There are big plans for a small town in Nevada. When a world famous architect is commissioned to design a completely enclosed city, he hires a young apprentice named Burke Isadore to translate his sketches into a three-dimensional computer model. The ambitious project is called New Moon City.

Burke is a man of his word. When he makes a promise, he intends to keep it. He has promised himself to make a difference in the world, and he sees the new city's design as a solution to environmental degradation, homelessness and isolation. But his youthful idealism leaves him with a blind spot to the intentions of others who are using the project to further their own goals, contrary to the original vision.

To complicate matters, there are some long-term employees of the master architect who are not well suited to the challenges of building the city. It falls to Burke to resolve the issues created by their foolish antics.

A newspaper reporter named Aliyah Estrella questions the entire premise of the enclosed city, known as an arcology. She thinks she would feel trapped inside a giant anthill if she were forced to live there. She also knows the local ranchers are not happy with the project, and some of her opposition articles in the small-town newspaper have raised the hackles of the powerful people behind the construction of New Moon City.

As the opposing forces head toward collision, it is left to Burke to keep his promises.