She knows she shouldn't feel this way. Not for him. Not for anyone in the AX. Not for anyone who's also sworn to God, be they nun or priest - sister or brother, mother or father. She knows. Oh, she knows she shouldn't feel this way, especially not for him. (It's not that this knowing stops her, of course, but the idea is there.)
When she accidentally cuts herself, when it is her turn to make dinner, she can't help but wonder if this is anything like what a cut from him would feel like. She sucks the place of the injury until it stops bleeding, and continues to make the sauce for the spaghetti. When they settle down to eat, her best friend doesn't comment that she can taste blood in the food. The taller blonde may say nothing, but she knows, if only because she feels the same about her own someone.
As she gets into bed that night, she can't help but wonder if the cool of the linen sheets would be anything like the ice-hot bite of metal against her skin. She knows it wouldn't be, but likes to imagine anyways. She presses the cut to her lips; she neglected a band-aid because facing Methuselah, life-or-death situations, the man she loves, and her best friend's craziness everyday make a cut seem superfluous.
She drifts off to sleep wondering - just a bit obsessively - if androids can bleed, and even if they can't, if he'd let her bandage his wounds anyway.
He doesn't like this. Whatever this is, to be honest, as he isn't supposed to feel, and only one other has ever before even caused something like emotion within him. That person is none other than the Woman of Steel herself. Whenever he thinks of her now, an image of another blonde comes to mind. The other has short-cropped sandy hair, emerald eyes, and dresses like a priest rather than a nun. This will, inevitably, lead him to thoughts of a third blonde.
Hair brushing her shoulders neatly, eyes a somewhat unnerving mix of silver - much like his Lady's - and ice blue, just a shade lighter than Sister Esther Blanchett's. (He recollects she is seeing Father Abel Nightroad, and feels what might be called the emotion happiness from any other for them.) He notes that, again, the third blonde has made him almost feel, even if indirectly, and continues to dislike the situation. He knows he should be devoted only to his Lady. Knows he should fend off the second blonde's attempts at courting her. Knows he should feel nothing unless he is programmed to do so.
And so he wonders, why he so very nearly feels when with her, and why she makes him feel suspiciously warm, no matter the temperature.
Noting that if he should spend even 2.34 seconds longer dwelling upon this that he would be .08 seconds late to meet Her Eminence, he turns his back upon Sister Evelyn Steele, who is squabbling about something of no importance to himself with Sister Amara Tenou. Though he is almost physically pained to leave her - he tells himself her electric powers have damaged his circuits - he still goes. After all, what use is there thinking about something which could never be? There is none what-so-ever.
Because, in the end, no woman as kind as she, nor one as righteous as the Cardinal, could love an android who knows not even enough about human emotion to even understand what they feel, let alone love them in return.
A|N: For my Koneko/cousin/BFF go-ahead-and-try, aka Evelyn, who dares to love Tres despite his short-comings, and despite his being an android. (And, rather shamelessly, for myself because I love Caterina-sama, even if I know it could never happen T^T)