A little over a hundred and fifty years ago, the Ancients disappeared from Charted Space. There was no announcement, and very little indication: in retrospect there was a slight increase in the number of pickups of tribute, and then the worldships simply stopped appearing.

At first, it didn't seem unusual: worldships were extremely unpredictable, and only infrequently visited realspace anyway (so far as anyone could tell). But as the silence grew, and the number of Dragon ships declined, the disappearance began to have an impact.

Non-Ancient ships were limited to J2 at the time. Dragon ships with J3 and J4 drives provided service to remote worlds, and bridged the gaps between J2 clusters. But it was the worldships that provided much of the large-scale transportation, including ferrying larger starships from shipyards to areas they would serve. The Dragons simply couldn't keep up, and they were as in the dark as anyone else. Further, some Dragon ships disappeared in jump periodically, leading to a panic over whether the Ancients were recalling them, or their black-box drives were failing in the Ancients' absence. (This panic proved unfounded, and the disappearances ended after the first few years.)

The reaction varied: The Alliance had always been grudging about their dependence on Dragons, and attempted coercion. Since Dragon ships required Dragon crews, this didn't go well, and many Dragons left for the friendlier spaces of the Zhdezplier. The Zhdez had already had a closer relationship to Dragons and Ancients, and while they were hit harder by the loss of worldship traffic, they welcomed Dragons.

The Union's Core and Sterhon sectors were J2 connected and not reliant on Dragon ships at all, but one of its two Pentads consisted entirely of worlds with only J3+ access. These worlds were generally not self-sustaining, and the realization of potential isolation caused a mass evacuation.

The drought lasted until a worldship appeared over Dessonia eighty-three years after the previous visit, over twenty years after humans had unlocked J3 on their own. The mines had not been operating in the interim, and it was only through the intercession of the Dragons that the Ancients did not punish the station. The Ancients ignored questions about their absence and future plans, and have since only appeared on rare occasions.