Figures that pop into her head when she looks into someone’s eye. They’re schedules, the numbers. Schedules predicting with brute precision each person’s loss of life. Burdened by such grim understanding, Jem avoids associations. Until she fits Spider, another outsider, and requires a possibility. Maybe they can find happiness together, only if in the short time that continues to be before his expiration time. But on a journey to London, Jem foresees a chilling string of occasions: The city’s a target. The clock’s running out. The countdown is normally to a blowup!