It feels faintly like crashing into a wall of glass he didn't know was there. He'd seen a future for himself, coming here, working on something fascinating that didn't involve death or strategy, letting himself be useful and being stimulated and potentially, eventually, content.

Swallowing disappointment without betraying so much as a blink, he goes to pick up the brush, and settles onto the ground. Boot blacking it is, but the sudden vision of the rest of his life stretching into meaningless drudgery makes him fumble and drop the brush on the first try.