An orphan boy copies Data after a rescue.
The Enterprise answers a distress call from the research vessel Vico, which has been damaged while exploring the Black Cluster. Data finds the only survivor, a boy named Timothy, whose parents were killed.
Timothy becomes attached to Data and begins acting like an android, a way of avoiding his grief and the guilt he feels, because he believes he caused the disaster. Troi encourages the friendship as a path to healing. When the Enterprise is threatened by the same forces in the cluster, Data works out that lowering the shields instead of raising them will save the ship, and Timothy finally accepts that the loss of the Vico was not his fault.