Rover

"Is that you?" called out Becky as she heard the key in the latch and the front door to the small apartment open.

"Yeah. Can you come and give me a hand?"

"Just a sec." She looked around for a towel to dry her hands then went through to meet Dave. "What do you want?" she asked.

"Can you help me with this, it's damned heavy."

Becky looked at the crate on the hallway floor and said, "What is it Dave? What have you bought?"

She caught the gleam of excitement in his eyes as he replied, "Never mind that just now. Let's get it inside and I'll show you."

She looked at her parquet wooden floor, the pride of her life as she had laid it down herself, and then looked again at the crate with its rough wood and sharp angles. "Hold on I'll get a bath towel and we can slide it along into the other room."

A few seconds later they were pushing and pulling the crate into the sitting room where they came across the obstacle of the carpet, but by rolling it over and over "don't worry it's well packed" they managed to get it into the room and placed it opposite the sofa. Out of breath they both sat down looking at it until she could contain herself no longer. "Well?" she said.

"Well," said Dave with a grin, "first of all I didn't buy it. And second it's not ours to keep, we've just been chosen to look after it for a few weeks."

"Yes but what

is

it?" her voice was beginning to reveal her excitement and frustration at the same time..

"Let's get it open first shall we."

"Dave Marchant, sometimes I could

kill

you," she said in mock anger and went off to the kitchen to fetch the claw hammer and screwdriver from the 'tools' cupboard.

She watched patiently as her husband worked away opening up the crate, then realising the mess he was about to make, she stopped him whilst she fetched some old newspapers from the pile waiting for collection by the building super and spread them around the floor.

As each wooden panel was opened and the straw and then the polystyrene protection joined them on the protective newspapers, Becky saw the shape of what seemed to be a small animal appear from the mess.

"It's a dog!" she exclaimed excitedly, "oh Dave it's fantastic. It will look great over there in the corner by the bookcase. And look how well it's made. It looks almost real."

"Hold on, hold on," said Dave laughing out loud, "this isn't a toy or a statue and as I said it's not ours to keep. We've been chosen to test him for a few weeks that's all."

"What do you mean?"

"Becky let me introduce you to Rover. The most advanced piece of hardware ever to come out of the Android and Robotics Company. Do you know it's taken five years of dedicated work by literally dozens of teams of people to get to what your looking at now."

"OK. But what

is

it?"

Dave looked a bit taken aback at her question. "Why, it's a dog." He said.

"I can see it's a dog, but why is it here and what's it got to do with us? You mean we just leave it there and look at it every now and again. What's the point in that?"

Understanding suddenly came to Dave.

"Oh I'm sorry sweetheart, I've been so close to this for so long I forget you don't know anything about it. To put it simply, Rover is a fully functional, part organic, part plastic, part metal, part other things RA, or Robotic Android to the man in the street. As I said he is the end result of years of work which started when someone somewhere came to the conclusion that a fully automated animal,

fully

automated and

fully

autonomous, could be very useful in a variety of roles."

"What roles?"

"Oh, search and rescue, drug detection, general law enforcement on the streets. It can help in disaster areas like earthquakes and do everything real dogs have been trained to do."

"Well that's alright then. As long as I know," a slight hint of sarcasm affected her tone, "but what's it doing here? God Dave getting information from you is sometimes like getting blood from a stone."

"I'm just coming to that. The company wanted to test it in a home environment to see how it would measure up to being a pet. But at first they didn't want to use the traditional nuclear family. They thought a slow progression would be better. So they've chosen us. A young married couple with no kids, living in an apartment in the centre of the city. If things work out here then it'll be tested with a larger family."

"It's not dangerous or anything is it? I don't want to be electrocuted or anything."

Dave laughed again, "No it's perfectly safe," he said. "Now let's get this show on the road."

"But hold on Dave. What about the building rules? We're not allowed to have pets and…and…Rover looks real enough to fool anybody. And what if it gets damaged? Who pays for it? And why would they let it out of their sight if it's so important? I mean I wouldn't if it were mine. And….." She stopped talking as Dave placed two fingers gently against her lips.

