Years after the apocalyptic worldwide blight decimated humanity, the isolated survivor colony in Bandon, on the Oregon coast, is just beginning to thrive when all it has built, and all it has fought for, is suddenly threatened by the appearance of a marauding force on its borders. But this is not just any force. Claiming to be representative of a new government order, the leader of this army demands unconditional surrender--or Bandon will be annihilated.
But conventional arms carried by an enemy are not all the survivors will face. A tiny microbe, as deadly to humans as the blight was to vegetation, may have been developed. And when a crippling illness sweeps through the town, Eric Fletcher, still reeling from the unexplained departure of his closest friend, finds himself facing that very man, Neil Moore, in a test that will determine if any in the tiny hamlet will survive.