BOOK OF ASTYANAX

  CHAPTER 6

  “WHAT HAVE I DONE?”

  Beneath his feet, the city burned and the sound of ‘death’ rang in his ears without mercy. And yet, even so, Odysseus could only ponder: What have I done?

  He was standing at the edge of the palace’s tower still, but the job was done. Even so, the battle did not end; he could hear the cries of war beneath him and could see the figures of the soldiers who slaughtered each other without thought. Soon, Troy would be theirs, and the Trojans who remained would all be dead or enslaved or worse.

  But he wasn’t pleased at the realization that victory would soon belong to them. He won—his strategy to infiltrate and sack the city worked beautifully—but there was no relief. For his deeds, he would surely be known as a ‘hero’, but there was no pride.

  Because the price he paid for his victory and reputation was too great for it to be considered ‘fair’, and he was not driven by such vain desires in the beginning.

  He looked out into the city that stood for ten years, taking in all they fought to take, but it no longer seemed such a beautiful sight to his tired and weary eyes. What was the point? he wondered. Troy was theirs, but where were they supposed to go from here?

  How many more had to die before their thirst for glory could be satisfied?

  He wanted to clench his fist and bare his teeth, but his body no longer had the strength or the energy to match his will. His will, too, cracked. Soon it would shatter.

  “What have I done…? I’m sorry… please, forgive me…” he muttered.

  The only words he could bring together were directed at one who no longer existed. They were spoken into the world, but they no longer possessed any kind of purpose or direction. Aimless, they would fizzle and break apart, like the rest of the things that would never be witnessed or heard. A part of history that would never be echoed.

  At least, those words would not be heard by any human.

  Even in his current state, Odysseus could tell she was there.

  “…I know you’re watching,” he said. His voice cracked; he did his best to keep it from breaking. He tethered himself. Forced breath into his lungs to stabilize himself.

  Time slowed to a standstill, and the entire world melted away in an instant. In its place, Odysseus could see a vast sea of shining stars, fragmented and scattered across an infinite expanse but still a ‘whole’, if you viewed them in the right way. They were constellations; patterns intricately designed by those who governed the heavens and called the world their domain. To see all of this, in this way, was only possible for a mortal if they had the blessing of a certain goddess. That goddess was, of course—

  “Athena.” He turned to face her, now standing somewhere completely different from before… or perhaps that was just his own perspective, for the gods lived in a realm beyond their reasoning. One such god was Athena, Goddess of Wisdom and Warfare.

  She stood before him now. Far taller than him, with an imposing figure and armed from head to toe in armor, she towered with a presence that cast a shadow. No mortal soldier could ever compare to it. But even though she was a goddess, and she was intimidating, her beauty could not be understated. Her long hair, a striking golden blonde, was currently covered by her helm, but her keen grey eyes stared into his being. The nature of a goddess was to be perfect. Flawed, maybe, but also perfect.

  She was a deity with whom he had a lot of history… a ‘friend’, a foolish mortal would refer to her as. An ally. But right now, her presence did little to soothe his nerves.

  “Steel yourself, Odysseus.” Blunt and to the point; cold and militant, like how a general would speak to a soldier. That was how Athena ordinarily composed herself. In all their conversations over the years, the king of Ithaca could barely count her instances of ‘compassion’ on his hands and fingers. Maybe that was for his benefit.

  “Steel myself…? I just steeled myself, didn’t I? Otherwise…”

  “Removing one obstacle won’t end this battle, nor will it win the war.” He could feel the pit in his stomach deepen at the thought of it. The rationalization. The ‘obstacle’. His breathing shook; his blood, which had previously run as cold as ice, now began to boil.

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  “Your job isn’t over yet, nor is this battle. You—”

  “Damn it… I get it okay!?” Odysseus cut her off. “I just… I just don’t care. Win or lose… I don’t care anymore.” His tone was shaky, but his voice was unbroken. The man himself, though… Well, it would be kind to say he was ‘unstable’ at the moment. The ‘Odysseus’ the goddess knew was unraveling. Surely that was to be expected.

  “You don’t care, but you’ve spent ten years fighting? You can’t stop now, when your victory is just within reach,” Athena said. “How many lives have you already taken for this cause? How many men have you killed? It’s too late to go back now.”

  “I… did all of that for my family.” He stared downward, his gaze averted from the goddess’s eyes. “But I’ve gone too far… I crossed a line. What am I supposed to do now?” he asked, his body and soul weighed down by an unimaginable shame.

  For the murder that had unfolded, he was certainly a reprehensible monster—a being who did not deserve to live, whose life was defined by regret and arrogant self-justification. For what he did, there was no justification. There was no way to spin it—no trick that made him any less of a beast and more a man. “I’m… a monster,” he wholeheartedly believed. What else could he call himself?