"Don't worry about a thing," he said, "all the details have been arranged weeks ago. The owners of the building have been given a big enough compensation payment to let us have an elephant here if we wanted. It's unlikely to get damaged as you'll see, but just in case something unforeseen does happen we're absolved from all liability. And as for letting it out of their sight. It's not. Well not exactly. Built in to the body is a multitude of sensors that feed back to the company. They'll be perfectly aware of what Rover's doing and where he is every second of the day."

Only slightly mollified Becky began stuffing the packing materials into three black plastic waste sacks "Well OK then," she said, "I suppose it's alright. But if it looks as if it's going crazy or something you take it straight back you hear?"

"I hear," said Dave with a chuckle, "but if anything does go wrong the company men will be banging on our front door before we know anything has gone wrong. Don't forget they'll be monitoring it all the time." They both carried the rubbish to the chute and Becky went back to the kitchen to finish preparing the supper whilst Dave began activating Rover.

As she worked Becky could hear her husband whistling softly in the sitting room. 'He's a funny man,' she thought to herself, 'one moment he's acting the man about the house and the next he's running around as excited as a schoolboy.' She smiled to herself. 'Can't complain though. That's what attracted me to him in the first place." She put the meal onto the serving trolley and pushed it through into the other room.

"Ahhhhhhh!" she shrieked before she could stop the sound as the brown furry thing came running up to her, the whole of the rear part of its body moving rapidly from side to side in a vain attempt to keep in step with a wildly wagging tail. Becky let go of the trolley and took an involuntary step backward. The creature came up to her showing its boundless glee and started sniffing excitedly at her ankles.

"Daaave!" she shouted as she tried to lift both feet at the same time, "take it away…."

"Oh my God Becky I didn't know you were coming in just then. I've only just switched him…"

"Get him OFF me!"

"Um, yeah, of course. Rover. Come here boy. Here."

The creature turned its back on Becky and went directly to Dave where it snuffled at his open palm.

"Oh my God," said Becky as she flopped into one of the armchairs, "

"I'm sorry Becky I really didn't know you were coming in just then. Well," he said with what he hoped was a placating smile, "at least we know Rover works."

"Yes we know that alright." Now that the shock had worn off she looked more closely at the creature. "Jeez Dave it looks real. Look it even looks as though its breathing. See? The body's moving in and out like its taking in air."

"I know," replied Dave tickling Rover behind the ears, which rewarded him with a small lick on his wrist, "isn't he just brilliant! Just look at that! He just licked me."

Tentatively Becky stretched out her own hand and said softly, "Here boy. Come here." Without hesitation the RA trotted over to her with its tongue hanging from the side of its mouth and with what she swore was a smile on its face. "Sit. There's a good dog." Rover sat. She patted its head and began stroking the fur on its back. Rover turned its head to her with wide open trusting eyes.

"Jeez," said Becky again.

The rest of the evening was spent playing with the new houseguest. "Although playing isn't strictly the right word for it," said Dave, "we're putting the unit through a carefully planned training program and noting down the test results as we go along."

"Yeah right," replied Becky as she took one end of a newspaper and began a tug-'o'-war with Rover who had the other end and was growling as he pulled back as hard as he could. Becky gave a low, playful growl in return which caught Rover by surprise. For a second his jaw dropped a millimetre and Becky snatched the newspaper out of his mouth. She fell back in the chair laughing as Rover came bounding towards her, tail wagging, in an attempt to grab it back.

They played a small game of "Fetch" using the newspaper again as a small rolled up ball. They taught him to play dead and to roll over and to sit up and beg.

"This is amazing," said Becky her cheeks flushed with effort and excitement, "he learns so fast!"

"Well he would. He's not a real dog. He's a machine with a very advanced micro-chip for a brain. Once he's shown something he never forgets."

Dave's words went around and around in Becky's mind. 'not a real dog.', 'a machine.', 'micro-chip'. 'But he acts and looks like a real dog,' she thought, 'it's difficult not to think he is one'.

They both managed to snatch mouthfuls of the rapidly cooling food and both of them were amused at the way Rover sat in front of them, looking from one to the other as if he was begging for scraps. "He really is amazing," said Becky."

"You're telling me!" replied Dave.

