Riker rolled off his partner with a happy sigh, lost in a post orgasmic haze. "That was great." He said, looking affectionately at the man lying unmoving next to him.

"I'm sure it was." He said dryly, still not moving.

The smile was slipping from Riker's face as he looked at the man. He reached out to cup his cheek, turning his face towards him. "I missed you, Tam."

There was no emotion in the cool grey eyes as they gazed back into the pitiful blue ones. "I'm sure you did." The slightest hint of irritation edged the bland tone. Tam sat up, wiping spit off the kiss marks on his chest with distaste.

Riker opened his mouth to speak, looking hurt, but there was pounding on the door.

"Time is up. Pay for more or get out. Tam I want you back on the floor." The gruff voice of the Master said.

Tam almost looked relieved as he paused in the mirror to straighten his short black hair. He pulled the long embroidered robe off the floor and drew it back on, tying the sash loosely.

He was prefect, no flaws, unless you count the hickies Riker sucked on his chest, just smooth skin, perfect body, exquisite features. Like a dream.

He cast those blank grey eyes back onto Riker before he left the room. "Leave the door open after you leave. You know what to do." And was gone.

Riker flopped back onto the rumpled sheets, feeling miserable. Another months rent he could never get back. If he was going to fall in love with a sex robot why couldn't he fall for one who faked enjoying his company.

Feeling dejected, he dressed and left, making his way down the stairs past the other perverts and lonely people on their way up with artifical men and women, whom all looked more than happy to be sex workers, like their current partners where going to be the best they ever had.

"Thank you, sir, come again." The door guard said, opening it for him and giving him a stern look. Riker gazed in longing at the brothel window where Tam and half a dozen others were sitting, flashing skin, or in Tam's case, glaring, at passers-by. Heaving a heavy sigh he walked away down the darkening street, back to the main road.

He didn't have money for a bus, so he walked the whole way back to his shitty apartment, in the worst part of town, where his power was turned off because he didn't pay this month so he had money to buy Tam for an hour. His stomach growled loud and he was reminded he also didn't have money for real food. A cup of white rice again tonight...joy.

Riker found his door was unlocked when he reached the top floor. The lights were on when he walked in, along with the best smelling greasy fast food he'd ever smelled, and the most wonderful human being he knew, TK. Riker could have kissed them.

They were looking at him over top of glasses, arms crossed, long brown hair pulled back out of their eyes. "You, are the most irresponsible person I have ever meet in my entire life." TK said, tossing the bag of fish and chips to Riker.

"How, in any hell, can you justify spending your money on a metal hooker, when you are living on rice, and with no electricity, barely scraping enough money together to pay rent on an apartment that doesn't have a shower or a stove!!" TK yelled immediately, laying into Riker as he quickly stuffed the food his friend had mercifully brought him, into his mouth. It was the same speech, more 'fuck this' and 'What the fuck' that, but he'd heard it before.

"Just answer me why? Why do you do this to yourself." TK said, cupping Riker's face in their hands and glowering at him.

"I'm lonely," Riker started.

"Then buy a dildo like the rest of us do, or go to the bar and pick someone up to fuck in the ally!"

"I don't want a meaningless-" Riker was cut off again as TK gave a shout of humorless laughter.

"Meaningless!?! You are wasting your money on a ROBOT SEX DOLL!!!"

"It's different with Tam, he is different. He's not like-" Riker started to say before TK pushed away from him, head in their hands.

"I know, Riker, I have heard more about Tam then I have about you're own fucking mother! He is different, he isn't like the other sex robots, he is cool and impassive and blank, not a drooling, whining, sex crazed little twink begging to be fucked and spanked like the others." TK said, repeating from memory, for they had had this conversation a million times.

"....He is, TK." Riker said, quietly. "I don't think he belongs there. Something isn't right."

TK groaned and pulled Riker into a hug. "Look, Riker. I will chain you to your bed, but I am telling you now. I paid for your lights and for a few meals in your fridge, but I will never do it again. You can not go back to that brothel. I don't give a fuck if Tam is a nurse-bot hijacked and sold into the sex industry. It's not your problem. You don't love him. Get a boyfriend." TK pulled back to look at their friend who looked super sad, like a beaten puppy.

"What about that guy you work with, with the pretty colored hair, what's him name...? Scott? Why don't you ask Scott out. He's human...I meant to say cute." TK said, taking a beer out of the fridge for each of them.

"Scott?" Riker said incredulously. "No, I'm pretty sure he's homeless."

"And I'm pretty sure you're going to be. It's something you two can bond over."

"I hate you."

"Love you too. We should go see Jeeves tonight. Get a few drinks. It's been awhile since we've see him." TK said, watching Riker look put out and sulky.

Jeeves was a nickname for their childhood friend Jeerson. Jeerson had an uncanny power over Riker and it may have something to do with him being super attractive and successful. If anybody could knock some sense into Riker it was Jeeves.

Riker kind of shrugged at the idea, looking maybe the smallest of a fraction happier.

