After 57 years in stasis, warrant officer Ellen Ripley is rescued from an escape shuttle. Working with the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, Ripley is sent to a space colony to investigate, after communication has been lost. Upon arrival, the team is faced with a range of alien attackers, and must fight to stay alive.

After fleeing East Germany, Kurt Barnert, an art student, now lives in West Germany. However, his past—and that of his family and his country -- begins to haunt him when he meets a fellow student, Ellie, and falls in love with her, much to her secretive father's dismay.

Marianne, a studious loner, and Connell, the popular star athlete, fall in love as teenagers. An adolescent betrayal drives them apart, and over the course of the next several years they weave in and out of each other's lives as they try desperately to get it right each time they are together.