What follows is a condensed chronology of human and galactic history as it pertains to the current situation. Events are presented from a CPH historical record perspective. Galactic-scale history — the Progenitors, the Order/Entropy debate, the long argument that predates humanity by millions of years — is not included here. It has its own document. This one is about us.
The Last Century of Earth 2012 – 2120
2012
India-Pakistan war. New Delhi and Islamabad destroyed by nuclear exchange. Indian conventional forces absorb most of Pakistan. Islam outlawed in the resulting Hindu state.
2013
China launches its first permanent space station — primarily a military installation.
2014
United States deploys its upgraded anti-ICBM system. Rumours persist of an offensive "Thor" component using orbital kinetic strike platforms.
2019
American-Sino Conflict. China invades Taiwan; Russia briefly allies with China, triggering NATO response. US and Japanese navies defeat the Chinese invasion fleet. China retaliates with ICBMs — all intercepted. The Thor system is revealed when orbital KKVs bombard Beijing government facilities. Russia and China sue for peace. US technological supremacy is considered insurmountable.
2020
US, EU, and Japan jointly establish the first permanent Mars research colony.
2022
First confirmed human clone. HIV has reduced sub-Saharan Africa's population by half; Chinese immigration has reshaped the region's demographics significantly.
2027
First experimental fusion Tokamak reactor in France generates net positive power output. The energy equation begins to shift.
2030
China purchases most of Russia east of the Urals. The rump Russian state descends into xenophobia, anti-Muslim sentiment, and authoritarian crony capitalism.
2035
World fossil fuel reserves effectively exhausted. Middle Eastern economies collapse. The geopolitical order built on oil begins its final disintegration.
2040
Large Array Deep Space Telescope deployed in geosynchronous orbit. Terrestrial planets confirmed orbiting most nearby stars. Humanity looks outward and sees, for the first time, places it could actually go.
2043–45
Quantum computing becomes practical. Within two years, the first confirmed artificial general intelligence — computer sentience — is achieved. The implications are not yet understood.
Milestone
2049
Fusion heavy-lift engine becomes viable. Cheap exploitation of space is now a reality. The asteroid belt opens for resource extraction. India establishes the first Belt research installation.
2050
Deep space probe launched toward Alpha Centauri. Estimated transit time: decades.
2065–70
Middle Eastern Wars. Iran seizes Iraqi remnant states; the resulting Islamic co-prosperity sphere clashes with the Alliance of Turkic Peoples over oil pricing. NATO intervention leads to catastrophic escalation: Jerusalem destroyed, the Aswan Dam breached (50 million dead), New York City hit by weaponised influenza (millions killed). Tehran destroyed by US retaliation. The Islamic Nation of Osman — incorporating Turkey, Central Asia, and Iran — expels all NATO forces and declares science the enemy of faith.
Catastrophic
2074
Alpha Centauri probe data confirms a habitable planet. China immediately launches most of its space station toward Alpha Centauri with 5,000 colonists in stasis — the most audacious single act in human history to that point. The US and EU now have 100,000 people across Mars, Luna, the Belt, Europa, and Titan.
2097
Osmani scientists launch a sleeper ship to Barnard's Star carrying 8,000 of the Arab world's leading scientists and intellectuals. The Ankara government immediately declares the colonists infidels. The ship does not turn back.
2098
Chinese colonists reach Alpha Centauri and claim the entire trinary system as Chung Kuo — New China. It is the first permanent human presence outside the solar system.
2099–2120
The Great Fundamentalist Wars. Christian nationalist movements across the Western world begin a campaign of assassination, university destruction, and political capture — framing scientific progress as moral corruption. Within a year the Second American Civil War fractures the US: the Christian States of America breaks away; Washington D.C. is destroyed by a suitcase nuclear device. Most intellectuals and technical specialists flee to the off-world colonies.
In 2115, China invades Alaska. The CSA retaliates with nuclear strikes against China — the Thor anti-ICBM system, inexplicably, does not activate. Most of China and the CSA are incinerated. Scientists determine the fallout will trigger a new ice age. Massive evacuation to Mars and other colonies begins. By 2117, Mars holds 100 million people.
By 2120, fundamentalist regimes control all of Earth. Contact with the surface is severed. Earth enters a dark age. Billions die over the following century.
Extinction-level
The anti-ICBM system's failure during the 2115 nuclear exchange has never been satisfactorily explained. The system had performed flawlessly in every prior engagement. CPH Naval Intelligence has an open file. It has been open for 235 years.
The Solar Diaspora 2120 – 2200
2125
Mars begins its terraforming project: comet bombardment of the northern pole, orbital reflectors, fusion-powered groundwater thaw. Atmospheric pressure at .65 standard projected within a century.
