A young orphaned woman named Kotzebue is trying to find out who her parents are in the icy landscapes of Alaska. Kotzebue is helped by an East German librarian, whose husband was killed while fleeing from the GDR. Although both women could not be more different from each other, a fragile relationship forms.

For some disabled children during the Nazi era, their fate becomes a "journey of no return": under the pretext of being transferred to other children's homes, they are in fact subjected to medical experiments and subsequently murdered. The film's plot also weaves in a love story, a kidnapping, and a deadly escape.