Jonas and Garianne, each seek their own way to try and end the threat the Adversary poses to the multiverse. Garianne continues to create an army of super-sentient beings, whose incredible abilities she hopes to utilise, while Jonas travels from one universe to the next on the trail of the elusive Kinsmen, who he hopes may offer them some way of stopping the enemy, an enemy whose power seems without limit. Unknown to all except Garianne, Alicia, a super-sentient whose potential far outstrips all who have come before her, is finding her own way in preventing the calamity. And all the while, the the more pressing threat of the asteroid, Sol 9173, draws closer to Earth threatening humanity's extinction.