Set in the modern world of mostly North America, Michael Lang relates the story of how aliens came to offer a trade: the world's dead for their technology. Intrigued by the prospect of working for these powerful entities, Michael is one of many who sign up to pilot one of the massive vessels that collect the dead. These pilots act as mere figure heads, proof for the populace of the cooperation between human and alien, but never truly in control of the ships they travel in. Guided by a powerful artificial intelligence, and set upon a path that is not their own, they question the meaning of what it truly is to be free. Michael travels the world tending to this macabre task. In lands near and far, few seem displeased with the dire trade of dead for a promise of a better tomorrow. Those who do dissent are kept far from the public eye. The muffling of these voices and a creeping suspicion of motives alien to human understanding leads Michael to suspect that all is not what it appears to be. Could Michael be right?