[The word means nothing to him, but there's something deep inside him, like some sort of thin filament, like a thread-thin worm, that writhes that the name.]

[The world seems to lurch around him, and his free hand grabs for the floor as though trying to stabilize himself.]

I used to, I started in ballistics. Before the war. I think you learn everything about a gun if you learn it that way. [He sounds exhausted, his fingers slowly releasing the gun into the other's hands.]