Can the new planet turn out to be the long-awaited paradise? Alara was supposed to be a new home for Earthlings. A small group of engineers in the First City of Alara are waiting for the arrival of the Ark - a spaceship carrying colonizers from Earth, four hundred light years away. There are the engineers' relatives, the necessary specialists and - most importantly - new settlers who are to populate the frosty planet. But the long-awaited arrival of the Ark is not a dream come true, but a terrifying discovery that engineers will have to face.
—G