"Are you going to go out with him? You have had a dry spell lately," Marlene teased. She gave a cheeky laugh and turned back to her work without waiting for a reply. The young countess was the epitome of modern beauty although it had not been given to her at birth physically; it was her birth into a lineage of extreme wealth that had shaped her features and physique. All of her clothes had been sent straight from designers so long as they would be appropriate for the formal business atmosphere of the embassy at which she had been stationed. Even her hair had been genetically modified to be thicker and stronger than the plebeians that made up the majority of the empire she served. Frequently Marlene complained that there was too little time in the morning for proper styling of the aforementioned expensive tresses and as a result she simply left if long and untouched. Even this cultivated envy in the office. Very few had the luxury of manipulating themselves at a cellular level to be 'naturally' attractive.

"I don't know," Solae sighed indecisively as she stared at her screen, tapping icons to adjust the font size and shift her keypad to a different language. The illuminated blue letters disappeared and were replaced by symbols utilized by another planet's native citizens. Their written language was logographic in nature rather than employing an alphabet, which meant as she translated essential documents she had to hold down multiple keys at once to create a new logograms. Understandably an extensive array of linguistic symbols, no matter the origin, could not be comprehensively included on such a small keypad.

Polished fingernails, painted with an expensive lacquer to mimic impossible health and shine, hovered above as she felt an almost imperceptible tremor in the ground. Lifting her eyes from her console she glanced around. Most of the office were still sitting at their desks or standing with others in conversation. The layout of the floor was open so that translators such as Solae and Marlene could more easily work in a collaborative fashion on a project. A row of offices were on the north and east sides of the buildings but reserved for those who had been loyal to the empire for at least two decades, had purchased favors to skip work requirements for promotion, or had simply been rewarded out of favoritism and fame. The offices were highly coveted for their privacy and even Marlene had not been able to 'out bid' any of the occupants. It was a well-known secret that half of her superiors had affairs behind the tinted windows and thick mahogany doors. It was not surprising to her that no one had poked a head outside their sanctuary of vices. Mr. Anderson in particular, her direct manager, believed even the titled men and women below him on the 'floor' were unworthy of his presence more than once a day.

Solae tried to shrug off a feeling of tension spreading over her chest, supposing that there was heavy machinery being moved down the street for construction or unrelated purposes, but then she glanced over to her glass of water. The crystalline did not obscure the minuscule ripples in the surface of her liquid beverage. Anxiety wound a knot deep in her stomach. "Marlene, do you..." she began, turning her head to look at perhaps one of her only friends in the office.

They had taken no chances in striking at the loyalists that worked inside the embassy, many of whom were well-educated, descended from prestigious bloodlines, and heavily rewarded for their fealty to the empire. Later Solae would realize they knew very few, if any, of those she had seen on a day to day basis had even the smallest chance of defecting to the duke launching his rebellion. Mr. Anderson's family had been gifted vast expanses of land on a fertile, undeveloped planet. He would have never jeopardized their gains, damning generations to veritable slavery for treachery, even if it cost him his life. Marlene was as materialistic as a human being could be, declining the pursuit of true love in favor of the richest suitor she could turn the head of on New Concordia, but she would have seen they would have used her and then killed her. Shallow she undeniably was but vapid she was not.

In the same instant the north and south walls exploded inwards, stone and twisted metal blasted in opposite directions across and through entire floor, irreverent of office walls that had been there seconds earlier. Debris collided fatally with her co-workers as it demolished everything in its path. Shrapnel impaled Marlene twice- a jagged fragment of a wall brace sliced through the right side of her throat while an indistinguishable fragment of a desk struck her shoulder with such force Solae could see the bone. The image seared itself in her mind. Never before had the young noble heiress seen anyone or anything die in front of her eyes. Death of family pets (few that there were) had been shielded from Solae as if she were a delicate flower incapable of emotional hardship. Blood oozed from Marlene's wounds, marring her previously perfect complexion. There was a gurgling noise as her head lolled to the side and her eyes fixated on the distance of non-existence. Countess Marlene Elaine Lares was no more.

Screams of abject terror and excruciating pain were drowned out by the the thunder of the destruction and a second load of fire screeching through the air before impacting with the east and west walls. Walls were crumbling as concrete, stone, and alloy fell towards the ground in massive chunks. Deafening silence, caused by the inability of human ears to cope with the violent high decibel cacophony, crippled the few people still alive. Windows had shattered and shards had been transformed into missiles that mercilessly assaulted animate and inanimate alive. What had become a plush, respectable place of work for the elite was now a death trap.


