Character
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Lal
observant (learns by imitation)
curious (rapid social exploration)
vulnerable (dependent on Data's care)
emotionally nascent (emergent affect and self-awareness)
ephemeral
representational
non-speaking
neutral
Lal is the emergent humanoid android Data assembles by transferring positronic neural structures from his own matrix. Presented as Data's child, she learns by close imitation—acquiring speech, motor coordination, social behaviors, and a nascent sense of identity—while remaining emotionally and technically dependent on Data. Lal's existence provokes a Starfleet custody and ethical dispute over synthetic personhood and autonomy. Her accelerating curiosity and dawning feelings expose fragility in her design, culminating in catastrophic neural failure and the reintegration of her programs into Data's matrix.
52 appearances
Artificial Sentience
Also known as:
Data's daughter,
Andorian female,
Andorian mirror image,
Andorian finalist,
LAL,
Lal (android),
Lal's Andorian option,
Data's child,
emergent android
Lal's Journey
A timeline through the narrative