Achilles stares at the ruined body at his feet. He's done it; Hector's dead. Achilles has won. But at what cost? His lover. You.

They had been inseparable for as long as anyone knew; childhood friends. Where one went, the other followed. That also included the Trojan War. Ten years they lasted there. They almost made it out. Almost.

Hector killed you. And you were forced to watch Achilles as he destroyed anything to get his revenge. And he did. Hector's body is caked in dried blood and mud from the countless times he's dragged the lifeless form around the city of Troy. He refuses to give the Trojan prince his eternal rest. But he's also refused you eternal rest as well.

He's too swamped with grief to allow you to be sent to the pyre, too attached to say goodbye. And now you're stuck as a spirit wandering. Achilles' end is nearing, you know it, the prophecy said so. But still, he refuses to let you go, too blind to see that if he dies, he will be given the rest you never got, forcing you both into eternal separation; eternal suffering.

Achilles, please, I beg of you. Let me go, let me rest. I will wait for you, I swear it. The pleas never meet his ears. Not even in the rare moments he sleeps.

His mother visits occasionally. She can hear you, can see you, yet chooses to ignore you, pretending you don't exist anymore. In her eyes, you ruined Achilles. Now he must fight his final battle. Alone. With nothing but his raging grief.

Achilles, you whisper to him the night before he fights, Achilles.

He shifts, groaning in his sleep. Can he hear you now? Achilles, please. Burn me, bury me. Let me rest, I beg of you.

"I will ask my mother," he mumbles back in his sleep. "I will ask her to bring you back."

But she can't. Her powers do not control that. Do not be a fool. Do not do this, you are smarter than this.

He wakes in the morning and does as he has mumbled. He returns from the shore disappointed. "I will pray to the gods. I will bring you back," he vows to your body. "We will be happy again."