In a medically advanced future offering humans near-immortality, human clones are created from collections of people--grand and sophisticated averages of a group. Unwilling to risk the possibility of accidental death in deep-space exploration, groups of 'compilation' humans are sent out into the galaxy on world-hopping adventures. Upon their return to Earth, the compilations are ceremonially sacrificed to redistribute the brain back to the group, allowing the sedentary humans to escape the boredom of existence in the remembered excitement, danger, and beauty of the galaxy. When a compilation has second thoughts the night before her sacrifice, she gains an unlikely accomplice as she attempts to escape her grim destiny.