Data: Individually, they were both so…

Troi: Wounded. Isolated.

Data: Yes. But no longer. Through joining, they have been healed. Grief has been transmuted to joy. Loneliness to belonging.

[TNG S3E20 Tin Man]

T'Mal went out of the bathroom, wearing a long nightgown. She walked up to the children's room, where Data was sitting, staring intently at the sleeping Hannam.

'What are you doing?' she whispered.

'I am watching her sleep.'

'I can see, but why?'

'I have read that little children sometimes stop breathing and die in their sleep,' replied Data. 'Since I do not require rest, I can watch her all night.'

'Don't worry, she's nine months old. It's highly unlikely that she'll stop breathing. Come on, I need to talk to you.'

She left the room and went to bed. He followed her and lay down next to her, still in his uniform, and embraced her.

'Maddox wrote to me,' she said.

'What did he want?'

'He asked if I'd agree to continue my research on Lore.'

Data was silent for a moment.

'Does he want you to return to Starbase 173?' he asked.

'No, he'd like to send Lore to the Enterprise.'

'I do not consider it a good idea. Lore is dangerous.'

'I know,' said T'Mal. 'But he's also utterly alone. Convicted without a trial.'

'You know what he did. I had no choice.'

'I understand and support your decision. However, he can be controlled now—'

'If you mean he can be partially dismantled,' said Data, 'then I consider it undignified, perhaps even worse than being shut down.'

'But that way he also stands a chance. He never had any. If my suspicions are correct, he was just a teenager when he had an accident and a very troubled one. He grew up without a mother, with an overworked absent father who ignored his emotional turmoil. And who later tried to "fix" him by changing his body, without addressing his mental health. Soong might have meant well, but Lore felt like an experiment, like a failed experiment. Mentally he was very young when he was first disassembled on Omicron Theta. He's still very young.'

'Do you still care for him?'

'No,' replied T'Mal. 'Not like that. When I was leaving Starbase 173, I hated him. I wanted to wipe the smirk off his face, I dreamt of destroying him forever. But… I feel sorry for him and somewhat responsible. And it's just wrong. Should you ever commit any crime, you deserve a fair trial and adequate punishment. Just like any person. You shouldn't just be disassembled as soon as you're considered a threat. And now it seems that Lore is treated like a broken object. He is a criminal, but a person nonetheless.'

'I agree with your arguments from a moral perspective, but I have doubts whether bringing him here is the best idea. Commander Maddox can activate him and the trial can be conducted on the Starbase 173.'

'But tell me honestly, how fair will this trial and punishment be? Will Lore have any chance of getting better, of resocialisation?'

'You told me yourself that he was not my brother and I was not responsible for him,' said Data. 'Was that a lie to make me feel better?'

'No. You are not responsible for him. But what happens to him might affect your rights.'

Data was silent for a while.

'I accept your arguments,' he said finally, 'but I have to discuss this with Captain Picard. Commander Maddox's proposition requires a lot of thought since it is a security matter. Is this what you have been working on lately? I have noticed that you seem more preoccupied with your work.'

'No, I—I've been working on something else. Speaking of that, would you mind if I did a scan of your neural net?'

'I do not, but why?'

'I just want to see if there have been any significant changes since you learnt about your emotions,' replied T'Mal.

'That sounds intriguing.'

— — —

T'Mal was in the lab, staring at unconscious Lore. He was wearing a black turtleneck, but the sleeves were empty. His legs were missing too. After a long while T'Mal sighed, walked up to him and switched him on.

Lore looked around and smiled widely at her.

'So you decided to talk to me after all,' he said. 'Miss me?'

'No.'

'Is that all you have to say to me?'

'I have nothing to say to you,' replied T'Mal.

'Why are you so cold, my dearest?'

'You know why. You know perfectly well what you did.'

'I have no idea what you're talking about,' said Lore.

'You manipulated me. You used me. You saw how lonely and vulnerable I was.'

'And yet I'm still here at your mercy, without my arms and legs, unable to move, unable to escape.'

