In 1944, 14-year-old Thomas is convoked to fight in the German Army. He survives, but his town is destroyed, his family dies in a bombing and his sweetheart Melanie is raped and murdered by the Russian Army. A Commissar brings the orphan Thomas to Soviet Union, and he is sent to the military school. Years later, Thomas becomes an agent of KGB and in 1962, during the Cold War, he is assigned to work in London. Living with ghosts from the past in constant fear and paranoia, he meets the black Londoner Yvonne, who gives him the strength of joy.