Captain Kevan "Mac" McDougal chose a solitary life by choice, running freight across the vast empty reaches of interstellar space. But his self-imposed isolation from the rest of the galaxy goes an unexpected step further when his ship runs into an anomaly in a distant star system. Mac's ship crashes, and he finds himself trapped on a planet where no powered systems function. Caught between rival factions formed from the survivors of past wrecks, Mac must learn to survive on a harsh world locked in a permanent winter, while trying to decipher the mystery of who or what is behind the dampening field that holds him and the other survivors hostage.