Writer’s Note: I’m gonna pretend the following post was always intended as an April Fools joke rather than admit that I spent several hours of my life researching and writing this with no intention of it being seen by more than the 3 other people in my Starfinder campaign. Multiple times throughout this scientific equivalent of a fever dream I use the term “robot” and “android” interchangeably. I will not be correcting this, just assume I’m referring to the Android playable race from the Starfinder tabletop RPG at all times.
About a week ago, a screenshot started making the rounds of Ed Greenwood, famous fantasy author and creator of the Forgotten Realms D&D campaign setting, describing the taste of drow breastmilk, which he described as tasting “chalky, and ever so slightly tart/hot (the same way those tiny cinammon heart Valentine’s Day hard candies have heat)”.
While rightfully ridiculing this oddly specific bit of overly horny worldbuilding, one of my friends who will remain nameless despite his crimes asked the question “what about cum”. For a brief moment I pondered spending my afternoon researching the chemical makeup of various animal jisms to see if there are any rough patterns in how an organism’s reproductive traits and behaviors (genital morphology, egg production vs live birth, internal vs external fertilization, length of sexual encounter) and the material components of the ejaculate itself (which must provide a very specific microenvironment to protect the delicate sperm cells).
(Un)luckily the topic very quickly shifted to my friend’s favorite subject: robot sex. So instead of talking about why a lizardfolk would produce incredibly small yet flavorful loads, I’m going to ask the question “do androids cream an electric drink?” which in and of itself raised MANY other questions that I needed to answer before we even touch that awful Philip K Dick joke.
Question 1: why are the robots cumming?
Because my friend is incapable of shame.
Question 2: OK but in universe why are the robots cumming?
Well if you want an in-universe reason, because the people who first created androids (either the humans of lost Golarion or some unknown other creator race) made them in their own image and probably also had people like my friend who were incapable of shame.
Question 3: do all the robots cum?
Probably not! The background info for androids notes that the android’s physical appearance is based on the android’s initial design but can also be customized later on by the android themself. So if an android decided they wanted to be a Ken doll down there, they could just do that. Also, as several corporations have learned how to produce their own androids, the base design of an android could be heavily modified depending on corporate needs.
Question 4: so what does cum taste like?
I have no actual experience to answer this question with, but according to Medical News Today dot com “People have described the flavor of semen, or cum, as bitter, slightly salty, sweet, or metallic.”
Question 5: wow, that’s incredibly nonspecific!
Not a question.
Question 5(2): why does it taste like that?
As I noted in the intro of this hell document, ejaculate is made up of a complex mix of chemicals evolved to provide an ideal environment for sperm cells to survive long enough to reach and fertilize an egg cell. Notable components include simple sugars such as glucose and fructose (to provide energy to sperm cells), pH buffering compounds (which maintain the ejaculate’s pH of 7.2 to 8.0 when encountering vaginal fluids, which have a typical pH of 3.8 to 5.0), minerals (including zinc, which stabilizes the DNA in sperm cells), and a wide variety of enzymes and other organic molecules. For more information, here’s a 200 page book from the 1950’s about the chemical makeup of a cumshot.
Question 6: so is that what robot cum tastes like?
Sadly due to the nature of android reproduction within the starfinder universe (ie, no reproduction, they’re constructed in foundries) there’s very little reason for android ejaculate to contain that specific cocktail of organic and inorganic compounds, as there’s no sperm cells that need to survive long enough to reach an egg.
Question 7: well surely there’s a way to deduce what sorts of chemicals might be present within the android equivalent of a cumshot based on the physiology of starfinder’s androids, right?
Androids within the starfinder universe are, generally speaking, composed of “metal skeletons and processors that support synthetic organs and living flesh” and have to eat and sleep in order to maintain their biological components, but notably don’t need to breathe to survive. This creates a tricky puzzle biologically speaking, as it would imply that either the organic components of an android are powered solely through anaerobic respiration (a form of respiration that produces about 1/20th of the energy aerobic respiration produces) or that there is an internal store of oxygen that can be used for aerobic respiration and then that oxygen can then be recovered from the carbon dioxide produced as metabolic waste (which would likely require a significant amount of the energy to do).
While contemplating this, I remembered I was writing about what it would taste like if a robot blasted hot ropes down your throat and my brain shut off for several seconds. Then I took a break to get some ice cream.
Question 8: so you have no idea.
I’m gonna pretend that was phrased as a question. Trying to deduce the exact components is almost certainly a fool’s errand, so instead I’m going to focus on generalities that we should be able to at least guess at. Android ejaculate would be primarily organic in nature, as the android would likely be synthesizing it using the organic material in their diet rather than storing it in a tank that they have to regularly refill like replacing the wiper fluid in your car. As no spermatozoa are present, android jism can take a highly generalized form, likely matching whatever fluid is most easily produced by the android (with some additives to make it more similar to cum, because again, these capabilities were designed by people who said “I think these robots should be able to fuck”).
The most likely candidate for this fluid would be whatever liquid media is present within the android equivalent of a circulatory system. It would already be abundant within the android’s system, meet many of the basic requirements to act as a jism analogue (thick, produced in the body, is a fluid), and would already be present within the android’s penis during climax…….
Question 9: are you still there?
Sorry, I pictured a penis blasting a load of cum and deflating like a tube of go-gurt and my brain shut off again.
Question 10: do the robots really have to cum blood?
Well I wouldn’t use the word blood to describe it, per se. Since androids don’t need to breathe, there would be no need for red blood cells to transport oxygen and carbon dioxide within the body. It’d be more akin to a slurry of nutrients and metabolic waste products in a liquid media. Think Soylent but with a little bit of piss in it, which is still gross but the average human cumshot has about 1.5 mg of urea in it so…
Question 11: any other horrible mental images you want to share?
Corporations protect their intellectual property through patents, and while the process for creating androids likely falls under public domain technology (as any patent information would’ve been lost during The Gap) that wouldn’t stop the corps from making slight alterations to their specific android designs in order to file their patent paperwork, and the exact chemical composition of the circulatory fluid would likely be one of the easier aspects of android design to alter in a patentable way. Which means a properly trained sommelier could probably determine what foundry an android was produced in just by sucking them off.
Scientific Vagaries 