The people of Earth have learned to travel to the stars, though they have found no other highly developed neighbors. Earth-like planets are adapted for colonization with, in theory, due respect for any life forms already there.

When the planet now known as Gaia was discovered, it was the prize; an idyll almost perfect for humans and their chosen animals yet without any large creatures. There was one problem. A force, a something, that appeared to consume animals down to ash, but it was rare and hard to understand, and everything else was so perfect. So, despite the Hostile Amorphous Native Entities, Gaia was settled and has prospered, helped by the fact that over the generations, some Gaians developed an ability to sense and destroy HANES -- or as they are more commonly called, Hellbanes. This ability has a useful side effect. These people can fix almost anything.

Gaia was settled on the Earth Community Plan, which means that colonists set up communities according to their Earth nations and customs, and this story takes place in the English community, Anglia. Jenny Hart is an ordinary citizen leading an ordinary life until the Hellbanes begin to rise, fear drifts on the air, and everyone, but especially her childhood friend, Dan Fixer, begins to change.

Published in Irresistible Forces.