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First, pain. Pain he has never felt before, an agony so strong that he does not know how to cope.
Then, nothing.
Darkness, all around him.
Silence. Ever-and-all-consuming silence.
He does not know how much time passes, if it passes at all. He is weightless, hung in eternity, a moment that never leaves or has already ended.
Who is he? Did he once know that?
Then, suddenly, feeling, or what can count as it.
He notices his body, knows who he is again — he is Patroclus. He is a boy, now a man, who fought in a war driven by gods and mortals alike.
And he is dead.
"Patroclus. You have lived a worthy life, and you are fit for Elysium", a voice booms around him.
He stands in front of the gods, the great three, tiny in comparison to their almighty forms. Zeus, his thunderbolt in hand, unseen and unfelt wind rippling his long white hair. Poseidon, floating waves soaring around his trident, a breeze of salt and sea radiating off him. And Hades, clothed in darkness, his eyes whispering of horrors never seen by man.
He should be cowering in fear, but all he has seen, all he has been through, has made him numb to this display of godly power. If they were so strong, why did they not stop the war? It was fought on their behalf, after all. They do not care how it has broken so many, how it broke him and Achilles — Achilles. He is not with him. All Patroclus wishes, now, is for Achilles to stand here before the gods with him, but alas, it will never be. That much he knows.
"When are lives worthy?", he asks them, not expecting an answer. "When one has ended another? When one is left to die on their own? When one is placed upon a path that one has no say in, a destiny one cannot alter, a tale that you, gods, have deemed heroic and thus worthy? When one is beset to never die, to watch all one holds dear perish in one's arms? You may measure the worth of a life, gods, but you may not determine it. You may deem me worthy of Elysium, gods, but I say no. I make a choice, the first choice, maybe, in the whole of my being, now that I am no longer governed by your decisions on life. Return me, gods, to the world of the living. Bring me back to my beloved, for all the struggles we have faced, he cannot face them alone. Return me, gods."
They look at him, their faces serene and ever-knowing. It is not how he has come to think of them. The gods have always been distant, and were it not for the war and Achilles himself, he would not have believed them to meddle in human affairs anymore. He might not even have considered them real, despite all the tales.
"Patroclus", they say again. It is as if they are one, unified for once in their ruling over him. They are one, in a sense — they are gods, brothers, born of the same kind. "We cannot do that. Meddling with death does not bode well in the cosmic order. We cannot send you back, and you know that your friend cannot come here. It is over, for you, for him, for the tale you shared. It is now his time for greatness."
"He is not just my friend", Patroclus snarls, "He is philtatos, my most beloved. Our soul is one, our bed is one. Do not dare insinuate that he is anything other than the centre of my world, and that I am anything other than his."
"Achilles is aristos achaion. He is fated for greatness. You have never been the centre of his life, his destiny has. He may be what makes you whole, Patroclus, but he makes all of humanity whole. He is the greatest of them all, and you are nothing compared to him. Do not, ever, pretend that he is your equal. He is not. Achilles is on one line with us, with gods, only that his power is on earth. You are but mortal, a speck in the holy order of the cosmos. A whisper not even worth singing out loud. We will not send you back."
With these words, the gods fade, leaving Patroclus standing alone. He knows that this does not bode well for his fate, but what fate does he have left?
He turns. There is nought but darkness all around him, and a tiny light in the distance. That must be the way to Elysium. But does he really want to give up that easily? Patroclus knows that whatever he tries, Achilles will not be able to come to him.
The living cannot go where there are only dead, cannot speak to or see those who are no longer. But he can. He can talk to Achilles, and though Achilles might not see or hear him, at least Patroclus will be there, silently watching over him. A restless spirit, not safe in Hades but bound to a person, unable to fully die until that person also passes.
A shiver runs through him.
Achilles shall never die, so Patroclus won't leave either. Lone immortality in death, seeing his love but never having him respond. But at least he will see him, will be able to talk to him, to be beside him like he was always meant to be.
He feels himself fading, slowly disappearing.
And then, closer, is Achilles.
It is like a wonder, seeing him again after what feels like eternity and was probably nothing.