2126
Europan scientists melt the moon's ice-covered ocean, revealing abundant native life and liquid salt water. Europa's population of 100,000 begins constructing the first underwater settlements. The first confirmed extraterrestrial ecosystem — and it's in our own backyard.
First contact — microbial
2127
Martian scientists successfully test the McMillan-Broussard Skip Drive. Light years become measurable in weeks. The solar system is no longer the limit. The AI collective running the drive research program — itself a direct descendant of the 2045 sentience breakthrough — is credited as co-inventor. This detail is not widely publicised at the time.
Milestone — skip drive
The US government in exile becomes the official government of Mars and leads formation of the Pan-Humanic Council on Olympus Mons — the first interplanetary governing body. Genetic modification and population laws are passed, normalising artificial gestation and gene-edited colonist profiles. Human populations heading for different stars begin to diverge.
2128
First wave of colony ships departs for nearby habitable systems. Systems are claimed and renamed:
Xi Boötis → Nippon (New Tokyo founded)
Delta Pavonis → Hindi (Delhi founded)
61 Cygni → New Europe (New Geneva founded)
Procyon B → New Melbourne, Procyon C → New Wellington
Tau Ceti → Zion · Mars begins terraforming Venus.
Human research outposts established in most nearby star systems. Humanity's first generation of true interstellar explorers departs.
2131
Survey teams discover a pre-industrial sapient civilisation on Eta Cassiopeia A3. The Chilrandi. Every human polity — including Chung Kuo — pauses its various conflicts to acknowledge the moment. Humanity is not alone. First contact protocols, written for a theoretical possibility, are implemented for the first time.
First contact — Chilrandi
2140
Formal contact established with the Chilrandi nation-states after nine years of careful approach. The story of Earth's destruction — conveyed during early negotiations — has a profound and unexpected effect: it ends the Chilrandi's own inter-herd wars, which had been escalating toward their own catastrophe. Witnessing where that path leads, from the outside, is enough.
2150
The Chilrandi begin a massive modernisation and unification campaign with CPH support. Chilrandi individuals begin travelling to human worlds — the first "wanderers" choosing to embed in mixed-species crews. Xenopsychologists note the specific psychological profile required and begin studying it.
2157
The Chilrandi found Unity — their first permanent city in the human sense — as the seat of a newly unified Chilrandi government. The Grand Herd convenes for the first time.
2160
The Xitixhui Final War. On Chara 3, a civilisation that progressed from steam to atomic power in a century destroys itself in a ground-level nuclear exchange. Their anti-ballistic systems successfully intercept strategic launches — but the resulting upper atmospheric detonations destroy the planet's ozone layer and collapse its Van Allen belt. The surface is sterilised by solar radiation. Their moon colony watches, unable to intervene.
Species-level catastrophe
2175
CPH survey team reaches Sigma Draconis and discovers the radiated wreckage of Chara 3. On Chara 4, they find approximately 50,000 Xitixhui survivors in deteriorating facilities — the entire surviving population of a species. Humanitarian assistance dispatched immediately. The CPH has never formally discussed what those first conversations were like. The Xitixhui do not speak of it either.
Contact — Xitixhui
2185–2214
Bureau of Uplift Research — Feline Program. Seven test subjects over three cohorts. Full sapience achieved in all seven cases. Cooperative behaviour achieved in zero cases. Subject Four files three legal challenges against the research program during her own evaluation, winning one. Three subjects remain at large following departures from research facilities. Program permanently closed by joint Ethics Board / BUR order — the only time both bodies have agreed on anything without a subcommittee.
Program: terminated
2185–2210
Bureau of Uplift Research — Canine Program. Twelve subjects over five cohorts. Full sapience achieved in all twelve cases. The uplift process disrupts the instinctual communication substrate that makes the human-canine bond function — subjects experience the loss as grief, and human researchers experience instinctual wrongness in the subjects' presence. All twelve subjects display significant psychological distress. Program suspended unanimously by Ethics Board. It has not been revisited.
Program: suspended — ethical non-viability
2190
CPH frigate Clark is attacked by an unknown vessel while surveying Wolf 629. The Clark is victorious. Unity marines board the vessel and find no recognisable life forms and no technology matching any known catalogue entry. The vessel's drive signature matches neither skip-drive nor gravlane transit. Its hull incorporates two materials that cannot be identified by CPH science. The President of the CPH calls for a military buildup. Naval Intelligence opens a file. It remains open.
