I begged for that arrow

Pacha Quispe Achilles | Angel of God| Eremiel I want to be back on the ground Where my feet touch my shadow I want to dig my heels in the dirt Feel it break between all of my toes Anything to stop floating ‘round

[patroklxs]

Σε φιλῶ | pacha & vivi

[patroklxs]

To hell with him. How dare he be so ready for this, so prepared for the ending that Vivian had prepared. What had happened to their Achilles? What had happened to him all those thousands of years?

“Do you know how many bullets are in this gun, Achilles?” Their voice was soft, but even. “Three. One for you. One for me. One in case I miss.” The safety clicked off quietly. “But I’m not going to miss, am I?”

[almost-achilles-blog]

“You never did have good aim.”

He was too tired to be amused, surely. But there was something relieving about the notion of simply being done, of finally being able to sleep like he wanted. He was just close enough, and Achilles reached out, catching the fingers of the others free hand so he could press his lips to the back of Patroclus knuckles.

“This is my turn to wait at the river then.”

[patroklxs]

Σε φιλῶ | pacha & vivi

[patroklxs]

How dare he touch them. How dare he invade their space like this, but, skin crawling, they held still. Their voice had begun to tremble, and yet, they spoke slowly.

“I watched even Hector fall into Hades, crawling with coins in his hand to pay the boatman, and he asked me, ‘Patroclus, were not you buried by Achilles with coins to pay?’ ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘Yes, Hector, I was. But I must wait – patiently, diligently – until the day my Achilles dies, so that he may join me in the grand Fields of Elysium.’

“And he stared, my murderer, with terrible pity in his eyes, as the boatman paddled away. ‘But Patroclus,’ I heard him whisper as the dark waters stretched between us, ‘Achilles is already dead.’” Then, an angry sound filled their voice – the volume rising in their town, blue eyes glittering down at the other. “Still, I waited. A hundred years, I waited, inconsolable, without sleep, without food, with only the howls of Cerberus and the heavy mist that rolls off the screaming river to keep me company, until I was ripped back into this world…I have lived a thousand lives waiting for you, Achilles, and each time, I have been murdered, felled, deceived, all as I search for the only man who ever made me, a small boy from Phtia, feel like I could walk amoung Zeus and Hera as peers.

“My bones still ache for the love we shared on the battlefield.” That was still true, and they knew it, but it didn’t change the need they had. “But this body – this incarnation, how old does it look? Eighteen, perhaps? Twenty, at best…This body is fifty-seven. It is not human. I got my memories back when this body had only lived for three years – and this time, I will not let you go.”

Damn him. Damn him for this, and damn the dark burning feeling behind their eyes. A shift had the small lump on their hip disappearing, falling black and heavy into their palm. “This time, I have you. Here and now, and I know it’s you. Elysium will not take me after this, but I don’t care.” 

The gun rose, shaking despite the tight, white-knuckled grip they held on it, the lips of it kissing the other’s forehead. Shame. He was handsome in this life – but then, he always was, wasn’t he? “I have spent too long with no one else’s touch satisfying me, no one else’s love taking away the ache, in this endless, horrible cycle. The pain must stop. I can’t hurt like this anymore. It ends, with us, tonight.” 

[almost-achilles-blog]

What words could he give that would mean a damn? None of them compared to the things that Patroclus said, the savage ferocity within his tone. What was there that he could say against the raging within his own heart, the thundering, screaming echo within his own ears?

No apologies would do, sorry wasn’t what they wanted to hear. Worse, Achilles found he didn’t want to apologize, didn’t have the heart to speak words that he didn’t mean. Instead, he leaned forward, pressing until the barrel was tight against his skin. 

“I’ve never stopped loving you. Every life that I had to live, every single death, you were always the last thing that I thought of, the only thing that I wanted. I couldn’t ever find you even when I didn’t remember who you were, always spent every life looking for something that I couldn’t find.”

Wavering, there were tears in his throat then, clogging his voice until he could hardly speak. He kept his eyes on the other though, even as his tears spilled free.

“I haven’t lived a single day since I lost you, but I won’t stop you from killing a dead man. Not if it’s what you need.”

[patroklxs]

Σε φιλῶ | pacha & vivi

[patroklxs]

It was him. Gods, it was him, and they could tell. With aching fingers, they reached up, tossing away the heavy curls of their hair.

“Achilles. Do you remember the first time I died? Not when Hector killed me, but the first time you killed me on the battlefield. The first time away from home…we were one, but you held your hand over my mouth. You begged me not to make a sound, lest the other soldiers hear us.” Wetting their lips, their hands folded in front of them, hiding a dark lump on the outside of their thigh. “You didn’t want to be discovered. And I asked if you were ashamed. You said no, and I felt how the battlefield had dried your lips, where you spoke against my flesh.” 

