New Jersey, 1937: A homicidal madman bears a safe holding a terrible secret that is thought lost when fiery fate intervenes. Decades later, the discovery of that secret is about to threaten the world once more.... Mining engineer Philip Mercer is in the war-torn Central African Republic searching for precious metal. There, he meets Cali Stone, a field researcher for the CDC who is investigating why a certain village suffers from one of the highest rates of cancer in the world-a fact that intrigues Mercer. Once back in the states, Mercer's search for answers leads him to a long-lost safe and a cryptic note inside that may reveal a three thousand year-old deception...