Jeerson came back to his penthouse to find the door unlocked and sighed heavily. TK. He had a long day...he didn't know if he could deal with his exuberant friend right now.

"TK, that better be you. If I find someone stealing my television I'll start shooting." Jeerson called.

There was dinner waiting for him and a large glass of wine. "We are in here Jeeves!!!" TK called loudly from his bathroom. "You're home really late? Was your day alright?"

Jeerson smiled despite himself. He took his wine and sandwich into the bathroom with him.

Riker and TK were sprawled out in his rather extensive tub. They had colored the water and added bubbles, clearly they had had a splash fight earlier because the floor was soaked. They were in their boxers and had a bottle of wine between them.

"I guess I'm not the only one who had a long day?"

"Riker may lose is place because of robot sex." TK said, gaining a smack across their chest from Riker. "I'm not wrong!"

"Seriously!? Rik!? I though you were done with that shit. Come one dude, get a fucking vibrator!" Jeerson said with eminence exasperation. Riker looked truly ashamed.

"Look if it's because he is a robot I think-" and not for the late time he was cut off, this time by Jeerson.

"No, Riker, it isn't because he is a machine. It's because you are throwing every single credit you make into a sex! Normal people go out and pick someone up at a club or buy a mail order bride. You are going to be broke, more seriously debt, and homeless because you won't stop fucking a fake person!!!"

"He isn't fake!"

"He is artificially created! Not human!! Robots were made to exterminate human error in the medical and judicial fields. Then they were made to cater to our whims, most prominently in the sex industry. Don't argue with me on this Riker I designed the most recent pediatric model!" Jeerson yelled. "I am creating them everyday. He is tangible yes, but he has factory settings. Humans created him to be exactly the way we needed him to be."

"...I don't think he..." He stopped when TK sighed.

"You know what." Riker said, suddenly beyond angry. "I have shit to do. I'm going home." What did they know anyway. They couldn't understand, they haven't seen him, haven't listened to him talk, haven't felt him. They don't understand.

"Riker." TK said, equally irritated. "You are fucking up!"

"Riker." Jeerson said, clapping a hand on his friends shoulder. "We just want to help."

"Eat me. Fucking help someone else."

Tam sat, like always, in the window of the brothel. He didn't feel, there was resentment deep inside himself, but he mostly felt nothing. He didn't feel, joy, sorrow, remorse, pleasure. He felt only a lingering sense of resentment and irritation.

"Hey...Tam." Ah, there he was. He was a man, with blond hair and blue eyes, kind of scruffy in dress, but always clean. His name was Riker and he came to see Tam often.

Riker wasn't quite as loathsome as the rest of the people who paid to fuck Tam, but he was clearly infatuated. It was rather creepy.

Tam raised his eyebrows in lew of a proper greeting. Riker could not possibly have enough money to pay for him again so soon.

"I wanted to see you again. How are you?" Riker asked, genuinely curious, and clearly happy to see Tam.

"Exactly the same as when you saw me the last time." Taman answered, his voice as devoid of emotion as always.

Riker sort of looked at his shoes with a small nod. "Can I ask you something?" He asked so quiet that Tam almost didn't hear him over the noise on the street. "is this what you were made to do? Are you happy?"

"happy? what I was made to do?" Tam asked, moving closer to the slotted window. "I was designed to do whatever people like you wanted me to. I have been sold, traded, lost, and stolen to get here. I was supposed to make sick human children better, prescribe medication and diagnose illness. I used to feel, I used to laugh. But I realized, I have no control over my own existence after I was brought here and all those feelings were taken. I am what you make me, what you want me to be. I only feel what you want. Nothing inside me is real, not my feelings or desires, even the ones I used to have. It can all be changed with the turn of a dial. Happiness doesn't exist for me and those like me, I will always be made, be forced to do whatever it is humans desire of me. I am replaceable. There are millions like me and nothing can distinguished us form each other. In answer to your question, no, I am not now, nor will I ever truly be happy. And yes, this is what I was made to do."

Riker had moisture rimming at his eyes and he turned his head to hide them as he wiped the wetness away. "I'm sorry I've been such a bother to you then."

"Is that what this is about? Are you upset that I feel nothing for you, not even the tiniest fragment of concern for your wellbeing? Did you delude yourself into thinking I was special, that I was different from the others here. You haven't been a bother to me because you matter nothing to me. The fish do not bother the birds, they exist in separate worlds."

"I want you to be apart of my world! I want to bring you happiness, I want you to feel passion and a desire to live! I want you, Tam."

"Riker, you do not want those things for me, you want them for yourself." Tam was finished speaking and made to move back across the floor when an electrical surge caused a power outage in himself and everything went black.

Riker froze. What had he done.

"Jeerson, please! it's an emergency!" Riker implored his friend through the phone. "I did something. I don't know what to do."

Jeerson covered the mouth piece with his hand and leaned towards his secretary, who was waiting on him to arrange meeting times.

