Timeline

• 2137 CE: The colony ship Stellar Horizon departs Earth, bound for Kepler-442b, carrying some thousands of African settlers in cryogenic stasis and a crew of a few hundred from Asia: Chinese officers and engineers, with Filipino ratings. Most settlers come from East Africa and share Swahili as a common language; a minority comes from West Africa and speaks Hausa. English is the working language between crew and settlers.

• Mid-2100s CE: During the voyage, a stellar storm causes critical damage to navigation systems, leaving the ship adrift in space.

• ~2200 CE (Cycle 0): The Stellar Horizon emergency systems revive the passengers near an unknown star system. With life support failing, the crew redirects the ship to a tidally locked planet, later named Duskara, and brings it down in a controlled emergency landing.

• ~2255 CE (Cycle 562): Settlement spreads from the first lakeshore communities on the Bahari into the wider twilight zone of Duskara. The first generations learn the wind, the water, and the extremes of the day and night sides.

• ~2305 CE (Cycle 1,124): Settlements stabilize along the 300 km-wide twilight band of the Living Edge, forming linear cities. A reliance on geothermal and wind energy begins to take root as foundational technology.

• ~2360 CE (Cycle 1,686): The first psychic abilities appear, such as weather working and thermal sensing. Their cause is unknown. For about a hundred years the settlements disagree about what the abilities are and who should control them (see From Sickness to Guild).

• ~2465 CE (Cycle 2,810): The concept of "The Awakening" solidifies, recognizing the psychic abilities among Duskarans as both practical tools and spiritual gifts. Weatherworking guilds and other specialized roles are institutionalized.

• ~2785 CE (Cycle 6,182): The Deep Roads, dug by the Deepkin one generation after another, join the cave settlements to the twilight cities along the whole arc, and trade between belt and caves becomes regular. The societal structures of the twilight belt cities and night-side cave settlements diverge significantly.

• ~2895 CE (Cycle 7,306): The Duskaran Accord is established to manage inter-settlement relations, resource distribution, and defense against environmental hazards. This confederation solidifies cooperation across the twilight belt and cave settlements.

• ~2980 CE (Cycle 8,205): The Thirst Wars. Three major cities withhold water exports, and the embargoes and skirmishes that follow nearly dissolve the Accord before Wayseers broker the Bahari Compact.

• 3000 CE (Cycle 8,430): Present Day. Some eight hundred years after landfall, Duskaran society is a blend of ancestral Earth traditions and unique adaptations. Psychic abilities, the care of water and matter, and the extremes of the planet continue to shape its culture and technology. The mysteries of Duskara, from the cause of the Awakening to the Far Edge and its unexplained marks, remain open questions for explorers and scholars.

CE dates are approximate conversions for the reader. Duskarans count only in Cycles (see Calendar and Time-Keeping).