One year ago a young archaeological intern named Rip Cantrell made an impossible discovery in the sandstone rock of the Sahara. Now, at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, scientists have recovered another such alien aircraft.

The expedition is funded by a powerful pharmacology magnate, convinced these extra terrestrial saucers are key to the breakthrough necessary for mankind to achieve intergalactic travel. Not to mention the profits associated with it.

Yet it is not only humankind with a vested interest in the discovery. For an alien refugee - stranded on earth for the past millennium, and now masquerading as one of the operation's technicians - it represents a potential beacon to his kin.

When this alien finds the aircraft's communications gear to be damaged, he is forced to make contact with the only people on earth with previous experience of summoning a saucer: Rip Cantrell, his uncle Egg, and ex-pilot Charley Pine.

As the world's population lives in fear of alien intrusion, and its powers fight for position, Rip and Charley find themselves presented with their own dilemma: to stay grounded on their earth, or to seek a destiny beyond the stars.