Renaldo Calabasas may be the most talented writer Heron High has produced. But at the height of the AIDS crisis and amidst the homophobia present most everywhere in 1986, not many of his fellow students seem to agree. But something changes the night Rene is struck by lightning and only his closest friend, Katie, and love interest, Tommy, can tell he's undergone some inexplicable transformation. Meanwhile in 2036, Heron High students Priss and Gaye survive an ongoing plague called "The Virus" as they try to solve the mystery of what happened fifty years earlier in what locals affectionately call "The Murder House." At the scene of the crimes, they happen upon an old self-help novel that is effectively a guide to transdimensional travel. As bodies and minds merge and travel across the astral plane, the characters discover that they are not as isolated as they often feel and that the shadow chasing them all might very well be a reflection of their own darkest secrets.