On his way on a diplomatic mission into the Blue empire, Tatcher, a Terran diplomat, finds himself in the middle of a raging battle between ten thousand Blue ships and a few hundreds Laren opponents. To his dismay, he sees the Larens completely destroy the Blue fleet. Since the Larens have such an obvious technological advance over the Milky Way inhabitants, Tatcher is pretty much convinced that this was just a demonstration to show the people of the Galaxy that resistance is futile against the Laren empire.

Tatcher makes contact with the Blue empire and, secretly, informs them about the real issue behind Perry Rhodan being nominated as First Hetran of the Milky Way. First incredulous and hostile, the Blues eventually understand the part that Rhodan is playing and agree to cooperate with the Terrans.

On the Earth, Rhodan, Bully, Tifflor and Hotrenor-Taak are talking. The Laren informs them that they must convince all the people of their galaxy to disarm their fleet, and that the Terrans must relinquish control of the Moon shipyard to the Larens. Rhodan reluctantly complies.

Since he escaped the rebel ship, Atlan is more and more suspected by Hotrenor-Taak to be on the side of Roctin-Par. He secretly goes to the Moon with two of his agents, Tatcher and his companion, Rorvic, a half-Cynos who has the ability to materialize visions. There, he meets with Rhodan who informs him of the latest Laren moves. Rhodan says he cannot let Nathan fall in the hands of the Larens and decides to transfer its knowledge in a safe place. Atlan violently disagrees and tells Rhodan that taking such a risk is suicidary. Nathan should be destroyed immediately. The two immortals cannot agree and Atlan leaves the room, furious.

Once alone, he tells the USO agents he intends to destroy the Moon computer despite Rhodan's opposition. He successfully convinces Ras Tschubai and Pucky to help him out. The small team manage to enter the restricted areas of Nathan, but the computer eventually reacts and protects itself with an Anti-Temporal Field, thus placing itself five minutes away in the future.

Meanwhile, Rhodan is having a confusing dream showing a different reality, in which he meets with Atlan and it turns out that the Larens never existed. His dream is interrupted when he is awakened by the alarm set off by Nathan when it realizes it is under attack.

Thanks to Rorvic's ability and Tatcher's diplomatic skills, the protection field is deactivated and Nathan is brought back into the present, where Atlan eventually disconnects it. Hotrenor-Taak is mad at Rhodan and orders him to chase Atlan and bring him before the Larens, so that he can be tried and most likely, executed.

In a final debriefing, Rorvic tells Tatcher that he believes Nathan didn't actually die but took steps in order to stay alive without endangering the Humans. The half-Cynos suspects Nathan is now gone on another plane of existence. It was probably responsible for the very vivid dream that Rhodan had.