“We lost him.” A man’s voice came through the door, rough, where the child’s should have been. But not Apollo’s.

“Major?”

The door opened, easy from the other side. The veteran’s cheeks were wet, though whether with Bridger’s remnant tears or with his own I could not say. “We had him and we lost him, our one chance.” The fatigues hung slack around him, man-sized on a body that was still a boy’s in scale. Bridger had been thorough. He launched the Major into life with all his gear, his pack, his helmet, bedroll, ammunition, rifle on his shoulder, while Bridger’s own kid-bright backpack rested in his hands, personal effects packed neatly for the tearful loved ones. “I’ll kill it,” the Major announced. “Sniper. I’ll kill it.”

I slumped useless before him, grief’s convulsions too severe to let me stand. It was not despair. Despair is a numbing blackness, which offers at least the consolation that there is no next task to face; I had tasks still.

“Sniper did this!” the Major continued, his voice iron enough to make MASON’s seem weak. “We could have saved everyone, living and dead, and Sniper destroyed it, Sniper, with its petty duty, and its Hive System. I’ll kill it. I’ll run it through, and feel its blood across my hands, and taste its last breath as it gasps away its life!”

I choked down breath enough to start my pleading, “Major, stop.”

“And then I’ll gather all its stupid dolls and burn them!” He kicked the one that lay beside me, his eyes taking pleasure as the neck flopped limp. “How far do you think the smoke would reach? A million toy corpses burning, but not the real one! Never the real one. No funeral rites for Sniper, no mourning fans and speeches. I’ll haul it to a field somewhere and watch the dogs and birds feast on its heart!”

“Stop, it won’t help.”

“And then the others, Ockham, Tully Mardi—there’s one you should’ve finished off long ago. They did this with their petty ambitions. I’ll make their bodies carrion, all of them!”

“Stop, Achilles. It isn’t Sniper’s fault, it’s ours.”

He turned, just enough to glance sidelong at me, while the helmet’s shadow veiled his expression. “So, you did know.”

I choked. “I felt like saying something would make it more true.”

He fidgeted with the rifle at his shoulder, where his shield should be. “How long have you known it was me?”

“I wasn’t positive until Lieutenant Aimer turned so conspicuously into Patroclus.”

“Have I always been… myself?”

“I don’t think so,” I answered, softly. “At first I think you were just an abstract soldier, but as Bridger matured, and their concepts of war and death matured, you matured with them. When they read the Iliad, it changed you. We both helped Bridger read it, over and over, Homer’s version and Apollo’s version too, so you became Achilles bit by bit.” I felt my breath grow steady, loss’s sorrow easing as a different sorrow took its place: pity. “I’ve always wondered which war you remember: the World Wars, or Apollo’s future war flying in your giant robot hero-god across the dark of Space, or Troy.”