They were trying out a new drive when a cosmic accident took them incalculable light years off course. A miracle of courage and astrogation meant that there were some survivors from the inevitable crash. The ship itself did not escape unscathed. What had been their vehicle became their prison. The buckled lock could not be opened from the inside and they had no other means of getting free. The air was slowly running out.

The planet they had hit was raw and primitive by their own standards, but it did hold intelligent life. One of the natives found the ship. Dare the trapped space travellers hope for a miracle? If they got out what kind of strange life forms would they be involved with? Could they hope to find the types of raw materials which would get their crippled ship into space again? If not, could they face life sentences on this strange, unknown, primitive world...?

Faced by a thousand fantastic difficulties the astronauts battled untiringly for their right to survive.

The ties of home were strong. In a few years man gets attached to bricks and mortar, and scenery. In a hundred years roots are so deep that no one wants to tear them up. In a thousand years it is quite unthinkable. In a million years, only a lunatic would want to leave...

Then came the alien, presenting an impossible choice... Humanity must leave Earth - or die! Behind them was everything they had known. In front of them, an unknown to-morrow.

Which were the greater - the hazards of remaining, or the dangers of the infinite void ahead?

Could they trust the alien?

He said there was another world, a safe world, that would be a new home - but was it all a trap?

There were dangers out there. The dangers of a population confined in ships for half a life-time; the dangers of cosmic radiation; danger of attacks by the 'Others'!

Only men of the highest courage and the greatest integrity could hope to survive in the raw, searing savagery of the unknown...