Chiss Rebellion

The Chiss Rebellion took place in 142 ABY in the midst of the Tribulation. It saw the rebellion of numerous against the rule of the Golden Empire. The revolt was put down the same year it began, though not without major casualties.

Background
The Golden Empire conquered and absorbed the in 137 ABY. Thousands of capital ships of the were destroyed or captured, and the defenseless Chiss had surrendered, hoping to some day be rescued by the survivors of the CEDF. Most of those forces retreated to, planning an eventual attack on the Empire from that secure location.

The Empire, meanwhile, struggled to assert actual control over all the Ascendancy's territory. While and its twenty-eight colony worlds had been taken and partially integrated into the Empire's structure, the thousands of systems functionally or nominally under the Ascendancy's sway were requiring considerably more effort. Straining the Armada further, the had attacked in 141 ABY, embroiling the Empire in the Vagaari War. An attack by the later the same year strained the Armada nearly to the breaking point.

Up in arms
With the Empire's forces divided and engaged, Rysh'la'timalyit and numerous other ousted Chiss military officials seized Royal HoloNet stations to encourage their people to revolt. Mass protests on Csilla and several former Chiss colony worlds became violent uprisings. Thousands of Royal Army soldiers and police forces sympathetic to the Empire were killed, and the Empire lost effective control of a dozen planets.

The rebels were bolstered by the presence of what remained of the CEDF, sallying out of The Redoubt and returning from far-flung worlds in the former where they had been waiting for just such an opportunity. The rebels proclaimed the Chiss Ascendancy revived and began pulling in descendants and leaders of the, both those who had led immediately before the conquest in 137 and those who had held leadership positions in previous eras.

The right place at the wrong time
After its initial success, the Chiss Rebellion staggered badly. The Empire's conquest of the Ascendancy had brought in alien companies and transport agencies, and the Empire itself had active involvement in the movement of goods and resources. Tariun Sakaros ordered an immediate halt to all resource movement into rebel-held worlds, and the Chiss rebels lacked the ships to begin commerce on any serious scale except among themselves. The inability to provide for the people now under their leadership weakened the perception of the rebels in the public conscious. Numerous rebels also began to lose heart as food and other supplies ran low.

Just as fatal to the rebels' chances was general popular sentiment. Only roughly a third of Chiss actively supported the rebellion. Half of all Chiss were in favor of the concept of rebellion, or at least freedom from the rule of the Empire, but they felt the rebels had seized the worst possible time for the move. While the Empire was indeed distracted, this part of the population pointed out that the Empire was distracted by protecting the Chiss themselves from invasion and enslavement by the Vagaari. The remaining sixth of the Chiss were in favor of the Empire, either for broad reasons about its universality and lack of isolationism or simply because Rin Sakaros had pledged to completely and permanently eradicate the Vagaari, something the Chiss themselves had never accomplished.

The reinforcements the Chiss rebels had counted on never materialized in any noteworthy numbers. The largest force sallied out from The Redoubt and promptly ran into both the Prime Fleet and the Vagaari at the Battle of Schesa, where most of the CEDF remnant was annihilated or captured by one side or the other.

Brought to heel
On the advice of Eskol Kaartinen and as a public relations move, Tariun Sakaros refused to deploy Centurions of the Order of Keltrayu against the rebels. He did, however, authorize detachments of the Armada to confront the rebels and restore order. The Armada fought the remains of the CEDF world-to-world for a few months, largely keeping the Rebellion bottled into its original target worlds and preventing its spread rather than seeking to actually root it out.

When the Ssi-ruuk were defeated and Sorrik returned with his forces, however, the Empire's retribution was swift. Hundreds of Sorrik's ships were sent to put down the rebellion, and Csilla and the revolting colonies were forcibly recaptured.

Fate of the rebels
After the first Conquest of the Chiss Ascendancy, Rin had accepted all Chiss into the Empire without prejudice, even those who had actively fought her. After the Chiss Rebellion, however, she displayed less mercy. Rysh'la'timalyit and all the other leaders were executed for treason, although Rin had them put to death by firing squad rather than any of her more creative means of execution. All outstanding CEDF forces were given a single opportunity to surrender; those who refused and were found in the future would be wiped out to the last being and ship.

Aside from the rebel leaders, soldiers and lower-grade commanders in the Rebellion were forced to take a loyalty oath to the Empire or face lifelong imprisonment. Some refused, but the majority had grown weary of poor conditions and embittered by the lack of unanimous support from their fellow Chiss and conceded.