Rita's life with an alien colony on her secluded ranch oasis in an industrial section of San Diego had been idyllic. When Rita is suddenly abducted by an authoritarian, tyrannical alien race, she must face a horrendous decision: surrender her beloved Phaedran colony to the Hagions to become their slaves, or watch helplessly as the Hagions slowly destroy Earth and humanity molecule by molecule through a silent, unseen nanotechnology assault.... To compound the problem, the Phaedrans seem inexplicably passive about their situation, offering no resistance to their captors-and worse, no cooperation in their salvation. It will take everything Rita has to outwit the Hagion race and free her colony, all while stopping the insidious destruction of humanity-a species Rita isn't sure she likes very much anymore. Rita finds cooperation from local astrophysicist Jason Childress, who has become unexpectedly sensitized to the Phaedran colony's mindlink. Jason's efforts to understand the increase in day-length and a sudden exponential global surge in natural disasters compels him to seek out Rita, if for nothing more than a receptive ear. Not finding her, he impulsively arranges an expedition to Antarctica with a colleague, where the discovery of mystifying cosmic events suggests an influencing force for which Jason has no preparation. Jason intuits that the changes in the galactic neighborhood, the tumultuous events occurring on Earth, and the lengthened day are all related...and he is certain Rita knows why. So begins the impossible war against an intractable alien force.