Malada is of the Watchers, those who roam the desert. She feels the spirit of the Waste but gives up her role to another-one who needed it more. Malada travels to the port with her father to trade their finds from a vanished civilization. In the chaos of the port, she sees what appears to be a very large lizard on the outside of a ship berthed there. Frightened by something she cannot name, Malada hides behind Joun.

Zet is an alien bred by entities he killed to escape. Taken in by the Demon gang on Calius, he works as hard as any of them to buy their ship. Second Engineer, he combs the ship, looking for anything that needs repair. On the skin, he catches sight of the Watcher female and feels things he had never experienced before.

Zet is an alien made up of various bits of DNA and formed in a laboratory. Malada is a human female raised in a desert culture generations old, how can it ever work?