Inventor Michael Holt is convinced that evolution was triggered millions of years ago on Earth by clouds of cosmic radioactive energy in space, and has calculated that one of these clouds is soon going to pass near Earth. Together with his friend, adventurer Rex Mason, Holt convinces Aaron Stone, his former classmate at MIT and now CEO of Stone Industries, to allow him access to his privately-owned space station to test the effects of a biological sample with exposure to the cloud. Stone agrees in exchange for control over the experiment and a majority of the profits from whatever benefits that it brings. Holt brings aboard his ex-girlfriend and Stone's chief genetics researcher, Linnya Wazzo, and her hot-headed ex-thief half-brother, Patrick O'Brian.
