When a mysterious meteorite inexplicably passes into the Earth's core, Wyman Ford is called to investigate. While he explores the cavernous crater, a stunned scientific community learns that a machine capable of destroying the universe has been found on one of Mars' moons. As Ford and a team of scientists race around the clock to uncover the machine's mysterious origins, they learn that in a mere 60 hours, the machine will be pointed directly at the Earth.