  “Weren’t you watching? Didn’t you see? —The choice I made!? What I did!?”

  Athena audibly sighed. “This world contains many monsters, Odysseus, but you are not one of them,” she said. “You were given a decision. The choice you made was the right one—the logical one, which spared the lives of you, your family, and your kingdom. As I taught you, you weighed your options and selected the one that led to less casualties.”

  He didn’t need a reminder. He knew exactly what he did; he knew why he did it. It was as Athena said; he saw the future and did what he could to prevent as much bloodshed as possible. To save his home, he took the burden upon himself, but to do that…

  “—It’s not human.” It couldn’t be called ‘human’. What kind of a monster could send a crying child to their doom to save themselves and call it the ‘logical decision’?

  “How am I supposed to go on now, with that on my mind!? I’m not like you!” he shouted at Athena, who only stood and took the verbal assault without a flinch. “I’m not a god! I don’t have the power or the perspective you have… so how am I supposed to cope with this!? If I knew things were going to end up here… I would’ve died like Achilles did.”

  “Enough!” Athena raised her voice for the first time that meeting—something that she didn’t often do around him, seeing as he never really angered her in the past. “You made a choice! It was not a fair one… but it can’t be changed now.”

  Odysseus fell silent. He wasn’t sure what to say, or how to respond. He lowered his head and looked at the ground, his breathing shaky and his own movements trembling.

  “Sometimes, you can only save those within your reach and forsake the others. Is that not what you resolved yourself to do when you constructed the horse?”

  “That… that was different,” he stammered, looking up again. But it wasn’t.

  He knew there was no difference. He clenched his fists and teeth.

  “Keep going; your job isn’t over yet. Regret won’t bring that boy back and hesitation won’t help you reach home, so choose. What burden would you rather carry?”

  “Keep… going? How can you say that, after all this…? After all the games you gods play with us mortals, how can you expect me to listen to that shit!? To have faith!? You’re far wiser than me—far wiser than any man, so why… why did I have to…?”

  Athena was unmoved. “I cannot remove the weight of your guilt,” she said, “and even I cannot defy fate. All you can do is bring meaning to the sacrifice you made.”

  The word she used, ‘sacrifice’, only hurt him more. But he couldn’t deny it was accurate. He put his own family, his own kingdom, and his own people before the infant and he acted accordingly. To prevent the future he saw, he committed a horrible act. If it were Diomedes who was forced with that choice, what would he have done? Would he have regretted it? If it were Neo, would he have followed in his father’s footsteps?

  None of that mattered, because Odysseus was the one who killed Astyanax. Now, because of his plight, Ithaca was saved. Perhaps all those involved were saved.

  “Keep going,” Athena said again.

  Odysseus let out a ragged breath, his body and soul dragged down by a weight that he couldn’t even describe. Nothing made sense; he wanted Athena to say something—anything—that would make it all clear, but instead she only repeated herself. ‘Keep going’, she said. Despite all the turmoil and all the pain, he was to stand and fight. But his body was heavy, every one of his limbs ached with a hollow pain, and he could taste the blood and ash that consumed Troy on his tongue. He hated it; he hated all of it.

  “What if I don’t want to go on? Can’t I just… stop?”

  “Then, perhaps you’ll die with Troy. Your name will be remembered, just as Achilles’ will be, but it’ll be only that. A name, uttered throughout time and echoed throughout space.”

  “Is that so bad?” he asked. “Is it such an awful thing, to just give up?”

  “If you truly believed it wasn’t, then you wouldn’t be talking to me right now.”

  He had no retort to the goddess who stood as unflinching and untouchable as the stars that dotted the sky. Deep within himself, his desire remained unchanged. To reach home—to meet his son and embrace his wife and father and mother—was a wish that stood the test of time. I would give it all up for them, he was certain.

  For them, I would burn it all to ash. Apparently, he was willing to do awful things for them. For Penelope, and for Telemachus, there was no price he was unwilling to pay.

  “…I understand,” he finally said.

  The endless space around him and the goddess shattered at once, with each and every star bursting and fading into nothingness. The world faded to the one it once was, plagued by smoke and fire. Each and every shout met his ears; every sound of clashing steel was a song he despised, but one he learned to live with in order to return home.

  His mind drifted back to Ithaca. He thought of Penelope, who swore to wait for him no matter how long it took for him to return home. He thought of Telemachus, the boy who never knew his father’s embrace, whose voice he never heard.

  Nothing could rid Odysseus of the shame he felt, but this way… it would at least mean something. If he could just make it home, if he could just reach Ithaca’s shores…

  As quickly as the act had shaken his resolve and shattered his soul, he forced the pieces back together. I swear… I’m going to see you soon, he declared.