A spaceship designed according to a new and untested theory, on a mission to a planet that existed in a different dimension, outside the Galilean universe, outside Einsteinian relativity.

Captain Lee Ashby, USN, was ready to retire. He wanted no more adventures in his life, no more uncertainty. But he found himself taking command of the Vortex Rider, leading a crew whose makeup made no military or scientific sense, except as colonizers of a new planet -- and they had no way of knowing whether the planet was already inhabited.