The characters of Star Trek: The Next Generation are the property of Paramount, and the other people they are property of, and they certainly aren't mine. This story is written entirely for amusement and not for profit. No references are intended to any actors portraying these fictional characters or to any other living persons. If you have stuck with me this far, thank you.
Chapter 9 Nobody's Perfect"Men are weird," said Zsuza.
"Keeping up this subterfuge is not going to be easy for me," Data announced.
"If Worf starts asking questions, all you have to do is look very busy, and say it's not your department. That's what every academic I know does, when asked a question about their research which they don't want to answer."
Data was working on Fanny's torso. "But if this supposed testosterone-seeking device actually existed," he said, "where do you think it would be situated?"
"Well," said Zsuza, "let's tell him it's situated where she keeps her brain." Zsuza pointed to Fanny's perfect little mons veneris, now exposed under the bright lab lamps.
Data looked baffled.
"The human brain is normally situated in the….…"
"Joke, honey, joke."
As they worked on, the atmosphere of quiet, busy companionship reminded Data of their exploration of Zsuza's antique chess books. He also noticed that his companion was using Counsellor Troi's scarf to tie back her unruly auburn hair.
"Zsuza, you called me 'honey'. Is this significant?"
"No."
Actually, Zsuza was not really listening to Data. An awful discovery had been creeping up on her for the past hour and she was feeling a cold, sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. It was the type of discovery that every researcher dreads.
She began to worry that she had seriously misattributed Fanny's origins. Fanny's construction was far too advanced for the date she had originally attributed to it. In other words, she had totally fucked up.
"Data," she said, "I am going to have to work on this a lot back home."
"Back home?"
"I need my dating apparatus."
"Dating?"
"Yes, for establishing Fanny's dates. Why do you keep repeating everything I say?"
"I am sorry. I seem to be repeating everything you say."
She looked more closely at him. He was engaged in removing Fanny's right leg now. They had decided to leave her head until last.
"What's the matter, Data?"
"I am just…..thinking," he said coolly.
Zsuza threw down the sonic calibration tool she was holding.
"You think I've screwed up, too, don't you," she said fiercely. He looked up, his alert system activated by the anger in her voice.
"Zsuza, what are you talking about?"
"If only I had been given a chance to supervise opening her box. If only I had had first crack at her, if I had not been in such a hurry to activate her…."
"….and if she had not rendered you unconscious," put in Data.
"….we might have been able to get her working in a harmless fashion. Then she could really have been a companion for you; or at least a feather in my academic cap. Oh, Data, I feel so sorry. I am useless."
Data pointed to the circuits laid out on Zsuza's workbench.
"Why should I want a mate who cannot even master the rules of chess?" he said. "Please do not blame yourself. Others made mistakes. I, for example, was with you in your quarters when Wesley persuaded the Captain, against his better judgement, I suspect, to beam Fanny aboard. Had I been on the bridge I might have counselled against it."
"I hope you would never do that, Data; every piece of space junk is a piece of history. We are learning from Fanny. Please think of that next time you see a rusty old ship floating in space!"
"Very well, I accept that point. But I should have been there. Commander Riker, an outstanding officer, was over-hasty in unpackaging Fanny, which we now know not only compromised the archaeological value of the find but also enabled her to lock on Wesley as her target.
"Wesley allowed her in his quarters against the express instructions of his mother because, being young and at a sexually very curious age, he was easily persuaded that Fanny was harmless.
"It is even conceivable that Dr Crusher was in error in omitting to spell out to Wesley the nature of Fanny's attack mechanism; it is possible that her powerful maternal feelings have created a taboo between her and Wesley concerning the open discussion of sexual function. I am theorising, of course.
"In short, Zsuza, no one person is to blame. And Ensign Hucker ought to have known better."
"Thank you, Data."
By now Fanny's principal logistic circuits had been exposed. They were a sorry sight. Most of them had simply melted irreversibly into useless lumps. The effort of learning to play chess had truly killed her.
"She would not have made a true permanent mate for me. That I have to accept," said Data firmly.
