After years of stalemate, a scientific breakthrough of Promethean proportions threatens to shatter the Cold War, spelling certain victory for the side that possesses it. Secretly, the governments of both sides have developed miniaturization, a technology that allows large objects to be made small by shrinking their very atoms. Unfortunately, it's severely limited: things miniaturized soon revert to their original size. But a professor named Benes has made a breakthrough that will strip away these limitations, and military leaders on both sides are quick to see the crucial role that unfettered miniaturization could play in deciding the war. So when the unnamed Other Side fails to hold on to Benes, they attempt to kill him before he can turn the tide for Our Side--and nearly succeed.

Now Benes himself has become the backdrop for a human drama as five people submit to the most extreme miniaturization ever in order to enter Benes' body and destroy a life-threatening blood clot deep in his brain.