In the decades after tomorrow, the intersection of emerging technologies like AI, gene editing, and 3D printing gives ordinary people unprecedented power to remake themselves and their environment, which they use for frivolous, dangerous, and even sinister ends.

After a series of high-profile calamities, the U.S. Congress passes the controversial Science and Technology Control Act, which licenses and regulates the practice of science. While serious infractions are rare, the increasing number of extraordinary threats are investigated by the Science Control Agency's secretive Section 08: Crimes Division.

After a stint in federal prison for trying to save the world, Nio is done with the spotlight. She spends her days in front of a computer, quietly helping others with problems no one else can solve.

When a case turns unexpectedly deadly, she travels to rural America to stop a hi-tech psychopath who tortures his victims via their own devices. Arrested by mistake, she's given a choice: return to prison or assist the investigation into the unexplained death of a renowned physicist—who happens to be her brother.

Shackled to a disgraced FBI agent assigned to protect her, Nio and her new partner soon discover her brother's strange obsession with the paranormal may have been a cypher for something darker still. Pursued by his shadowy enemies and dodging the twisted affections of her rival, Nio has just days to discover the truth. But in a world made plastic by technology, truth is never the same twice.