It's been five years since the sole survivor of an unknown race was pulled from the wreckage of an alien ship in the outer reaches of the Oort Cloud--a ship that fired on an armed UNEarth probe. A computer translates the alien's speech, but the strange prisoner won't--or can't--reveal anything the authorities want to know. Desperate for answers, UNEarth recruits a primate ethologist to interpret the alien's body language, and the bizarre 'music' salvaged from the alien ship proves instrumental in discovering the link between the two races.