There is jealousy, murder, intrigue, and a hint of the mythic supernatural at an isolated construction camp in Northern Canada. The world has tipped over the predicted environmental cliff, the skies are orange, and the outside world is disintegrating as the tropics burn and the Arctic ice cap disappears. A work crew is building a new highway to a gold mine because the melting permafrost has destroyed the old road. Doc, the camp medic, is a divorced, struck-off doctor, intent on indulging the many sides of his sexual nature, who uncovers an illicit trade in strange stones that the workers have found during the road excavations. The site of the crystals is a bony-fingered geological anomaly, guarded by an army of vulture-like birds who take offense to the disturbance, spreading fear and panic among the workmen. The diverse and willful crew must unite to survive a flash forest fire and a rash of grisly deaths.