"The Miles that exists in this context," he repeats, staring at his younger self. Who is that? A stranded galactic with no title, working desperately to prove that he belongs along Piotr's guerrillas and not dead in the bottom of a ditch somewhere. Mucking stables, translating for his fellow transplants, helping the hillfolk as best he can. Even helping himself as best he can, as evidenced by them being here. It's ... not much, compared to what he had before, but it's not nothing either. And all his sordid history with either identity is necessarily wiped clean.

It's ... enough to actually makes him pause. Because it's good advice. It's damn good advice, which means it's automatically suspect coming from himself. Most importantly, it's enough to jolt Miles out of the haze of despair that's descended in the wake of confessing all his mistakes. God, he wants to get up and pace. He makes an abortive gesture towards it, but he's instantly unsteady on his feet when he moves to get up. Too much mead already.

He's forced to sit back down again, limited to drumming his fingers on the chair. His thoughts are finally turning from the internal to the external, mostly because he doesn't quite want to stare into the void that is his life at the moment. "You have experience with that," he says abruptly. The realization hits him like a lightning bolt. It explains the weird comment about his age, about having died, and being able to give himself advice that he hadn't thought of already. He leans forward, gray eyes focused on his double in turn. "Going somewhere completely crazy and having to find yourself again. What the hell happened?"