Unable to walk due to a spinal birth defect, Kaylee Parker has devoted her life to science, hoping to find a cure for her condition one day. However, right when she's on the cusp of a breakthrough, a freak solar event destroys most life on Earth and devastates civilization. Kaylee survives, but it seems like her dream of walking has been destroyed as well. The surviving humans prove to be remarkably versatile though, and soon they are hard at work rebuilding their world, housing people in two domed cities known as New Washington and New Los Angeles.

As a top scientific mind, Kaylee is soon recruited to work in New Washington's cutting-edge science department. Through a seemingly miraculous twist of fate, she is also able to recover some of her pre-disaster research and continue her experiments, though she must do so in secret. Unbeknownst to her, another major technological breakthrough is on the horizon. Fearing another potential calamity, scientists have developed a virtual world that humanity can escape to in the event that the domed cities fail, and life in the real world is no longer tenable. The hope is that if that worst-case scenario ever occurs, people will eventually be able to download themselves into new bodies and return from their virtual exile. While most people are content with their new lives in the domed cities, those stuck on the outside are determined to bring the cities down. Just as Kaylee is on the verge of another breakthrough in her clandestine experiments, terrorists attack the cities, placing Kaylee's dream and humanity's survival in peril.