On the night of February 13, 1945, RAF and USAF bombers begin the firebombing of Dresden, Germany. Billy Pilgrim, an American prisoner of war, survives underground in a disused slaughterhouse numbered five, locked in a cold-storage meat locker two stories below ground. When Billy and the other prisoners emerge the next morning, the city above them is gone. Billy experiences this moment, as he experiences all moments, unstuck in time.