Their hands snaked across their own shoulders. “Here, you cursed Apollo for letting anything other than your kisses burn my skin.” They pointed to their forehead. ”Here, you told me the Gods should have worshiped how my curls never rested in the same way.” Then, their chest: “Here, Achilles, you whispered to ask if Cassiopeia had come down yet to tell me how she envied my blemishes, my – my freckles, how they spanned deeper worlds than the stars she lived among. And I asked you, with all the love I had thick on my tongue, if when the war was over with the Trojan, would Thetis tell me never again to see her son? Would I return to only wrestling with you in the dust and sand, rather than bearing my shoulders into it, gripping at it with white knuckles because letting my hands do that to you would have left marks the other soldiers would see?”

Then, their hands pressed to their abdomen. “And here, you said you would never leave me.” What a horrible lie, and their hands fell to their sides. That was all Achilles had ever been – a liar. “I could not be the reason the great Araistos Achaion fell from the graces of his people. I could not let the Trojans take you. And I died in your armor, with your name on my lips. I waited for you. I sat by the bank of Styx, I saw armies pass by. I spoke with the boatman with no voice, and he pitied me. I was kissed by Persephone. I spent a hundred years in Hades.”

[almost-achilles-blog]

He hadn’t risen in hours, but every word felt like the blades that they were meant to be. Such pain had never been felt in any life of training he had been pulled through, no battle had ever set such an ache within his chest. Patroclus though, Patroclus had always been petulant, every bit of him had always sent a sort of brittle pain across Achilles skin. 

What was he to give, apologies that he didn’t mean? At least Patroclus had been given death for a time, at least he had known the sweet embrace of a chance to rest. What right did he have, to be so angry, when all Achilles had ever done had been for their benefit, what right did he have to complain. Worse, when had Patroclus ever not complained?

Rising slowly, bones creaking, Achilles took pained steps to separate the distance between them. Close enough, so close that he could feel the soft fabric of the blonde’s deep red dress against his fingertips. Lips puffing on a quiet sigh, he fell to his knees, dark eyes staring. 

[patroklxs]

Σε φιλῶ | pacha & vivi

[patroklxs]

How easy this would be, then.

He had recognized so quickly, seen the look in their eyes, the unmistakable blaze of a Myrmidon’s power left for thousands of years to fester, to smoulder until it was a roaring pool of magma within them, and they were a volcano. They were a geyser. They were Vesuvius itself, ready to burn Pompeii alive and devour it in a swarm of ashes.

“Hello, Achilles. Do not come to me. I’ve things to say.”

[almost-achilles-blog]

He wanted to scream then, wanted to cry, because he had never denied the other anything, not for as long as they had lived arm in arm and chest to chest, and look at where that had gotten them? Patroclus dead, and he himself cast across the span of time with never a moment to rest nor feel whole. Every life had been a millennial, every death a thousand over, but they had never let him stop. 

All this for another warrior, who looked nothing like they had, who held the golden curls and the oceanic eyes that had once made Achilles beautiful. This was what had become of them, wasn’t it? He wanted to rage then, to take the strength from the skills that he could still feel within his hands and wound the other, pull at blood and bone. But what energy that would take, what patience and ferocity, and instead he nodded, dumb and tired.

[patroklxs]

Σε φιλῶ | pacha & vivi

[patroklxs]

“Right. Of course you aren’t.”

Swaying, they strode deeper into his office. Now was not the time to walk away because he wasn’t taking visitors. By all technicality, the museum was closed, none of it was taking visitors, but they were not a regular visitor. They had business there, business far more important than a museum visitor.

“Achilles.”

[almost-achilles-blog]

“What part of I’m not taking visito-”

The voice was different, all wrong, with a tone that sounded off and phrasing that was too crisp, too soft. Different, but there was no way to mistake it, and he looked up with a tightness in his chest. 

He knew those eyes, something about them. There was a haunted glaze to them, the same kind that he saw in himself when he bothered to look in a mirror, the same shadows that couldn’t be concealed. Suddenly he wanted to cry, but he had done that so often lately for no reason at all, and Achilles didn’t know if he wanted to be hopeful or not.

“Patroclus?”

[patroklxs]

Σε φιλῶ | pacha & vivi

Thousands of years. Too many to count, too long to wait for a single man, and they had waited long enough. They had waited, patiently, fighting themself for the last century. Was this what they wanted? Was this what had to happen? And today, with the knowledge in their hand, they had sat and stared for hours at the paper. Tartarus Museum of History. It was just like him to be a historian. Even in their first life, he’d been so interested in historical things, the oldest things in Greece he could find.

