To his right, Mirene Sol. Queen of poisons. Hair like copper wire, tongue like a venomous bloom. She’s draped across her chair like royalty or roadkill—you never know with her. She smirks as I enter, like she’s already dissected every word I haven’t said yet.
The third’s a surprise.
No name. No record. Just a voice modulator and a body swaddled in photon mesh. The signal glimmers around them like a cloak made of refracted air.
“The Nine are not amused,” Mirene purrs, as I slide into my seat. “One of our own gutted in your halls. Another flayed by... what do you call it? The scream?”
“The war song,” I say evenly.
“Right.” She bares her teeth. “The tantrum.”
I don’t blink. “He was defending his people.”
“And in doing so,” Vikar intones, voice low and mechanical, “he declared open war on ours.”
My fingers lace together on the table. Calm. Cold. Deadly.
“No,” I say. “He declared something far more dangerous.”
There’s a pause. Interest. The hooded one shifts, photon mesh rippling.
“I didn’t come here to beg,” I continue. “And I didn’t come to apologize.”
“Then why are we here?” Vikar asks. “Why haven’t we simply sent another wave? This time with heavier ordnance?”
“Because you’re tired.”
The words land like quiet thunder.
“You’re all tired,” I go on, voice low, surgical. “Tired of skirmishes and burn-outs. Tired of bleeding lieutenants into gutter wars over docks and districts. Tired of tracing sabotage back to whispers. Tired of rebuilding territory lines every three weeks with the ash of your own soldiers.”
None of them deny it.
“War costs. Blood. Resources. Reputation. Stability. None of which you can afford to waste. Not anymore. Not when surveillance satellites watch every move. Not when your supply chains hang by a thread over a black-market abyss. Not when every faction has a blade to the other’s throat.”
Mirene leans forward, eyes glittering. “So what? You’re proposing a ceasefire?”
I meet her gaze.
“I’m proposing sovereignty.”
That gets them.
Even the mesh figure stirs.
I lay out the tablet, activate the projection.
Holographic schematics burst to life above the table—sector maps, trade routes, encrypted comm networks, and a framework built not from ideology... but from mutual greed.
“Centauri proposes a treaty,” I say. “One that allows all Nine factions to operate—openly—under defined territorial protections. Sector shares. Trade corridors. Arbitration councils. A digital trust-net layered across all black-channel transactions.”
I pause. Let it breathe.
“Think of it. No more turf wars. No more ghost assassins. Just guaranteed profit margins. Shared defense protocols. The ability to trace every betrayal in seconds and punish it legally—without losing a single soldier.”
Vikar’s metal hand flexes. “You want to legalize crime.”
“I want to professionalize it.”
