Dr. Holly Truong is a woman haunted by her past.  Specifically, her relationship with her mother who abandoned her as a child to go do research in an obscure corner of the world. So when she receives news that her estranged parent has been found dead under mysterious circumstances in faraway Melanesia, she is compelled to put everything on the back burner and go in search of answers.

Waiting for her there is something completely unexpected. Recreation of alien life, made possible by a private SETI program called Metis Eye. Unsettling and fascinating in equal parts, the creatures represent life as never encountered before—an evolutionary pathway only hinted at but never perfected on Earth.

However, she soon finds out that there’s more to the island than meets the eye. Lurking deep within its forbidden zones is something far more terrifying than biological horrors. A secret, that if left uncovered, could spell the end of civilization itself. And there are people who seek nothing less.

As conflict over control of the island looms, Truong is on a clock to decipher the clues left by her mother and reach the prize before anyone else. But that’s the easy part.

The hard part is staying alive.