The story is set in the future, first, on a planet called Klydor, where five young exiles have been sent as punishment for various crimes by the Colonization Section of Earth's tyrannical government, also known as ColSec. As the story opens, the young people manage to hijack an Earth spaceship with the help of Bren Lathan, a renegade pilot whose own ship has crashed and left him stranded on the planet surface.

With the young exiles aboard, Lathan takes the stolen ship to Earth with hopes of starting a rebellion that will eventually free the Earth colonies, like those on Klydor, from the tyrannical control of the Earth's government. The teen-agers are to go into the decaying inner cities of the Earth and recruit freedom fighters for the coming battle from the youth gangs that roam the streets. After gathering their small army, they plan to meet with...