Sixteen-year-old Jimi knows people change, but nothing could prepare her for what's about to happen to her best friend, Del. Del is obsessed with becoming a chimera: a person who pays back-alley geneticists, known as "genies," to illegally splice animal genes into their own. The resulting physical changes have scared lawmakers into drafting legislation declaring chimeras officially nonpersons, so when Del goes missing, Jimi is desperate to find him before he alters himself forever.

As she tries to save him, Jimi must face down unscrupulous people and risk her own life, all while knowing that if getting spliced is the choice Del has made, it means he's leaving her behind forever.