The story of Achilles

Chapter six

We arrived in Troy and hoped it would be a short war. Humiliate the Trojans and off we were again, but this was far from true. The war would be 10 long years. As we got closer, the Trojans had spotted us already. They had called some favors in from their allies. Of course they had very much fate in their thick walls and their greatest hero, Hector, the oldest son of Priam. When we finally arrived they were ready, they weren't planning on going outside their walls at all. We anchored our ships near the coastline and took the little boats to the shore. We set up a simple tent camp, just a few hundred yards from the walls of Troy. Our plan was to lure the Trojans outside the walls so we could easily defeat them. Unfortunately, it didn't happen that way. The Trojans stayed in the city and we started to plunder all nearby cities. We didn't only took all the food, we also took loads of slaves with us. Over the nine years we made loads of improvements to our camp. Not only did our tents make place for some nice huts, we also build walls around our camp and we build storage sheds so we could store our food somewhere safe. Over the years Agamemnon got more and more grumpy to everyone. He didn't like that we were still stuck here without even the slightest sign of a victory. I also had more frequently arguments with Agamemnon, I didn't agree one bit with the way he ruled this camp. He saw himself as the most important man in the camp and of course he gave himself the best food, hut and everything. I talked about Agamemnon a lot with Patroclus, I loved talking shit about the one I hated most to the one I loved most. On one of our last lootings I had taken a beautiful girl named Briseis. Although she technically was a slave, I didn't like to call her that she I call her by her name, and I didn't like calling people slaves in general. I'm not the only one who got some loot, all the other leaders also got theirs. Agamemnon also got a girl himself, she was a daughter of a priest of Apollo. He wanted her back so he went to our camp and tried to reason with Agamemnon. Obviously that didn't work, Agamemnon got really angry with him and told him that if he didn't leave right away he would chase him out of the camp. The priest left but he still wasn't very happy, that's why he decided to pray to the god Apollo. Apollo felt bad for the guy and he disliked the fact that his priest was treated that way so he helped him. he let the plague break out in our camp. It started off with just two or three people but it's the plague, it spreads very fast and before we knew it, half our camp was infected. I knew it was getting really bad and I decided that it was best to go talk to Agamemnon. I was slowly walking to his hut, trying to prepare myself. Me and Agamemnon didn't get along very well so this was going to be hard. He didn't like to be told to do anything he didn't want to, leave alone by me. I realized I had already walked by his hut a few times. – though it was more like a cabin with all the things he did to it – I sighed a few times to mentally prepare himself and then I knocked. "Yes, who is there?" He didn't sound to happy about someone knocking right now but I had already made up my mind. "It's Achilles, oh great Agamemnon, I would like to have a word with you," I said. "Yeah, sure, you can come in," he answered me. He sounded irritated, that wasn't very good news for me. I sighed one more time and then I went in. "So, Achilles, what do you need to speak to me about? Whatever it is, hurry, I don't have much time to talk" I looked at him confused at him. "Why don't you have much time, oh great Agamemnon?" I truly hated to call him great or anything good but I had to, if I didn't, he would just throw me out immediately. "It means, oh strong but also stupid Achilles, that I don't have very much time to talk to you because I don't want to. So hurry!" Ah, I thought, this is already going the wrong way. "I need to talk to you about the daughter of the priest. We talked to the oracle and she told us that Apollo is furious with us because you have the priests daughter. She told us that if you don't give her back without the ransom the priest offered. Great Agamemnon, you have to give her back, be reasonable with us." Agamemnon looked me up and down in disgust and said: "Of course I am willing to do that if, and only IF, I get something with the same value in return." I looked at him in disbelieve. "Agamemnon, you are very famous but also very greedy, where could we possibly find you a present with the same value. Everything that we looted in the nearby cities is fairly distributed. What do you expect us to do, divide all of our loot again, just so you can have something in return for what a god wants you to return. Oh Agamemnon, don't you think that this is a bit unfair? Come on Agamemnon, give the priest his daughter back and do something good for all of us, – for once, I thought with it, what beside the point is – if you do we will give you the value of the girl back, we will double the value three times, no four times. If Zeus will ever allow us to destroy Troy, I will personally make sure you will get the value back." I did pretty good, right? He had to agree with me. But as always, he did the complete opposite. "You really think that I am letting you fool me?! You will still have your part of the loot when I will be left with nothing! No, only if the Greek give me something in return, I will not give up my part, I need something in return that has equal value. I will get it myself. How about I take your part of the loot, or Ajax his part or Odysseus his part!" That was it! This was really the last straw. Howcould he do that, how could he be this irresponsible! We had a huge argument. Iwas getting angrier and angrier and then, he did the thing that just, madesomething snap. "Well, Achilles, if you are so happy to help our perfect littlecamp, you give me your slave, if you give me Briseis, I will gladly give mineback to that stupid priest." HOW COULD HE! this was it! I was ready to killhim. this was it, the last minute of his life. I looked at all the guards, Icould handle them easily. If I killed Agamemnon here right now, I could defeatthe guards and I'd still have enough time to get Patroclus before we got away.Yeah, that will work. I had already pulled my sword out halfway but then a handstopped me. I wanted to pull my sword completely out but the hand stopped mefrom moving. I looked around and then I saw it. The woman who I had spoken toin the forest was standing there, looking at me. She almost looked like shefelt pity for me. Athena, goddess of wisdom and battle strategy was standing there. Nobody else could see her. We were frozen in time, then she spoke to me in a very calm yet powerful voice: "Come now Achilles, control yourself. Later in your life the Greek will give you great and valuable presents. You will have to control yourself now, or you can say goodbye to all your loved ones. Don't do this, Achilles, if you control yourself now, everything will be worth it in the end." I knew I had to control myself indeed, I only had one question left. She was already starting to fade. "Wait!" I said. I have one question. "Yes? What is it, my great hero?" Her voice echoed through the room, I knew I didn't have much time. "You told me that I will revenge you, now I ask you, when will that time come? I don't know if Agamemnon will even keep me in the camp after this." Did I sound worried? I probably did, not only had I to control my anger but also my voice. "Listen Achilles, you don't need to worry about having to leave the camp. You are the strongest Greek, they all need you. And about the revenging me, you need to know that..." Before she could finish, she had faded completely. Time came to life again, Agamemnon looked a bit scared. I quickly put my sword back again. "Listen to my words, Agamemnon. You are a drunkard! You with your dog head and heart of a deer! You are not even brave enough to put your battle armor on and fight with us! You are scared to death for that. However, you can stay in your perfect little hut all day long and you take away everything from everyone. You don't care about any of your man, you don't even car about winning this war. The only thing you care about is having the best of everything. The only thing you can do is talking other peoples loots, you take things from everyone who disagrees the slightest with you. You.. you bummer! All your men are useless as well, otherwise they would have stopped you from humiliating me like this. But I will swear an expensive oath: Once, all sons of Greece will honor me and they will miss me like they would miss their very close loved ones. Even though you won't like it, you won't be able to prevent that many Greek will get killed by the great Hector. You will be willing to kill yourself because of all your anger and guilt, because you have treated your best Greek like garbage!" I stormed out of his stupid tent. I wanted to be alone for a while.