The Commodore nudged the trayful of teacups across the table with the muzzle of his rifle, the steaming brown suspension they held sloshing and spilling over onto the porcelain saucers.

“Drink,” the Commodore said, the word possessing neither the force of a command nor the warmth of an invitation. Rene looked to his right and found Zildiz glowering at their host, arms folded and brow stitched in her usual scowl. Beside her sat Leaper child, hogtied to his chair with lengths of wire, a puddle of drool forming underneath his cheek where his head rested against the table.

Neither of his companions seemed capable of observing social niceties at moment, so Rene felt it incumbent upon him to take up the slack. He leaned over and gave the cocoa a polite sniff.

A bold and nutty aroma wafted into his nostrils. Rene eyes widened in pleasant surprise. He took an eager sip and was overwhelmed by the richness of its flavour, so much so that he scalded his tongue gulping the rest of it downs. The Commodore saw his eyes smarting with tears and chuckled, saying:

“I based the molecular makeup of that drink on a powder packet I dug out from a mining hab out in the belt. It’s the real deal, so don’t you go wasting it.”

“Much appreciated, Commodore,” Rene said, absently licking the rim of his cup clean—the cocoa was just that good. Divine, even. It was certainly a drink worthy of the ancestor-gods. Zildiz was less appreciative, and asked bluntly:

“What are your intentions with us?”

“Rest assured that at the present moment you are more useful to me alive than sanitized. That can change, of course, depending on whether or not I like your answers to my questions,” the Commodore replied.

They were seated in the midst of what Rene supposed to be some kind of grand banquet hall, the kind in which the heroes in the Log of the Voidtrekkers may have sat and discussed the pressing issues of their day. Crises like the Water Mutiny or the great purging of the tribes of the lower decks, for instance. But if this had truly once been a hall of heroes, then it was in a sorry state indeed.

Long trestle tables and vacant chairs surrounded them from every side, with trays, wrappers and pieces of cutlery arranged as though by a passing hurricane. Set into the back of the hall were small antechambers that reminded Rene of the food stalls at home, each equipped with large vats. Above them the overhead lamps set into the ceiling tapped a staccato rhythm as their lights flickered on and off, their interiors choked with writhing clumps of half-dead flies.

But what really unnerved Rene were the mechanical simulacrums that scuttled behind the Commodore and attended to his every need. They were similar to Exar in that they were intelligences capable of autonomous action, but whereas Exar’s body was an elegant sphere, these machines were a collection of tools attached to clumsy, multipedal bodies whose motions made his skin crawl.

One of them was currently wrapped around Rene’s arm, a sinuous worm-thing with hooked suture needles for fangs that were even now engaged in sewing shut the crater of flesh which the boy’s teeth had left his forearm.

He felt only a dull ache from the procedure—the worm-thing had applied a topical anesthetic beforehand via a darting syringe tongue. It had also sedated the boy with the same implement, jabbing him in the inner elbow while Rene and Zildiz tied him securely to the chair.

Rene was starting to miss Exar’s reassuring presence. They’d left him behind at the entrance to the hall along with the remainder of Rene’s survival kit, monomachete included. The Commodore was clearly taking no chances at this point. Gone was the flayed man draped across the front of the gun carriage, for at a gesture of his shrunken hand an assembly of hinged, interlocking lamellar plates had sprung up to enfold every centimetre of his vulnerable flesh. Now all they could see of him were his goggles peering out at them through a tinted visor. His arms protruded from the metal cocoon through a pair of flexible tubes composed of a chainmail-like material that allowed his limbs a full range of motion. For the moment he seemed content to hold his battle rifle in a loose grip, though Rene found it worrying how its snout kept wandering vaguely in his direction.

“What would we stand to gain from telling you anything?” Zildiz said, completely unbothered by its presence.

“I can turn you into a stain on the floor with a squeeze of my trigger finger. How’s that for an incentive?”

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“That really won’t be necessary,” Rene quickly interceded, “Ask away, sir. Only too glad to be of service to the Fleet!”

“You’ve just established that the information we possess makes us too valuable to be disposed of,” Zildiz said, ignoring Rene’s attempts to shush her, “And you previously mentioned that you don’t believe in torture as a method of intelligence gathering.”

“A preference which I’m already starting to reconsider,” the Commodore growled. Underneath the table, Rene reached out with the toe of his boot until he found Zildiz’s foot, which he promptly trod upon. She winced, then quickly mastered herself and retaliated with elbow to his ribs.

“What’s the matter with him?” the Commodore asked as the ensign groaned and hunched his shoulders.

