Big Pete and the Swede, together with Maggie and Dolores, who is training to qualify as a space pilot, take a holiday in the miners' new spacecraft while some building work goes on at their villa. "Maybe ten weeks will do it," Maggie estimates. Pete has been summoned to his home planet, Corsair, to save them from disaster, so they set off in that direction to give Dolores more space hours, only to make a slight course error which leaves them hundreds of light-years from civilisation.

Meanwhile the Imperium declares war on the Federation, while a little personal business by one of the senators leads him off in the direction of the Viridian System to start a canny land grab.

The second in the Viridian System series takes our heroes far far from their home area, and delays Pete's urgent summons. Strange aliens cross their path, only to show that sometimes the curves in spacetime really are the quickest routes to your destination.