Dr. Andrew Moore, a prominent virologist, returns to his office in San Francisco after a conference to find a cryptic postcard from his old college roommate and ex colleague, Roger Northwood. Upon calling his friend's lab in Cambridge, Andrew learns that Roger has just been murdered by an intruder he interrupted stealing research files from the lab. The postcard suddenly takes on new meaning as Andrew tries to discover what Roger was trying to tell him. Could it be he found a solution to the bottlenecks of their original research years ago, and was killed by people intent on stealing the valuable work? On a journey that takes him around the world and brings him face to face with tycoons that will stop at nothing to get what they want, Andrew races against the clock not only to save the love of his life, but to unlock the secret that could cure the world's greatest epidemic...