One thousand years of mankind's rise and fall in space! A bold group of explorers takes the first steps toward leaving Earth's solar system. Their quest: new worlds to colonize, so that humanity may yet have a chance at survival. The team is scorned by the world's government and canonized by its citizens. And even getting off the ground, they soon realize, may be the most difficult task ahead. At mission's end, their ship on the verge of collapse, its captain maddened by the depths of space, Captain Coney encounters a strange energy field on the edge of the universe, and the creature within.