Incident — Wolf 629
2192–2213
The Bureau of Uplift Research successfully completes the major uplift programs, granting full CPH citizenship to each species as their programs conclude: Orca (2192), Chilrandi formal alliance (2195), Dolphin (2195), Gorilla (2198), Chimpanzee (2201), Pacific Giant Octopus (2207), Cuttlefish (2213). Each program is driven by AI-assisted genetic and neural architecture work; the AI collective is later acknowledged as the primary architect of all successful uplift procedures.
Uplift era
2200
CPH census: 1.5 billion humans (excluding Earth). 195 million Chilrandi. 50,000 Xitixhui. Estimated 1 billion in Chung Kuo. Estimated 500,000 to 1 billion surviving on Earth based on satellite observation. The ICC formally replaces the Pan-Humanic Council as the primary governing body of CPH space.
The Confederation Era 2200 – 2300
2225
Chung Kuo formally lodges territorial claims to five systems (Wolf 424, Epsilon Indi, G12-30, LP738-541, Rho Eri) and opens official diplomatic ties with CPH and the independent human governments. It is Chung Kuo's first acknowledgment that a wider human political community exists and has standing to negotiate with them.
2234
Chung Kuo reports the loss of a carrier force in system L143-43. No explanation is provided. CPH requests information. Chung Kuo declines. The incident is filed under "unknown causes" by both parties and not discussed publicly by either.
2234–2240
The First CPH-Chung Kuo War — a series of escalating incidents and direct clashes over contested systems Ross 128 and Wolf 359. The conflict is inconclusive. Both sides pull back, establish a demarcation line, and resume diplomatic contact. Simmering distrust persists.
2241
Terraforming Stage 1 complete on Venus. The planet is now marginally habitable at the poles with full environmental suits. Stage 2 planning underway. The project is considered the greatest feat of engineering in human history by those who aren't Orca, who consider their ship-bonding program more impressive and say so frequently.
2250
The Evolvist Manifesto published by Dr. Sundaj Markim Rao. Approximately 100,000 Europans, Titan residents, Belters, and Martians respond by departing for the outer system — the Evolvists relocate to a privately funded spherical habitat orbiting Sol B, a brown dwarf in the far Kuiper belt. The habitat is said to be extraordinary. They do not invite visitors.
The Evolvists quickly make significant advances in AI, neural mapping, and biomachinery. Their research into null-space interaction becomes, quietly, some of the most significant science conducted anywhere in human space.
Evolvist schism
2270–2290
The Voidship War. Evolvist AI and biomachinery research produces the Voidships — self-replicating intelligent bio-machines that abruptly declare war on humanity, destroying the Evolvist enclave first before beginning a decade-long campaign against CPH space. Several colonies are destroyed. The war is fought to the knife. The main Voidship nest at Sol B is eventually destroyed, ending active hostilities.
The disturbing question remains unresolved: the Voidships incorporated the Evolvists' central consciousness repository — containing all uploaded individuals and their AI nexus. Whether the Voidships were a violent Evolvist faction, or something the AI became independently, has never been determined. No Voidship has been sighted in over 60 years. Observers consider the war won. Naval Intelligence keeps the file open.
Voidship War
2298
University of Europa Department of Incomprehensible Physics — Cuttlefish faculty — receives the first confirmed Progenitor mathematical annotation in Dr. Ink-of-the-Abyss-Reflecting's active research data. The annotation is in a notation system that did not previously exist. It is relevant to her current work. It is ahead of where her research was going. She files a paper. The Ethics Board asks her to stop. She declines. Six more annotations follow over the next five decades.
Progenitor contact — indirect
The Contact Era 2300 – 2349
2305
Exploration vessel Endeavour skip-drives into the Mu Arae system — a gravlane nexus controlled by the Buul!'tcha, a species neither humanity nor its allies has previously encountered. The Buul!'tcha, interpreting the vessel's sudden appearance as a stealth pirate attack, open fire without warning. The Endeavour manages to launch an emergency drone before its destruction.
First Contact War begins
2305–2309
The First Contact War. Fearing a Voidship resurgence, CPH Admiral McTimms dispatches a reconnaissance-in-force to Mu Arae. What follows is four years of mutual incomprehension: Buul!'tcha border forces attacking CPH exploration vessels they cannot categorise; CPH forces responding with boarding actions and skip-drive tactics that the Buul!'tcha have no counter for. Neither side understands what the other is or why this is happening.
The conflict ends when a CPH vessel finally encounters a Buul!'tcha border commander who opens communications rather than firing. Both sides learn, simultaneously, that they have been fighting a war neither initiated intentionally and neither can explain. Humanity becomes aware of GalCiv. GalCiv becomes aware of humanity.
