"Do you know," said Amy, "there was a moment there when you got really hot."
He leered at her. "Thank you."
"That wasn't what I meant!" she said and smacked him. "I mean you actually got hot. You had an increase in temperature. Is that supposed to happen?"
"I have no idea," he said. He put an arm around her. "And there is no way I'm going to ask my father, because he'll just tell everyone else. I'm public property to him. His experiment."
She snuggled up to him. "Don't think about that right now. So, did you like it?"
"I'd have to try it again to make sure," he said.
"Idiot. I take that to mean you did." She ran her fingers through his hair and grinned when it stood up on end. "That's good."
"What is?"
"Your hair. It's just like normal hair."
"Why shouldn't it be?"
"Because I thought you shellacked it to your head or something."
Lore started snickering. "Ah, the vanity of humans. It looks that way, my pretty woman, because I can't be bothered with gel and haircuts and all the other strange things you people concern yourselves with."
"Lucky you," said Amy. "You know, you have really nice eyes."
"Really? Yellow eyes?"
"They're not really…yellow. They're more like—gold with flecks of darker gold in them."
"Well, yeah," said Lore dismissively, "and my favorite color is blue, too."
"No. Really?" She yawned. "That's very nice."
"Are you going to go to sleep?" he said. "Because I don't sleep. I'd like to go out and work on that clock some more."
"Sure," she said and snuggled down into the covers.
"Oh…one more thing. This relationship thing, does it mean we're committed or something?"
"Why? Wouldn't you like that?"
"I…I need some time to think about it. You wouldn't want to be around me for long anyway," he added, snidely to cover up his uneasiness.
"Well, then, stay around as long as you like and when I get tired of you I'll kick you out. I don't know, Lore. I really don't know. Why are you so paranoid?"
"I don't know. Ask my father. He programmed me. I'm going out to the livingroom," he said and slid out of bed. He pulled his jumpsuit on and turned back to her. She was asleep.
"Hey," he muttered, "sweet dreams, human."
He coiled a spring tightly in his fingers and then let it loose and watched it fly across the room.
Great, just great. He'd just been used by a human. What was he, delusional? Crazy? Thinking that she cared about him at all. And he was so dumb that he'd gone along with it.
Cursing, he began putting the clock back together. He'd just have to show her who was boss, that was all—let her know she couldn't manipulate him.
So when she came out at about four in the morning he was standing in the middle of the room, arms crossed.
"You think you're something, don't you," he sneered.
She stopped and looked at him. She was wearing a blue bathrobe that almost exactly matched her eyes and it was skimpy and reminded him of what they had been doing earlier. "Lore, I have no clue what you're talking about."
"Using me," he said. "What, you've never had a machine before? Thought it would be something new?"
Her face flushed with anger. "Fine," she said. "Believe that. Believe whatever you want." She started walking out of the room again.
"Hey, wait!" he said. "No fair."
"Are you whining at me, Lore?"
He tried another tack. "You can't expect to manipulate me."
"No, I can't."
"I do not understand you, human. Whaddaya want out of me? What are you trying to do to me?"
"I'm not trying to do anything to you. I'm treating you like I would treat a human man."
"You are not!"
"Oh, come off it, Lore. You're trying to play headgames with me like you play headgames with everyone else, and you're annoyed because it's not working."
He struck a pose, leaning to one side, arms crossed across his chest, and mugged at her exaggeratedly.
"Oh, great," said Amy. "Another immature male. I can't believe this. You'd think an android would have more sense than a human!"
"Hey!" said Lore.
"That is dirty pool."
"I hope so. Dirty pool is the only
pool that can get past you. So now that we've had our morning-after
argument, do you want coffee?"
"I don't need to eat."
"I know. Ever heard of courtesy, Lore?"
"Yes, as a matter of fact I have. Nobody's shown too much to me, though."
"Do you want coffee, Lore?"
"Sure. Fine. Anything that makes you happy."
He sulked in the corner while she brewed it out in the kitchen and still hadn't stopped when she came back out with two steaming mugs. She handed one to him and said, "Cheers."
He took a sip. It was hot.
