Captain Jaidee Rojjanasukchai is a machete-wielding customs officer whose job it is to inspect imported goods so that Bangkok can avoid the infectious blister rust, a disease that kills the genetically-modified food that is now the world’s sustenance. Lieutenant Kanya Chirathivat counts bribe money used by foreign companies landing dirigibles at a coastal airfield, so that their imports will be accepted. One dirigible, with the name of Carlyle & Sons, flees as it is about to land because it knows it will be subject to inspection. Its owner, Richard Carlyle, is very corrupt; Jaidee describes him as a man “who speaks so casually about changing pollution credit systems, of removing quarantine inspections, of streamlining everything that has kept the [Thai] Kingdom alive as other countries have collapsed” (51). Instead of permitting the bribed imports to enter the country, Jaidee orders them burned, so that the companies with whom he and Kanya deal know their place. Besides, Jaidee says, the companies’ insurance companies will compensate the loss.

Jaidee arrives home late from work. His wife, Chaya, expresses concern for her safety, for she has lost fingers in a past conflict involving her husband.