Strange Legacy
by Lacrimula Falsa
Disclaimer: All praise the Great Bird of the Galaxy. I do not own any part of the StarTrek franchise/universe. Reviews are my profit.
Summary: Some families have heirlooms. Some families have legacies. The LaForge family has a pale man with yellow eyes and a cruel smile. A post-canon story.
A/N: For acmac, DataLore1 on AO3 and for Masked_Man_2, because without her my muse would die of neglect.
First Awakening - Part One
[Lore]
When Lore wakes up after years - and he could know the exact time, right down to the milliseconds, but he is angry enough without checking his internal chronometer - he is strapped down to something.
He almost expected to wake up without a body attached to his head again.
But he is in one piece this time.
He methodically takes in the room and tests his restraints.
It's a laboratory of some sort, all white walls and sterile metal surfaces. It looks unused, like someone has only reactivated it recently.
Much like him.
The restraints around his wrists and ankles he could break, he notes, but the metal covering wrapped around his torso contains a high energy circuit. He'd electrocute himself if he broke it. Overload his neural net.
Crafty humans.
Lore's musings are interrupted by the door of the lab sliding open.
A human man walks in and Lore recognises him immediately, regardless of the obvious signs of age and the fact that the contraption over his eyes is missing.
"LaForge."
His voice synthesiser is damaged, he realises, and his self-diagnosis system is either damaged or offline.
"Hello Lore."
When the human speaks, it's a shock. LaForge is not just aged. He's old. His body looks healthy, but his voice sounds frail.
His shock obviously shows on his face, because LaForge laughs self-deprecatingly as he sits on a stool in front of him.
"We aren't all ageless machines, Lore. Humans grow old. I thought you'd know that."
"Why did you reactivate me?"
It's the only question he can ask, the only one that makes sense.
He refuses to voice the others.
Where am I?
Why am I not dead?
What happened?
Where's Data?
"Not for you, that's for sure."
"For what then? Running experiments on me? Dissecting my brain? For what, human?"
"For Data."
Something sharp twists in Lore's stomach, like a metal shard slicing trough his innards.
Where's Data?
"Well, I don't see my dear brother anywhere. Shouldn't he be here, if you're doing this for him?"
"Data's dead."
Lore would deny it for years to come, expect for the small moments between waking and unconsciousness when he was truly honest with himself, but this was the moment his world tilted on it's axis and than shattered into tiny pieces.
"No."
He blames the broken rasp of a word on the defect voice synthesiser.
Androids don't die.
"He was blown up along with a starship in the Battle of the Bassen Rift."
LaForge's voice is dispassionate, like he's talking about the way a tricorder works. Then the human hesitates and there's a tense moment where the only sound is the humming of the high energy circuit.
"He sacrificed himself to save everyone else. Just like the hero he was."
He sacrificed himself. For humans.
Lore doesn't know if the wave of anger he feels is directed at the humans or at his brother.
But it abates as fast as it has come, leaving a strange, cold feeling in it's wake, like his chest is filled with ice.
Where? When? Why? Whom were you fighting? The Federation is peaceful, why where you at war?
He doesn't ask any of those questions. Instead he says
"I guess I'm the only one again."
because it's the only thing that matters.
For a moment there's a look of…sympathy, almost, on LaForge's face and -shockingly enough- grief, before he says, calmly.
"Yes, you are."
"Did you - re-activate - me-to tell-me this."
Lore's voice sounds even more broken now, his voice synthesiser giving up. His speech is halting, slow and the inflection is wrong.
"I'll fix that. Give me a moment."
Lore wants to protest, but LaForge holds a small tool next to his throat and with a quiet hum he's mute.
And then the human pries open his throat and rummages inside his body and he wants to rip his arm free and tear that weak organic creature to shreds.
But he does not, because he has to know.
When he is able to speak again, LaForge answers his query.
"No, I didn't reactivate you to tell you this."
"Then why…"
"I told you. For Data."
The human holds up a hand to ward off any further questions.
"Because your brother, believe it or not, wanted to give you a second chance. God knows why."
"A second chance."
His brother that beamed him into space. That dismantled him to rot in storage somewhere.
His brother that sacrificed himself for the humans. For weak organic creatures that will be dead in less then a century.
The sharp thing in his gut twists again.
"Yes. Data…He was… After he got emotions, he thought it wasn't right. Deactivating you. He thought that he could…fix you. Make you…normal. Give you a conscience, maybe, I don't know. He said that he'd try to repair your ethical programming. He never got the chance."
"After he got emotions."
LaForge looks surprised, then understanding.
"Yes. He reclaimed the emotion chip you stole and used it."
"He used it."
He didn't destroy it.
"He wanted to destroy it at first."
"Why didn't he?"
He doesn't know why he is asking these things. It doesn't matter, its not what he needs to know. Nothing that will help him escape. But…
"I didn't let him."
Why?
Why would you want him to feel? What did it matter to you?
"Why did you reactivate me?"
"It was in his will."
"What."
"His will. He wrote a testament. All his friends got a personal item and a letter. In mine he asked me to fix you."
He asked me to fix you.
"Why?"
And then LaForge laughs again, brittle and quiet.
"Fuck me if I know."
Lore almost rolls his eyes.
"Not why he did it." And he can't say that name that belonged to a face just like his own. "Why you are doing it. This."
And suddenly LaForge's face is up in his, angry and determined.
"Listen robot. I don't care for you. I'd have been happy to leave you in a storage box to rot, to see you taken apart for spare parts or have a scientist dig around inside your brain. For me you're worth less than a box of scrap. But Data, who was my best friend, asked me to fix his lunatic of a backstabbing brother."
The human draws back and his face is calm again, quietly decisive.
"So whether I like it or not…that's what I'm going to do. For Data."
Abruptly LaForge stands up and walks over to a shelf to pick up a tool that vaguely resembles a tricorder, only smaller and blue.
"But if you hurt anyone, you're toast."
It takes a moment -longer than it should- for Lore to understand what the human means. That the old, frail human is threatening him.
He almost laughs.
"You can't hurt me."
LaForge walks back over to him with an almost…amused expression.
"You know…Data said that too. That androids can feel no pain. That you don't hurt."
The amusement leaves the human's face completely and he suddenly looks grave and almost…annoyed.
"It's bullshit."
Suddenly Lore feels all his limbs seize up. Then everything goes black.
A/N: The next chapter will be Geordi's POV. Any thoughts so far?