For nearly an hour she gazed skyward in complete silence, her eyes fixated on a single point flickering amongst a sea of otherwise unwavering light. With each heave of the dying speck she twitched involuntarily as though pricked by a needle. Soon enough it would be over. She kept telling herself that yet she wasn't sure whether that would calm or infuriate her further. Moments later she got her answer. With one final flash of agony the dot vanished, leaving the purple tinted night sky of Tempest calm and unmoving once more.
Furious. That was the answer to that. She was absolutely livid in a manner she'd not felt in very literal ages, not since she was first betrayed by one she considered a friend. For thousands of years she'd studied these wondrous beacons, learned their ins and outs, harnessed the power of their mighty waves and the bountiful resources of the planets they held in flawless orbit. From this she'd been gifted eternal life and youth, and had personally passed that same gift onto dozens of others. She was a Silent Sister. These were her children and she theirs, and over the past hour she'd watched helplessly as one of them died. Her eyes darted from star to star, the names of each and every one coming to mind without a second of hesitation. It took only a few minutes for her to circle right back around to that horrid blackness, that patch of nothing where there should have been light. She couldn't help but stare at it as her body shook with anguish and her teeth threatened to grind themselves to dust. It was ruined. It had been so perfect, the blanket of stars so finely knit in the sky, and now it was ruined.
Of course if she were to be perfectly rational she knew it'd been ruined for nearly a millennia, she'd seen it personally while on away missions. Ambra was staring into an ocean populated almost exclusively by corpses. Every star she laid eyes upon save for Penarch and Dahsha III had been systematically destroyed by the Varelsi over the course of more than 900 years, it had just taken a while to become so hideously apparent as their radiance had to traverse the great vastness of space. With some of the visible stars being tens of thousands or even tens of millions of light years away it would be a good long wait before the skies went completely dark. Still, the first sign observable from Tempest had made its ghastly show, and in the years since she'd been relegated to a desk job by the Lord Commander Rendain and made to do managerial busywork by Empress Lenore she'd almost forgotten how much she hated that sight.
For the first time in what had to have been several minutes Ambra blinked, surprise overtaking anger momentarily as the sound of rending iron tore through the silence followed shortly by a pained scream. Looking downward she noticed that the hand railing of her balcony had been all but decimated, the metal bent and deformed around two sections that had been completely melted away. Unfurling her clenched fists Ambra noticed molten fragments clinging to her gloves and spilling between her pointed fingers. She must've unconsciously been generating and channeling heat into her hands while lamenting. That would explain the sound of buckling metal, but what about th-"AAAUGH!"
Peering over the edge of her balcony Ambra saw one of the two Thrall assigned to guard her home bent over and wailing in agony, jagged pieces of orange hot metal jutting from its now smoldering shoulder. The screaming went on for a few seconds more before Ambra's already strained patience snapped. "WOULD YOU BE QUIET?! SOME OF US ARE TRYING TO HAVE A MOMENT OF CONTEMPLATION!"
Hearing its master's voice the Thrall leapt to attention, its right arm moving to salute her despite the extreme protests of its shoulder. "I-I'm sorry to have bothered you Miss Ambra! I-I'll be quiet! P-please get back to your contagion!"
"I DIDN'T SAY CONTAGION YOU IDIOT, I SAID... NEVERMIND, JUST SHUT UP! SHUT UP AND..." Before she could think of a second command an all too familiar sound pierced the air, one that sent her bubbling blood into a full blown boil. Awoken and confused by the sudden commotion Constable Cuddles, favorite pet of the Lord Commander Rendain and quite possibly the only creature in the rapidly shrinking universe that could rival said Lord Commander on Ambra's list of most hated things, began howling into the night. "AND SHUT THAT MISERABLE MONGREL UP AS WELL!"
"I-I'm on it Miss Ambra!" The Thrall said fearfully before sprinting off into the night, leaving his speechless comrade standing awkwardly in the doorway.
