Years in the future, after the United States has another Civil War, the North and the South have split. In the North, where Ryan Prince lives, the government decides what its citizens are going to do with their lives. When Ryan receives her letter, she finds out she hasn’t been given a normal job like the rest of her family. Instead, she is whisked away and trained to be a government spy. Soon, Ryan is sent into the Dead Zone, the dangerous land separating the North from the South. There she meets Scarlet, the leader of the rebels with a complicated history of her own. As she grows closer to Scarlet while trying to uncover the rebel plans, Ryan begins to realize she will have to choose a side as she questions everything she has ever known about her life and her home.