Altair does his best to go slow. Edward is shaken from his glimpse of Haytham- understandably, because even expecting it, even knowing from Haytham's account that it has to happen at some point, Altair's a little surprised too. He's seen the past and the future, but there's a difference between physically traveling through time and seeing someone he knows at an earlier point in their personal time.
He doesn't have time to think about it, though, because he has Edward to deal with right away. And while he's not exactly panicking, he's also not completely calm. If Altair can't deal with this well enough, they might lose Edward completely. It's possible, if Edward decides he doesn't like what he hears, he could end up rejecting Altair completely. If that goes as badly as Desmond's earliest attempts to sync with Haytham, that's the end of his chance at finding the Observatory or getting Edward on their side.
So when Edward actually opens up enough to talk to him, Altair puts aside his own distraction and tries to focus. There's not a lot of privacy on board a ship, but as her captain, Edward at least has his own cabin on the Jackdaw. When he gets there, Edward takes a deep breath- Altair can tell he feels stupid sitting alone, talking to himself- and says, "We need to talk."
"Yes," Altair agrees.
"I want to know what just happened," Edward says. "I know you know. This is just too much weird to not be connected." Altair starts to answer, but Edward plows right on. "I want to know who he was. And I want to know what you're doing in my head. And-"
"I'd tell you," Altair interrupts. "If you could stop talking long enough to listen."
"How do you do that?" Edward asks. "You're making me think things."
"It's just because I'm in your head," Altair says. "I can't say anything out loud." Not without control of Edward's body, anyway, but that's hard to do without some kind of unusual circumstances. Besides- it would probably chase Edward off for good. "You're only used to hearing yourself in your head, so at first when you hear other people, you hear everything in your own voice."
"It's weird," Edward says, and to Altair's relief, this time he thinks it instead of saying anything out loud. The last thing he needs is someone from Abstergo to hear Edward's half of the conversation.
"You get used to it."
Edward shakes his head and mutters something rude. It seems to be directed to the universe at large rather than him, so Altair ignores it. "Who was the man on deck?" he asks, and Altair hesitates. If it was up to him, he would have started the story somewhere else, but this is the second time Edward's asked about Haytham. It's obvious he's not going to let the question go until Altair gives him a straight answer.
"He's your son," Altair says, and braces for the whirlwind of disbelief that's sure to follow.
Edward doesn't disappoint. When he's calmed down enough to answer, all he says is- "No."
"It's true," Altair says. "I'm in your head. I can't lie to you."
So far, Edward's kept Altair at a distance, only letting him in far enough to let the two of them talk. But now he draws cautiously closer, delving in a little deeper, far enough to understand the intention behind Altair's words instead of just their surface meanings. "Fine," he says eventually. "You're telling the truth. But how is that even possible? I mean- that guy was older than I am."
Altair sighs. "It's a very long story."
-/-
Hey guys, I just want to say thanks for all the reviews/favs/alerts you guys have been giving this story. Seriously, this morning I woke up at 4:30 with a really bad cold to prep for an hour long presentation in my least favorite class. Then I checked my email and saw a bunch of FFN alerts that made my morning not all that bad after all.
Oh, also, about the cold- I'm on way too many cold meds right now and if this chapter or the next few sound weird, that's probably why.
TL;DR: You guys are awesome and I'm sick.