In Eon, Axis City split into two: a segment of Naderites and some Geshels took their portion of the city out of the Way and through Thistledown into orbit around the Earth; they spend the next thirty years aiding the surviving population of Earth to heal and rebuild from the devastating effects of the Death which strains their and the Hexamon government's resources.

Firstly, to learn what has happened to the Geshels' long-sundered brethren (who took their portion of Axis City down the Way at relativistic near-light speed).

Rhita moves away from the academic institute the "Hypateion" (a reference to Hypatia) which Patricia founded and that world's version of Alexandria.

Ser Olmy is concerned by the prospects of the Way being re-opened with the attendant consequences, and by the revelation to him by an old friend that one of the deepest secrets of the Hexamon was a captured Jart whose body died in the process but whose mind was uploaded.

Its original mission, assigned to it hundreds of years ago was to engage in sabotage and transmit its freshly acquired understanding of humanity back to present command, but the return of Pavel Mirsky changes everything.

Their expedition leaves for the location of the test gate somewhere in the barbarous hinterlands of Central Asia in the nick of time, as the queen is deposed during their trip.

They begin the task of storing and digitizing all the data and life forms on Gaia to transmit down to descendant command.

Ry Oyu intends to make up for his failure to instruct Patricia properly when she was trying to open a gate back home in Eon; he correctly opens the gate, and bare moments before the Way completely disintegrates around him, finally sends her back home to an Earth where the Death did not happen.

Publishers Weekly stated in its review of the novel: "This slow, visionary tale is less than compelling, but its portrait of the different responses of intricate, interlocking cultures is striking.

"[3] It has been suggested[4] by David Langford that the physical form of the Jart specimen as described in the novel is a tribute to the real-life bizarre fossil species Hallucigenia.