Gabriel Espada, a cynical, rootless, penniless drifter is perhaps the most unlikely of heroes, but he has a mission: to discover the secret of Atlantis. The young geologist Iris Gudrundóttir senses that a chain eruption of all the major volcanoes on the planet is approaching and confides her fears to Gabriel. To avoid the catastrophe, which might provoke a new ice age, Gabriel must delve into the past. The sinking of Atlantis will offer him a key to understanding the earth’s strange behaviour.