In provincial Tikhodonsk, unemployed Sergei Lapin ekes out a miserable existence. By force of circumstances, he finds himself in the midst of criminal squabbles between powerful financial groups. But Lapin does not know that his memory is blocked and in fact he is a different person - an agent of the powerful and completely unknown intelligence service of the former USSR, Max Kardanov. Diamonds worth three billion dollars that disappeared during the 1991 coup are associated with his name. Both former colleagues and bandits begin to hunt for Kardanov, and he is looking for the key to his own subconscious. And, having found it, he himself goes on the offensive.