A fatal explosion in a Utah rocket factory kills thirteen people and destroys a building. James Martin is recruited to take over the operation where the accident occurred to replace the incumbent manager and to find out what happened in the incident. At the same time an investigative reporter is also trying to discover what happened to see if there is a story. The two run parallel investigations, one inside the company and the other outside the company.For Bernard Rasmussen, the reporter, he is trying to get the story of his career. His approaches sometimes verge on the unethical, but the story is the thing. He is convinced that there is a story somewhere in this incident and will take any and all avenues to pursue it.For James Martin it is a new experience as he and his wife, Katrina, move to Utah and he has to dig deep into his engineering training and experience to ask the right questions to get at the technical answer to the incident and then his life experiences to discover the real reason behind the incident. He is disturbed when he discovers the true nature of the Sagitta program and who has an interest in the program, which is not at all what he expects.