"So," he said, "do you always get up at four in the morning?"
"No," she said. "But I knew you would be leaving before dawn and I wanted to see you off."
"Yes," he said, realizing. "I guess I ought to hit the road before the sun comes up. Everyone hates me enough already. They might just get out the pitchforks if they know I spent the night at your house."
"Yes." She stared down into her coffee mug. "I want you to know, Lore, that if it was up to me I wouldn't mind people knowing, but I'm afraid of what they'll do to you."
"Don't worry, sweetheart," he smirked, "my lips are sealed." He made a motion: zipping his lips. Then he looked down at the clock, which he had reassembled. "Thanks for letting me play with the clock."
"Oh, sure. No problem."
He took another sip of coffee. "I'm going to leave it here. The old man'll be sure to ask about it if I bring it home. Hey…" he hesitated. "If…if you got anything else to take apart, I'd be happy to come over again."
She grinned at him. "That sounds nice, Lore. I do have a request though."
"Yes? What?" Please, he thought, please don't let her get all humanly romantic.
But she said, "Don't throw me down the hill if I go up there."
He grinned at her. "All right. You let me disassemble your house, I let you up on my hill. Deal."
And they shook hands.
"Where were you all night, Lore?" said Juliana as he came in the door.
He was feeling good. Playing with that clock had really perked his spirits up. And Amy—well, there were great possibilities with Amy. She could be an ally or an accomplice or even a friend. So he didn't feel too much like causing trouble.
"Out on the hill," he said.
"All night?" Juliana's voice betrayed her skepticism. He turned to look at her beautiful sculpted face with her quizzical, probing eyes, and felt annoyed.
"Hey," he said, and thumped himself in the chest, "I'm a grown android. I can take care of myself. But if it makes you happy, Mother, I didn't commit murder or arson. I didn't even throw rocks through windows."
"Lore, I wish you wouldn't be so cynical," she said sadly.
A disappointment, he was always a disappointment. Lore began to feel ugly again. "Where's Father?"
She gave a short laugh. "In his lab, where else."
"What's he doing?"
"I have no idea. Why don't you ask him."
"Sounds good," he said and went down the hallway.
He walked into the lab without pressing the door chime. "Hey, Pop, whatcha doing?"
Noonien Soong looked up from his computer terminal. "Right now? I'm working on some programming."
"What else is new." Lore grabbed a stool and dragged it over, set it down and plopped onto it, straddle-legged, peering over the scientist's shoulder. "Can I see?"
"Certainly." Soong leaned back a little. "I'm making refinements to the positronic matrix I first invented."
"Hmmm," said Lore. "I thought you had perfected it."
"Well, there are always things you can do. Do you want to help?"
"Not really, no. What's the point? You've got me now. I don't think it's possible to refine my positronic matrix."
"No."
"Then why are you working on it?" Lore looked suddenly suspicious. "Hey—"
"Lore, how would you like a brother?" said Soong brightly.
Lore drew back. "What do you mean?"
"You know. Another android. A younger brother."
"A brother? Or a replacement?"
"Lore! Don't talk like that. I'd never want to replace you. You're my son." He grabbed Lore's shoulder and squeezed.
But Lore was still distrustful. "I know you're not satisfied with me. I know the colonists don't like me. I'm not going to let you replace me."
"I told you, he wouldn't be a replacement, he would be a younger brother."
"Well, I don't care what he would be, I don't want him."
"What about a sister?"
"No."
"All right. Fine. But it doesn't hurt to refine it anyway."
"What for?" scoffed Lore. "You going to publish a book? A manual? "Android-building for Dummies"?"
Soong looked at him levelly. "I am going to publish a book, in fact. Reporting my findings. Then," his voice hardened and he stared back at the computer and the diagrams displayed on the screen, "then people will stop talking about me. Calling me names. They'll forget about Daystrom once they've seen what I've accomplished."
"Are you going to take me on tour?" demanded Lore.
Soong looked up at him in astonishment. "Of course not. I might publish some pictures of you, though. If that's okay with you, that is."
