Gabriel Connor is up against it. Expelled from the Concord Marines and exiled in disgrace, he's offered one last chance by the Concord to redeem himself. All it involves is gambling his life in a vicious game of death.

Former marine Gabriel Connor and his fraal companion are scratching out a living among the dangerous stars of the Verge when they stumble onto new, unknown forces. Only their deaths seem likely to avert the disaster about to flood into the Verge. But an astonishing revelation from the depths of time makes the prospect of survival even more terrible than a clean death.

A dark night is set to descend upon humanity. An empire of malevolent aliens looms in the out reaches of known space while the Galactic Concord struggles to unite humanity's crumbling alliance. Gabriel Connor's quest to preserve the Verge and clear his name leads him to Algemron, a system ravaged by war and rotting from corruption within, then to the ruins of an ancient civilization. To save his friends, he must risk all he holds dear. To save himself, he may have to become something more than human.