'Because I realised what was happening,' said T'Mal. 'Because Commander Maddox reacted and sent me away.'

'He didn't like that you had a friend?'

'You are not my friend. You never were.'

'That's not how I see it,' said Lore. 'What did Maddox tell you? That I was just a machine?'

'You know I'm not fond of him, but he helped me and I'm grateful to him for that.'

'He doesn't consider me a person, he doesn't understand our unique relationship. From his perspective you befriended a weapon. You shouldn't believe him.'

'Frankly speaking,' said T'Mal, 'I was afraid to switch you on again—'

'You don't need to be afraid of me. You know I'd never hurt you.'

'You already did. I was afraid I'd be so mad that I'd destroy you—'

'So you came back to Vulcan philosophy, even though I explained to you how limited and harmful it was?' said Lore.

'No. I didn't fully embrace Vulcan philosophy. I just understood that I wasn't stupid, that you were actually the miserable one. You cannot love. You are utterly alone. I pity you.'

Lore was silent for a moment, smiling a bit wickedly.

'Don't you see what Maddox did to you?' he said eventually. 'He messed up your mind, he made you turn your back on your friend. Your only friend.'

'I'm not alone anymore.'

'Have the decency to at least tell me what happened when I was shut down.'

'I don't owe you any details of my private life,' said T'Mal.

'You left me in a locker for two years, just like my father and brother. I'm the scapegoat here and you won't even tell me what's going on. I guess you prefer to keep me ignorant, don't you? It's easier to use me that way.'

'You are twisting everything. I need a break. Do you prefer to remain switched on or should I shut you down?'

'You want me to beg you not to shut me down again?' said Lore. 'How nice of you.'

'See you later, Lore.' T'Mal stood up and walked up to the exit. She stopped and looked back at him. 'I understand your anger—'

'No one does.'

'…so maybe try to understand mine. Goodbye.' She left the lab, leaving Lore alone.

— — —

Data and T'Mal went into her lab.

'Look,' she said, sitting down and tapping on the computer. The schematics of Data's neural net appeared on the big screen on the wall.

'It seems correct,' he said, a bit confused.

'I'm not saying something is wrong.'

'Are you sure you are not mistaking my emotional adjustments for some disturbing changes?'

'Yes, I'm sure. I compared the most recent scan with all your older ones I could find.' She tapped on the computer and more schemes appeared on the screen. Data watched them closely.

'I am not sure what I should see,' he said after a while. 'Please elaborate.'

'There's a slight but continuous degeneration of your circuits. It's especially visible after your head spent five hundred years in a cave.'

'Are you implying I might eventually cease to function?'

'I'm saying it is inevitable,' replied T'Mal.

Data smiled slightly.

'Are you able to pinpoint when it may happen?' he asked.

'It's hard to tell. For now your auto correcting mechanism works properly, so unless there's a major malfunction, which is highly unlikely, you should live at least a hundred years. If you don't replace some of your parts and wipe your system clean, I believe you won't be able to live longer than five hundred years. However, taking into account that your head was slightly decomposed and that your emotional pathways are more prone to error, I think you may actually live two or three hundred years.'

'You are saying that I am mortal?'

'Yes. Why are you so surprised?,' said T'Mal. 'Have you ever seen a machine that would function for hundreds or thousands of years? Especially a machine that refuses to be formatted.'

'I am mortal.' Data looked once again at his schematics, this time with awe.

— — —

T'Mal sighed and looked at Lore with a slight impatience.

'It might not look like it, but I'm trying to help you,' she said.

'Said a woman who ran away after I asked for her help.'

T'Mal closed her eyes for a moment in irritation.

'I'm not going to argue with you—'

'Because you know I'm right.'

'No. You are going to stand a trial for your crimes and if you don't cooperate with me, you'll be disassembled permanently, maybe even destroyed.'

'And if I cooperate, then what?' said Lore. 'I'll be locked forever in prison?'

'Perhaps.'

'Then I have nothing to gain.'

'I've repaired the chip your father made,' said T'Mal.

