Diana Vertue, known in an earlier life as the terrifying esper Jenny Psycho, had been a hard-core terrorist and a saint of the uber-esper Mater Mundi, but she'd outgrown both those roles. She'd gone looking for the truths of her existence, the meaning and purpose behind the events that had shaped her life, and unfortunately for her, she found them. Now it's time for a psychic showdown with the Mater Mundi herself. In another part of the galaxy, Ruby Journey delivers Parliament's offer of a reprieve from Jack Random's persecution as an outlaw, as long as he joins in a desperate plan to save the Empire from the decimating forces of Shub, approaching humanity's homeworld with genocide on their artificial minds.