The Polaris Cadets, Captain Strong, and a very obnoxious Cadet Monroe, are assigned to retrieve data from a robot rocket referred to as the "Deep Space Projectile", in the vicinity of the star Sirius. While docking with the Projectile a malfunction causes the Projectile to break away fro the Polaris and T. J. and Captain Strong find themselves spiraling in toward Sirus a white star 2.35 times as massive and 23 times as luminous as our Sun.