On a January day, a Presidential inauguration day, a one-megaton blast ripped through the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C. Subsequent explosions around the globe changed the face and the shape of the earth forever. Out of the ruins emerged Deathlands. In this blasted heart of the new America, a group of people plan desperately to escape the eerie wastes and mutated life forms of their environment. Three warriors--the tough, intelligent Ryan Cawdor, a beauty called Krysty Wroth, and the armorer J.B. Dix--set out on a harrowing journey to find a rumored enclave high in the mountains.