 The Instrumentality stages a successful coup, but in the end it is Dunsmoore (who has been redeemed by the threat to his home planet) who hijacks the alien gravity technology and pilots Io into a diversionary orbit around the comet itself, barely saving Earth from total annihilation—though millions die as the remnants of the comet and the sulphurous outgassing of ruined Io cascade into Earth.The book pits the earth and its inhabitants against a universe of diplomatic but equally narcissistic alien lifeforms.