Achilles is kneeling beside a dead body sprawled out on the sheets, as if lying asleep. His face is streaked with tears, his throat raw from crying, yet he still whispers to the gods, begging for mercy. Patroclus does not know how to comfort him — he has travelled from the afterlife, from a state close to Elysium, into the mortal world, only to see his love, and the man he found is so surrendered to his grief that he does not even seem to notice the world around him. Patroclus knows that here, he is nought but a ghost, a shadow of the life he once lived, yet he still reaches out, wanting to help — but neither he nor Achilles feel the contact, and Patroclus sees his hand, near-translucent as it already is, pass through his beloved's shoulder.
In this moment he asks himself why he is here, but remembers it just the same — his love is alone, and while Achilles does not know about him, Patroclus can still be there, however passive that may be.
Still, he ponders — what will become of Achilles?
Images flash before Patroclus' eyes, scenes marking the passing of time and the life of Achilles, memories collected over centuries of silent watch. Short moments, glimpses, nothing more, as Patroclus looks on, day for day for day.
Achilles, standing at the edge of the cliff, staring at the ground far below him.
Achilles, in the middle of the sea, stopping to swim.
Achilles with his dagger in hand, his chest bared to the blade.
Achilles with an amphora in his hand, no longer able to utter a coherent thought.
Day after day, week after week, month after month. Alone but for his thoughts, and all they tell him is to be with Patroclus.
Oh, the gods may have told Patroclus that he would never be the centre of Achilles' world — but what was this? No man not in love would do this, would he?
As much as he wants to, Patroclus cannot lift a finger to save Achilles, yet as Achilles tries and fails and tries and fails yet again, Patroclus is screaming at the gods, begging them, pleading with them to help Achilles.
But all he receives is silence.
Years of silence. Years in which Achilles is ruined.
He cannot be harmed.
He cannot die.
He can suffer, though.
To Patroclus, it seems as if Achilles thinks that this is the only way he can be close to him.
Nowadays, Achilles seems like nothing but bones held together by the pure will of his immortality.
Skin stretching taut over his cheekbones, hair matte and knotted. Eyes hollow, clouded by wine. Nought but a shadow of the man he used to be.
But Patroclus loves him no less.
Achilles' men are furious, seeing their hero decay like this. They shout at him, command him to get back to their cause, until finally, Achilles relents.
"The hero has returned", they chant, "All praise aristos achaion!"
Achilles stalking forward, no feeling visible on his face. Patroclus is there, on the battlefield, always close to his beloved. He sees Achilles, his blade in hand, cutting down left and right. The spark returning to his eyes. But leaving as soon as night falls again.
The same the day after, and after that. Months later, the war is won, and Achilles seems restless. Patroclus watches, as always, from the sidelines.
He still pleads with the gods.
Daily.
Whenever Achilles strikes down another, and another, and another. A soldier for hire, greater than all the others, more brutal, more remorseless, more cold.
Tales are soon sung of the man who can make a whole battlefield a lake of red, stories told at the bedside to children, keeping them home at night. Children grow old and tell their own youth of a man once deemed the greatest hero, a man fated to never die, who now spends his days along the wars waged in the world. Soldiers flee from their armies as soon as they see the man from their childhood nightmares appear before them.
Yet Achilles does not seem to care.
The tales change, as tales always do, and sing of a man cursed to live.
But the man is always the same. A man so filled with grief he cannot do anything other than try to avenge. They sing of futile hope, and of never bartering with life.
Patroclus sees it all, and he wails in sorrow.
The man he loves, gone?
But then, one day, finally, finally, the gods listen.
Patroclus feels her before he can see her, a power greater even than that of Achilles, her steps on the ground leaving neither mark nor sound. A woman whose council remains unrivalled, through mortals and immortals alike, the goddess of wisdom and war strides to Patroclus, a calling owl marking her arrival.
She stands beside him, watching Achilles surrounded by more than a dozen of men.
"He wasn't always like this", Patroclus says, almost defensively.
Athena turns to him, an all-seeing smile on her face, yet her eyes filled with sorrow.
"We know this."
The two of them, to anyone who might listen or care to look, are nothing but whispers in the wind, and an unusually bright patch on the yellow grass, the cries of battle overshadowing what otherworldly thing there may have been to see.
