Leaping from world to world, like a swan. Alighting on each, partaking in delights beyond measure, finding wonders past imagination. Looking up and seeing, not the sky, but the Skies--an endless, limitless sea of potential, ripe for the taking.

A sea of adventure, infinite beauty, for any and all. 

She can't help but feel the longing of her own younger self. How many times, sitting in the spaceport and seeing the ships leave, did she wonder about the stars? About, you know, leaving it all behind. How many times did she sit on a mountain peak, and imagine that she could, you know, take a single step and soar into the sky?

The people of Bitemark, able to leave. The ability to leave, find a new home, wherever you want, whenever you want.

Except…

"It would just be the same empire."

No matter where they went, no matter how far they went, the same. 

"The same empire, with the same petty cruelty, the same boots on different necks. How can we, the Azura, claim to be superior--claim to be administrators that deserve to be listened to and pampered and obeyed--and then hand it off to somebody else? How, when our entire sense of beauty is built on [i]being[/i] Azura, on Azura values, on Azura sight?"

A million shades of nothing but blue.

"We create all this variety, all this wonder, all this beauty, we see all these new ways of thinking. And then we say that the only way any of it can be acceptable is if it's us. If servitors share our culture, our language, our sight. Genocide or assimilation, so long as the only thing left is Azura."