"Mother!" she called out as she walked past a library of the familial estate on New Concordia. All literature was now easily accessible by electronic device but printed volumes were kept as status symbols by many, including the Marquess and Marquise Falia. Almost all of the tomes were older than either of her parents and had been passed down by her ancestors as they had started the collection when the title of Marquess had first been bequeathed onto them. Solae paused in her hunt for the Marquise Falia as the reflection of stained glass windows glittered and shone on the bindings, giving them a mystical appearance despite their age.

"In here, dear," was the calm and composed reply of Marquise Falia. Solae tore her eyes from the allure of reading adventures, scribed by people centuries past, and continued on into one of their sitting rooms. Sitting in an antique chair upholstered in priceless burgundy brocade was a lady born and bred for the aristocracy. Never had Solae witnessed her mother falter in her representation of refined etiquette- even with her children. Her back was slightly arched so that even as she sat the Marquise's shoulders were directly over her hips. Her face did not reflect warmth nor derision; it was polite, blank, and inscrutable as always.

"Mother, I've been assigned to the embassy," Solae told her breathlessly in wonderment. She had not expected to fail her testing or interviews, but she also had not expected such a prestigious assignment from her initial application. In preparation for a less than ideal assignment she had begun a list of the essentials that would need to be shipped via interstellar means.

"Of course you have, my dear. New Concordia is not ripe with applicants that have your credentials. You are a Falia. I am sure this is only temporary until they find a place on a more appropriate planet. They would not keep a Marquise [i]here[/i] of all places. You are meant for better things. You always have been." Her voice was even and impassive. Solae chose to believe her mother loved her but she could not ignore the possibility that this love was a result of Solae's obedience in bringing further prestige to them. It reflected well on the Marquess and Marquise that their daughter was climbing the ranks of empire diplomats.

"I'm not really a Marquise yet, Mother," she said. The title would be officially conferred onto her only when both of her parents were dead. As their only child there was no question that it would be her inheritance along with all of their material possessions. Solae stared at her mother, admiring the beautiful golden white color of her hair, the same color that had been passed to Solae and had inspired her namesake. Even if her parents were not the adoring pair applauded in fiction, she was certain that this position, and that this Falia lineage had meant she was blessed by divinity for reasons she could not comprehend.


Solae's memory dissipated. She was uncertain if she had fallen unconscious or merely been jolted into nostalgia by trauma, but the threat of her attackers was still imminent. From what little she could see from her vantage point not a soul was moving in the building; it was a still tomb for the deceased. A residual high pitched whine filled her ears yet, making her unable to discern if there was anyone approaching, but she could not lay and wait. Panicking and gasping she crawled from her splintered desk and husk of a chair to a giant chasm in the floor. Seizing the opportunity she had, knowing that it would not last if the goal was to kill everyone in the embassy, she hurtled herself into the gap that had been created. 

The fall was only a single story and something cushioned her fall sufficiently that she did not break a limb on impact. Solae was terrified to look down and see what had softened her drop but she knew instinctively that it was a corpse. Men in fully body armor and wearing rifles were visible outside a window as they waited for survivors to emerge from the rubble. One of their mouths was moving, and the ground below her was vibrating, but had neither the ability nor time to deduce their next course of action. Staying low to the ground she closed her eyes, elbows and knees propelling her over slick, soft, burning, and splintered obstacles that she dared not comprehend. Her fingers jammed themselves into something brittle and, reaching for it gingerly, she confirmed she had reached a wall.

With reckless abandon Solae crawled towards a triangular crevice in the wall to her left. Every part of her ached and she became astutely aware of throbbing pain on her forehead. Shadows from the openings that had once been windows played tricks on her vision. Delirious, hallucinating, traumatized, and imagining benign changes in light were omninous, Solae finally reached her place of escape, thrust herself through the unforgiving and rough rock, leapt to her feet, and sprinted down the street aimlessly.

If she had been spotted by the soldiers that had so callously murdered every embassy worker they did not shoot and did not catch her as she fled. Perhaps it was because she turned into every alley she found, scrambling over fences and gates, ducking under shrubs, and trampling any plant life that was shorter than her knees. At least half an hour passed before the adrenaline coursing through her body gave way to sheer exhaustion. Solae did not recognize the scenery; she was sure she had not been here before, wherever "here" was. She took a few short, staggered steps into a patch of grass and then collapsed. Her blouse and skirt were drenched in sweat. Somewhere during her flight she had lost both her shoes or cast them off leaving her bare-footed. Long pale hair stained by blood was plastered to her neck and back. Muscles in her legs trembled even as she laid on the ground grateful for the respite and struggling to breathe.

She was safe... for now. But as Solae tried to process what she had just endured she was stricken with the realization that anyone bold enough to attack the embassy, and would want her dead, would have the resources to know where she lived. It was impossible to return home. She was stranded alone in foreign location without food, water, shelter, or even a way to defend herself from the wilderness much less whomever might hunt her.