Jericho Jackson has some difficult choices to make. He controls a motley fleet of cargo jump ships with nowhere to go, and has a fledgling colony to protect from discovery. Shanna Percival (now Shanna Jackson) hopes to solve their problems with information gleaned from the Polecat Protocol archive, suspecting it has yet to give up its greatest secrets. Curiosity can be its own reward, but she needs answers. Military deserters would kill for Jericho’s stockpile of jump-ship fuel, and there is nowhere to hide.