Cold. Dirty. Dry.
Cronos is a star system in the galactic northwest and part of the Holy Terran Empire, currently ruled by House Carter.
It has a military hyperspace jumpgate to G2, and two commercial jumpgates to Proxima Centauri and Avalon. The Avalon side of the Cronos-Avalon jumpgate, however, was destroyed during the Caal Invasion, rendering the Cronos sytem's Avalon jumpgate useless.
Cronos has three rocky inner planets and four gas giant outer planets. Only Cronos 3 is habitable. Another artificial colony, New Israel, has been set up on underground on the largest moon of the largest gas giant, Cronos 4.
Cronos Colony[]
Cronos 3 is a cold, dry desert planet prone to high winds and dust storms. What little water it has is usually frozen as ice, but during the long summers (six months) the planet gets warm enough at the equator for water to flow in a liquid state.
History[]
Due to its close proximity to Earth, Cronos 3 was one of the earliest planets colonized when humans first began expanding into space in the mid-21st century. Despite it's frontier culture and low population of just under a quarter million people, it is still considered a "core" system.
At first Cronos 3 was a mining colony, with colonists living underground or in domed cities. Over the next two centuries, however, most of the veins of ore were mined out, and the planet is now dotted with abandoned mining colonies.
By this time, however, over a century of terraforming had produced scrub vegetation and a thin but breathable atmosphere. Furthermore, the Cronos colonists developed winter crops that could grow during the long, cold summer months. The remaining Cronosites grow enough to feed their own population, but most manufactured goods need to be imported. They also lose a percentage of every generation as youngsters emigrate to nearby Avalon for better life opportunities.
Caal Invasion & Aftermath[]
Cronos has been lucky enough to never be in the path of any of the Federation's many wars. As the Caal Invasion fleet approached Avalon, however, panic broke out on Cronos, as the system was only one jump away. After Vin Dane destroyed the Caal fleet, panic was replaced with relief and gratitude.
Many Cronosite instantly became ardent supporters of Vin Dane, and the Cult of the Emperor quickly spread from Avalon to Cronos. Once the Holy Terran Empire was established, though, the Governor of Cronos (Agrarian Democrat Edwina Smythe, the mother of Federation Chairman Joseph Smythe) declared the system for the Federation. This sparked mass pro-Imperial protests. When the Light Infantry tried to forcibly disburse a demonstrations outside the capitol building, it turned into the violent Cronos Riots, during which Edwina Smythe was overthrown and the Cronos government seized for the Empire.
Cronos Resistance[]
A pro-Federation resistance movement popped up almost overnight, officially led by Edwina Smythe but in reality directed by Earth Fleet veterans Leisa & Xinjao O'Reilly from the New Israel colony. Although the Cronos Resistance was relatively small, the brand new Imperial Army was initially disorganized, inexperienced, and poorly equipped. Although they eventually wore down the Resistance, it cost the Imperial Army greatly, and the guerrilla war dragged on for months.
Cialt Siege[]
After the Imperial Army broke the back of the Cronos Resistance and was in the mopping-up phase, they discovered the Cialt Brotherhood (Christian Monks who refused to acknowledge Vin Dane as a living god) were running an underground railway through its Cronos Abbey to smuggle Resistance members and Federation sympathizers off of Cronos.
As Emperor Vin Dane wanted Chairman Smythe's mother, Edwina Smythe, taken alive as a bargaining chip, the Imperial Army initially besieged the abbey, but starving the monks out proved ineffective. After a string of Imperial defeats by the Federation in the Ascension War, Vin Dane stepped up the pressure, and the Imperial Army stormed the well-defended abbey to take Edwina Smythe by force. Although they succeeded in capturing the Abbey, the rebels and monks escaped at the last minute in a rescue orchestrated by Heth, a K'Nes hired by Joseph Smythe to rescue his mother and the other rebels.
After that, however, Cronos saw no more fighting during the Ascension War. The dismantling of the jumpgate network hurt them less than other systems, as Cronos was already fairly self-sufficient, but the sparse access to manufactured goods is an increasingly worrisome problem.
Cronos is currently ruled by House Carter. By the time of the Y3K universe a thousand years later, Cronos had been conquered by House Solder from Alpha Centauri, and was governed by a religious oligarchy (presumably the Cult of the Emperor).
Behind the Scenes[]
We're not 100% sure where the system's name came from, but the best guess is that it was named after the Klingon homeworld (also spelled Kronos or Qo'noS) in Star Trek. However, player/writer Ed Stasheff (who fleshed out the details of the planet) mistakenly thought it was named after Chronos, the Greek god, and so named many planetary features after things from ancient Greek mythology.
The New Israel colony was also made up by Ed on the spur of the moment in season 4.3, mainly just to provide an excuse for his character Xinjao O'Reilly to find ships and troops for Task Force David's raid against the Christian Federation.