Home was cold. Even the hot shower they had taken was cold under their skin, even the hot curling iron taken to their hair to cause massively wide curls across milky shoulders. Flawless eyeliner, thick lashes, their makeup had to be perfect, everything had to be perfect. A single call to Skylar, a curt voicemail that they had a present for them with their mother, that they loved her and would see her for their shopping date on Monday. They’d spent years finding a perfect little gift for her – as this day would come, and they would have to leave her.

The museum was beautiful, but where their heels clacked against the hard tile, where their long dress trailed along the floor, they were a new fixture. The night darkened the museum, but there was just enough light to see the door at the end of the hall. The engraving read Pacha Quispe, but a sticky note beneath it read Achilles. It was time. They were ready.

The door swung open silently, their heart thrumming heavily in their chest.

“Good evening. I’m looking for a Mr. Quispe.”

[almost-achilles-blog]

How many hours had passed since he had gone home? How much time since he had left the confines of his office, since he had pulled himself farther than the edge of his office chair? More than hours, surely, with how his shirt had gone stale and the braids of his hair had fallen slack. 

Curled over his desk, head in hands, the plush of his palms pressed starbursts against his closed eyelids, put a sharp pressure on the hollow of his eyes. Achilles could feel it in the back of his skull if he pressed hard enough, and it was as sweet to feel something as it was horrible. He didn’t want to feel, not if this was what feeling felt like. 

And there was no real point, was there? What sort of man was he, what kind of angel when he couldn’t even keep a small child from trying to kill themselves? What sort of warrior was scared of the dark within his own home, couldn’t stand the silence that came from an empty room? 

“I’m not taking any visitors.” 

Voice thick, curdled with emotion and rough from disuse, he sighed, nails scratching against his scalp. 

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Meet the Father | Achilles & Caelum

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Caelum finally noticed that he was holding the purple hippo. He found it cute that the guy kept it. Had a sort of innocence to it. If he did have something like that Aedan would probably tease him endlessly. He admired the man more for having it oddly enough.

“Ah don’t tend tae have expectations of anyone. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover n’all that. Ah’ve worked in the church and as a private investigator. When Ah arrived in Glasgow and worked in St Mungo’s kirk the priests said the epidemic around them was god’s work. That we should have nae part in it. A lot of people died because of that decision. That was when ah first arrived too. After that ah don’t tend tae have opinions because those tend to cloud judgement. I still form my own time tae time, I’m no perfect,” he told him but that was about humans. What did Caelum think about angels. He had no clue Pacha was the first one he had met. 

What he has heard and learned that Angels could be vengeful, or graceful. Gabriel the messenger who told of Jesus’s birth also cast out the leviathans. However this was written in a book in a light that the writer wanted them to appear in. The reality could be far different which was what Pacha was saying.

“Stornoway, isle of Lewis originally,” he told him.

[almost-achilles-blog]

“Piety is often a matter of perspective rather than faith. God judges us on our actions, but those actions don’t always mean how much we pray, or how many sinners we save. We are as pious as we are wicked, despite our virtues or our wings. This isn’t what you want to hear though.”

The child hadn’t come to him for a lecture though, not when he was so intent on finding his father. Stronoway though, and he had been the only one of their kind in the isles for decades. He had been allowed to search for his love, desperate to find Patroclus even though he had already started to feel the desolation that came with the lack of him. He had been allowed to search, so long as he did his duty to the garrison, gave them children of his blood. Just the same, he recognized the boy by his eyes, the line of his mouth, and Achilles didn’t know whether to scowl or sigh. 

Why ask, when he already knew the answer? One hand released his hold on the stuffed animal, and his fingers pulled at his hair. thick and black where it curled past his shoulders, it was loose still, free of the war braids that he could never break the habit of wearing and free of its high tail. He puled at the pale strands of grey that wove their way through it all, and sighed.

“What year were you born.”

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Meet the Father | Achilles & Caelum

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Caelum walked inside and closed the door behind him and then looked at the guy who was now speaking some kind of language. It was nothing like he had heard of. Gaelic was his first language, latin his second then english, but this was different and resembled nothing of those languages. It was then he theorised he was dealing with an ancient being one that had lived many lifetimes more than he has. That or it was a language he had not much dealings with. 

