The Universe is nursing a morning-after hangover. That's how ex-freedom-fighter Lem Benzaran feels. Exiled after going AWOL to save her world, she lives in a changed galaxy in the aftermath of a purge that wiped entire planets clean of people like herself. A vague prophecy plagues her isolation: she's destined to cause the Universe's heat death. Jei Bereens is one of Lem's only contacts with her old life. Once his command team's golden boy, Jei's now under constant surveillance as a distrusted super-weapon. Worse, amidst waves of withdrawal from his lost love's nerve pheromone, Jei's struggling to break free of the childhood rival who's learned to use that vulnerability to trap him in his mind. That rival, Jared Diebol, now holds almost every card he needs to take full control of the forces bent on homogenizing the galaxy. Driven to desperation by Lem and Jei, Diebol's created a mind-control device that may finally turn Jei into the world-destroying machine he needs to end this war. If Lem tries to stop him, Diebol vows to kill her at Jei's hand. Between Jei's struggle for freedom, Lem's desperation to escape her destiny, and Diebol's hunt for control-someone has to give, and someone has to die.