"I hate to say 'I told you so' but – I did. Anyway, what's wrong with me, eh? We were getting on fine in my room before Fanny turned up."
"Zsuza, I realise that I failed to complete the sexual sequence you requested. I was inadequate. I do not expect you to wish me to repeat the attempt."
"Don't be silly. Your boss called. Are you saying you didn't like being with me, Data?" Zsuza felt a lump in her throat. Was she so unattractive that even an android programmed to please was finding excuses to turn her down?
"Zsuza," said Data gravely, "you must understand. I do not have feelings of love or hate. Even if I accessed my sexuality program for you night and day, you and I can never have a proper relationship. A human female needs a man who can love her – and I do not feel love. "
"But, Data, who knows how you might develop, over time?"
Data cocked his head on one side, a movement which Zsuza now knew signalled that he was deeply troubled by a conundrum.
"Zsuza, my past is very mysterious."
"I forgive your past."
"I have an evil brother – he may still be functional, for all I know."
Zsuza snorted. "Family! You think you have an evil brother? You should meet my mother."
Data sighed.
"I can never have children."
"We can adopt."
"Zsuza! I am - an android!"
"Nobody's perfect!"
For a long time neither said anything while Data adjusted the lighting in the lab and Zsuza re-checked the categorisation of Fanny's motor system. Then the android suddenly turned to her and said, "But Zsuza, what about your chess tournament?"
Ah, now he had put his pale finger on it. It had been in the back of her mind all the time; that brilliant chess career she so longed to grasp with both hands.
"Yes, Data. You're right, as usual. The real reason you and I cannot have the kind of traditional relationship you have in mind is nothing to do with you being an android, and me being a woman. That's all hooey."
"Hooey?"
"Hogwash. No, the real reason you and I cannot be a permanent item is very, very simple. It is that you are a Starfleet officer and I am a nutcase chess player.
"I cannot live without competitive chess any more than you could live without Starfleet. Chess means travelling budget class to tournaments all over the galaxy and living on coffee, cigarette smoke and late-night snacks from some very dubious sources. Chess does not mean sitting in the saucer section of the Enterprise all day playing online games, inbetween minding other people's babies. No thanks. Starfleet is your life, and chess is my life. And what I really love about you, Data, is that I think you saw that even before I did."
His earnest eyes creased with concern.
"Are you upset?" he asked.
"No. Now let's get on. We still have a lot to do here and I don't want to go to bed until it is done."
They worked on. They worked well together. They each had a fondness for exactitude and detail, and Zsuza's technical knowledge and broad frame of reference impressed Data. He realised that working with her felt more like working with his good friend, Geordi LaForge, than anything else.
But it was getting late. Zsuza had been awake for over 23 hours and despite her earlier boast to Data, she found it hard to keep her eyes open. Gradually, as they worked on, exchanging only brief shorthand snippets of conversation that would have been incomprehensible to anyone walking into the room, she felt her eyelids becoming unbearably heavy and her head began to sink.
Just a little snooze, perhaps, to freshen up her mind.
She woke up lying sprawled on her side on a spare workbench at the side of the lab, next to Fanny. The first thing she saw was Data, standing between the two benches, apparently motionless between his two helpless females - the sleeper and the doll.
"Data? What time is it?"
Glancing back down at Fanny – by now only a shell - then at Zsuza, he seemed to be making a mental comparison.
"Zero two fifty four point three eight. You fell asleep with your face on the desk," he said, and came over to help her up. "I thought it best to put you somewhere where you could sleep more comfortably without being disoriented when you woke."
Zsuza sat up and stretched. Finding herself lying defenceless on a lab bench, alongside the empty would-be android, with the real android wielding a sonic driver over the two of them was curiously unnerving. Apart from which, she hoped she had not been snoring.
The bench was hard and she felt stiff.
"My leg's gone to sleep," she remarked with a yawn.
Bafflement.
"I mean, it's got pins and needles," she added.
More bafflement.
"My leg is numb. The circulation has been cut off because I've been lying on it," she finally managed to explain. She tried to put her weight on it and gave a cry of discomfort.
"I can't walk on it," she said.
Data put down his sonic driver.
