Special thanks to Mai-DanishGirl for reminding me about accurate chromosome counts. -_-;
-J-
Sometimes EDI wished she could sleep like organics. Other times, like now, she was glad she didn't need to sleep. She liked the quietude, liked being awake while everyone else was sound asleep, at rest.
As it was, she sat on the couch, with a pillow in her lap. On the pillow was Jeff's head, devoid of his usual SSV Normandy cap, so she could run gentle fingers through his hair.
She didn't think anyone expected today's party to turn into a sleepover, and for a few it hadn't, but it seemed right somehow that the party be allowed to dwindle out of its own accord. And she knew that Shepard would be glad to have the palatial apartment stuffed to the brim with family, just this once.
She did update Dr. Chakwas about Shepard's most recent headache when she saw Alenko slip Shepard painkillers for it. Dr. Chakwas was worried about Shepard's stress levels, all the while knowing there wasn't anything to be done until the interminable period of waiting was over.
EDI knew that the Illusive Man's base had finally been identified. All they were waiting on was Hackett's discreet ordering of all his ducks. Once those metaphorical ducks were all in a row, the big push would begin.
First, the Illusive Man's station—and EDI fully intended to be there herself, in person.
Then Earth. It seemed like a big step, going from Cerberus to facing the Reapers full on, but a brief analysis indicated it wasn't that big a step, all things in proportion.
EDI would never admit to snooping, but she did. And Horatio at the Embassies, while he didn't snoop exactly, did keep his audio receptors open. Occasionally, as a gesture of goodwill between allies, he slipped her little tidbits of information. Nothing he would get into trouble for sharing, but things that she, with her processing power, could link with other things she knew and draw conclusions.
It was getting close to time. The Crucible was finished, except for the Catalyst. The Catalyst data was with the Illusive Man. Once they went through him, they could secure the Catalyst, implement it, and then launch the Crucible. If they wanted to move the Crucible, the Reapers needed to be sufficiently distracted, which meant an apparently suicidal push by the whole galaxy where the Reapers were strongest.
Earth.
It was enough to give any organic headaches, so no wonder Shepard's stress levels were through the metaphorical roof. They would even out again once Shepard had something more constructive to do than wait.
EDI wondered if it would be strange for the geth, to be machines fighting other machines. She wasn't sure how she felt, except that she found the Reapers repellant. If anyone deserved to be exterminated, it was them. She looked at her synthetic fingers, still combing gently through Jeff's hair.
Yes, she was synthetic, but she wasn't just a machine. It was what made her different from the Reapers, even if she had some of their…contributions…in her makeup. But Vega had twenty-three of his father's chromosomes, and didn't seem to think it mattered; he was, had become, his own person, independent of his sire.
Yes, that was how she felt. The Reapers might have contributed to making her, but that was where it stopped. She was EDI, and she stood with the organics.
Particularly this one, so trustingly asleep with his head in her lap. It wasn't the first time that EDI felt sure she had learned 'love' without ever having intended to do it. She would risk non-functionality for Jeff. His life mattered; it was intrinsically valuable because he was intrinsically valuable to her, although in no way a machine could compute. It was enough to know that it only mattered because it was another thing that set her apart from the Reapers.
"I love you, Jeff," EDI said quietly into the silent room, aware of the positive feedback that flooded her circuits. Yes, she loved him. Very much. She was glad she had listened to Shepard.
No one ever fell in love without being a little bit brave.
She was grateful she found the courage to do so.
Jeff shifted in his sleep, eyes opening blearily. Before EDI could apologize for waking him, she realized he wasn't really awake. "…love you too…" he slurred before his eyes closed again, just as asleep as before.
EDI stared at him, not even bothering to blink from time to time. She knew Jeff was fond of her, but hearing the words for the first time here, now, when he wasn't awake enough to lie or exaggerate…
Something like pain flooded her neural pathways. If she'd head a heart, she felt sure it would have squeezed painfully. EDI couldn't cry, but she did purse her lips, puzzled by the feedback she could only label 'distress' welling up in her. Why should reciprocation of feelings distress her so?
Unless it just made the possibility of losing the object of affection even more unpleasant, something more to be feared. But she had examples: too many organics, if they felt similar distress under similar conditions, pushed it aside, refused it, willfully disregarded it.
That must be part of the courage needed for love, EDI thought, resuming her stroking of Jeff's hair. It comforted her a little, only a little, that the Reapers really would have to go through her to get to him. Through her as the Normandy, and through her as the mobile platform.
She'd much rather survive, and have Jeff survive, and find out in a Reaper-free future whether there was a place in the galaxy for a man who loved his ship, and the synthetic who loved him. She so wanted to find out if there was.
EDI couldn't cry, so she did the next best thing: she closed her eyes, bowed her head, and imagined tears slipping from beneath synthetic eyelids, down her cheeks to drop like rain onto the face of her beloved.