His ears rang, a migraine settling like a low drum as a flood of painkillers and stabilisers washed through him. This was the price of Nexus travel you push your body too far, too fast, and you become the next corpse, the next cautionary tale whispered in port bars.

He waited for the drugs to steady him, inhaling and exhaling with slow, deliberate breaths. Water flowed through his gills as he recited a calming mantra to quiet the tremor under his skin.

The ship began to move, and the faint vibrations travelled up his limbs. It was no longer truly his vessel now an abomination sat at its helm, and he watched it with the cold detachment of someone who had learned not to hope.

Returning to this cursed system made him regret a dozen choices he had once considered profitable. Through the external feeds, he watched countless monstrosities drift in the void and a vast structure growing in space.

At once, he recognised its purpose. It was a bastion. Civilisations usually kept two or three at fixed Nexus points. They acted as a second line of defence when the first line failed.

The first line mostly consisted of autonomous mines that manoeuvred into intercept patterns whenever an invading force appeared from the Nexus.

Most bastions acted as checkpoints, screening arriving traffic for contraband and shielding a system from invasion. Losing one was expensive. Losing them all meant leaving the system open to all. Only a handful of powers had the industrial depth to build more than a few at a time.

He zoomed the external cameras in on the growing bastion. It was constructed from the same grey carapace he had seen on the enemy ships, a living architecture of bone-like plates. He wondered how it would stand up to conventional, modern weapons.

Bastions had obvious weaknesses. They were enormous, heavily armed stations that needed vast crews, maintenance cycles and logistics. Most were run by crude V.I.s, or by shackled or cooperative A.I.s any of those could be exploited.

Capturing a single bastion, then turning it against its builders, was often easier than trying to grind them all into dust.

How do you take something that is, essentially, one vast living organism?

"Captain Orka–Zol, we need to speak in your office," a voice intoned in his mind, slicing through his thoughts. He turned and stared at the creature that now commanded his ship.

It had not moved at all, its body rigid and its eyes fixed ahead. He was not even certain this thing counted as an individual. With a weary sigh, he disengaged from his pod, swimming into his exo suit while he waited for the water to drain away for recycling, then left the bridge.

Moving through the corridors felt increasingly surreal. More of the creatures crawled along the bulkheads, repairing what little battle damage remained. The scars of the last engagement had long since been erased, yet they now spread deeper into the ship, expanding into fresh compartments.

His crew had been sidelined in the process, left idle and purposeless, and the humiliation gnawed at him.

When he stepped into his office, he found the largest of them waiting, its carapace marked with flowing red script. It dwarfed the others in size, and it was disturbingly impossible to tell if this was a singular being or merely another fragment of a wider consciousness.

One thought spiralled through his mind, but a voice answered before he spoke. "Yes, you are talking to a single mind, captain," it said, dripping with amusement that only sharpened his resentment.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

"What do you want now?" he growled.

"To discuss the future of you, your ship and your crew. I cannot keep you confined forever. That would waste an individual with your particular skills." There was no humour in that tone. He stared into those fathomless black eyes, wondering whether this was the moment his existence finally met its conclusion.

"Why have this conversation in private? You already poke around our minds," he said bitterly.

"I told you from the very beginning. I am your new employer, and the time has come to discuss your next century of service."

His thoughts collapsed around that single word. "Century? What in the name of every star do you mean, century?"

"I intend to hire you, your ship, and your remaining crew for the next hundred years. You were an integral component of this expedition's war and in the cleansing of the Valurians."

"I had no part in any genocide," he snapped. "I fired no weapons."

"Logistics decides every war, and without your efforts this expedition would have crumbled."

His fury surged. For a moment, he glanced towards the rack where his weapons were mounted and considered making a suicidal lunge, but he knew it would accomplish nothing. "Enough," he sighed. "What do you want from us? You already own our bodies and our minds. I have no patience for more of your twisted games."

The creature simply watched him, silent for a lingering moment, before it finally spoke. "Would you be interested in becoming the head of a galaxy-spanning logistics enterprise?"

