LAST NIGHT, a meteor crashed deep in the woods of a small farmtown in Midwest USA. Nobody knows exactly where because THEY don't want you to know - yet. When two of the local good ol' boys find the man-sized hunk of alien rock (or does it find them?), they sneak it away from the crash site to their backyard barn. When Sheriff Grace McCallister woke up this morning, the only thing on her mind was how to make it up to her girlfriend and her daughter after the huge blowout they had last night, before she ever heard anything about a meteor crashing in her county. But as the day wears into night, those good ol' boys and a batch of town regulars - including a reclusive Scientist and the local Militia - start acting strangely. Soon, it becomes clear to Sheriff Grace and a handful of survivors that the cause of all the trouble may actually only be the beginning of a much larger threat to the world, and they might be the only people on earth to stop it - if only they can figure out WHAT'S IN THE BARN ?