The Contessa Lines cruise ship, the Nerissa, is the nexus for a disparate cast of nefarious factions. Two cunning and cold-blooded killers have smuggled themselves aboard, disguised as their murder victims, their motives unknown. And members of the Foundation, a mysterious cult, have infiltrated the passenger list, with their own sinister agenda to take over the ship. When they strike, they disrupt the on-board wedding ceremony of police officer David Spaulding and his fiancee Deborah Corliss. Can the ship's captain, aided by David and his new friend, author and anthropologist Richard Black Wolf, regain control of the Nerissa before it is too late? Or will this ship of fools meet disaster at the bottom of the ocean?