Disclaimer: Nope, the characters aren't mine. Nor is the premise. Everything else is.
A/N: Short, sweet, to the point. Review, please.
Considered Acceptable
It was considered acceptable to be in love with your ship.
Back in the days when everything was normal, and the world worked the way he'd always believed it should, it was perfectly natural that when a captain spent all his waking (and sleeping) hours on his warship, he'd develop a certain relationship with it. And since the AI personalities were designed to be fully human, it was not an abnormal thing that they could inspire the same emotions as any other human being. And since they chose their faces for themselves, most of them were attractive, to say the least.
Yes, it was considered acceptable to be in love with your ship. But only the ship.
Android avatars were strictly off limits. That's why he'd choked to see the being he'd come to think of as Rommie for the first time. Well, that and the fact that she'd been naked. And Harper had a detail oriented mind... With her as someone he could talk to, touch, laugh with, and teach, he'd lost his shield of objectivity. He'd been prepared to be married to someone else, spend his life with someone else... but he'd always known that the Andromeda Ascendant would hold part of his heart. Now, he was alone again, unattached, and he was faced with the ship made flesh.
She was perfect, everything of the ship that he loved plus a human aspect that made him fall harder for her. He had to watch her every day, see her fight and be and learn to laugh and cry, and not be able to do anything about it... and it pained him.
It was considered acceptable to be in love with your ship. But not to do anything about it.