Sometime in the 2900's, a certain amount of civilization has been restored to the galaxy. Trade has resumed. Alien races live together on the same planets to the extent that the environment suits everyone concerned. Life is a lot more rough and tumble than it was before the collapse. Colonies lost during the dark age are starting to be rediscovered. Humanity survived, and has bounced back along with everyone else. They do not dominate. The Gillig also still exist. Neither do they dominate. Quite the opposite, in fact.

The story starts on a cruise ship, an interstellar pleasure vessel taking a tour of the ten most spectacular views in known space. When making the hyperjump to their next destination, something goes horribly awry. The ship misjumps and winds up light-centuries away from its intended destination. Worse, all the ship's major systems seem to have broken down. It can't maneuver, hyperjump, or even launch message pods or life boats. Life support, artificial gravity, sensors, and the entertainment systems seem to be all that still functions. The ship is stranded and incommunicado until repairs can be made. This is bad, but not tragic.

Then the proximity alarms go off, followed closely by the collision klaxons. Not having any way to avoid it, and unable to abandon ship, the cruise ship collides with something. Much of the ship and many of the passengers and crew are mangled and ruined as the ship crashes through into the interior of the obstruction. When everything stops moving, only about 12 people out of the 300 or so passengers and crew are still alive. The aft of the ship manages to remain relatively intact, and should be able to support the higly diminished ranks for the forseeable future, though not indefinitely. However, they are still stranded with no way other than blind luck to get them out of their predicament.

They decide to find out what they ran into. Exploring, they discover that they are embedded in the side of an old, pre-collapse starship that has had its teeth kicked in. It's completely dead. There is nothing of any use on board to help them get rescued. A short time later, they notice that the bulkheads around the wreck they call home are in slightly better shape, while the debris of their own ship is becoming less distinct. Edges are softening, paint fading. Once it becomes noticeable, the process accelerates. They realize that the derelict is somehow repairing itself, using the materials available as raw stock. And one of the passengers swears there is someone else on board with them.

Eventually, she is proven right. The power comes on in the derelict of its own accord, and shortly afterward the ship's artificial intelligence makes itself known. The personality is female. After a certain amount of negotiation the AI agrees not to kill the rest of the intruders and instead accepts them as the closest thing to a crew she's likely to have for a while.

And so this band of misfits set off in their new ship back toward civilization as they know it and try to resume their lives already in progress. Unfortunately, as they quickly learn, their new ride has some deep-seated psychological issues which threaten them and anyone else they come in contact with. And there's still the nagging possibility that the misjump that got them into this mess wasn't entirely accidental, and may have been caused by one or more of the survivors.