Marcus Redding is a junkologist, living on the boundary between the Belt and Mars, hunting for tech from ships of the Pre-Crawl days. Harboring a secret and a chip on his shoulder the size of Deimos, he prefers to be alone. Yet, with his new partner, Lashiel, an Ilas hybrid, he has found something that will make him very rich, or make him very dead.

Pursued by gangsters who want their cut, the Martian Defense Force, and an alien race that has meddled with human affairs for far too long, Marcus finds himself in a race against time, the elements, and a plethora of enemies to save the two-person crew of the Junker Blues.