The earth's magnetic poles have reversed and civilization has just had its clock reset to the great cosmic flashing 12:00am from almost a million years ago, and humanity, and everybody in it, is pretty much forgetting everything it learned since the last time.
Everybody except Hertell Daggett, who remembers pretty much everything because he'd once been shot in the head - the doctors got the bullet out, but missed a few tiny specks of copper that remained, floating inside his brain, connecting him to the things everybody else on earth is slowly forgetting.
Hertell sees an opportunity to start civilization all over again, and maybe even get it right this time. What could possibly go wrong?