Jesse Johnstone, the First of the Old Ones who having received the Ageplay treatment expect to live well into a second century, is elated. Malila Chiu, the middle-aged (although only eighteen) soldier of the damned Unity has finally been located. From the outer reaches of the atmosphere in America’s newest weapon, the R-ship, he follows her into the Scorch. From his distant youth the Scorch has been for Jesse a sanctuary, even if a bloodthirsty one. Now he finds the jungle pitted against him and his men at every turn as he chases Malila’s will-o-the-wisp signal farther into its unknowable center. As he is admitting defeat, Malila comes to him. Joyously confessing and forgiving their mutual failings the two consummate their love by the light of a newly benevolent Scorch. However, Malila returns to Jesse changed. She has become the willing Messenger of the Scorch and the conveyance for Splanch's sprouting. The sprouting announces it is the emissary to America against their common enemy, the Unity, but does so by discarding Malila, leaving her like a husk, for a time, while he presents his credentials to American authorities. Jesse is aghast. His love now carries the stuff of his nightmares. Nevertheless, Jesse determines to complete his promise, that of guarding Malila from harm, in all its shapes. They sleep apart. Meanwhile, the American spies, Will Butler, Hecate Jones, and Elise McCrory are working to obtain the critical information to save America from the looming Unity invasion. They are aided by the computer entities, Frog, Cain, and EffieCee, who have their own conflicts after the death of Edie, Malila’s computer companion. Elise is deeply suspicious of Cain, who is usually ridden by the lord of the Unity, Jourdaine. In time and not without many misgivings, she finds Cain to be a trustworthy and thoughtful friend. Due to American fecklessness, a peace treaty between it and the Scorch comes to naught and the Unity invades Georgia. Fortunately for the fate of America, notice has been provided mere hours before the attack by the spies, but they succeed only at the cost of Elise McCrory’s life. Malila awakes to find Splanch has abandoned her as Atlanta is being invaded. She and Jesse find themselves between two warring camps. Jesse feels his suspicions about the perfidy of the Scorch now justified and Malila is incensed, sending him away. He goes only when, presenting himself as a decoy during an attack, he is able to lead the Unity forces away from her. They are both eventually captured by Jourdaine, who despite being gravely injured in the crash of his skimmer has made a recovery of sorts. He is blind in his right eye and deeply paranoid. In an act of spite, Jesse is identified by Professor Nortvengler, the leader of the Syntopia, another captive. Jourdaine is delighted that he has finally captured the rustic superman of Malila’s vivid stories. He has Nortvengler Sapped, rendering him a mindless automaton like the bulk of the Unity army. Jourdaine bleeds Jesse, nearly killing him outright, for his Ageplay agent. Receiving the blood revitalizes a still recuperating and progressively megalomaniacal Jourdaine, making him, he believes, a new deity, an almost eternal ruler of the Unity. He anticipates an army living for centuries under his personal control. During the night the temperature falls from the seventies to minus forty. Troopers, whether Sapped or not, if caught out in the open, die. Sapped troopers who survive, turn on their officers. This change in temperature is managed by the R-ships, dirigible-like affairs which, residing in the frigid stratosphere, can send down toruses of super-cooled air using the “omicron-procedure.” They have done this to freeze the river allowing tanks to attack an unprotected quarter of Unity defenses. Despite the frigid temperatures and fearsome loses, American forces storm the weakened defenses of the Unity. As the sun comes up on the day of his expected triumph, Jourdaine slowly learns that his dreams of conquest have been smashed by the outlander savages. He determines to abandon his remaining troops and return to safety in the Unity, taking Malila back to the Unity as chattel for her humiliation in lieu of a military conquest. Showing her an already debilitated and Sapped Jesse to demonstrate his power over the best she imagines, Jourdaine demands she accompany him voluntarily. Malila refuses to come with him, saying she would rather die with Jesse, “the best man I know.” Jourdaine is about to have her Sapped when he is killed. Malila is found by the American forces crooning remembered lullabies to the raving Jesse. They are sent to a comfortable old house on Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga to allow Jesse, a hero of the nation, to die in quiet surroundings. There, via vivid hallucinations, Jesse retells his long painful life to Malila, unwinding it "like a ball of yarn that’s doomed to run out at the last." Sensing his imminent end, Malila, in despair, goes to the foot of the garden to collect herself and there meets Speaker, a member of the Scorch and Jesse's oldest friend/enemy. Speaker heals Jesse, for "only the wounded may heal." Jesse and Malila begin to make plans for their long life together. Inside the CORE computer of the Unity, a new entity emerges, disoriented, amnesic, and naked, knowing only the name “Cain.” During her last living moments, Cain and Frog duplicated Elise McCrory’s persona into a computer entity. When Cain arrives after seeing Jourdaine off on his ill-fated invasion, they are reunited as friends and perhaps more in a newly created Eden within the CORE.