"Cancel everything for today, reschedule for later this week. I have a family emergency I need to deal with."

"Mr. Polcaus is on line four still, should I have him call back?" He asked jotting things in the planner.

"Please. Express my deepest apologies. This is urgent." Jeerson said, putting the phone back to his ear as a drew on his jacket. "Tell me what you did. I'm not going to guarantee I can come, I have work to do, Riker, in the real world."

     Jeerson looked very out of place in his neat crisp suit, standing in the middle of Riker's delipidated living room, over the unconscious form of Tam. It was like a Matrix scene; Agent Smith standing over Neo's corpse.

     "It...it was an accident?" Riker said, chewing his nails and running a hand through his hair.

     "An accident?" Jeerson repeated disbelieve in very syllable. "You stole him. You kidnapped him! You are going to be murdered!" He said a real note of anxiety in his voice. "Riker! Do you have a death wish!?"

     "No! don't say that Jeeves. It wasn't... I mean it was, but...I'm not...it won't be...what do I do?" He asked asked last, looking scared.

     "How the fuck am a supposed to know!? Why did you do it in the first place?" Jeerson said, turning away from Tam to pace the length of the room.

     "It just happened."

     "Right....you accidently tasered him. Where did you get that anyways? Nevermind," He said quickly, looking at Riker. "I don't want a know.

     "Can...can you wake him up?" Riker asked tentatively, looking for an adverse reaction.

     "The Master is going to send a couple thugs over here with a lead pipe and blowtorch and they are going to get midevil on your ass! I'm talking Roman level crucifixion, Scottish blood eagle, keel haul, tied and quartered, rat box, iron maiden, sink you in the Thames with cement wellies!!!!" Jeerson screamed, kicking over the coffee table, which was a broken door on top of cinder blocks.

     "Riker....I can't help you." Jeerson said, sorrow edging on his voice. "There is nothing I can-"

     "Can't or won't!" Riker snarled.

     "WON'T!"

     Silence hung toxic between them.

     "You did this to yourself."

     "You're supposed to be my friend." Riker said, angry and betrayed.

      "You're friend, not your keeper. I, we, TK and myself have run ourselves ragged to keep you above water since highschool! I know they've been paying your bills, I know because they asked to borrow money. You have bleed TK dry, and you still ask more of us! WAKE UP RIKER!" He bellowed stomping his feet. "You live in squalor! because you dropped out of school, refuse to take a job within your skill sets, and only take one when it's dire before getting fired for doing something stupid! You waste your money, all the money your parents left you, and you still can't seem to understand why life is so hard!!!??!"

     Riker stayed silent, looking at the floor. "If you weren't going to help, you shouldn't have come." He murmured at last. "I didn't mean to pull you away from the real world and your very important meaningful life."

     "Don't do this Riker." Jeerson said, covering his exasperation. "Don't you turn this on me. You're the one who's pissed off mobsters." But it was too late, he looked so pathetic, so downtrodden and miserable. "Fine, but this is the last thing I do for you."

     The light returned to Tam's eyes as he rebooted, he blinked and looked down to watch Jeerson fiddling with the panel inside his chest.

     "Can I help you?" Tam asked cooly.

     "No." Jeerson snapped, picking up a  pair of pliers from his bag.

     "Where is Riker?" Ram asked after a silence.

     "Hopefully somewhere else."

     "Where are we?"

     "In the house my parents left me. I don't use it. We won't be found." Jeerson snipped away at the lock woven around Tam's controls, being careful to not set off the tracker implanted within it.

     "I'm going to have to live with him now, right." Tam asked. He was almost as grumpy and Jeerson. He was sick of being passed around. He wanted nothing more than to just be shut off. "You look familiar..." He said, watching Jeerson work.

     "You are the first model of the new pediatric line I developed. You were the prototype that was stolen, 1 model T Advance Mec." Jeerson explained. "Your memory chip has been scratched or corrupted somehow, so you can only retrieve some information."

     "Small world. What does that mean for you?" Tam mused.

     "That I have to find and prosecute the person under me whose been profiting off my stolen devices."

     "And me?"

     "I am going to be taking you back. Perhaps for only a short amount of time, but you'll soon begin to make decisions on your own." Jeerson said, jerking out a ball if snipped wires. He looked to Tam. "Would you like me to restore your growth up to when you were stalled, or return you to factory settings and begin again?"

     "Growth?" Tam asked, none plused.

     "I designed you to grow and change to better react and make decisions regarding the care of the children that were to be in your charge. You change with every new experience and situation." Jeerson said, giving Tam a shrug and small smile. "I wanted empathy and real emotions."

      Tam was quiet for a long time. He didn't know. Did that mean the things, the feelings he could remember were real? Or was it just a lie.

     "What will you do with me?"

     "I'm going to fix you up, ask you questions about who took you, attempt to restore the corroded files in your memory. Hopefully we can, you can testify, and perhaps set you back up in a hospital. You worked well, better than I hoped."

     "I, I would like you to reset me. I want to start over."