Jenny Dunne
Role: Old woman from the village of Wilthail. Fourth, brief Packet of The First Wanderer. Affiliation: None. Era: Plausibly ~119 A.L., the Timeline’s date for the first generation voidships launched from Aerth.
Summary
“A simple lady” who has travelled from her small village to watch “the first men and women to attempt to reach Earth’s nearest alien star” — a rocket launch described as “all-white, elegant, a history torch.” The passengers will be asleep for “many hundreds of years” en route, which pins this to the sublight generation-ship era rather than the later Ribbondash era.
The First Wanderer inhabits her only briefly, decides “this was early, too early,” and exits. She is the narrator’s first glimpse of the post-Earnest future and the story’s clearest anchor point for dating the A.L. era: if the 119 A.L. first generation-voidship launch from Ch. 02 — Timeline of The 500 Year Climb is this moment, then Jenny Dunne is our best pin for aligning Ch. 03’s chronology to the Timeline.
Appearances
- Ch. 03 — For Every Dove a Bullet: Brief, single scene at the rocket launch.
Related
Open questions
- Is “Wilthail” a real A.L.-era place name or a fictional village? Unstated beyond “or some such.”
- Is the launch specifically the 119 A.L. event from the Timeline? The story doesn’t give an A.L. year, but the description matches.