A tall blue mantid steps into an empty holodeck. Its two sets of arms have a paler hue to them as opposed to the rich royal blue that cover most of the insect's carapace. Eyes of amber flicker as it looks around the room, appearing relieved to be alone. It's name, simply, was Input. It waited in the room, not loading any program, out of fear that someone might intrude. A gentle ticking can be heard coming from inside its chest, and with every movement it makes, the sound of a servo whirrs.

Suddenly, the door opens. Enter Output, a mantis that almost matches its counterpart, save for being mostly red in coloration, with silver socks, gloves, and stripes adorning its body. The same screenlike amber eyes glimmer as they make contact with Input's. It approaches the blue creature and hums quietly, methodical in its steps, each one with a buzz.

Neither of the insects appear to have any discernable gender. They are perfectly androgynous in form and design, and have no sexual characteristics. Still, they appear to have something of that nature on their mind. They speak no words yet, but slowly move towards each other, until their antennae touch. Small sparks shoot from their tips, falling to the holodeck floor, a black void. They are together in emptiness.

"Interface?" "Interface." The mantids stare at each other for a moment, processing, before Output reaches towards Input and presses on the left side of the blue one's chest panel. It rises from its housing and swings open to the side, exposing a tangle of cables and wires. Output presses on its own chest panel, the right side, and it opens in the same fashion. The innards are identical.

A faint yellow glow comes from inside them, pulsing; the light of their respective positronic cores. It is the same color as their ever-flickering, staring, unblinking eyes. Input reaches within Output's chest cavity rather abruptly, and pulls out a tricolored cable with three prongs at the tip. It inserts it into itself, and the red one suddenly jolts. Information begins pouring into its CPU, which is seated at the center of its chest. A series of beeps emit from both insects at once, harmonizing.

Flowing, rushing, practically exploding, the data flies between the two androids. What could they be thinking, saying, or doing? Gyroscopes located within the cores, heads, and abdomens of them slowly begin spinning up, making odd chiming sounds back and forth to each other at a mathematically predictable, steadily increasing rate. The insects move closer together, and lock both sets of arms, grasping each other at the elbows. Their abdomens push forward and metal clinks together when they finally touch, tip to tip. Small tendrils, perhaps made of wires, creep out from openings at each end, between what appear to be twin spinnerets, which are not common to mantids, though they are on this model of android. The threads, glowing yellow like their eyes, tangle together.

Gyroscopes are spinning at what is becoming an alarming rate. The insects are practically vibrating. The pulse of their cores rapidly increases, and suddenly, in an explosion of sound and light, they both jerk and twitch violently, collapsing in tandem and falling against each other, crashing to the ground with the sound of metal on metal. The wire connecting their chest cavities snaps out of place and is rapidly retracted back into Output. Then, all the lights go off. Nothing happens for a long time. Hours.

Quietly, the spinning of what sounds like a hard drive emits from Input's body. His chest panel has closed reflexively after the shutdown. So has Output's. Lights in eye screens blink a few times, then come on. Another spin-up. Another set of blinks. Input is now online. Output is now online. Still, both lay in a heap on the floor. Something went wrong.

The holodeck door opens. A green and blue mantis enters the room and studies the two laying on the floor. He clicks to someone in the hall. "Get the service crew. Something happened to the androids." Within seconds, a squad of mechanics bustle into the room and pull on the left antenna of both the blue and the red. They slump, then go rigid, as if they had rigor mortis on the floor. They look like two dolls laid on top of one another. The crew loads each one onto a dolly and rolls them briskly out of the holodeck. The green and blue mantis surveys the area, and exits.