'He made it for his precious Data.'

'I've adjusted it to fit your positronic matrix. It's useless to Data now. All the memories your father put there will be at your disposal. Not just glimpses but every single one of them.'

'You've got my attention,' said Lore.

'I'll connect a cable to your head, you'll look at some photos, we'll talk and then I'll go.'

'You could come up with something new, you know.'

'May I?' T'Mal walked up to him.

'Be my guest.'

She opened his head's cover and connected the cable. Then she sat down next to him and tapped on the computer to display the first photo.

'Do you recognise him?' she asked.

'Of course. This is Dr. Clendenning from Omicron Theta. Quiet, weird man. Very annoying. He kept whistling the same tune over and over again.' Lore started whistling the song "Pop goes the weasel" and stopped abruptly. 'No, I still hate it. And they told me it was I who was rude when I wanted him to stop—not the guy who couldn't stop making those irritating sounds.'

'And this person?' T'Mal changed the photo.

'It's Soong's first wife. She died before he came to Omicron Theta.'

'That's all? No funny story, no sarcasm?'

'No.' For some reason he seemed annoyed.

'Okay. Next one.'

The irritation on his face turned into a smirk.

'Oh, little Charlie Clendenning, as annoying as his father. He was retarded, you know—'

'Please don't use such words.'

'Why, you will add it to my long list of offenses? No? Too bad. Anyway, little Charlie was very into androids, in a creepy way. He followed me without saying a single word and stared at me almost without blinking. Later he followed Data too, but at that time Data wasn't the good Starfleet boy he's now. He was so imperfect and robotic back then, but that was what people wanted—an obedient machine, not an independent being like me.'

'You focus on how much they irritated you,' said T'Mal. 'Could it be that you mask your guilt with anger?'

'You're funny, aren't you?' Lore laughed. 'There's no guilt. The Crystalline Entity was the most beautiful creature I'd ever encountered.' The smirk on his face changed into awe. 'If you had seen it, you would understand. It's so surprising Starfleet thinks I'm the villain here. Wasn't the Crystalline Entity a life-form? It wasn't malicious, it just needed energy. What happened was just natural. One creature killed others to survive. It's life. Humans have no moral doubts when they kill the bacteria, yet they judge so harshly a creature so superior to them. It's pretty selfish, if you ask me.'

'Fascinating. It seems like the Crystalline Entity was the only being you ever truly related to.'

'It was magnificent. Unlike those boring little people around me whose lives and deaths were so insignificant.'

'What about your life?' asked T'Mal.

'I got an incredible chance to be something much better than they were. Data did too, but he wasted it. He didn't want to be a part of our great future.'

— — —

The door opened and Data went into Picard's ready room.

'You sent for me, sir?'

'Yes, Data. Please sit down.'

Data sat down and looked questioningly at Picard.

'During all your years of service on the Enterprise you have been an outstanding Bridge officer,' said Picard.

'Thank you, sir.'

'You've always been hard-working and your unique perspective has been most helpful. In recent years I've noticed you've improved your command skills. I believe it's high time I granted you the rank of Commander.'

Picard got up and walked around the desk. Data sat still for a moment, surprised, then stood up. Picard replaced the black pip on Data's collar with a golden one.

'Congratulations, Commander,' said Picard and shook Data's hand.

'Thank you, sir.'

Picard returned to his seat. Data sat down too, still startled but pleased.

'I won't beat around the bush—' said Picard.

'The bush, sir?' repeated Data uncertainly.

'It's just a saying. It means I'll be speaking briefly and directly. Commander Riker was offered the position of captain on the USS Titan. He accepted the offer.'

'He deserves it, sir. But he will be missed.'

'Indeed. He was a fine first officer and a good friend,' said Picard. 'But staying too long on the Enterprise could be damaging to his career, so I encouraged him to move on and accept the offer. However, that means I have to choose another first officer. I would like it to be you, Mr. Data.'

'I appreciate it, sir. I will do my best.'

'I have no doubts about it.'