"The next best thing to winning is giving the other guy such a bloody nose, he wonders if beating you was really worth it." When the Earth became overcrowded, the Company terra-formed the planets and moons of the Three Systems into fifty Earths for humanity to call home. The worlds all prospered, and life was good. Until the Company decided that they had the right to tell humanity how to live on those new worlds as well. Jace Ryan is a resistance leader on the planet Augustine. But the resistance's time has run out. Company Troopers storm their camp, and Ryan is captured, while the rest of his people are killed. He loses his home, his friends, and worst of all, his sister Jade. Aarla, the CEO of the Company, offers him a spot in her organization. When he refuses her, she sentences him to a penal colony. On the prison ship he meets three other prisoners: a mercenary, a pilot, and a telepath. Together, they learn that they've all lost something at the hands of the Company. Together, they decide that they've lost enough. When Aarla and Fleet Commander Straker arrange for the prison ship to crash land on Beauregard, they think that they've rid themselves of Ryan. They think that the war is over. Little do they know that for Ryan, the war is just beginning.