What happens when Perns turns on itself? Over seventeen turns ago a new planetoid appeared in Pern's orbit. At first Pern figured it was harmless and jokingly named it the Blue Star after the planetoid banished by Avias. Pern had become more technologically advanced since that time and believed it was safe from this seemingly benign 'star'. Only Caloiv - a starsmith knew otherwise. He had seen the thread eggs and sought to warn Pern's Weyrs only to be shot down again and again. Caloiv had only one believer - Rulani the Weyrwoman of Telgar and rider of gold Kilanth. Rulani attempted vainly to get the Weyrs prepared but she only recieved dark looks and mutters about how she was going insane.

It wasn't until Cibola's hatching that Thread fell. As Cibola's entire wingforce went to protect the ground, Telgar's fighting force made a horrifying discovery - the Thread took more than one flaming to die! Farkesk and his handler Farken prevented many tradgedies by discovering Alenthee, a plant that allowed this new Thread to be destroyed in one flaming. However Cibola and Telgar's fighting force were nearly decimated by what Telgar called Yarn - a much stronger version of thread that fell during even the cold and took too long for the grubs to eat.

While the tradegdy was occuring in the air, new colors were appearing from the clutch. Among them were the Silver queens, even more arrogant than their Gold sisters, and Coppers, the largest male dragons in the Weyr much to the dismay of Bronzes. This wasn't the first time that these colors had been seen, first among the whers and kept deadly secret, and then among the flits. But not one person truly believed that the dragons would mutate as the firelizards had, nor even as the whers had.

Not even a year passed since the birth of the new colors when a plague, borne by the thread, spread among the Weyrs during Turnover. While dragons and humans alike were affected none of the mutant colors or children caught the plague. This lead to much suspicion and begining with Telgar Hold - the banishment of all mutant creatures. This was proved futile as Cibola and Telgar Weyr stepped in and forbid such an order. Not long after the plague a host of cat-lizards, mutants as well, started attacking Holds and cotholds. Horses, a runnerbeast mutation, proved adept at battling with these creatures but foudn resistance in suspicious holds.

Seventeen turns have passed since the first Diamonds hatched from Fianth and things are not proving to get better. In fact the wherhandlers are growing restless. They fight Yarnfall when it falls at night, they defend the Holds, and promote the peace and yet what do they get? They are not tithed and their supply of candidates dwindles every turn. But that's not all - over a hudnred of the original colors have disbanded from their Weyrs to form a new one. The Western Weyr refuses to allow any mutant creature in, though they say they won't harm any young ones, they are also refusing to house or feed whatever young mutants occur. There also lies the threat of what should happen should a fully mature mutant seek entrance into the Weyr.
So, with all these problems is there a way for Pern to pull through? Or will the world of Pern finally learn what the word WAR means?