No parents. No power. No surrender. Welcome to Olivia Rifka's world. A sixteen-year-old living in the abandoned school building of De Novo High, she and hundreds of other fellow orphans must survive by hiding and stealing. When a virus is unleashed on the school by the Alliance-the government intent on finding them-Olivia and a group of other defiant De Novians embark on a journey to retrieve the antidote. Unfortunately, not everyone on the journey is who they seem to be, and Olivia isn't sure who she can trust-especially not Levi, the strange newcomer who seems oddly familiar to her. As time reveals growing hostilities and bitter betrayals, Olivia discovers that corruption is only avoided when using God's moral standards-but is it too late for the other De Novians to discover this fact and be saved from a terrible fate?