It's late in the 23rd century and the aging interplanetary hauling vehicle Pequod is on a ten-year reclamation project on behalf of The Company, the corporation that has run North America since 2102. The crew is tucked away in hyper-sleep when the ship comes across a mysterious object floating in space. Awakened from their artificial slumber, they retrieve the pod and are shocked to discover the body of Virgil Nygard, executed 150 years earlier for leading his militia in the slaughter of more than a million people. They are even more shocked to discover that Nygard is alive.