Prequel. The characters are the ancestors of the heroes of previous novels. The action takes place several hundred years before the events described in them and revolves around the invention of space conversion. The author of the discovery, a smart student at the Vocational University of Technology, couldn’t find a better use for it than using it to send woodlice under the clothes of his dorm neighbors. Meanwhile, the United Galactic Transportation Company (to monopolize) and the “cloak and dagger” services of the Empire (to destroy) became interested in the discovery. The author turns out to be superfluous to everyone.