As a teenager Pliny witnessed the eruption of Vesuvius from his home across the bay. Many years later, following a request from his uncle Tacitus who is an historian, he takes time off from being a lawyer to travel to Pompeii and Herculaneum where he hopes to find out what happened to his uncle, Pliny the Elder, who died in the eruption. But upon returning to his villa outside Rome, he finds a letter from the Emperor which throws the whole household into a panic.