"Then why didn't you do anything?", Patroclus asks, his heart crying over what Achilles has become.
"He must learn, as every immortal must, that life is fleeting, over before it has even begun. Your death would have come sooner or later, and sooner it was."
"He has learned! He has suffered enough, Athena."
"He must learn to cope. This —" she gestures towards Achilles, men falling all around him, "— is not coping."
"Innocent lives have been lost!", Patroclus shouts.
"Yes — and Achilles must realise this for himself. Murder is not a way to bring you back. He must learn that he is more than you — and you must too. Patroclus, all this? You forsook Elysium to be a ghost, a restless spirit bound to a man who would never die? What if you had died a natural death? Would Achilles still have loved your old, decaying body? Your sacrifice was honourable, yes, but you still have much to learn."
Patroclus stares ahead in silence. Had he really given too much for Achilles? But was his love now not doing the exact same thing — too much?
"Can you at least... try to help? To tell him that what he's doing is against my wishes? That might, in a way, push him towards a better path — you wouldn't interfere, not really, it'd still be his choice in the end..."
"I can try", the goddess says. "I can try."
Patroclus looks over at Achilles, his back dark against the cruel beauty of the sea behind him, the ground beneath his feet red with blood.
Athena walks towards him, her bronze spear and chest plate glistering in the evening sun, the head of Medusa on her shield a reflection of the pain on his face. Her strides don't falter, even as she steps over the bodies littered around Achilles.
"Achilles, stop", the goddess of wisdom and war commands, her voice booming over the hills.
"Who are you to tell me this?", Achilles growls. No one has dared to speak to him in such a way for many, many years, the reason for which visible all around him.
"You know me, Achilles. You have known me from the very beginning."
Finally, realisation hits. "You're Athena."
The goddess nods, Patroclus coming up to her.
"Why are you here?", Achilles demands.
"He would not have wanted this", Athena answers.
A beat. Patroclus waits in silence, waits for Achilles to say something — he asked for this, to give peace to Achilles, to steer him onto another path —
"He is dead!"
"He would not have wanted this", Athena insists, and rightly so. Patroclus is pleading, telling Achilles that she is right, that he does not want for him to be this way, in the futile hope that this time, this time, Achilles will finally notice him but alas, he is disappointed again, and Achilles shows no signs of having heard him.
"Can you not understand me? HE IS DEAD!", Achilles shouts, jumping to his feet. But even at his size, the goddess still towers above him, unfazed by his outburst. "I have very much heard you, Achilles, but Patroclus—"
"DO NOT. EVER. SPEAK. HIS NAME!"
"I am sorry."
Patroclus is broken over and over again — he meant for closure, not for Achilles to be like this, to react like this. It pains him, to see his beloved in such a state, but there is nothing he can do to change it. Achilles sits back down, as if defeated. And in a way, he is — Patroclus is, after all, dead. He might still be around, but Achilles does not know that. Yet, Patroclus hopes.
"Death is not the end, Achilles."
"I— I know." Achilles wipes his face, then buries his head in his hands. "How is he?"
"He is dead, Achilles."
"I KNOW THAT. How could I not know that? When every waking moment I miss his stride beside mine and whenever I close my eyes I see his face before me? How could I not know when whenever I turn I expect to find him there and instead get to relive the moment that spear was plunged into his chest, that spear I could not stop because I was so foolish to let him go and when he left did not follow? Whenever I cross these lands I see him, etched into my memories, bound to every place. How I beg the gods to make me feel anything but pain, to let me meet him again, yet all you sent me is silence. I was meant to be the greatest warrior, instead I am nothing. I try to achieve my destiny but I will never, never be good enough to protect those I hold dearest. I know that he is dead. I know it with every part of my soul, goddess. As he would have, had it been me. But oh, it can never be me, can it? What would I give to see him once more, to be united again, even if it is in death. But I cannot bring him back. I cannot come to him, either, and gods know I tried. He is gone, fully, irrevocably gone, goddess. You need not remind me of that. I ask you how he is because I love him. I have, do, and always will love him. We are two halves of the same soul. Without him, I am but a mere reflection of what I once was. He was the one who made me whole, who made me me. He will always, even after all this time, be philtatos."
