Deep in the huge Los Alamos research facility the Helios Project is about to bring commercial fusion to reality using a new and controversial technique. Suspecting sabotage to the theoretical work, project director Jeremy Newstead calls on the skills of the beautiful Lorelle Charmaine, a 23 year old mathematical genius but before she can unravel the international conspiracy set to vaporise most of New Mexico she is kidnapped and subjected to pleasure therapy which nearly destroys her and leaves her brain permanently traumatised. Helios goes ahead before Lorelle can prevent it and out of the chaos that results comes the parasphere, a radiation bubble that possesses properties that have no parallel with anything in modern physics. The parasphere is both benign and deadly and by the time its properties are understood it has set in train events that bring Lorelle and Newstead to the brink of insanity and humanity to total subjugation. As the world sinks into chaos Lorelle grapples for control of both her mind and her body. She is given just one chance to survive but by then it is almost to late. The final scene combines the skill of the scientists she worked with, her own powerful will to survive and the unique knowledge she has gained from the parasphere in an action filled resolution.