"I guess," said Lore without enthusiasm. "I don't see why I should care. Nobody'll like me no matter what you do."
"Lore—"
"It's an accomplished fact. I don't care, though." Lore turned away. "Just as long as I know somebody cares." He looked at Soong out of the corner of his eye.
Soong smiled at him and patted his shoulder. "Don't worry, son. I'll always love you."
"Well, good." Lore scowled at the wall. There was a mold hung on it, and he knew that it would fit his own face exactly.
Soong turned back to his computer. "By the way," he said, while his fingers flew over the console, "I was wondering where you got to last night."
"Aw—nowhere really. You know that hill? The one outside the town? I like that hill. You get the best view of the stars from there."
"So you like looking at the stars?"
"Yeah, well, I wouldn't look at them if I could go to them."
"Not yet, son."
"Why not?" demanded Lore belligerently. He got up and began to stalk around the lab. "I'm ready, I know I am. I want to go…out there. I want to see everything you've told me about. I want to go to Earth, I want to go to Vulcan…Father. Vulcans would like me, wouldn't they?"
"Well, to tell you the truth, I don't know, son. You're logical, true, but you're also rather…emotional."
"Heh." Lore stared out the window. "Heh. Yeah. Right. I guess. Still, though. D'you think I could ever find a ship? Just a little ship. One with warp. Aw, that would be great." He pressed his hand to the window, desperate to escape, that strange ache he didn't understand. "Warp. Seeing the stars streak by you, knowing you're going someplace. Hey, I wouldn't need a home if I had a ship. Maybe I could be a trader. Gold-pressed latinum. You know, I've never seen gold-pressed latinum. Have you ever seen gold-pressed latinum, Father?"
"It's nothing much," said Soong absently, his hands manipulating the computer. "Just another metallic compound. Only Ferengi concern themselves with amassing wealth, son."
Lore laughed and tapped one foot on the floor, arms crossed, still staring wistfully up at the sky from out of the window. "Yeah, well, without wealth you can't do anything. And I intend to do something. I'm going to be around forever, after all. Right."
He did a couple of steps of tap dance around the floor.
Soong looked up sharply. "Lore, if you're going to fool around do it someplace where there isn't sensitive equipment. Why don't you help your mother?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Lore continued to tap dance.
"Lore!"
"I'm going, I'm going." He walked to the door, stealing a glance over Soong's shoulder as he went.
"This place is such a drag," he said before the doors shut behind him.
Soong sighed and shook his head before going back to work.
"Mom."
"Not
now, Lore. I'm trying to tune the viola."
"Mom."
"Did I say something to you, Lore?"
"Mom."
"Lore!" Juliana looked up savagely from the strings of her instrument into the insolent face of her android son. "Don't you have anything better to do?"
"No," said Lore sullenly. "Father just kicked me out of the lab. I have nowhere to go and nothing to do and I'm sick of the colonists making fun of me."
"I'm sorry, Lore. Why don't you try to do something creative?"
"Creative!"
"Paint or play the piano or something."
"What for? I'm just an android. Androids are machines. Who wants to see what a machine paints?"
"Lore, we gave you a creative program for a reason. Now, why don't you go use it?"
"Fine." Lore stalked off. "If you don't want me around I'll just find something to amuse myself."
"What are we going to do with him?" Juliana muttered to herself.
Lore went into the studio and looked around him. So many things to use, nothing that he wanted. He was bored to tears.
He picked up a palette and began squirting paint out of tubes while he ran through his catalog of painting styles, all the way from ancient Earth to the modern intergalactic scene. He could copy all of them. What a drag.
He slammed a stool down in front of an easel on which he had set a clean white canvas and ran numbers programs through his database while his brush moved over the canvas. He wished he had something to take apart. The last thing he had taken apart in the house was the piano and Juliana had threatened to kill him…he smirked to himself.
He came out of his numbers programs to actually pay attention to the easel and found that he had painted Amy's eyes.
