World War II is over, and former German intelligence officer Captain Gregor Reinhardt has returned to Berlin. A year after Germany's defeat, he has been hired back onto Berlin's civilian police force. The city is divided among the victorious allied powers, but tensions are growing, and the police are riven by internal rivalries as factions within it jockey for power and influence with Berlin's new masters. When a man is found slain in a broken-down tenement, Reinhardt embarks on a gruesome investigation uncovering a dangerous serial killer.