Irina learns she has inherited Huntington‘s disease, which killed her father. As she tries to cope with the diagnosis, she finds a letter he wrote to Russian chess champion Alex Beztov, who is now on a suicidal quest to unseat Vladimir Putin as president. Dad had asked him what to do when you are playing a losing match. How do you go on - and SHOULD you - when defeat is a certainty? Since Beztov never replied, Irina journeys to Russia to ask him.