High above the earth, death looms. Orbiting slowly and silently, unknown to almost all ...

The White House is only starting to suspect the worst. While most of the world's Intel resources have been tied up in Afghanistan and Iraq, the President of Chechnya has been making plans - and the clock is ticking.

A world away, off Christmas Island, ex-navy operative Lachlan Fox is on a diving trip with this best friend, Alister Gammaldi. From the moment they lift a mysterious metallic object off the sea floor, the two men set in motion a chain of events that will drag them into the corrupt world of international politics and arms races.

From East Timor to Grozny, Washington to New York and Venice to Iran, Lachlan Fox is forced into an adrenaline-fuelled quest to save his friends, himself ... and the world.