A lot can happen in five years.
The Il'Ri'Kamm Hive Mind tried using OtherSpace Drives to coerce people to commit xenocide against an ancient enemy.
The Earth-centered Stellar Consortium nearly collapsed under the Bright Horizons cloning scandal on Sivad, and a madman rose to power before an invasion by the Vanguard ended his reign. Lord Fagin, the Pirate King, saw his palace on Tomin Kora destroyed - the beginning of the end of his criminal empire. The planet Val Shohob, home of the Mystics, was destroyed.
Revolution in the Parallax led to the loosening of the Nall grip on the planets Grimlahd, Vollista, Ist'thol'mek and Ydahr - and then the Nall began to fight amongst themselves in a brutal civil war.
The Hive Mind's creators, the Kamir, helped destroy the seeming last of the Hivers. And then came the warmongering Kretonians, conquering the known worlds and sending a precious few - some 50,000 refugees - fleeing aboard the colony vessel Sanctuary.
Sanctuary became lost in the realm known as Hiverspace, an alternate universe, and roamed for what seemed six months to those aboard. But centuries had passed back home by the time Sanctuary returned in the year 3000.
The universe had changed. Earth had become a bastion of xenophobia. The Ri'Kammi Hive Minders lived again. The Nall had become interstellar heroes by defeating the Kretonians and freeing the known worlds. The once peaceful Centaurans had become suspicious and sometimes violent as pawns of the Kretonians. Possessed by Hiver tendrils, the Centauran Mindshard fleet launched an attack on Sanctuary, only to be defeated, thanks to assistance from the Kamir.
With Sanctuary's return, conflict arose among the governments of the Solar Consortium. Mars broke away from Earth to form its own republic. And then Earth, under President Lazarus Blades, sought a more even-handed approach to outsiders, trying to open doors for trade. But lunatic terrorists set off plasma bombs that decimated Earth's surface, killing billions.
Ungstiri mob boss Lord Boromov fell afoul of the Nall when one of his ships attacked a Nall warship, and for his trouble, he saw Ungstir invaded before he was captured and executed live on holovision.
The paranoid Lem'ing roamed the known worlds, destroying spaceports and trying to pre-emptively wipe out any threats to their distant territory. The madman governing the polydenum-rich planet of La Terre destroyed his world and all who dwelled there to spite the invaders.
The Il'Ri'Kamm Hive Mind ended its quest to eliminate all corporeal life after discovering that the frog-like Maltarians were, like the Hivers, creations of the crafty Kamir. The Hivers and Maltarians worked together to stop a multiverse rift from destroying reality - and then the Hivers resurrected the planet Val Shohob, placing it near Vollista.
The Mystics under Eye Balthazar rejected the Kamir, their "Voice" of prophecy. The Kamir then swore to destroy those who turned against them, and set into motion a plot to sow chaos and war. The Hivers, proving their loyalty to the corporeals, resurrected the dead world of La Terre. The conflict culminated in a showdown on the planet Nocturn between the Kamir and the Hivers - and they destroyed each other in the process.
After leaving Nocturn, the VES Minerva, commanded by David Ransom Porter, discovered the multiverse nexus: A series of gateways leading to alternate universes, including Hiverspace.
The Centaurans invented a time-twisting Moebius Device, which fell into the wrong hands and led to the expanding Moebius Effect, which began on Earth and ultimately spread as far as Mars before it could be stopped. An alternate Earth, where Colin Neidermeyer ruled first as president and then as king, materialized. When Neidermeyer imprisoned aliens in work camps and threatened to attack Luna and other worlds, the Nall invaded. Neidermeyer fled. Then the OtherSpace Ring network exploded, stranding the Nall Vox Ulka of Hatch Kithar in Sol System. A new Vox, Ock of Hatch Vril, was named on Nalhom. Civil war erupted among the Nall in Sol System. And then came the Kretonians, again, to take advantage of the conflict. In the end, the Kretonians and Nall fought to a draw, and local rebels drove them off. Neidermeyer set off plasma bombs all over the new Earth, repeating history in the name of pride. Vox Ulka of Hatch Kithar sought asylum aboard Sanctuary.
Oswald Cottington IV, builder of Sanctuary, survived an assassination attempt and a stroke. Then he decided to capitalize on Nocturn's proximity to the multiverse nexus. He had the colony vessel fitted with a new Spindrive and embarked on Sanctuary's final journey. Upon arriving at Nocturn, however, the colony vessel became swarmed by warships of the Nall Clawed Fist Fleet. Cottington surrendered to Vox Ock of Hatch Vril, but was shot and killed while attacking a traitorous Vollistan Light Singer named Volari, who would become Sanctuary's new overseer.