Timeline of Major Events
Dates are written in day/month/year. Years are divided into 13, 28-day months
d15.m12.y00 Colonists arrive on Pern Landing
d01.m01.y01 Landing construction completed, year one officially begins
d23.m06.y01 Fire-lizards discovered when a group of children on a field trip stumble upon a hatching
d13.m02.y02 Geneticists create the first mentasynth enhanced fire-lizards
d18.m09.y04 Whers are developed in an early attempt to create bigger fire-lizards
d04.m05.y08 First dangerous Threadfall over Landing.
d02.m08.y09 Leaders of the colony meet to discuss the state of affairs. Resources are thin and sleds teams struggle to protect the widespread settlements in the south. Plans are in development to try making bigger fire-lizards, but many would rather move to the safety of the northern caves.
d19.m08.y09 Half the colony moves north.
d03.m09.y09 The Dragon Project becomes official.
d19.m04.y10 Kitti Ping completes the program and passes away, the first batch of dragons eggs are created.
d06.m08.y10 Landing is abandoned and relocated at Jordan River Hold, which is renamed New Landing Hold. The first batch of dragon eggs is lost.
d01.m12.y10 Role-playing begins. Three groups of eggs have been successfully created, one is near hatching.
d08.m01.y11 Oldest clutch of dragon eggs hatches 16 viable specimens.
d03.m03.y11 There is the first casualty among the dragon project. A brown dies of a parasite after his human partner attempts to take him and leave New Landing. She commits suicide shortly after her dragon's death.
d08.m03.y11 The second hatching occurs during Hurricane Felicity. Out of 25 eggs, only 17 hatched. One hatchling died before bonding.

History
It has been eleven years since people arrived on Pern.

During the first eight years of colonization, people spread across Pern's southern continent. It was agreed before arriving that women of child-bearing age were expected to multiply, and multiply they did. In year 8, everyone was finally settling in on this peaceful, agrarian world. Until one day, unexpectedly, Thread fell from the sky. Fire-lizards aided in Thread defense, and sleds, the flying machines previously used for transportation and shipping, were fixed with flame-throwers to take to the sky. Sleds provided mediocre protection by burning Thread from the sky, and after the fall ground crews went out to mop up the large quantities of Thread that always got through the sleds.

Several hundred lives were lost during those first few Threadfalls. Countless homes were destroyed. Crops were ruined, livestock killed. People fled, abandoning their remote farms to return to the safety of Landing and its nearby holds. The further reaches of the south were completely abandoned because it put too much strain on sled pilots and ground crews to try and protect the entire continent.

After 10 months of Threadfall, sleds were already showing the signs of over-use. Powerpacks were strained and many sleds had been damaged beyond repair in collisions. Tectonic plates around Landing, Pern's base of operations, were growing unstable. There was talk of modifying fire-lizards to make them bigger. But that would take years. Something needed to be done now, so the colonists held a meeting to discuss their future. It was clear that they could not remain at Landing with the possibility of volcanic eruption. They needed to move to more stable ground where they could make homes among rocks to try to stay out of the deadly Threadfalls.

The colonists at the meeting fell into two obvious camps. Some wanted to move north to the safety of the caves where they hopefully could become self-sufficient. They believed there was no way that the scientists could ever succeed in making rideable, self-replicating fire-lizards. After all, look what happened with the whers. Others put their faith in the scientists. who couldn't move their work across the ocean, to find the answer. Late in year nine, the two camps separated, dividing families in some cases, separating loves in others. The first group moved to the Northern continent, taking half the population and supplies with them. Distance, slowly depleting resources, and general negative feelings have prevented the Southerners from attempting to make contact.

In the South, the colonists living at Landing held their breath in the shadow of a great volcano with the promise that the science teams were working day and night to produce an answer. It was soon clear that they could not remain in Picchu�s dangerous vicinity and everything was meticulously moved. They decided to move Landing to the nearest large settlement. The Jordan River Hold, two bays over west of Landing, had been a small settlement, mostly home to fishermen and farmers, founded by Jack Moore. The large rocky, cliff along the mouth of the Jordan River possessed a number of natural caves. Shortly after the pass began, Jack Moore found himself up to his neck in refugees wanting to take shelter in his caves. The location was ideal for relocating Landing, and thus the Jordan River Hold was renamed New Landing Hold.

