Leaving
the planet used to be a death sentence, but Jurn returned
from the Shadow Squares solar installation with the news of
the Corps-caused global disaster. No one was surprised when
he disappeared. But he hadn't returned empty-handed. Hidden
deep beneath the skin in his hip, Jurn has smuggled tech which
could change everything.
He is
secretly helped by Denni, a thirty year old trapped by societal
judgement in her parents' basement. She had taken on the unenviable
task of cleaning up the internet, and with it reforming the
way that knowledge was collected and understood. As secret
as a spider in her web, Denni has toppled regimes, built universities,
funded science, and espionage in her fanatical devotion to
a secret project that she dares not utter aloud.
Tason
was sliding sideways through a gamer's life when his parents
demanded that he support himself. They never imagined that
he would talk himself into a job with the Indian space agency
and then with the Corps. Gathering a team of misfits from
the Dharavi slum of Mumbai, Tason cons their way into orbit,
already planning how he might turn the latest change in their
luck to their advantage.
Setting
in motion an impossible project, two ships out of Bangkok
force an asteroid and a comet to collide. They have set their
sights on far Proxima, and a generation ship to take them
there. Busy calculating a slingshot around the sun and Jupiter
and worrying that their fragile ship will disintegrate, they
refuse to divulge their intentions to an Earth distracted
by environmental and social collapse.
With as
many projects as there are people to suggest them, Earth is
either on the cusp of a galaxy-wide civilization or is merely
making technological noise before it falls into mayhem and
biosphere collapse. In the centre of the struggle, Denni connects
people with technology, ideas with those who can fund them,
and vision with those brave enough to carry them to fruition.