Matthew Reilly - Temple

Bam! The body went still.

Race couldn’t believe it.

It was like navigating your way through a fog-enshrouded maze while being protected by a guardian angel. All he could do was just keep running—keep moving forward—while Doogie took care of the dangers all around him, dangers which he himself couldn’t see.

He heard more muddy footsteps—heavier this time—the four-legged variety.

Bam.

Smack.

Splat.

Up on the citadel, Doogie swore.

That last hit had run him dry. He was out of ammo. He ducked behind the parapet and frantically began to reload.

Over by the river, Van Lewen hung from the underside of the upturned ATV, heaving on it with all his weight, conscious of the fact that there were rapas out there in the mist behind him.

‘Get your weight up higher!” he called to Nash and the others inside the vehicle. ‘We’ve got to tip it over!’

They moved instantly and almost immediately the ATV— already precariously balanced on its side—began to tip over.

Van Lewen quickly scurried out of its way, just as— whump—the big eight-wheeler landed on its tyres and he hurried for the door on its side.

Race was still running hard through the mist when suddenly, like a curtain being drawn to reveal a stage, the veil of fog before him parted and he beheld the citadel.

It was then that he heard the clack-clack of a safety being released on a G-11 somewhere nearby and he froze and slowly turned—and saw the last Nazi commando standing in the fog behind him, his G-11 aimed squarely at Race’s head.

Race waited for the now-familiar report of Doogie’s sniper rifle. But it never came.

Why wasn’t he firing anymore?

And then abruptly there came an almighty roar, which Race translated as the roar of one of the cats.

But it wasn’t the roar of a cat.

It was the roar of an engine.

The next instant, the ATV came exploding out of the mist and slammed into the Nazi commando’s back.

The Nazi fell, crushed beneath the big all-terrain vehicle, and even Race himself had to dive out of the way as the ATV rumbled past him and skidded to a halt in front of the citadel—stopping right in front of the fortress’s entrance, aligning itself so that its sliding lefthand door opened flush onto the citadel’s doorway.

A second later, Race saw the rear hatch of the ATV pop open and Van Lewen’s head appear.

‘Hey, Professor, you coming or what?’

Race leapt up onto the back of the vehicle and dived headfirst into its hatch. No sooner was he inside than Van Lewen slammed the steel hatch shut behind him with a loud resounding thud.

‘They got the idol,’ Van Lewen said, sitting on the floor of the citadel, surrounded by the others, in the half-light of their flashlights. The open door of the ATV was behind him, completely filling the wide stone doorway of the citadel.

‘Fuck,’ Lauren said. ‘If they get that thyrium to a workable Supernova we’re screwed..’

“What are we going to do?’ Johann Krauss said.

“We’re going to get it back,’ Nash said flatly.

‘But how?’ Troy Copeland said.

‘We have to go after them now,” Van Lewen said. ‘They’re at their most vulnerable right now. They came here to grab the idol and then, presumably, take it back to wherever it is they’re keeping their Supernova. But on a snatch-and-grab mission like the one they just pulled, you’re at your most vulnerable when you’re in transit from the target objective.’

‘So where is their home base?’

‘It has to be close,’ Race said firmly surprising everyone with his conviction, including himself. ‘Judging by the way they got here.’

‘And how exactly did they get here, Professor?’

Copeland said disbelievingly.

‘I don’t know for sure,’ Race said, ‘but I think I can make a pretty good guess. One, they got here using a method of transport that avoided detection by your fancy SAT-SN network, so they didn’t fly. Two, aside from flying and travelling on foot, what’s the quickest and easiest way to get a force of about thirty men through the rainforest?’

‘Oh, damn, why didn’t I think of that…’ Lauren said.

‘What?’ Copeland said irritably.

‘The rivers,’ she said.

‘Exactly,’ Race said. ‘They came here by boat. Which means their base of operations can’t be too far aw—’ He cut himself off.

‘So where is it?’ Nash said. ‘Where is their base of operations?’

But Race wasn’t listening. Something had just clicked in the back of his mind.

Base of operations…

Where had he heard those words before?

‘Professor Race?’ Nash said.

No, wait. He hadn’t heard them at all.

He had seen them.

And then suddenly it hit him.

‘Lauren, do we still have that telephone transcript here?

The one with the Nazis’ ransom demand on it. The telephone conversation that the BKA intercepted between a cellular phone somewhere in Peru and Colonia Alemania.”

Lauren spun and .immediately began rummaging

through the equipment in the darkened citadel.

‘Got it.’ She handed a sheet of paper to him.

Race looked at the transcript that he’d seen earlier.

VOICE 1: —-base of operations has been established—-rest of the—-will be—-mine—-

VOICE 2: —-about the device?—-ready?

VOICE 1: —-have adopted hourglass formation based on the American model—-two thermonuclear detonators mounted above and below a titanium-alloy inner chamber. Field tests indicate that—-device—-operational.

All we need now—-the thyrium. VOICE 2: —-don’t worry, Anistaze’s taking care of that—- VOICE 1: What about the message?

VOICE 2: —-will go out as soon as we get the idol—-to every Prime Minister and President in the EU—-plus the President of the United States via internal emergency hotline-ransom will be one hundred billion dollars U.S.—- or else we detonate the device…

Race’s eyes zeroed in on the first two lines of the transcript.

VOICE 1: —-base of operations has been established—-rest of the—-will be—-mine—-

‘Will be mine…’ Race said aloud. ‘Mine… the mine.’

He turned to Lauren. ‘What was the name of that abandoned goldmine we saw from the Huey on our way here?

The one that was all lit up? The one that didn’t look all that abandoned anymore.’

‘The Madre de Dios goldmine,’ Lauren said.

‘Is it situated on a river?’

‘Yes, on the Alto Purus. Nearly all the open-cut mines in the Amazon are situated on rivers, because seaplanes and boats are the only way to get the gold out of here.’

‘How far away is it from here?’

‘I don’t know. Sixty, seventy miles.’

Race turned to Nash. ‘That’s where they’re going, Colonel. The Madre de Dios goldmine. By boat.’

Heinrich Anistaze crashed through the undergrowth, forging his way eastward until at last he pushed aside the final branch and was confronted by a truly spectacular sight.

The Amazon rainforest spread out before him like a lush green carpet running all the way to the horizon.

Anistaze was standing at the edge of the tableland—at the top of a sheer, foliage-covered cliff that overlooked the rainforest. To his immediate right was a magnificent two hundred-foot waterfall that flowed out over the tableland, the end product of the caiman-infested river that ran alongside Vilcafor.

Anistaze ignored the waterfall.

Of more importance to him was what lay at its base, in the wide section of river down there.

He smiled at the sight.

Yes…

Then, with the idol under his arm, he quickly began to climb down the set of ropes that snaked their way up the cliff-face, heading down to the river.