Twelve-year-old Sunny Nwazue, an American-born albino child of Nigerian parents, moves with her family back to Nigeria, where she learns that she has latent magical powers which she and three similarly gifted friends use to catch a serial killer.

After being captured and surgically transformed into a "special, " teenaged Tally Youngblood, now a government agent programmed to protect society from outside threats, is ordered to eliminate the rebel colony New Smoke, Tally's former home.