"Let me carry you to bed," he said. "The work is finished here."
"Finished! Thank you, Data, but I really should have been…." The idea of him carrying her to bed was more than delightful; but another stab of guilt hit her at the thought that she had left him to finish her work.
"Do not worry, Zsuza. I have familiarised myself with your methods and have reproduced your cataloguing system exactly. Each item is numbered, imaged from all angles and packed safely for transport.
"All that remains is for me to get you into bed."
Zsuza smiled at the innocence of his choice of words. The last man whom she had heard use that expression was, as it happened, the last man to 'throw' a game of chess to her to gain her confidence; in his case it had been all part of the seduction routine, part of the cruel game of cat and mouse and sexual politics which Zsuza wanted to leave behind her for ever. The light fell on that comical tilted nose and she longed again to snuggle up to him.
After locking down the lab equipment and leaving the lab computer on standby, Data lifted Zsuza effortlessly from where she was still perched on the spare lab bench.
"Put your arms around my neck," he said softly. Slim as he was, she found it very easy to lean her head into his shoulder.
"You cannot sleep in your quarters while those crates are there," he said. "It is out of the question. If the ship were to become subject to any kind of disturbance or force field you could be crushed."
"But…"
"I will not allow you to sleep there," he repeated and set her down for a moment to wag a schoolmasterly finger. " May I offer you my quarters instead?"
Her heart skipped a beat.
"Thank you, Data. I am sure I will be very, very safe in your quarters. Very safe indeed."
And before she could stop herself (not that she tried very hard) she gently kissed his mouth.
"Would you be able to…to see a way to…to accessing your sexuality program again for me?" she whispered.
Her answer was another, much longer and increasingly urgent kiss.
Not many crew were about at that time of night; it was a quiet period and the ship's default policy of observing the normal rhythms of a 24 hour day as far as possible was in place. If an emergency, or the merest hint of one, had occurred, the corridors and turbolifts would have instantly become crowded with scurrying men and women – but as it was, only a few night crew were treated to the sight of their soulless android walking through the ship carrying in his arms a curvaceous young woman with deplorably messy hair, stopping every few metres to kiss her face, her neck, her breasts and her eyes.
Zsuza had wondered earlier that day what making love with the android would be like. As with her archaeological theories, some of her guesses were right, and some wrong.
She had not expected the soft trueness of his skin or the movement of what looked like real muscles beneath the skin. She certainly had not expected the sprinkling of black-brown chest hair; and when she discovered that she could tousle his hair exactly like any man's, she felt curiously delighted, as it proved to her that he must spend a lot of time keeping it so neat.
Their earlier, brief encounter had led her to expect gentleness and sureness of touch. The way he went on kissing her with grave, attentive care on every part of her body that wanted to be kissed – that, too, she had guessed at, and hoped for. But the naturalness of his genitals, the perfect hard-on-the-inside, soft-on-the-outside texture of his erect penis - and the fact that he was circumcised - were still a surprise.
The way he seemed to know exactly how long to tease her yearning clitoris with his tongue and fingers was a surprise. Where had he learned this? The way her vagina was virtually pleading for him to fill it when he slowly entered her was only to be expected. But the way his body trembled – very, very slightly - in her arms; the way his goodness, his kindness and his honest offering to her of his manhood made her heart melt at the same time as her loins; the way he began with infinite care and confidence, with thrusts never too hurried until they needed to be, to lead her to the most delicious, warm, rippling, top-to-toe orgasm she had ever known, the way he suddenly seized her face between his hands and thrust his tongue into her mouth just as she climaxed – as he climaxed too, it seemed - could only be….. –
"What a surprise," she said aloud after a few minutes, as he rolled over to take his weight off her body.
"Yes," he said, in a completely normal voice, as though agreeing about the weather. "I too am – quite surprised."
The woman, too sleepy to give this remark much thought, wriggled round to look at the android, and stroked his nose.
"Who installed your sexuality program, darling?" she murmured.
"A man called Dr Noonian Soong," he replied.
"Lucky old Mrs Soong," said the woman, and went straight to sleep.
(end of chapter 9)