Eventually they had cleaned up the supper things and had gone upstairs. "What about Rover?" she had asked.

"Oh he'll be alright. When there's nothing for him to interact with he just stays where he is. He'll be OK until morning."

So with a firm, "Sit! Stay!" they had turned out the light plunging the room into darkness and had gone to bed. Becky lay on her side, snuggled up to David, with her left leg resting on top of him, covering his loins, her mons pushing slightly into his hip giving her a warm, sensual feeling. Soon they both drifted off to sleep.

Towards morning just as the room became light, Becky was awakened by her husband's hand gently squeezing and massaging her breasts. First one and then the other began to throb warmly as her nipples hardened against his touch. As she slowly came awake she smiled and turned over to face him. She could see that he too was only half-awake. She loved this part of the day, when they were both drifting, feeling warm and secure and sexual.

She reached down and took his semi-rigid penis in her hand, closing her fist around it to give it a sheath of human flesh in which it could be aroused even further. It didn't take long. As her right hand stroked his cock into full hardness her left reach around his waist and pulled him gently towards her, With one arm around her body in response his hand reached down and began playing gently with her cunt lips. She sighed in pleasure as she felt her body responding and they kissed each other with an open mouthed, tongue entwining kiss. Their lust quickly built up and as hands wandered and fingers probed and teeth nibbled at each other's bodies they both began perspiring in sexual anticipation.

She felt Dave's hardness like a rigid flesh pole ready to slide into her body and he felt the lubrication pour out of her vagina. Moaning slight and making their own personal noises they kicked off the bedclothes and Becky hastily got onto her hands and knees with Dave taking his place behind her. With one motion he guided his cock to the entrance of her cunt and then with a slow push forward slid the whole length of himself deep into her body. They both stopped for a few seconds to become accustomed to the feeling, then Dave began a slow fucking motion, pushing in and then sliding out whilst Becky lowered her head onto her folded arms and thrust back with each forward motion.

They both gave themselves up to this intimacy. This feeling of oneness with each other. Becky wanted more and reached back to fondle her husband's balls as they slapped against her buttocks. She was rewarded with the feeling of them swelling slightly against her touch. As her passion grew she took one of his hands away from her hips and holding the index finger guided it to her small puckered anus. She tensed slightly as she felt it slide into her dry rectum. But then her lust grew even more and she started to grunt as the dry anal finger fuck took her to new heights whilst her cunt was flooded with her descending juices.

Dave retracted his finger and, withdrawing his penis momentarily, inserted three into her vagina, coating them with her lubrication. He then slowly, ever so slowly pushed all three deep into her arsehole. She began to feel herself slipping into orgasm and as Dave pounded once again into her throbbing, twitching cunt she at last shrieked out her climax as her whole body went into a paralysis of release. Dave began shooting his sperm into her twitching cunt and she lay there, every nerve in her body fluttering, her breasts throbbing and sore and her extended nipples rock hard with lust. As she reached her final crest she looked over her shoulder at Dave's contorted, strained face as he finally reached, and then began to come down from his own climax.

And, there in the open doorway behind Dave, she saw the figure of Rover sitting there patiently with his head on one side observing with interest the actions on the bed.

But all she could do was groan as the final throes of passion swept over her, and she buried her head into her arms with her eyes tightly squeezed shut.

"Well it will have to go into my report," said Dave after breakfast.. "He's meant to remain inactive until he is in an interactive situation, then he responds. It may be that the programming for that part of him needs to be tightened up. I mean if the sound of our love making can get him started what if the fridge turning itself on or a car door slamming outside has the same effect? I'll put it in my report and leave it to the lab boys to decide what to do."

"I must say it gave me a start at first but then afterwards when I remembered what he looked like it was kinda funny. He was just like a High School student concentrating on some complicated lesson in class. If he had warn glasses it wouldn't have looked out of place."

Dave smiled, "Yeah I suppose so. And after all that's why he's here. To live in a natural environment to gain some input from the real world." He looked at his watch, "Anyway I'd better be off. You're sure you're OK being left with him for a few hours."

