Spring 1942 and Russian forces prepare to stem a remorseless advancing tide. Only a bitter Russian winter had halted the German advance following their shock 'Operation Barbarossa' invasion of the previous June. Major Russian counter-offences during those long winter months had come to no avail. Natalya Dimitrieva, a young experienced flier, enlists with the demoralized and depleted Russian Army Air Force to avenge the death of her father at the hands of the Luftwaffe. Amidst a background of uncertainty, suspicion and male chauvinism, she is appointed as a ferry pilot to a backwater maintenance division. To add to her disappointment at this posting she is faced with the apathy of her senior officer Sergei Zhelkov and her ambitions are frustrated until a sudden mysterious and tragic event propels her to the forefront of Russia's grim struggle for survival. Natalya and Sergei are drawn together when they find themselves embroiled in a vendetta against their own Russian Commander Voronchev in collusion with his German cousin, fighter ace Hessler. Her initial success is surprising, but is it entirely due to her innate ability or is the ghost of Sergei's dead brother riding in the cockpit? Natalya pursues her objectives, through the cataclysmic destruction of Stalingrad and beyond, stalked by Hessler in his obsessive quest for revenge.