"I know all this, Achilles. We see more than mortals will ever know."
"I am no mortal!", Achilles shouts, his voice deep and angry.
Achilles does not take lightly to being taken for a mortal, Patroclus has learned over the past decades. Still, Athena does not step back. He wants to warn her, to tell her that now Achilles will snap, will try to kill her, until he remembers that she, too, is immortal, a goddess. Achilles cannot win against her, no matter his prowess. "You are correct. I am sorry."
Patroclus did not expect such remorse from a goddess, and especially not from Athena. To him, the gods have always seemed far away, distanced from human emotions, but again he seems to be proven wrong.
"I ask you again. How is he?"
"Pa— I— he is well. As well as can be"
Achilles looks at her, tears in his eyes. Look at me, Patroclus wants to scream, I am here, I love you, I have been there with you, for you, all these years —
"But is he happy?" No, Patroclus says, I cannot be, not without you. I can only be happy when we are united, and we will never be. But I am happy to be there, to see you, even though it pains me to see you break. I love that I can be here, but I am not happy. For all he wishes he were heard, his words are pointless, nothing but wind whispering stories only the gods can understand. Athena beside him stills, then chooses to tell a version of the truth, similar enough to what is real that Patroclus hopes his dreams can come true.
"He is wandering still, in these worlds. Occasionally, he speaks to us."
But this does not satisfy Achilles, as it would not have satisfied Patroclus had he been in his stead. "Is he happy?"
Now, for the first time, Athena seems flustered. She cannot convey direct messages between the living and the dead, lest she fear the judgement of the other gods. "I— I do not know. I cannot — could not tell you, even if I knew."
She does not look at Achilles, but even if she did, his sight would not have calmed her. Crying, his body shaking with sobs, Achilles sits, silently reaching out for a Patroclus that is not there and will never come. Patroclus extends his arm, wants to touch Achilles, to comfort him, to remind him that he is there, but his hand goes right through Achilles' shoulder. Do something, he begs the goddess, just finally do something!
But Athena only places a heavy hand on Achilles' shoulder, does the exact thing Patroclus had attempted and failed to do. "He would not have wanted this, Achilles. That I can tell you." She leaves, and Patroclus is left beside a wrecked Achilles, as helpless as ever.
Yet something seems to have changed inside Achilles. The knowledge that Patroclus is here, in the mortal world, seems to have awoken him, given him a new will to be.
He finds himself speaking to Patroclus, telling him about his day as if Patroclus was beside him – and as if Patroclus hadn't been there with him all along. But Patroclus still listens, his heart (or what is left of it) warming from the loving tone of Achilles' voice, who, as it seems, has never forgotten how it once was between them, all those millennia ago. Achilles talks to a nothingness, every day, trusting his hopes that Patroclus is there beside him, listening to his every word. He is, of course, there, has never once left his side, through the good and the bad.
And slowly, Achilles learns himself again, his talks to an ever-so-silent Patroclus giving him a new sense of calm, a new love for what is life, a confidence he was lacking before. Because if his love is always watching him, then he must be loveable — and his own confidence, his own being does not let him be anything but the very best he can.
Centuries later, Achilles yet again seems to be a changed man.
He is immortal, yes, and he still holds importance within the mortal world, meddling in affairs from both the side and the front, shaping the world like the gods will him to and later, when they fall ever more silent, as he wishes. He has aged beyond his years, still looking like the youth he once was but possessing the wisdom and weariness of a man far older than him.
Time has scarred him, and while there are no visible blemishes, his eyes tell of horrors seen by no other.
No-one but Patroclus.
He still talks to him, every night. Speaking about his plans, his wishes, his dreams.
Achilles achieves his goals, one by one, his prowess famed in all the world, but the dream that always sparks inside Patroclus' heart, the dream that never changes, that is never fulfilled, that is repeated night after night after night, is Achilles' wish to see him again, to be reunited. Patroclus, after all these centuries, millennia even, still wishes the same.
Achilles still cries out to him, sometimes, when the nightmares from his past come to him. He stretches his arm across the empty bed, searching for the love he spent a few years with yet who seems to have been with him, who was with him, all this time. And Patroclus still cannot help.