His mind simply stopped. Of all the infernal directions this conversation could take, this was the last he imagined. He closed his eyes, muttering his calming mantra under his breath, hoping to quell the fresh surge of pain building behind his skull.

"What?" was all he managed, utterly adrift.

"You really are slow to grasp your potential promotion. Consider this. If the Triumvirate collapsed tomorrow, what would every Grithan do, and what would your enemies do?"

That persistent mental itch flared as whatever augmentation he carried nudged his thoughts faster. His mind ran ahead into dark projections. The result would be a catastrophic civil war. Whoever seized command of the clone armies would rule what remained of the Triumvirate.

Their enemies were vast and numerous, and every border would become a slaughterhouse. Entire sectors would be glassed if any defensive line faltered.

Trillions dead, system after system stripped bare. It would be genocide on a cosmic scale. The Triumvirate's entire role as a supplier of cheap clone armies had earned them endless clients and even more enemies across Nythora's Halo.

Every Grithan faction would hack the empire into feuding warlord territories.

"Now you see one possible outcome," the creature murmured. "Allow me to offer another. I can drag your entire civilisation into oblivion."

His mind snapped back to normal as the itch faded, leaving him shaken. He could barely find words for the sensation.

"I have watched your discussions with Kraklak, listened to his war stories and the horrors he described. Kraklak is hardly the brightest scientist the Triumvirate ever produced, yet his perspective is instructive."

The itch surged again. His thoughts were dragged through visions so vast they defied imagination. He saw war like a spreading plague, corrupting minds and bodies alike. Twisted horrors grew out of conquered populations, infection radiating from planet to planet, then leaping across entire systems. These things multiplied endlessly, overwhelming any fleet the Triumvirate deployed.

Whole solar systems sterilised, the nation quarantined, the Grithan civilisation annihilated. The Triumvirate fought and fought until every last world perished.

He sucked in air as the vision snapped away, struggling to steady himself, fighting the urge to collapse under the weight of what he had witnessed.

"Both futures lie within reach," the creature said calmly. "And a thousand others besides. Perhaps the galactic powers intervene. Perhaps I fall before any of this unfolds. Every possibility exists."

Those words echoed in his skull long after they were spoken. Finally, he forced himself to look up, his voice barely steady. "Then what do you want from me?"

"A new Triumvirate," it answered, "to replace the old one. And like it or not, you are one of the pieces on my board."

He weighed the consequences and found there was no real choice. He would not stand by and let his species be wiped from the stars, becoming a footnote in some distant chronicle. His crew would have to follow this presence, whatever it proved to be.

What could he possibly do? He was no soldier, he was a transporter. He had seen little real combat. His ship had suffered only minor scarring from debris fields and careless manoeuvres.

"What do I need to do?" he asked.

"Keep doing exactly what you do," the thing replied. "I will contact your ship once I am settled in civilised space. My contracts will pay far better than your usual fares."

Understanding opened in him like a gated field. The sums offered might eclipse anything he had earned before. With that backing, he could buy more vessels, expand his routes. If this entity could supply security, profit would follow.

"And then there is Grithan greed," it added with a dry chuckle. "Call me Trumek, not 'thing' or 'creature'."

He was no longer surprised, only curious. "Who will lead this new Triumvirate?"

Trumek regarded him for a long second. "There are many possibilities. I may select several individuals capable of governing your nation."

Could he lead his people? The thought passed through him and was dismissed. He had no taste for rulership. The void and the ship were his life, he had no appetite for endless councils and budgetary wrangling.

"What will you do when the Triumvirate returns to investigate?" he asked.

Trumek said nothing at first, "They will come looking. I will be waiting. You will report that factions within the expedition fought a civil war and the Nullite deposits were wiped out by the natives."

He felt pity for anyone foolish enough to come back and investigate this cursed system. His implant chimed, delivering a new cargo and crew manifest. The payment was listed in Nullite and the figure was obscene.

If that was the full payment, he might afford additional ark ships larger than his own within a few short years, assuming the Nullite transferred was of the highest purity.

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