Espionage, intelligence, warfare, politics, religion, diplomacy, genocide... the Reclamation has begun. Tier Three: a compact of six vast interstellar empires, intricately bound by political, diplomatic and trade accords. Together, after centuries of massacres, brushfire wars, trade embargoes and political assassinations, they have finally brought a modicum of peace to a turbulent galaxy. But all of it is about to unravel. In deep space, the kaygryn inexplicably launch a suicidal attack on an Ascendancy crusade fleet; on the shared world of Uvolon, the Ascendancy shoots down a kaygryn corvette over the human city of Anternis. Zavian Yano, a member of the United Nations’ élite Xeno Division diplomatic corps, has one job: to stop the provar and the kaygryn from going to war. Strike Commander John Garrick, one of Solar Operations Command’s most senior generals, also has one job; but he has been side-lined by the President at the height of tensions. On a rainy Uvolonese mountainside, Special Agent Lyra Staerck is killed by a kinetic railstrike, and must find out why. And Captain Ben Vondur, a pilot in UNAF's 6th Goliath Squadron, has orders that seem designed only to inflame the situation. Four people, separated by thousands of lightyears, are bound by fate. And all the while the galaxy hurtles towards war…