"She specifically requested me."
"You're not going in there, Data," Riker said, folding his arms. "On my orders." Riker's eyebrows were tightly knit together in a frown, and he leaned against the door, an unspoken accusation in his eyes.
Data hesitated, a fraction of a second. A sliver of a second. For anyone else the delay would have been imperceptibly small, unnoticeable and unnoticed. But Data hesitated, before he turned and left.
"Captain?"
"Geordi," Captain Picard said. "I need you to review these – tonight." Picard handed a viewscreen across his desk.
"What is it?"
Picard swallowed. "These are Justine Riley's specifications."
Geordi groaned, softly, under his breath. "I'm not reading these. She's a person, not a machine."
Picard shook his head. "These are the technical papers Miranda supplied. We were provided with a copy. I want you to read them and find something – anything – that will help us."
Geordi shook the viewscreen slightly. "It feels wrong. Like looking into her soul."
"That's exactly what I'm hoping you'll find."
Justine wouldn't look at Troi.
"They're only trying to protect you. Will won't leave, and I won't leave either. It's only for one night," Troi put a hand on her shoulder.
Justine jerked away, and the cuffs around her wrists jangled slightly.
Geordi replicated himself another iced tea, and brought it back to his desk, slumping into his chair, exhausted. He sipped the tea and scrolled the viewscreen, muttering to himself. Here was Justine, in every aspect – every neuron, every nucleotide, every freckle and eyelash and smile. The color of her eyes, the whisper of her breath, the tumbling of the blood in her veins. He could read her life history, he could calculate her pH, he could estimate her life span.
It felt like spying. Reading her statistics, over and over again.
He paused. Over and over again. He could swear he had read this section on skin regeneration before. He pulled up the file on a larger screen, and scrolled backwards. There. The same description. Twice.
But a small difference: this section described J374.
Justine – his Justine – was J375.
A sudden dark premonition washed over Geordi. Just how many Justines were there? Frantically, he searched the text for descriptions of the other 'J's. Buried in a back file, titled "In Vivo Diagnostics," was a list:
J1-nonviable
J2-nv.
J3-nv.
J4-nv.
The non viable specimens continued into the 100's:
J107-nv.
J108-nv.
And then –
J109-viable, significant neurological impairment. Terminated.
Geordi's hands began to shake, and he lowered his glass of tea sloppily. Terminated. He had a sudden vision of Justine, eyes blank, listless and lifeless. Terminated. Hardly daring, he continued down the list.
Terminated. Terminated. Terminated. Terminated. Over and over again. And then, he came to something much more horrifying.
J313 – viable. Neurological functions acceptable, emotionally unresponsive. Self-terminated.
"She killed herself," he whispered. He stood frantically, chair clattering to the floor, and hit his combadge. "Captain!"