I: “Never, Apollo! Never! I know it burned, the day you heard Mushi was going to go study the ants on Mars because Utopia’s top entomologist said Mars was too dangerous, but one Utopian is just that, one Utopian. Mushi still had the courage to go to Mars, and many others have.”

Apollo: “Liar.”

I: “Apollo…”

Apollo: “You lost faith too, Mycroft. You know it. You lost faith the day you made me choose between dying in my Seine Mardi’s arms, or fleeing to the lonely Moon, and I, who was the firebrand you hoped to follow to infinity, chose death. Why did I do that, Mycroft? How can you trust a world where I did that?”

I: “I can’t! You’re right! You’re always—”

“Shhhh.” A calm hand shook me. “Do you need to step outside?”

It was Papa, worry swirling his wrinkles as a stationer swirls the stripes of paint that will stain marbled endpapers. Worry for me. Who worries for me? Who shows concern, not for the tool I am, the duties I might fail in if illness binds me to a sickbed’s uselessness, but for me? I buried my face in the breakfast-scented darkness of Papa’s uniform and sobbed. “They’ll go to Mars. Promise me they’ll go to Mars? They’ll go to Mars.”

“Shhhh.” He put his arms around me, warm, warm in my mind even if they were too dry and skinny to be literally warming. He let me lie like that, and sob against his breasts, whose soft sacks, once plumped by suckling children, old age has not quite consumed. “They’ll go to Mars.”

Lesley’s words leaked in between my sobs and Papa’s breath. “I could’ve killed you when you walked in here just now. And don’t think I couldn’t have, no matter whatever zillion security gizmos you have going. But I didn’t. And, unlike with Ojiro, it’s not awe of the Olympics that stopped me, it’s the certainty that most of my Hive would be massacred if I attacked you now. I agree with the lot of you that this mess will be less bloody if it’s started in an organized way on a set date. The Olympics are a good choice. But for this Olympic truce to work we need Ojiro, safe and sound, and free. If you find them, you can’t just keep them prisoner, you have to return them to me, free to lead their side. If you don’t, Tully and I will speak up and tell everyone you’ve captured and coerced them.”

“You have My word.”

“… And mine,” Achilles seconded, though not quickly. There was a long, black pause first, and the words that came were bitter. Sniper is Jehovah’s enemy, our enemy, and, more than anybody, cost us Bridger. Achilles, breaker of men, does not forgive.