Five survivors try to make sense of a New World after a devastating urban catastrophe challenges their basic human needs. Set in a bleak, post-urban landscape in the aftermath of the Third World War, the film presents a strangely limited environment where a single woman and four men are forced to communicate without words as a result of destructive gasses from the war. When their pasts are erased by the war, they are forced to recreate their lives both individually and collectively. Wearing a gas mask, Yasuaki emerges from a basement shelter, where he has been hiding. He staggers to a river to get a drink, where he falls asleep and slips into the water. Yasuaki is saved from drowning by another survivor, Zorikh, a tall man with an injured leg, who teaches him how to fish. As the two eat their catch, a third survivor appears, Moises, a former clown, who still entertains by juggling. Yasuaki finds a woman, Jacqueline, a painter, while walking along in the meadows. He follows her back to her shelter and observes that she lives with Zorikh, the man who had saved him. He witnesses the abusive and violent nature of their relationship. When Zorikh discovers Moises playing music with Jacqueline, he violently attacks the clown. Yasuaki meets a fifth survivor in a tunnel, Oscar, a friendly young man wearing goggles. They team up to abduct Jacqueline in order to save her from her possessive lover. When they learn Jacqueline is pregnant, they must decide between their own selfish desires and the survival of the human race.