As the conflict escalates between the Open Air Society and Profortuna’s Council, newly-promoted Corporal Crystal and her former Military Academy classmate, Corporal Fisher, are assigned undercover work together, just as their eight years of sexual tension combusts. On kitchen duty in the First Quadrant, Crystal and Fisher interact with the intelligentsia, making contact with members of the Open Air Society and gathering intel for the Council. Crystal uses the opportunity to rekindle her relationship with two members of the intelligentsia, Henri and Stepho, leaving Fisher alone to fume over her preference for the scientists she met when they were refugees in Fourth Quadrant after the initial terrorist attacks. When Crystal learns the scientists are working for the Pro-Freedom Movement, she begins to question which side is the right side. Would life on Profortuna be better without the Council controlling every aspect of people’s lives? If civilians were free to make their own decisions, could she ever get Fisher, Henri, and Stepho to agree to be her three chosen mates?