Northern Ontario in the mid-1950s: a wilderness landscape where miners in the tiny town of Valton risk their lives bringing up radioactive uranium ore from deep underground. In this savage world of rock, sky, trees, and danger, a young pre-teen's life shreds in two when he retaliates against a bully with a bloody lesson that dredges up a startling taste for violence he didn't know he had. Weakened by the encounter, he finds sanctuary in the surrounding woods but soon faces new threats to his survival. Then the mysterious voice of his broken half whispers to him as he musters what strength he has left to try to find his way home.