After the fall of the Second Galactic Union in 1716 GY, a ten-thousand-year dark age settled upon the galaxy. Interstellar travel disappeared, and many star systems regressed to a near-barbaric state, burning coal and growing food directly from exposed topsoil.

In 11,203 GY, a treaty between the Empires of Tremain and Gallium formed the Third Galactic Union. Ships of the Stellar Patrol, a pseudo-military wing of the Union government on Tremain, began exploring the galaxy in search of human civilizations that survived from the Second Union.

You are a native of Gallium, one of the Union’s most politically powerful worlds. Your family has served in the Stellar Patrol for five generations, and it was expected that you would join as well. More than a year after signing up, and two months after being transferred to the S.P.S. Feinstein, you are still only ranked Ensign Seventh Class.

Your superior officer, Ensign First Class Blather, has made your life miserable, and you have begun to wonder whether you are really cut out for the Stellar Patrol. Then the unthinkable happens.