After a century of tumult peace and freedom has finally come to Earth and Mars. Mankind has begun the process of undoing the centuries of harm done to their home world and needs a new frontier for those still filled with wanderlust. Starship Gagarin is the first vessel set to explore out into that new frontier.

Thomas Kafando was elected chairman of the mission at Gagarin's first convention. He wants an exit to the stars to escape his fame. He's credited as the hero of the battle of the Citadel and the Aphrodite Coup, but he was just the right person at the wrong place and time. He will never know a moment of peace so long as he stays on Earth.

Lucy Drummond is his protege. She grew up in the squalor of the Citadel until rescued by Kafando and the International Safety Federation. She wants nothing more than to be the hero Tom won't admit he is. Emily Malex is one of the few Martians onboard and one of the crew's most adept, obsessive engineers. Conroy Hewitt is one of the ship's mixologists and is a master of managing spirits—both alcoholic and the morale of the crew. Julu Serpen is another Martian and another hero of the Aphrodite Coup. Where Lucy has undergone the best training the ISF can provide, Serpen has been in the field and in the middle of conflict since she was a child fighting in the Martian revolution.

Together they are mankind's best sent out on a mission to meet and befriend intelligent aliens out in the cosmos.

Two hundred years ago the Union of Sovereign Planets helped the Tuariskeagn people resettle on their home world, Kwegaigh, and ever since the conflict between them and the other intelligent life on the planet, the Santosians, has simmered and occasionally boiled over. The Tuariskeagn are more technologically advanced and they have been at work uplifting the technologically inferior Santosians, who very pointedly do not want this "help." The USP has helped maintain the uneasy peace, but the arrival of Starship Gagarin upsets the balance. Will Gagarin and her crew be dragged into a centuries old conflict? Will the USP maintain control of the situation?

Or will the Dissidents of Utopia, a clandestine illegal underground aid organization finally get their wish and push Kwegaigh into civil war?

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