He stared at the canvas and then he stared at the brush, and he tried to figure out why he'd painted Amy's eyes. There was no logical reason…
He finally decided that he liked the blue of her eyes and that was why. Then he decided that since he'd already painted her eyes he might as well paint the rest of her face. So he did, his brush moving android-fast, and within half an hour he had her face down. He slicked bright yellow paint around the pale oval of her face for hair and carefully detailed her red mouth and the smooth snub of her nose; then he streaked orange and blue around her, the same colors that were in her apartment.
And he was done.
He swung his leg on the stool and bit the end of his brush. His first work of art. Apparently he was no slouch. He printed "LORE" in careful black letters in the bottom right corner and looked at her smiling eyes and thought, Now I just have to figure out a way to hide this thing.
In the end he just set it in a corner and began painting the gears and cogs of the clock he had taken apart last night. They were a rich brown from age, and with a black background they were what Juliana might call dramatic. He did them all in technical detail and when he was done he felt more relaxed and very pleased with himself. So he signed his name on that as well and took it back to his room and hung it up on the wall.
Then he went back to the studio, cleaned up, and picked up the canvas on which he'd painted Amy's face, and wrapped it in brown paper. He was in the middle of smuggling it up to his room when Juliana came around the corner and saw him.
"What's that you've got, Lore?" she asked with curiosity in her quiet British voice.
"Uh, nothing." Lore held it more firmly wedged underneath his arm. "Nothing. Just something I painted."
"May I see?"
"No. I don't want anyone to see."
"Well, all right," she said, though she looked disappointed. "Can you tell me how it turned out?"
"Perfect," said Lore dismally. "Just perfect."
"Lore painted something today," said Juliana at supper.
"Mmmm," said Soong. As usual he was preoccupied with his dinner. Soong was a hard worker, and a hard eater, and woe unto anyone who interfered with either of these pursuits.
Juliana jabbed him in the arm. "Noonien! You could at least show a little enthusiasm!"
"It's nice," mumbled Soong, piling more meat onto his plate.
Juliana sighed and shook her head at Lore. "You don't need to feel bad, Lore; he's that way about my works too. Art just does not move your father."
That was when Lore realized a perfectly providential thing—something that had been dropped into his lap by Fortune. Juliana thought he'd only painted one picture. She didn't know that he had painted two. If he could just find someplace to hide his portrait of Amy nobody would ever have to know.
"Well, Mom," he said. "I could bring it down and show it to you, if you'd like."
Juliana beamed at him. An artist among a colony of scientists, she was desperate for a kindred spirit. "Why, I would love that, Lore!"
"Don't be disappointed, though," he warned her, getting up. "After all, I'm only a machine. I can't really be creative."
"Lore—" began Soong.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Lore went out the door and climbed the steps to his room, banging as he went. He knew perfectly well that a picture of gears would disappoint his mother, but still he was bringing it down. Why do I do this, he asked himself. Because I'm dumb? Why?
He took the canvas off the wall and stomped down the stairs with it and went into the diningroom to hold it out in front of himself, a smirk firmly fixed on his face.
He was right; Juliana was disappointed, although she covered it well. But Soong laid down his fork and said admiringly, "Why, son, that's quite good."
Juliana rolled her eyes and sighed. "Noonien, you're just impossible."
"What's wrong?" said Soong. "I think it's brilliant."
Lore gave Juliana a smug look.
"Noonien," said Juliana, "it's—"
"It's a perfect representation of clockwork gears!" said Noonien excitedly. "It's exact. The colors are exactly matched. Why, it looks like the actual thing. Lore, I think you're a genius."
Lore preened. "So you think it's good."
"I already said that. I think we should hang it up someplace."
"Noonien," said Juliana.
"Well, you can't," said Lore. "I want it in my room."
Soong held up his hands placatingly. "Fine with me. It's your painting." He frowned. "I don't remember ever showing you an old-style clock."
Oh, I've put my foot in it now, thought Lore. He said, hedging, "Maybe you forgot. I think they have one in the Science Museum."
"I don't think so," said Soong.
"I think they do," said Lore.
Juliana held up her hands. "Enough arguments, boys, eat your suppers."
Soong, brightening, went back to his dinner.
Lore set his painting in the corner and thought, This life of faking is going to drive me crazy.