When he introduced himself each word sounding like he has gravel down his throat. It made his own feel a bit uncomfortable. “Aye ah did, but it’s a pleasure tae meet ye. Ah should introduce mahself. Ah’m Caelum Macdonald. Ah was told ye might be able tae help me. Ye see ah know I am an angel hybrid, but I have no encountered many angels in mah life. In fact yer the first one. Ah guess ah just no been lucky. Anyway ah ramble, ah was wonderin’ if ye might be able tae know who mah father is? Ah know it’s a long shot and ah’m sorry fer bothering ye with this,” he told him.

[almost-achilles-blog]

There was a child, an infant by every standard that he knew, standing in his living room asking him about fathers and angels. He was a full grown man, well over full grown if he was honest with himself, yet he felt on the cusp of exhausted tears, had felt the burn of them all day. An adult, an angel of God, yet he held onto a purple hippo like it was the only thing keeping him alive. 

What sort of angel was he, what kind of warrior?

“Caelum. I don’t know whether to congratulate you or console you on finding one of us, I’m afraid you’ll find we don’t usually live up to expectation unless you’re an Archangel. Even Michael and Gabriel have their faults though.”

“Where are you from?”

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Meet the Father | Achilles & Caelum

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Caelum looked at the guy before him and it was clear he disturbed him. Then he realised why he was recommended. He was an actual angel. A full blooded one. He never met one before he always had a calling but he tried to answer it best as he could by serving the church at least until he then set up his own Private investigation business. However he was now in front of an actual angel. It made him feel even more nervous than he was before and he distubed the guy. “Ah’m sorry fer botherin’ ye. Ah was told ye might be able tae help me,” he told him. “Ah kin come back another time if ye would prefer that?” he asked. His angel father could wait. 

[almost-achilles-blog]

Eyes shutting tight, the other man’s voice was thick, loose tongued and heavy with an accent that he couldn’t understand at first. His head wasn’t screwed on right for this, not today, but there wouldn’t be any other day. He might not leave his bed, he might not leave his house again. There were enough things to keep him sustained within the walls of his home, and surely if he seemed desolate enough, Heaven would pull him back, keep and confine him until they deemed him well again. 

Shaking his head, waving for the child to come in, Achilles kept bruised black eyes on the young hybrid. The words he spoke first were Greek though, dead and ancient, the sort of Myrmidon slander that he had tossed fitfully at Agamemnon, screamed desperately at Odysseus. Blinking then, frowning, he found English, harsh to his own ears. This was the first he had spoken nearly all day, and he could feel the gravel of every word. 

“Pacha Quispe, but you knew that, I guess.”

[caelumluxmacdonald]

Meet the Father | Achilles & Caelum

@almost-achilles

Caelum was at the door of some guy Pacha Quispe, he was the owner of the museum and he was told he might, and it was emphasised might know something about angels. He knew he was an angel hybrid, however he never met his father. He decided now that he had sort of settled into the island he would try and maybe get some information that may lead to him. He knocked to door feeling slightly nervous. “Mr Quispe?” he called out.

[almost-achilles-blog]

His bones ached, with a tired, cold feeling that had been there since he’d woken. A simple, short text to Cian to say he wouldn’t make it in today, and Achilles had instead curled on his side. Long body hidden beneath the soft warmth of his blankets, both legs had pulled up nearly to his chest, and his arms were coiled around the soft, lavender fluff of a stuffed hippo. He hadn’t left bed since waking, and with the knock at his door, the clock beside his bed read four in the afternoon. 

Slowly, the sound of his name, professional and demanding, drew him from the comfort and safety of his bed, and Achilles stumbled down the stairs to the front door. Fingers still clasped around the stuffed animal, he squinted at the man on the other side. Angel hybrid, and here he hadn’t even showered today, but he found that he didn’t care. There was no need to shower, not when he felt like this.

“Yeah?”

[manlycoups-deactivated20160829]

“What can I say, spoil sport’s my middle name.” Noah grunted before waving his hand to the large crate at the corner of the shop. 

“And you heard right. Some people dropped them off just a few days ago. I didn’t really know what to do with them so they’re all just in that box over there.” Noah said with a shrug of his shoulders. “Knock yourself out.” 

[almost-achilles-blog]

“Ah, thank you. I suppose we all have to have something unfortunate about our names though.”

Taking it as the direct invitation that it was, Achilles fell to sit beside the large box. There was a film of dust along the exposed covers that he could see, and Achilles traced a knuckle over a scroll before pulling it into his lap with care. 

Sword training, discipline, and vaguely, he remembered Chiron having a scroll similar to this.

“Pacha Quispe,” 

“These are in remarkable condition. Did you get the name of the person who donated them?”

