Publisher's Synopsis
It is the late twentieth century. Both the United States and the Soviet Union are about to enter outer space using nuclear-powered spaceships. Just as both countries close in on the achievement of space travel, a number of giant alien spaceships come down over every major city in the world.Five years later, these aliens, known as the Overlords, have taken control of the entire world. Their flagship is based over New York and is managed by Karellen, the Overlord who is charge of Earth-related affairs. The humans know Karellen as "the Supervisor." Karellen uses the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Stormgren, as his liaison to the human race. Once every few weeks, Karellen meets with Stormgren inside his ship. However, neither Stormgren nor any other human has ever seen what an Overlord looks like.Stormgren is attempting to placate the Freedom League, a group that opposes the Overlords' dominion, no matter how friendly the aliens seem to be. A radical fringe group of the Freedom League kidnaps Stormgren; Karellen uses Stormgren as bait so he can keep track of these radicals. The radicals do give Stormgren the idea to use a scanning device to try and find out what is inside the room where he and Karellen meet. Stormgren then meets with Karellen, who announces that the Overlords will reveal themselves in fifty years. Stormgren then uses the scanner and discovers that Karellen is on the other side of the blank "viewscreen"--it's just a piece of one-way glass. Later, as he is handing over the paperwork for the World Federation, a new world government, Stormgren uses a flashlight to sneak a glimpse of Karellen.
