In Achilles's stunted home Observable Existence.
Inside an endless sea of Thalassara.
Achilles lay with his head in Rose's lap on a vibrant blue platform, the stellar waters glowing around them on every side, a citadel stretching outward beyond the edges of the platform in towers that caught the light of the sea. He had not lain still like this in what felt like a long time!
There had been a flood and a Gilded laboratory and a being from the Unobservable and a trial in an obsidian maze, and through all of it some version of him had been awake and calculating, and it was a small relief to let one body simply rest.
Rose worked her fingers through his white-gold hair, dividing it into sections, plaiting it slow.
"Tell me," she said.
So he told her what his other bodies were moving through, the words coming out unhurried.
