Without war, there is no peace. Without chaos, no calm. Without poverty, no riches.

Our role is to keep society in balance. To ensure no government becomes too strong. No country too powerful.

Equilibrium is shaping the future. Ensuring we have a future. A future that we own …

‘They’re a bunch of megalomaniacs!’ exclaimed Connor as they huddled round Amir’s tablet and read the document displayed on the screen.

Amir nodded and continued to study the files. ‘Equilibrium is a multinational criminal organization with its central cell in China. According to this statement, its goal is to destabilize the world in order to enhance its own global domination. One method of doing this is to infiltrate governments, then acquire stakes in critical infrastructure and natural resources.’

‘So Equilibrium is ultimately about money and power?’ said Zhen.

‘Yes,’ replied Amir, his eyes racing over the files. ‘As far as I can tell, Equilibrium functions like a company with its own Board of Directors, each responsible for a different territory, with China’s Director being the chairman of the Board. Think of it like the mythical beast of the Hydra – a many-headed snake that survives even if you cut one of its heads off.’

Connor’s brow furrowed. ‘Didn’t Hercules kill the Hydra?’

Amir nodded. ‘He chopped the heads off, then used a firebrand to stop them growing back.’

Connor tapped the flash drive. ‘So, this is our Hercules. Somehow we need to expose the Chinese head and stop it ever growing back. Then we destroy the others. OK, who’s on this Board of Directors?’

Amir buried deeper into the personnel folder, but each file came up virtually blank, only stating a location and contact number. ‘As you can see, there’s very little, if any, information on them. In fact, it appears they go to great lengths to remain anonymous. I’ve only a corporate structure to go by for any evidence they actually exist. However, those beneath the Director are identified.’

Amir clicked on a link to reveal a greasy black-haired man with a poor complexion and close-set mud-brown eyes magnified behind rimless glasses.

Zhen gasped. ‘That’s Liu Yan!’

‘Who?’ asked Connor.

‘Chairman of the Politburo Standing Committee. The third most powerful man in the Communist Party.’

‘He’s not the only one of influence under Equilibrium’s employ,’ said Amir, opening several more files. ‘There’s the vice-president of the Xinhua News Agency, the CEO of China Investment Corporation, and even the Minister of National Defence!’

Connor stared aghast at Amir. ‘Our enemy’s even more powerful than I feared. What information do you have on the Hive itself?’

‘As we already know, it’s the headquarters of their Chinese operations. But it’s also the heart of their cybernetics programme – hence the high-tech medical facilities. Equilibrium’s people don’t just want to rule the world – it appears they want to rule the future as well.’

Amir pulled up a series of documents with schematics of robotic limbs, microprocessors and human bodies. He ran through them. ‘There are projects here for artificial intelligence, voice cloning, biomechanics, genetic modification, human augmentation –’

‘Human what?’ asked Zhen, struggling to keep up.

Amir leant back in his chair. ‘Basically, they’re attempting to create super-humans.’ He ran his finger down the screen, reeling off the projects. ‘Strength enhancement, night-vision capabilities, cerebral uplinks to the internet … this is scarily advanced stuff. We’re talking real-life cyborgs. Human Terminators!’

Zhen bit her lip anxiously. ‘Will we have to fight these cyborgs?’

Amir squinted at the screen, then shook his head. ‘Most of it seems to be in the developmental stages still. But this is definitely Equilibrium’s endgame.’

‘They have to be stopped,’ declared Connor. ‘But, before we attempt to chop the head off this snake, we first need to rescue our friends. If we can locate them and alert the ship’s captain, then Equilibrium will no longer have that hold over us.’ He looked at Amir. ‘Equilibrium must have tracking information on their whereabouts. Having broken the encryption on these files, do you think you can hack into their computer system like Bugsy did?’

Amir whistled through his teeth. ‘It’ll be risky, but I can give it a go. Bugsy left a pathway link to their mainframe’s back door … if it’s still active, that is.’ He went online, his fingers flying over the keyboard. ‘First I’ll have to set up a Tor router, then bounce our signal through multiple nodes, so our location can’t be pinged easily.’ After several minutes of furious typing, Amir turned to Connor and Zhen. ‘Here goes nothing.’

He executed the link to the mainframe. The screen flashed once, then went blank.

Amir slumped in his seat and sighed. ‘Sorry, the link’s dead.’

Then a cursor flashed in the top left corner.

‘Hang on …’ He straightened and smiled. ‘I think we’re in.’

Connor leant over his friend’s shoulder as Amir began to tap away on the keyboard. ‘This’ll be like hunting for a needle in a haystack. It’ll take some time –’ Suddenly the cursor went haywire and streams of numbers began filling the screen. Amir swore, stabbing at the tablet’s power button. The computer refused to power down.

‘They’re back-tracing all the IP addresses!’ cried Amir as he tried to disconnect the flash drive to prevent corruption of the files. But the system was locked down. Amir picked up the tablet and smashed it repeatedly on the edge of the workbench until the computer was little more than fragments of circuit board.

‘You’re making a habit of that,’ said Connor, eyeing the remains of the wrecked device strewn across the bench and floor.

‘Old-fashioned kill switch,’ said Amir, panting. He looked at Connor, a sheen of sweat on his brow. ‘Sorry. Equilibrium blocked the back door and left a trap!’

‘Did they locate us?’ Connor was already reaching for his Go-bag and preparing to make a swift exit.

‘I’d set up the Tor router over a VPN,’ explained Amir, as if Connor knew what he was talking about. ‘It shouldn’t have been traceable. I’m pretty confident they didn’t reverse-engineer the IPs all the way. Not in the time we were online.’

‘Good,’ said Connor, settling back down and dropping his Go-bag. ‘Now, is there any other way to access their server?’

Amir looked along the workbench, cluttered with piles of electronic gear, a pair of sleek laptops and other high-tech surveillance equipment Bugsy had acquired. ‘The only way would be a physical link. Someone would need to enter the Hive and plug a transmitter directly into the mainframe. But we’d have to be crazy to attempt that.’

Connor slid one of the laptops, along with a bunch of surveillance gear, over to Amir. ‘As Sun Tzu once said, every plan is crazy before the battle, but sane in victory.’

Zhen’s brow creased. ‘I don’t think he ever d–’

Connor kicked her shin under the table and smiled pointedly at her. ‘Time to work out a plan.’