When it comes to power, sometimes the whole Universe is not enough. Two serious offices - the Technical Support Directorate, responsible for communications between planets and fleets, and the Contacts Monitoring Agency, designed to correct the mistakes of would-be progressors - are in a tense confrontation, if not at war. Neutral territory is Earth. And it is there that, by chance, senior operator of the Technical Support Department Andrei Denisov brings Paquita, a palace warrior, bodyguard of the ruler of Shira, whose civilization is thirty centuries behind modern humanity. A whole epic unfolds around attempts to hide such a malicious violation of instructions and find a way to return Paquita to his home planet: with intelligence games, blackmail, kidnappings, chases and... gladiatorial battles.