Robert Luxley has a biological problem that he does not understand and cannot control: one touch from his bare hand will leave you paralyzed for fifteen minutes. He thinks he's one of a kind, until he meets Cassandra, another carrier of what she calls Sensory Deprivation Syndrome. Fearing discovery, Luxely follows Cassandra through a dark underground of "Deprivers" in a desperate search for her brother, Nicholas, who has been taken hostage by a radical gang of carriers with a terrifying agenda. Meanwhile, as knowledge of SDS spreads, panic erupts, and soon no Depriver anywhere will be safe.