Achilles: “There I disagree. Death and life are more different than that.”

Faust: “Poor word choice in your case, I apologize. I can tell you speak Greek as well as English, but, tell me, when you do, what kind of Greek comes out, modern or Homeric?”

Achilles: “You believe I am what I am, then? You didn’t even ask to see Patroclus.”

Faust: “Dear boy, I believed you the instant you stepped through the doorway. You walk like a horse, and continued straight three paces as if to let your hind-quarters pass the doorpost before turning toward me. I know no one else who was raised by centaurs. There are other signs.”

Achilles: “I… guess there would be…”

Faust: “I know you’ve decided not to fight for Gordian, but I hope you won’t reject us as a potential ally should it become practical. We’d be a good one.”

Achilles: “I’m sure.”

Faust: “Think of an enormous number. Lots and lots.”

Achilles: “A thousand.”

Faust: “Exquisite.” The pleasure on the Headmaster’s flushed face surpassed common delight and swelled toward glee. “Do you know how many generations it’s been since anyone outside the most primitivizing Reservations would pick a number smaller than a million?”

Achilles: “No.”

Faust: “Neither do I! Brill’s data only goes back to 2144. You must let me run ten thousand tests on your brain, on every fiber of you. In your spare time.”

Achilles: “Spare time…” A moment’s frozen incredulity elapsed before Achilles laughed, a deep, raw laugh with deep, raw weight behind it. Faust laughed with him. I got the joke—spare time in a war?—but not as they did. To me it was funny; to them it was a healing, binding breeze. “Alright, Faust, you’ve given me enough. I’ll see you more, I’m sure.”

Faust: “More leaders yet to test? Who’s next? Ancelet at last? Or has Mycroft found someone among the Mitsubishi worth an interview while Andō’s inaccessible? I presume you won’t try to base your impression of the Mitsubishi faction on poor Dominic: Acting Chief Director, yes; in over their head, yes; good sample of Mitsubishi thought patterns, goodness no!”

We did not answer Faust. But I will answer you, my distant master, and show you the next meeting, the one which the Great Soldier made me vow not to share with any living soul. Some encounters do not blur, even in my mind. They chose the open beach as meeting place, the northern coast of Crete, where a cloudless sunset made the sparks of our satellites visible between Moon and stars, and where the same salt smell which marks the rocky shores of home brought tears to my eyes, and to Achilles’s. Five of them joined us on that open beach. Two I knew: Mushi Mojave, whose ants made verses of our footprints on the sand’s broad canvas, and Aldrin, who made the sea a sea of stars. The others were new to me. One’s coat made living tissue of the deep, turning invisible currents to visible tendrils, and granting the Mediterranean vast eyes to stare back at we who imagined ourselves safe on her shore. Another left the waves unchanged, but spotted them with strange ships, whose distant spires stabbed straight up from the surface like blades, or like the fins of fish a hundred times too huge. The last coat made all storm and darkness.