Timeline of The Reach

Coastal flooding causes the collapse of the global markets.  Diseases begin to ravage agriculture and humanity alike.  Complete ecological collapse is predicted.  Estimates predict that within 250 years Earth will not be able to support more than a billion people.

Lifeboat 5, christened the Leif Eriksson, begins her burn for Whistler on February 8th, 2147.

Her deceleration burn ended 7,502 years (17 relative) after leaving Sol (AD 9649).

Zenophage One kills two thousand colonists.  The BioGen science team pioneers a method for rapid-development of tailored xeno-antibiotics.

Population begins exploding using imported genetic material and a rigorous breeding program.

Hadean Drive Yards completes Dock One and begins constructing Korolev drive ships.  High speed probes dispatched to all the stars in the sub-sector.

Human explorers have set foot on all planets orbiting Whistler.

First democratic election for Minister of The Council is held.  Phillipa Yeoh is elected in a landslide.

The Council ends the “100-Year Hall Pass” and bans unchecked exploitation of Whistler’s habitable worlds.  Belt mining ramps up in earnest.

The first permanent colony on Demeter is established at Thermasia.

Hole is spun up, establishing a base of operations for mining in the Inner Belt.

Zijin workers unionize and demand representation on The Council.  After several years of violence and walk-outs, The Council adds the demanded voting seat.

The Council declares the end of the “Establishment Phase”, relieving several draconian regulations designed to establish a sustainable colony in an orderly fashion.  The Exchange opens, creating Whistler’s first commodities market.  Mining and agriculture are turned over to private control.  Hadean Drive Yards begins producing starships for commercial purchase.  Commercial bases and private homesteads begin cropping up all through the system.

Hadean Drive Yards and NewCryo-AutoDoc launch the first commercial sleeper ships.  Within the next five years, manned expeditions begin to Whistler’s neighboring stars.

The billionth human in Whistler’s Reach is born.

Longbow Systems establishes a shipyard above Demeter.  Concerned about Demeter’s growing independence, The Council funds the creation of Trinity Station around Yang.

The Council funds the establishment of a permanent human colony at Grove.

The Council formally declares jurisdiction over all human colonies that originate from the Whistler settlers.

Sleeper ships have enabled the establishment of human colonies at most of Whistler’s stellar neighbors.

On February 3rd, the people of Demeter formally request independence from The Council, which is outright refused.  The Council re-tools part of the Whistler Defense Force from police actions to naval operations.  On October 15th, the WDF frigate Halloren opens fire and destroys a Demeter patrol craft and mining ship for illegally trespassing on a Zijin mining claim in the Outer Belt.  The resulting shooting war lasts nearly a year.  Demeter’s small navy demonstrates surprising agility and technological superiority, but are ultimately crushed by the superior numbers and manufacturing base of the Whistler forces in a final battle over Feldman on August 19th, 281.  The resulting peace accords allow for Demeter to self-govern to the edges of their atmosphere.  A permanent naval picket is established in orbit, based on New Luna.  Unbeknownst to The Council at the time, during the conflict a large number of sleeper ships were sent from Demeter to settle on a habitable world around Jericho.

In a staggering upset, Hadean Drive Yards loses The Council’s “Next Generation Warship” contract to upstart Phoenix Propulsion Labs.  Hadean’s balance sheet can’t survive the loss of the Council’s military contract and is slowly liquidated over the course of the next few years.  In 287, The Council votes to award Phoenix Propulsion Labs with Hadean’s seat on The Council, becoming the first “native” corporation to join the ruling party.

The penal colony at Little Bastard is established.  One-way trips on automated sleeper ships are offered as alternatives to life imprisonment or execution for career criminals and political dissidents.

Researchers at the University of Whistler announce the confirmation of navigable trans-dimensional space, opening an entire new branch of physics and engineering.

The colony at Jericho becomes public knowledge. The Demeter colonists there, using a loophole in The Council’s manifest destiny decree of 255, declare complete independence.  The Whistler High Court grudgingly agrees, and the Republic of Jericho is acknowledged as an independent political entity.

The first trans-dimensional “dive” is completed by an experimental probe.  The probe travels over a parsec in six days.

The Mao-MacGregor (M²) Jump Drive enters production.  The drive allows ships to “dive” into trans-dimensional space for limited periods, allowing large distances to be traversed rapidly.  The technology spreads to the Republic of Jericho almost immediately.

Anchorage station is established to formalize diplomatic relations between The Council and the Republic of Jericho.

The Unification Wars begin, as colonies adapted to operating independently are suddenly brought under more direct Council control and mass uprisings occur across nearly every system of The Reach.

After four decades of turmoil across eight star systems, most of the unification uprisings have been put down, but several pockets of underground resistance remain.

The first Grade 2 M² drives enter military use, allowing two parsecs of travel in a single dive.

Population of Whistler’s Reach is an estimated 40 billion, three-fourths of whom live in artificial environments.