Joshua wakes from riotous nightmares only to find that it's all real: he is not truly human. But the solicitous AI who has taken him in—an archivist of knowledge from the world before—is able to teach him a great many things about history: not only of himself, but all humanity. But there is something sinister about the seeming utopia that this AI governs. Even as Joshua sets out to discover its secrets, his old friends back in the Valley are readying for all-out revolution against the corrupt, domineering Clan that's ruled them for too long.