[mizuilenawang-blog]

Coffee

[mizuilenawang-blog]

“Pacha,” she said to him, a slight lift in her brow until she noticed the complaint forms in his hand, “Oh, that.” She turned her head back to her book, not that ignoring him would change anything. She liked him, she truly did but there was no way she was going to change who she was for some idiots that had too much time on their hands.

[almost-achilles-blog]

The wrong approach then. He didn’t like doing this, hadn’t been harsh in years, decades or centuries, but he knew the thrum of it within his veins well. He was a Myrmidon still, even if the body wasn’t the same, the ferocity was still there. 

“Miss Wang,” Achilles tried again, grimacing at the way that she seemed bent on ignoring him. Reaching out, he plucked her book from her then, snapping it shut with a sigh before dropping it to the table. “These were on your desk for a week. Proper chain of command says that you sign them before bringing them to me, since they come from your department. Ignoring a stack of misconduct and discrimination forms doesn’t make them disappear.”

[mizuilenawang-blog]

Coffee

Lena sat alone at the coffee shop, her coffee laced with blood she took her time to enjoy reading a new book that had just arrived. 

[almost-achilles-blog]

“Lena?”

Achilles had never liked having to hunt down employees after hours, especially not with complaint forms of all things. There was no other real option though, not when the young vampire was always gone by the time he left his workshop.

[manlycoups-deactivated20160829]

“And I’m off, big brother!” 

Noah looked up from his book and frowned as Kiara bounded up to him, pressing a quick kiss on his cheek. “I’ll be home before dinner, I promise!” 

“I’ll hold you to that.” Noah grumbled before snapping his book shut. Kiara shot her brother a knowing look before her eyes brightened at the sound of the bell above their shop door. 

“Don’t be such a spoil sport, Noah! Look alive, you have a customer. Play nice!” She threw a wink over her shoulder before side-stepping the new comer and heading out the door. Noah pinched the bridge of his nose in mild irritation before looking up with a tight smile. 

“Hey, do you need help finding anything?” 

[almost-achilles-blog]

Watching the girl go with a wide expression and a faint, amused smile, Achilles leaned to the side to avoid colliding with the quick footed girl. She was gone just as quickly as she had turned though, with the door chiming after her. 

“A spoil sport, hm?” 

“Hopefully. Someone told me that this store had a cache of Incan journals that were donated about a week ago?”

[hell-of-a-killer-deactivated201]

“Well, when you get to be as old as me, you start to hate everything.”

“Apt or not apt.  Besides, I’m a strong type of guy.  I’ve quite the colorful vocabulary.”

[almost-achilles-blog]

“Matter of opinion, vampire. Older than you, and I don’t necessarily hate everything.”

“Strong guy, but you’re sitting in a diner at...two in the morning with a milkshake. Cheers then, to us strong men.”

[hell-of-a-killer-deactivated201]

“I hate Christmas. Don’t you?”

[almost-achilles-blog]

“Hate seems like a rather ...strong word.”

“Apt, but strong.”

[patroklxs]

idle hands | achilles & patroclus, 1200BC

[patroklxs]

What a horribly scandalous creature he was, his Achilles, but when no one could see, Patroclus would be glad to admit that he was glad and grateful for his lover’s attitude. It was nothing like his own. 

A dark halo of curls circled around him, the back of his head resting in the soft dirt. Just a skip, a brief curse of his heart, and his chest was set throbbing nervously, exomis holding loose around his thighs. No one would see here, right? 

With a deep colourful flush to his freckled cheeks, Patroclus tipped his head back, almost as if in anticipation for whatever Achilles chose to do. His feet pressed nervously together, toes curling in the soft cloth wraps around them, but his spine curved against the thin soil beneath him.

“No, I need not only anoint you, but I worry some day soon you may tired of my flesh. I worry not for what Demeter requires of me, but rather now what Dionysus tempts me with. What of you? Have you satisfied what it is your beloved Chiron asked of you today? Do I yet owe you a gift in the name of Eros?”

[almost-achilles-blog]

“I could never tire of you. Does Hades not hunger for Persephone when she leaves his side? I love you not only for the skin you have been given, Patroclus, but for the heart that beats within your chest.”

Pressing his lips to the very organ that he named, Achilles stared up at his lover through golden lashes. He was comfortable between the other boys thin thighs, a familiar home that he had made for himself in the quiet of the night, when lantern light danced across the boys dark skin. There were no flames to trace with his lips, no shadows to taste, but Achilles licked the sweat that he found regardless. 

Teeth finding familiar grooves of flesh, he suckled at the warmth that was displayed to him. Fingers slipping then, they disappeared beneath the rough fabric that separated them, and his nails traced along the inner seam of Patroclus’ thighs.

“I would offer you a gift, if you would have me.”