One hundred and eighty years in the future, humankind has expanded across the cosmos. On the dangerous frontiers of Dawn, the Atek descendants of the lost colony ship Ariadna struggle to hold on to what little they have, and none are more vicious and backwards than the Caledonian Highlanders. Lieutenant Wilhelm Gotzinger III gave everything to PanOceania, and in return, he was court-martialed, demoted, and disgraced. Assigned to a diplomatic attache at a remote outpost on Dawn, he's holding out hope that this terrible assignment is his chance to fade into comfortable obscurity. Instead, Dawn bares her claws. His transport is shot down. The Caledonians find him. He's taken prisoner. Stripped of his technology and weaponry, Wil still has his wits, his fists, and skills honed across a lifetime spent in interstellar battlefields and Neoterran back alleys. But amidst his escape, he uncovers an alien conspiracy that places both PanOceanian and Ariadnan lives at risk. The only allies he can turn to—that he must learn to trust—are the Highlanders who took him captive, chief among them enigmatic half-human hybrid Saoirse Clarke. All he needs to do to return home is overcome decades of animosity, convince the clan chieftain to act, and face down an army of horrors with only an outdated rifle, his old Aquila duster, and a broken multispectral visor.