"I am surrounded by incompetence and unprofessionalism." She noted while wiping the residual iron slag clinging to her palm off on the railing. She'd have to remember to have someone fix that tomorrow. She returned inside, slamming the door to her balcony shut in an attempt to drown out the noise of Constable Cuddles' continued wailing. With a great sigh she removed her headdress and rested it on its perch as she prepared for bed. As she turned towards the third wardrobe from the left, the one that contained domestic non-official summer nightwear, something on the nightstand caught her eye. The same something that had caught her eye every night for the past week. Her electronic tablet.
It was an ugly little white and blue thing that miserably failed to match the decorum of the room it resided in which drove its owner mad to no end. She would've tossed it out long ago if it weren't for one crucial detail. It was LLC technology, meaning it was unable to be monitored by the Lord Commander and was extremely resistant to hacking. While she much preferred the fashionable state designed tablet she knew everything sent from and received by it was closely surveyed for any signs of dissent or treachery. Picking up the LLC device Ambra opened up her email and scrolled down until she found the one she was looking for.
Subject: "So... rebellion?"
FROM: Verod Rath
She didn't even open it. She had listened to the recorded voice of that brutish warrior over one hundred times in the past seven days. Simply looking at the title caused her mind to recite the message verbatim. She just looked at it, a finger hovering between the buttons labeled 'Reply' and 'Delete'. She was a Silent Sister, she was meant to command the very stars for the betterment of the Imperium. She was a Silent Sister, she was meant to carry out the will of Empress Lenore at all costs. She'd followed her code for eons and never before had its various precepts been so at odds with one another.
But what was the will of the Empress? Was any of this what she really wanted? The degradation of the once proud Jennerit Imperium, the subjugation of its people beneath the heel of the Varelsi, the loss of its most sacred traditions and rituals, was this really what she desired? While the Jennerit lived under the creed "Any deed, any price" most saw that as an invitation to do what was needed to maintain the Imperium and its honor, not a means of condoning acts of cowardice. All but the Lord Commander Rendain and that lapdog spy mistress of his, Deande, interpreted that creed the same way. The right way. Surely the Empress thought the same as the majority of her loyal subjects, surely she believed in the honor of her people... right? It had been so long since Ambra had spoken with her personally, so long since she had spoken to her without the Lord Commander standing at her side and answering on her behalf that she could no longer be sure of what was her will.
Of course, that was just it! She hadn't been following the advice of Rendain, she was being used as a figurehead by that traitor! He had been a lowly commander of the glorified cannon fodder known as the Thrall brigades, then took command of the Imperium's army by popular vote, then the space fleet by official decree, then the royal guard by leveraging favors, and finally de facto control when he appointed himself royal counselor. He'd slowly but surely replaced the Empress in all but name and reduced her position to an empty title. Ambra wasn't loyal to whoever may happen to rule Imperium, she was loyal to Lenore and to the Imperium itself.
She now had a plan. She was going to break down Rendain's control through her own political position in the Silent Sisters, rebuilding the Empress's power base through skillful exploitation of Rendain's less loyal underlings and- "AAAUGH! NOT MY ARM, PLEASE NOT MY ARRRRRR!" This scream of pain from a familiar Thrall was of course accompanied by more yapping by that insufferable mutt Constable Cuddles.
No. No that wouldn't work. She couldn't stand in the sight of the Lord Commander for a moment longer. No, she'd just join Rath on the front lines. Sure she hadn't been placed onto a combat mission for nearly a decade, sure she could die, sure she hated all the muck and filth that accumulated around war zones, but anything was preferable to being in the presence of the Lord Commander "RUFF! RUFF RUFF!" or that DISGUSTING animal of his a single solitary second longer. Hell, maybe just going off with Rath to fight the Imperium directly would be more effective in rallying the people. Seeing such a senior official up and leave would certainly spark talk around what remained of the Imperium, and if she died she could be turned into a powerful martyr. Any deed, any price after all. Even if that price was her life. With that Ambra began drafting up her letter of resignation, one that she would read before the Council of the Passage in her next televised brief with the public.
Recording of an address made by Claudia Ambralia Divia to the Jennerit Council of the Passage
19953.355
"Rulers of our noble Accord; I, Claudia Ambralia Divia, hereby wish to address a most disturbing division within our Empire..."