On June 30, 1997, assassin Reginald 'Reg' Cameron [Robert Patrick] enters a club and assassinate a high-ranking People's Liberation Army officer, General Wu [Nonong Talbo]. Fearing revenge, Reg must flee Hong Kong as midnight approaches and Chinese troops begin to pour into the city just as British rule ends on July 1. He must escape to avoid any further attempts on his life.
After escaping multiple assassination attempts against himself, his colleagues Simon [Brion James] and Jack [Tim Thomerson] drop him off at a safe house, Chun's Martial Arts School, owned by Reg's ex-girlfriend Katie [Ming-Na Wen] and her grandfather Master Chun [Meng-bang Li]. Katie reveals that her grandfather defected from Red China during the Cold War and will be hunted once Chinese rule goes into effect. They plan to flee on a flight to Malaysia just before midnight. Master Chun is delighted to see Reg again, but Katie dismisses him when Simon calls with information about his would-be assassins.
On his way to meet Simon and Jack, more would-be assassins close in. He is intercepted by Simon and Jack in a car where they explain that Triad gangs are after him due to the high price on his head for his earlier assassination. Knowing he must finally flee, he agrees to meet Katie and Master Chun for their flight to Malaysia. On the way he explains why he is such a successful assassin: he does not care about collateral damage because he witnessed his parents' murder in India when he was 11 years old.
At the airport, Reg prepares to part ways from Simon and Jack by handing his guns to Jack, whom Jack had not realized was an assassin at first. However, as Chun, Katie and Reg are about to board the plane, more assassins converge on the airstrip. Jack decides to shoot, killing some, but he is soon shot and killed, a blow Reg witnesses that deeply affects him. While fleeing the airport on a motorboat, Chun is shot in the arm. Reg's protégé and lover, Li [Selena Chau-yuet You], arrives at the port to help in their escape, but she is killed, and her death weighs on Reg even more than Jack's.
Needing medical attention, they stop at a Chinese checkpoint as troops roll in from the mainland. Katie is skeptical due to Chun being a defector but accepts help from the guards. Chun receives treatment and tells the others to meet him at Kennedy Port in the morning.
They eventually travel to Reg and Simon's company to call off the hit on Reg so it will be easier for them to flee the country. Going through a shootout to the main computer, they are able to mark Reg as dead and the bounty collected by Simon. But before they can escape, a colleague of Reg and Simon, Malcolm Goodchild [Andrew Divoff], appears and reveals that it was he who placed the bounty on Reg, knowing that he would be labeled as a national hero for killing an assassin of a Chinese General. Reg and Malcolm fight on an elevator and as Malcolm gains the upper hand, the door opens and Katie shoots Malcolm.
That morning, the four escape Hong Kong via boat from Kennedy Port along with Chun, who meets them there as promised.