“He has a weak stomach,” Zildiz said, giving Rene as scalding look, “We haven’t had much to eat on our way over here. Speaking of which, the first of our demands is that you provide us with a decent meal.”

“What makes you think you’re entitled to make any demands?”

“You can certainly squeeze what you want out of us the hard way,” Zildiz reasoned, “But why go through all that trouble if a little reciprocity will do the trick?”

“Oh, so it’s all give and take now, is it?” the Commodore crooned, “And what would have me give away, exactly? The access codes to this facility’s surface batteries? How about a complete rundown of the Fleet’s remaining deployable assets?”

“Nothing that dramatic. I’d just like some clarification on a few things. As you’ve pointed out, we are entirely at your mercy. Anything you tell us will remain buried beneath this frozen moon. In fact, I have no doubt you are already planning to ‘sanitize’ us afterwards to be certain of it. You stand to lose nothing in this exchange, and my side will gain no advantage.”

“Then why insist upon it?”

“Personal curiosity,” Zildiz shrugged, “It isn’t everyday that one comes face to face with a member of a fallen pantheon. I’d like to hear what you have to say for yourselves.”

“Fallen?” the Commodore repeated in an ominous undertone.

“I meant to say defeated,” Zildiz said, “But somehow that felt a bit improper.”

The Commodore went dangerously quiet at that, and for a minute Rene was convinced that the madwoman had finally pushed her luck too far.

“Well, you wouldn’t be wrong,” the Commodore said wearily, his admission carrying with it a wealth of sorrow, “Not that that’s any cause for celebration on your part. You’re just as trapped as we are. You know, I once hated your kind with a burning passion. Now I can only pity you.”

Zildiz made an ugly face and began to reply. But before she could make another inflammatory remark, Rene spoke right over her:

“Begging your pardon, blessed ancestor, but I’m not sure I heard that right. Did you just say that we’ve been beaten?”

“In every sense of the word,” the Commodore confirmed, “I’m sorry to have to break this to you, crewman, but the strategic situation is hopeless. Has been for the better part of this millennium, I’m afraid.”

“I see,” Rene said slowly, struggling to keep his voice even as the walls of his reality came crashing down, “You mean to say that Arachnea—”

“Is firmly in the enemy’s control. The problem is that the Vitalus is embedded into every layer of the biosphere. We can’t kill it without also rendering the planet completely uninhabitable—and believe me, my people certainly tried. But the most we could do was fend off the armies of cosmophage variants it sent after us, but even that became impossible after a while.”

“But you seeded the galaxy with life,” Rene said, refusing to accept what he was hearing, “You crossed the starry expanse, combining matter with that-which-is-not, carved sentience out of silica. How could you let this happen?”

“I’m no more of a deity than you are, Rene. I should have thought that obvious by now.”

“Then what bloody use are you?” Rene was on his feet and shouting, spittle flying from his mouth as he stabbed a finger at the Commodore’s face.

“Rene…” Zildiz was gripping his shoulder with uncharacteristic gentleness. Rene shrugged her off and continued his tirade, the frustration and fear of a lifetime spent at war bursting like a levee before the flood:

“Do you have any idea what you’ve condemned us to? Millions of us slaving away in the darkness beneath the mounds, fighting tooth and nail against the Amits for the mere right to breathe, and for what? Just so you can say that we’ve already lost? That it’s all meaningless? Ow!”

Rene broke off as the worm-thing suddenly bit deep into his shoulder. A wave of dizziness came over him, and he would have fallen over if Zildiz hadn’t caught him in time.

“I’ve instructed the medic drone to give you a dose of happy chemicals,” the Commodore explained, “I understand that you’re emotional, crewman Rene, but your anger is misplaced. It’s true that the Exodians (your vaunted ancestor-gods, as you call them) are responsible for the creating the current conditions on Arachnea. But I am not one of them. Like you, I was born into this conflict, just another struggler in a battle without hope or honour. My people are…” the Commodore corrected himself, “or rather, were, the second iteration of unaltered homo vagus within the simulation.”

“Are you referring to the Great Game?” Zildiz said, perking up.

“Call it what you like. Suffice it to say that the Vitalus has been running this show for a very long time now. Crewman Rene here belongs to the fifth iteration. Up next on the proverbial chopping block, as it were.”

“But why?” Rene was grasping at threads, at anything that could hold together his rapidly unravelling world view, “I mean, what does the Vitalus even want?”

“There are a few theories,” the Commodore said, “I subscribe to the simplest one. It’s my considered opinion that the damned thing’s gone absolutely bananas.”