As a baby, Tara Wolfe was kidnapped by Hong Kong triads. After a bungled ransom demand, she was taken secretly to the mainland. Now known as Wei Mei, she has known no other life but the rural village where ‘Mummy Rita’ raised her. When men with guns arrive in the village looking for her, she runs away to the Chinese megacity of Shenzhen, and a life on the streets.

Witnessed by a talent scout defending herself from an assault by three rich kids, Mei is recruited for a Communist Party school for assassins. The training is brutal, but Mei makes a couple of friends along the way: ‘Rats’ and ‘Sis’. Then, after an arduous training exercise, something happens that tears the tight-knit trio apart.