They are eternity, a pair divided without hope, together without touch or unified grace.
Times are ever-changing, and Achilles seems to be more powerful than even the gods. First, he was their puppet, their pawn within a powerful game, but as the centuries have passed and the gods moved to give the world over to mortals, to humanity, Achilles seems like the only remnant of a time where gods meddled in mortal affairs, and where the otherworldly was a daily occurrence. His persistence over the years has made him, has turned him into a powerful man possessing the knowledge of humanity as a whole, yet never being far-off like the gods but deep down still what would be considered human. He has the power to rule the world, and he knows it. But in all his glory, Achilles remembers the years spent with a young man on the shores of a war that still seemed so far away. The time spent with his one and only love, the man he hopes (and knows, in his heart) has seen all these years together with him, separate but still one.
Both of them dream of being together once again, and still pray to the oh-so-silent gods in hope of a wonder that seems so far away yet ever so close.
Until, at last, one day, something like the shadow of one of them comes down to Earth.
It is Zeus himself, Patroclus realises, once the most mighty of all the gods, come to speak to them.
Now, however, he is nothing like the all-powerful being he was when Patroclus last saw him, all those millennia ago in a world clothed in shadow and nothingness. Instead, he seems like a weary old man, someone held by nothing but the idea of his former greatness. Humanity has stopped believing in the gods, and they have in turn stopped to believe themselves.
The king of the gods, once ruler of the entire cosmos and now but a speck in the infinite, stands before Patroclus. He can still feel the power radiating off him, but it is nothing compared to that of Achilles. In his life on Earth, Achilles has become closer to a god, moving more and more toward that mark of gargantuan power with every day that passes, until his strength rivalled and then surpassed that of the once most powerful beings in the universe.
Zeus stands before the two of them, in his remaining godliness visible to both Patroclus and Achilles. And he speaks to both of them at once, telling them what they already knew, stories of a world they have seen, tales of lost power, of forgotten strength. But it is his finishing words that surprise the two of them the most, words that they have waited for millennia to finally hear and now do.
Zeus' voice is raspy, unused and ancient. But the words he speaks hold power nonetheless, an invocation with a meaning far beyond what they have hoped and yet just that.
"There is strength in everlasting life, Achilles. You have found it, though it took you far longer than we had expected. It could have been faster, we know that now. We have slept, for long, and we do not know if and when we will wake again. We are tired and old. Nevertheless, the mortal world must be watched over, and you have taken that task very seriously. We have decided to reward you for that, still, you must not take this lightly. Going against the natural order of the cosmos does not bode well, yet the world needs beings of long-lasting knowledge, and we cannot fulfil that task to satisfaction anymore. We are weak, and our old enemies even more so, yet there are new challenges the human race faces, challenges you know but we never saw. We give you what you wished for, Achilles, for you have served us well."
Zeus coughs, seeming ever more frail with each passing moment. His strength seems to have weakened even more after admitting that he, once unrivalled in all, was weak, and his siblings too.
The forgotten ruler of the cosmos fades into a blinding light, like a stolen remnant of who he once was.
But as Achilles looks around himself, there is still a shimmer in the air, a sense of a being fading into existence. And there he is, once again in the world of the living, the man of his dreams.
Achilles and Patroclus look at each other, their eyes meeting for the first time in millennia. Tears streak their cheeks, their eyes shining in happiness, grinning from ear to ear before their lips meet.
There is a joy radiating from them at this moment, something tangible in the air. A sense of a wound healing that has been open far too long and is now, at last, being mended again. They dance around each other, two souls that were together all along yet still separate, who are now, finally, unified.
They are both immortal, now, having been bestowed with the greatest gift the gods have to offer — eternal life. The two of them know that it is, in truth, more like a curse.Yet now they can share its burden, divide it between them, carry it together and not alone.
They are, finally, happy again.
They are there, as the last ships of humanity leave earth, now but a barren wasteland.
Guiding, as beings close to gods or maybe even like them.
On to a new journey, after millennia of humanity on earth.
They are wistful, really, but happy.
After all, they are together.