Despite all their care in moving them, the first batch of eggs (created by Kitti herself before her passing) was lost. However traumatic, life at New Landing took hold and the scientists had one last ditch effort with what was left of their resources to create one more try. Among those that avidly remained hopeful were Kitti-Ping�s dragon project team. Before she passed away, Kitti-Ping was able to impart some of her knowledge to a group of scientists with specialties from new ones like fire-lizards to terran favorites like xenobiology. A team that had been influential in the discovery of the abilities of fire-lizards and experts in the mentasynth used in the dolphins the colonists brought to Pern carried on Kitti-Ping�s project and have created the eggs she dreamed of before she died. Over the course of year ten, the eggs were finished and awaiting their hatching in New Landing Hold�s hatching rooms with the hopeful colonists holding a collective breath.

Three batches were completed over the year; the first batch of 20 has hatched with sixteen surviving dragons. The second clutch was not as lucky. Only 16 out of 25 survived. Another group of 19 eggs is still developing and nears hatching.

What became of the Northerners?

d19.m08.y09 - Half of the colony (approx. 4500 people) move North, taking roughly half of the supplies of the colony with them (per agreement)

d01.m09.y.09 - The colonists arrive at the cave structure in the Eastern portion of the Northern Continent and begin setting up homes in the caves (near Half-Circle territory). The holding eventually becomes known as Cave Hold.

d13.m03.y10 - A earthquake runs through Cave Hold and surrounding area, killing herds, horses, people and destroying supplies. All but two sleds are lost to the destruction; a total of 157 people die, many of whom were younger able-bodied males, mining at the time of the earthquake. Following the earthquake, leadership of Cave Hold is more turned over to Malloren Morgan, a former military woman. Aiding significantly post-quake and having a leadership history and wartime experience, people look to her as a strong figurehead for them and more or less are glad to have someone in charge.

d07.m05.y10 - After the first winter hardships, many of the young and old have died due to harsh conditions and sickness. Approx. 50 have passed with the winter season. Malloren�s rules begin to become more strict after this.

d12.m05.y10 - Approx. 200 settlers leave, deciding colder weather further north may bring less Thread and more surviving vegetation, branch off and head that way to find better shelter and life.

d15.m07.y10 - Approx. 250 settlers travel further west on the belief of finding better food and more secure cave systems further inland.

d29.m11.y10 - Approx. 350 settlers head further south down the peninsula (heading towards Nerat area)in preparation for the coming winter season. Their main reasons for doing are to avoid the horrid conditions of the past winter, and also to escape the increasingly restrictive leadership of Malloren Morgan.

d10.m13.y11 – Sutton Fremont, an Englishman who had begun loudly protesting Morgan and stirring the idea of going back to the Southern Continent, dies when he ‘carelessly� stays at sea in his fishing boat alone for too long and is caught in Threadfall. Those who had supported him are cowed by the ‘tragedy,� but whispers of his death being planned persist through Cave Hold

d12.m01.y11 - Only partway through the winter season, another 48 people have already died (or left) from conditions and illness, largely young and old again. Over the past months, herds have all but died out and the people have turned to horses and even dogs and cats as food sources. There is general malnourishment, fear, and discontent everywhere. Morgan has become steadily more and more tyrannical, rationing to an extreme instead of trying to further growth of food, restricting movement out of doors unless absolutely necessary, Threadfall or none. Reproduction is discouraged to the point of less food being given to pregnant mothers. For various "crimes" some people have been cast out of the cave holdings as well. Belle Moore and Lilly Lee begin rallying support to return south. They enlist Khalil Rami, an assistant in Morgan offices, to beign copying certain records she keeps confidential from the Hold.

d25.m03.y11 - Belle, Lilly and approx. 100 other settlers take a boat and leave to go South again. The boat is snuck onto in the dark of night, with very little in the way of supplies, and only one flamethrower should Thread find them. Khalil�s copied charts and records include: death records, lists of those who moved away from Cave Hold, stores remaining, records of notable events since arriving at the Hold, Threadfall charts for the area, family tree of those living at Cave Hold, and information regarding newly discovered animal and plant life (not terribly extensive).

d07.m04.y11 - Belle Moore's ship (christened The Return upon departure) arrives at old Landing hold, finding it destroyed and buried in a volcanic explosion. She calms the panic by moving they travel to her father's hold.

d09.m04.y11 - The Return arrives at New Landing, far expanded from what even Belle recalled.

