Humanity stands on the brink. Again.
Surviving the Syndrome meant genetically modifying almost every person on the
planet. But norms and gems are different. Gems may have the superpowers
that once made them valuable commodities, but they also have more than
their share of the disabled, the violent and the psychotic.
After a century of servitude, freedom has come at last for the gems, and not
everyone’s happy about it. The gemtechs want to turn them back into
property. The godgangs want them dead. The norm majority is scared and
suspicious, and doesn’t know what it wants.
Eli Walker is the
scientist charged with deciding whether gems are truly human, and as
extremists on both sides raise the stakes, the conflict descends into
violence. He’s running out of time, and with advanced prototypes on the
loose, not everyone is who or what they seem. Torn between the intrigues of ruthless executive Zavcka Klist and brilliant, badly deformed gem
leader Aryel Morningstar, Eli finds himself searching for a truth that
might stop a war.