The story begins with the protagonist, under the alias the Technician, who is in deep cover to stop the Hezbollah terrorist organization from overthrowing the government of Tunisia.

He lives under this alias for 5 years and becomes a popular professor, until the deputy director of Central Intelligence at the CIA, Harry Dunne, confronts him with a shocking revelation.

At another point, when he is about to be shot by a former enemy, he is saved by Waller, who explains that Harry Dunne is really a part of Prometheus, an organization of business executives and powerful politicians around the world.

The members of Prometheus are pushing the Treaty on Surveillance, which would allow for an international super-FBI, and their own Richard Lanchester (a former businessman turned politician) would be at the head.

Bryson is surrounded and about to be executed when a machine he's purchased, a virtual cathode oscillator, destroys the machinery in Manning's home and disables all the "smart guns" that are trained on him.

Publishers Weekly said, "Ludlum goes full throttle in this frantically paced, if somewhat hollow, tale of one man's efforts to thwart the forces of world domination.

... Ludlum's cautionary theme - that technology will soon allow for surveillance on a scale that grossly infringes on personal privacy - gets lost in the barrage of flying bullets and explosions,"[1] and Cahners Business Information said, "the story is an exciting showcase for all the latest spy gadgetry, but it has little of the contemplative quality and social context of Ludlum's finer efforts.