An experimental weather machine, a transport ship filled with hundreds offamilies, and a troop of hired killers converge on a derelict colony world onlyto discover it's not abandoned. Lauren Moore is a brilliant young scientist and the creator of Cloudburst: amassive satellite designed to control rainfall on dry planets. Onboard a newcolony ship carrying several hundred families, soldiers and cryogenically storedanimal embryos, Lauren has been commissioned to use Cloudburst to terraform theplanet. What Lauren doesn't know is the soldiers escorting the ship have beensent to remove the existing colonists to make room for the new ones. Thecorporate term is eviction. The human term is mass murder. The only man who canhelp her is a mysterious drifter who some say is only a myth, an invention ofdesert nomads and lunatics.