1954 : Vixen 03 is down. The plane, bound for the Pacific carrying thirty-six Doosmday Bombs -- canisters armed with quick-death germs of unbelievable potency -- vanishes. Vixen has, in fact, crashed into an ice-covered lake in Colorado. 1988 : Dirk Pitt, who heroically raised the Titanic, discovers the wreckage of Vixen 03. But two deadly canisters are missing. They're in the hands of a terrorist group. Their lethal mission : to sail a battleship...

In October 1943, a U.S. destroyer sailed out of Philadelphia and supposedly vanished, the result of a Navy experiment with electromagnetic radiation. The story was considered a hoax-- but now Juan Cabrillo and his Oregon colleagues aren't so sure. There is talk of a new weapon soon to be auctioned, something very dangerous to America's interests, and the rumors link it to the great inventor Nikola Tesla, who was working with the Navy when he died...