In Los Angeles a deadly plague called the ‘Pandora’ virus is stolen from a high-security installation, and the F.B.I. calls in Agent Alec ‘Mac’ Mckay to follow up the leads. A trained virologist, he discovers the culprit is one of the world’s top researchers. He discovers the man has a safety box in a bank vault and a trap is laid to capture both the doctor and reclaim the virus. Meanwhile, Julie Hayes discovers her do-well brother Scotty has become involved in the plan to rob a bank… The very bank that the F.B.I. is now watching in their bid to reclaim the Pandora virus. An unwilling accomplice, Julie tries to alert the bank staff, unaware that the man she thinks is a bank teller is in fact Mac working undercover. Things go from bad to worse when the errant doctor, looking tense and terrified, arrives with a tall, blond-haired, leather-clad man whom the watching agents identify as St. Joy, the leader of the L.R.A., a well-known doomsday cult. St. Joy wants Pandora. He wants Pandora so badly he is willing to kill anyone who gets in his way, and he intends to release the virus into the atmosphere, killing not just himself but millions of people into the bargain. All hell breaks loose when a combination of bank robbers, St. Joy’s fanatical followers and a S.W.A.T. team all meet up in the bank, the situation then being made worse when a major earthquake hits the city. In the aftermath, it falls to Mac and Julie to try and keep the virus out of St. Joy’s hands, and a lethal game of cat-and-mouse is played out in the shattered skeleton of a great skyscraper.