Buried deep in the earth's polar ice cap--carved into moving island of ice twice the size of the United States--is a secret place, the site of a remarkable abandoned experiment that could have frightening ramifications for the planet. The brain trust of the former Soviet Union who created the seventy-year-old Ice Station Grendel would like it simply to melt from human memory. But that becomes impossible when an American undersea research vessel, the Polar Sentinel, inadvertently pulls too close to the hollowed-out iceberg ... and one of the crew sees something alive inside. Something that never should have survived. It is a discovery that sends shock waves through the intelligence communities of two powerful nations, as American and Russian scientist, soldiers, and unsuspecting civilians are pulled into Grendel's lethal vortex of secrets, violence, and betrayal. The covert battle over Grendel is spinning out of control, and the future of all human life on Earth will be altered -- or destroyed -- once its nightmarish truths are revealed.