Darol—healthy, youngish, and fatally jaded—volunteers to test a highly experimental drug for $5,000 dollars. A veteran research subject, Darol submits to the relentless probing and bloodletting with cool detachment, relying on juvenile pranks to keep the boredom—and occasional terror—at bay. When the drug awakens a seizure disorder in the youngest recruit, who refuses to acknowledge it for fear of losing the paycheck, Darols shell of apathy begins to crack, and he finds he will do almost anything to save the kid. Almost.