Hello Wolrd

They said she lived at the end of the world. In a black cave, carved deep into the flesh of the earth. A foul lair, ringed with frozen statues—not sculptures, no. Men. Fools bold enough to approach her, foolish enough to meet her gaze.

I see them, these statues. I walk among them. Warriors, thieves, glory-seekers. All turned to stone, their features twisted in terror. They stand there like a frozen stage, set for the final act.

That’s her. That’s her doing.

Medusa. A Gorgon. A creature born to kill. They say she has fangs, leathery wings, serpents hissing where other women wear hair. A blasphemous beast, pacing in a prison she deserves. They say a single glance is death.

So I will not look.

I hold my shield before me, a mirror stretched toward death. Hermes gave it to me, along with winged sandals. Athena whispered the path in my ear. They have scripted the lines, the gestures, the end.

I am armed with their will. Carried by their favor. I am not alone.

And I know why I’m here.

I do not kill for pleasure. I’m no barbarian. I came to free my mother from a tyrant’s grip. They forced this quest upon me, hoping I would fail—but I won’t.

I am Perseus. Son of Danaë. Son of a god. Even my birth is a legend. And tonight, I’m writing a new one.

I am not afraid.

I stop. She is there.

Lying on a stone slab, her chest rising in calm, steady breath. As if nothing could touch her. The snakes drift lazily on her head—as if they, too, are dreaming.

I lower the shield—just for a moment. Not to look. To aim. 

I will be swift. I will be just. I will be glorious.

The sword rises. She does not wake. And I strike.

I did not see her die. I only saw her head fall.

I don’t move. My arm still raised, the sword dripping—I wait. A breath. A god’s wrath. A tremor—something.

But nothing comes. Not once does the cave become anything but silence.

She is there.

Her head, tilted on the stone, eyelids closed, mouth slightly open, as if she were about to speak again.

I expected something else. Rage. Ugliness. A face to recoil from. But no.

No fangs. No serpents. Nothing of the beast from the songs.

A face still young, drawn by death yet soft—almost peaceful. Balanced features, a high forehead, the delicate shadow of lashes on her cheek.

They said she was hideous. Ugly as sin.

But it wasn’t true.

Dead, she has the face of a sleeping woman.

I stand frozen, stupid, the sword still in hand. A cold sweat slides down my back.

She is not what I was promised.

They told me: a monster. They told me: a threat, an abomination, a blasphemy.

I clench my jaw.

I am not a child. I won’t falter just because a face looks too human. I won’t pretend I don’t know why I’m here.

I have a mission. That’s all this is.

She was dangerous. She still is—even in death.

She petrifies. She kills. She was born for it. And so was I.

The gods armed me. They guided me. Protected me. They knew what had to be done.

And I did what I was told.

I am not guilty. I am useful. I am a hero.

I will walk to the end. I will bring back the head. They will praise me. They will sing my name.

They will say I slew a monster. And I will let them say it.

I will say nothing.

I will keep to myself what I saw. What I realized—one second too late. What I cut away.

I am not a coward. But I am not innocent, either. I am what the gods made me.

And maybe that’s enough.

Maybe that’s what it means to be a hero: To carry out the acts you didn’t choose. And stand tall anyway.

I lean down. I take the head by the hair. It’s heavy. Still warm.

The eyelids remain closed. She will not take revenge. She will petrify no one else. She will never speak again.

So I rise. I lift my head.

I am Perseus, son of Danaë, born of Zeus in the form of golden rain, sent down from the heavens by the will of the gods.

I was given Hermes’ sword, Athena’s shield. Slayer of the Gorgon, killer of monsters.

MY GOODBYE - EPIC THE MUSICAL - MEDUSA PART 1

- PATROCLUS LAMENT -

He ought to have remained at a distance from Achilles — to observe him as a prudent man watches the sun: not to touch, not even to approach. For Achilles was no mere mortal being. He was the flame itself — sovereign and devouring — the sun at its zenith, so resplendent that even the boldest eyes turned away, humbled.

And yet, he had remained — near. So near. In the radiance of that burning light, he was neither consumed nor diminished. He did not melt beneath the hero's blaze. He stood there, unscathed — as though fashioned to dwell within such brilliance. Not as an equal, but as one chosen.

Achilles had raised him to the summit — to heights only those marked by his favour might attain. At his side, he became something more. No longer merely a man, he was transfigured — touched by divinity, the bearer of a light not his own, yet granted to him for a time.

Achilles, in truth, was everything his heart could admire and his soul could fear. His hair — a river of gold surrendered to the winds of war — shone like a crown forged by the heavens. He was glory incarnate, youth irresistible, strength made flesh. And yet, it was not there he sought him.

No. He searched for him in the shadows — in the quiet recesses of his invincible form, in the silences war left behind, in the hushed spaces where the hero ceased to be a god and returned to being a man. It was there he longed for him.

He would have worshipped him — from the height of his splendour to the most fragile of his fractures. For even Achilles, hero among all heroes, bore within him the unrelenting trace of mortality. That forsaken heel — that careless omission of fate — revealed not a flaw, but a truth: even the most lauded must bow to the laws of the finite.

And he — a silent figure within the hero's halo — had glimpsed, in that flaw, not weakness but essence. The immortal is often nothing but a mortal masked in pride — a man who dares defy the end he cannot escape.

He would have kissed that heel — not as a mark of defeat, but as a sacred relic. For in it lay not Achilles' ruin, but his soul.

He himself was nothing in the clamour of the world — a nameless shadow, a fleeting breath. But near Achilles, he was everything. In that borrowed light, he existed at last — transfigured by the hero's singular gaze.

He loved him in those suspended hours when war held its breath — when the clash of arms ceased and silence wrapped the earth in solemn embrace. In those moments, Achilles looked at him — truly looked — and in that gaze, he was undone.

He was his abyss. And Achilles became his own.

He would have adored him as one adores a god fallen to earth, as one yearns for a homeland never reached. He was not merely the son of Peleus, nor the object of poets' songs.

In choosing to wear the armor of a god, he offered himself to fate — not for glory, but for love. And though he perished in Achilles' stead, the world mistook his devotion for arrogance.

This is the echo of Patroclus: the silent martyr, the shadow who dared to burn.

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