The Earth is the graveyard of billions, thanks to mathematician and rogue cryptographer Jack Potter and the treacherous extraterrestrial creature known as Wheeler, Jack's one-time business partner in the trade of alien and human technologies.But Potter and a handful of others managed to escape the holocaust thanks to the miracle of teleportation. From the cold gray ruins of the Moon, the last pitiful remnants of the human race now stare down at the devastation that one of their diminished species unwittingly helped to bring about. Here at civilization's end, a beautiful Chinese mind assassin, a cold-blooded cybernetics genius, a DNA-manipulating "gene witch," and Jack himself stand at the threshold of a new day -- when accelerated evolution will open the door to the full achievement of human potential; when the epic saga of humanity will begin again and Jack will ultimately be redeemed...if he doesn't go insane first.

But Wheeler is still out there -- and out to finish what he started. And this universe isn't big enough for Jack Potter to hide himself in.