"Of course silly," she smiled back, "Rover and me are just like that aren't we boy?" and she crossed the fingers of one hand as Rover gave a small whine and a wag of his tail.

"Alright then, I'll see you later." He kissed Becky on the cheek and let himself out of the apartment.

The morning drifted by in a routine of mundane chores. One bag of washing in the machine, another waiting to go in. Vacuuming the carpet. A quick waxing of the parquet flooring in the hallway and with all the time Rover following her around watching and occasionally joining in when he pretended to attack the vacuum machine. At around eleven o'clock the front door bell rang.

"Oh come in Joyce I'm just about to make a coffee." Said Becky as she let in her best friend and neighbour into the apartment.

"Good," came the reply, "I could murder a cup."

"Hard night enjoying yourself?" asked Becky with a grin.

"You could say that. But Becky you should've seen him. He was gorgeous. I mean drop dead and don't wake me up again gorgeous."

"But they always are," said Becky as she made the coffee. "Every guy you meet is drop dead gorgeous until you meet the next one."

"Yeah I suppose so," replied Joyce with a rueful grin, "but can I help it if I…well…like men. And they seem to be attracted to me as well. Can I help that?"

"No of course not. Here drink this and tell me all the juicy bits."

"Well I met him in that singles bar I told you about over on…for Christ's sake what's that?" and she nodded in Rover's direction as he padded into the kitchen. Luckily they had already been given a cover story to tell any inquisitive people.

"Oh yeah you don't know do you. We're looking after him for a few days for Dave's parents. They only got him a few weeks ago, then out of the blue they won this holiday to Miami so instead of putting the poor thing in kennels we said we'd look after him." Becky put out her hand, "Here Rover, here boy". Obediently he trotted over and sat down beside her ready to be petted.

"Hey he's cute," exclaimed Joyce.

"Yeah he is, isn't he?"

For the next fifteen minutes they petted Rover and chatted about Joyce's latest night-time experience. Then they both went into the sitting room with a second cup of coffee to watch their favourite soap. Rover lay down at Becky's feet and rested his head on his paws.

"Right," said Joyce, "now you can tell me the truth."

"Wh…what do you mean?"

"Well let's put this way Becky, If Rover's a real dog then I'm a monkey's uncle."

"What the hell are you talking about?" asked Becky in genuine astonishment.

"I don't know what's going on and quite frankly I don't really care but for you to tell me a fairy story about your parents and having to look after Rover, well that's got my curiosity up. So quit kidding and tell me the whole story from beginning to end. The whole truthful story," Joyce said.

Becky was caught and she knew it and so she explained to Joyce exactly what Rover was and why he was in the apartment. "But Joyce, how did you guess?"

Joyce laughed out loud, "Honey," she said, "I know you don't approve of my lifestyle and you think I'm…well…a kind of loose woman," she chuckled, "which I suppose I am but that's me. I can't change that. But I've never met a male anything that didn't have a thing."

"A what?"

"A thing, a peruli, a prick, for God's sake Becky a COCK!"

Becky's eyes shot open wide in shock and without thinking about what she was doing she lowered her head and looked towards Rover's rear.

"Oh heavens," she cried putting her hand over her mouth in surprise, "you're right. He hasn't got one." And with that she fell backwards on the sofa and laughed non-stop until the tears were rolling down her face, It didn't take Joyce long to see the funny side and join in and both girls were soon rolling around laughing uncontrollably.

Rover looked from one to the other giving out an occasional yap.

"B…b…but didn't you notice there was something missing," spluttered Joyce.

"No, but then I'm not in the habit of checking out dog's undercarriages. It's not what you might say is a

thing

of mine," and she collapsed again in hysterical giggling.

"But that

cock

and bull story was a classic!"

It took some time before they managed to pull themselves together and do what they originally intended doing. To watch their favourite soap.

They were both so engrossed in the show that they hardly noticed Rover get up and leave the room.

By the time the end credits started rolling it was time for Joyce to go and she and Becky went to the front door together. They were just passing the open kitchen door when the same sight froze them to the spot in astonishment.

"Oh my…"

"Christ…"

Both women looked at each other then back at Rover who, with a contented look on his face, was energetically humping into the bag full of washing by the machine.