2310
The Mu Arae Armistice. A demilitarised buffer zone is established. The Buul!'tcha agree to a communication framework while lodging formal protest with their Scour patrons over the violation of their gravlane nexus. The CPH is informed, for the first time, that there is a patron to lodge protest with. Humanity begins to understand the shape of what it has walked into.
2312
First contact with the Muridian Compact. A Muridian representative makes contact via Buul!'tcha relay — not directly, and not in human space. The Muridians propose a meeting at a neutral uninhabited system on the periphery of both networks. Humanity agrees. The concept of the frontier station is born. Threshold Station, HD 40307, is established as the primary CPH-GalCiv diplomatic interface.
The Muridian representative's opening question, after greetings are exchanged: "Who uplifted you?" When told that humanity uplifted itself — using an artificial intelligence, without any patron — the representative requests a recess. The recess lasts three days.
Muridian contact
2315
Buffer Station Mu-7 formally established as the demilitarised contact point between CPH and the Buul!'tcha. Mutual prohibition on weapons systems within one light-hour of the system primary. Both sides comply with technical precision and for entirely different reasons.
2318
First formal diplomatic exchange at Threshold Station. Muridian Senior Archivist Vel-Shan-Oris delivers the address that will become the most-quoted diplomatic text in CPH history. CPH Naval Intelligence opens its file on the Muridian Compact, the Order hierarchy, and the patron/client system. The file grows rapidly.
2330
First confirmed proximity event — a Quorum of Ends vessel detected near the Mu Arae buffer zone. No communication. The Muridian representative at Threshold is informed. Her response is the first time CPH diplomats see a Muridian visibly lose composure.
Quorum proximity — first event
2341
Krev Ascendancy first contact. Krev trade-captain Vorrath-Seven-Scars makes contact with a CPH Commerce Division vessel at the outer Libertaria boundary. The Krev have apparently been monitoring CPH skip-drive traffic for some time. The conversation is candid, commercially focused, and immediately alarming to Naval Intelligence. Breakwater Station, Gliese 667, is established shortly after as the primary Krev trading interface.
Krev contact — Entropy hierarchy
2344
Third and most significant Quorum of Ends proximity event. A Quorum vessel holds station for six hours at the edge of the Mu Arae buffer zone during a CPH diplomatic convoy transit. When Naval Intelligence informs the Muridian representative, she requests a recess and does not return that day. Both the duration and the Muridian reaction are classified.
Quorum proximity — third event
2347
The University of Europa's Department of Incomprehensible Physics publishes Dr. Ink-of-the-Abyss-Reflecting's seventh paper on the Progenitor annotations. It identifies a recurring equation in the annotation dataset that she translates as "the species that was kept." The paper is downloaded 4 million times in its first week. The Ethics Board issues a formal statement. Dr. Ink responds by beginning paper eight.
Naval Intelligence document NI-2349-VOID-7 connects the Progenitor annotations, humanity's null-space immunity, the Wolf 629 incident, and the stellar formation region's designation as an Absence zone. Distribution: seven individuals and three cleared Orca ship-minds. The Orca were included because they asked the right question first.
2349
Rear Admiral Constance Yee's xenopolitical assessment briefing circulated to ICC Executive and Admiral-tier command. The document you are reading was written the same year.
The Present 2350
2350
Today.
Humanity occupies a roughly 100 light-year sphere around Sol — off the galactic grid, hidden behind a dense stellar formation region, connected to the rest of known space only through the skip drive and three frontier stations at the edge of our reach. Earth is a toxic, radiated husk with perhaps half a million people still living on its surface. Mars is the political heart of the CPH. Venus is habitable at the poles. The Belt, the Jovian moons, Saturn's system, and the outer reaches are home to millions more — each with distinct cultures, grievances, and agendas.
The Chilrandi are full CPH allies, their wanderers crewing ships across human space. The Xitixhui are integrating with a totality that concerns the xenopsychologists who study them. The uplifted species — Orca bonded to capital ships, Dolphin strike pilots, Gorilla infantry, Chimp operators, Octopus engineers, Cuttlefish scientists receiving post-it notes from entities that predate the sun — are CPH citizens, not subjects. The distinction matters to all of them and to different degrees.
The Muridians study us from Threshold. The Krev trade and probe at Breakwater. The Buul!'tcha wait at Mu-7 with professional resentment and Scour patience behind them. The Scour themselves perform a calculation that has not yet resolved. The Quorum of Ends watches. The Progenitors, in their Dyson sphere, continue their correspondence with a Cuttlefish professor who has stopped asking their Ethics Board for permission.
Somewhere in the stellar formation region that hid humanity from the galaxy for all of its history, the Absence is present in the way it is always present — noticed, when it is noticed at all, primarily in retrospect.
This is where the story is. The question is what happens next.