Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Terry Riley can't seem to catch a break. As a senior political reporter for the Washington Post, he's received death threats and taken on his share of scumbags, but this day trumps it all. He's been skewered by corrupt local politician Senator Daniel Pritchard, served a court summons from his ex-wife, and discovered his girlfriend up and left, taking most of his stuff with her. Yep, a great day. Things are about to get worse. Riley decides to cover the first International Summit on the Environment in Mexico City. Despite still being a wanted man in Mexico, he burns to uncover the deceit surrounding Pritchard and heads south of the border. But when he arrives, he learns that thousands of Chiapas rebel villagers in the Mexican Badlands are being wiped out by a sadistic general and a mysterious epidemic, and he's landed smack in the middle of it all. Forced to align himself with a rebel leader to stay alive and to get his story, Riley is thrust into a web of political corruption, illegal drugs, and genocide. But this isn't new territory for jaded and cynical Riley, and he's about to get the story of his career... if he lives that long.