After living at Cave Hold for four months, people were just starting to get settled in. The caves provided shelter from Threadfall while the sleds provided decent enough protection for crops. However, due to increased tectonic activity, a major earthquake struck the area. All but two sleds were destroyed in a rockslide and many able-bodied youths were killed in a cave-in.

Groups left, disheartened by the conditions and depressing lifestyle, heading further north, further south, and striking out into the west. If the earthquake wasn�t enough, a harsh winter took many of the Northerners�young and old, birthing mothers, strong young men even! It was a dire situation.

Food stores went bad, crops were destroyed by Thread, and the diet became primarily fish, seaweed and whatever else they could find. After time, the herds of livestock died out, and the horses were all in sad shape from being kept inside, too precious to lose. The weaker horses were eventually taken as food (the stronger were kept alive, since there were only two sleds with precious and fading fuel supplies), and people even got so desperate as to turn to cats, dogs, and tunnelsnakes for food when the nets came in empty.

Malloren Morgan was a charismatic leader. A former officer in the Nathi War who had been discharged and joined the Pern expedition, was remembered for her aid and skill on the flight to Pern and her role in setting up Landing. Many remember her fondly, and a strong leader was needed in this time. She offered to take the helm, as it were, and the population of Cave Hold readily accepted. She began well enough, strictly enforcing people to stay inside during Threadfall, as well as before and after for a few hours, and eventually noticing that the fish came to the surface after �Fall, and so went about sending boats out sooner post-Fall. She ran a tight Hold, and was admired�for a time.

The power seemed to go to Morgan�s head and the rules and restrictions slowly became more and more extreme until the situation was no longer better, but worse than it had been. Sutton Fremont was the fist person to seriously speak at large of returning to the Southern Continent. But poor Sutton�s fate met him in his lonely fishing boat, out at sea when �Fall came in one day, and he died alone, a horribly painful death at that. People whispered, didn�t believe he�d be so careless, suspected he�d been left out there by some foul play of Morgan�s. But no one dared speak aloud anymore about it.

Belle Moore and Lilly Lee, two friends of Sutton Fremont�s, began seeking out others of like mind. Once too concerned for their young children to stand up, Sutton�s death pushed them to find a way out of the hellhole that had become Cave Hold. They found support, most impressively in the form Khalil Rami, who offered to copy the important records in Morgan�s offices for them so they could bring such to Landing when they left. The network was quiet, but steadily found strength in numbers and a plan was hatched. Late one night, some 100 people silently boarded one of the boats taken to the Northern Continent almost a year and a half ago, and slipped away in the night to the angry wakening calls of Morgan�s supporters. Too late to stop them, the newly christened ship The Return sailed off into the open ocean of Pern.

They first came back to Landing and were shocked to find it gone and buried under volcanic ash and rock. But Belle assured them not to fear, for her father�s home, Jordan River Hold, wasn�t far by boat and he would welcome them all to stay in its safe cavern network.

But no expected to come upon a bustling and well-populated hold, two clutches of hatched and mentally bonded dragons and a hold renamed �New Landing� that had become the center of just about everything on Pern�

To summarize: upon the leaving of Belle Moore's ship, the population of the Cave Hold was 3145. The fate of those who left for other settlements in the North is unknown. Well over half the firelizards once bonded to these people have left them, they are all malnourished, dirty and in need of medical care of varying degrees. Very few elderly people have survived, and very few young children are still alive, though any people with children or pregnant would have been better off joining the boat leaving than staying at Cave Hold. The hold has two sleds, in bad condition, and a handful of flamethrowers. No more herds of livestock, very few out of shape horses kept in the caves, and the diet there consists mostly of seaweed, fish, and the occasional former household friend or tunnelsnake.