Elara sealed the door to her private quarters on the *Bridge of Stars*. No aides waited outside. No AI interfaces hovered in the air. No data slabs lay on the table.
Just four chairs and the four of them: herself, Elizabeth, Sabrina, and Lira. The meeting had one rule. Speak plainly.
The Oracle's latest warnings and the Drift Audit results had made it impossible to ignore the cracks any longer. People were holding the empire together, but the cost was climbing faster than any stabilizer frequency could offset.
Elizabeth arrived first. She sat straight-backed, but the lines around her eyes had deepened in the past weeks. The generational transition in the sanctum was done. She had stepped aside as expected. The reality still sat heavy on her.
Lira came next, moving with the careful steps of someone still recovering. Her recent protocols had helped her body, but the exhaustion in her face was clear.
