalies that had been found there suggested that the rumors might be right. Unfortunately, the worlds of Samarasa had once been part of the space held by the Kvesterians - and as such they had taken first claim to the dig - and to the information it provided. To date, nothing outside those first anomalies had been made public - but the rumors had continued to grow with every passing year.

It had only been through Will's skillful negotiations - negotiations that had probably included the threat to leave the Kvesterians on their home world, Picard thought - that Will had managed to inveigle an invitation for his former captain,

Correction, Picard thought, his mood growing dour once again; two invitations. That had been his requirement to Will when he had learned of the former first officer's plans - a place for himself on the dig - and a place for Beverly as well.

He sighed, then glanced at the flashing yellow indicator on the communications panel, knowing he needed to listen to the message in full - and respond - but the first few moment of the message had told him all he really needed to know.

"Damn it, Jean-Luc," Beverly had sighed as she recorded the message, "why aren't you there? I really need to talk to you - and I haven't got much time. Actually," she added a moment later, "I don't have _any_ time. Professor Jackson just called me. She was to be the keynote speaker at the conference on molecular neurobiology on Aldo Three - but there's been an outbreak of Correlian fever at the Telos colony, and she's scrambling to get enough people and supplies there to get it under control before it turns into an epidemic. She asked me to present her speech - and in light of the situation, I have to go. I'm sorry; I know I promised I would make it this time, but I won't be able to join you at the dig after all..." she had continued - but he had shut it off, having heard the same message often enough to know the apologies and the promises by heart.

What did I expect? He asked himself grimly. She's made it plain enough that whatever we once had - or rather, wish we once had - was that: a wish - and nothing more. It's time to move on with my life - alone, he added, then looking back at B-4 who was still standing by the nightstand, amended, or perhaps, not so alone.

"B-4, if you wouldn't mind, I would like another cup of tea," he informed the android. "And, after I get dressed, I'll take you to a place I think you'll enjoy. Captain Riker informs me that there is a large koi pond in the arborteum..."

"What is a koi pond?" B-4 interrupted.

"Koi are fish, B-4; very large, pretty fish," Picard explained.

"Like my fish?" B-4 asked, a glimmer of pleasure in his usually expressionless face.

Picard nodded. "Like your fish," he agreed, reflecting on the small aquarium he had installed in his apartment on Earth. B-4 had taken an instant fascination with the denizens of that world, and spent hours at a time simply staring into the water-filled space, watching with the intense concentration of an android - or a child.

Whichever, Picard thought, it kept B-4 occupied when he had work of his own to do - or when he slept.

"I like my fish," B-4 replied.

"I know. That's why I think you'll like the koi pond as well," Picard said gently.

"May we go now?" B-4 pressed.

Drawing from the patience he had developed long ago, Picard sighed, then shook his head. "Not yet. I'm going to shower and dress, and you were going to make me another cup of tea. Then," he said with a gently emphasis on the condition, "we can go."

B-4 hesitated for a moment, the information processing in his positronic net, then turned and headed from the room.

Picard watched the door slide shut behind him, then shook his head even as he smiled, memories of the children he never had washing over him. Thinking of them, he stepped into the washroom, turned on the shower, then stripped and stepped into the steaming waterfall.

I miss them, Picard thought; I miss the children they were, the wonderful adults who they became...

But B-4 would never become an adult, he remembered suddenly. He was, and would always be a child.

But I will not always be here to be his parent, he realized abruptly, the reality of his own mortality suddenly flashing through his mind.

And when I'm gone, who will be there to care for him?