Matthew Reilly - Temple

Duck!’ and the two of them yanked their bodies down just as a low-hanging branch whistled by over their heads.

‘Thanks!’ Van Lewen yelled.

‘No problem!’

And then through the lattice of dark tree trunks ahead of him he saw daylight. Heavy, grey, late-afternoon daylight.

‘All right, everyone,’ Van Lewen said. ‘Arrowhead formation. Doogie and Molke, you take the lead. Agents Schroeder and Becker, you’ve got the left. Professor Race and I will cover the right. Okay; you all ready?’ The big Green Beret raised his M-16 in one hand while he held onto Race with the other.

Up ahead, Race saw Doogie and Molke lift their own M16s.

‘Ready,” Doogie’s voice came back.

The three Germans called in. ‘Ready-Ready-Ready.“

‘Professor?’

‘As ready as I’ll ever be,’ Race said.

‘Then let’s rock,’ Van Lewen said.

The three American-German Jet Raiders burst out from the treeline in a perfect arrowhead formation right alongside the Nazi armada and in an instant Race found himself shooting across the water in the midst of four Nazi jet Raiders!

The four Nazis turned as one to see the three American rivefbikes, total surprise in their eyes, They reached for their guns fast as Van Lewen called, ‘Doogie! Take left!’ and the two Green Berets let fly in both directions with simultaneous bursts of M16 gunfire. The four Nazis were blasted off their riverbike in an instant as the three stolen jet Raiders whipped past them.

As he shot by the fallen Nazis, Race turned in his seat to s.ee several sets of ripples cut a beeline through the water toward them.

The 4aimans…

And then suddenly a line of 20ram bullet holes raked the water on either side of his speeding jet Raider and he was instantly snapped out of his trance.

He Spun quickly and saw two attack boats—one Rigid Raider and one Pibber patrol boat—swing in quickly behind them, the Pibber firing wildly -with its turret-mounted 20mm cannon.

Race gunned the accelerator and his riverbike surged forward, Behind him, Van Lewen swivelled around on the Saddle so that he was now facing backwards, levelled his M-16 and opened fire on their pursuers; His volley of mace fire strafed both boats cracking the windshield of the Pibber and nailing three of the four men on board the Rigid Raider.

Then, abruptly, the whole fleet veered left as it rounded another bend in the river;

‘Everybody! Bank hard left!’ Van Lewen yelled.

‘Left?’ Race shouted confused.

‘Through the trees again! We’ve got to get to that command boat!

At that moment, more gunfire rang out all around them as Pvo Nazi riverbikes swung in behind them.

Bullets flew everywhere; whizzed over Race’s head, and then suddenly—sprack! Race saw a hideous gout of blood splash out from Doogie’s left shoulder as the young Green Beret was hit.

‘Arrrggghhh!” Doogie’s voice roared over the radio, but somehow he managed to keep up his speed.

Voom-voom-voom. The three American riverbikes shot into the treeline—Renee and Schroeder first, Doogie and Molke second, Race and Van Lewen last of all.

They were followed a split second later by the two Nazi bikes.

Bullets smacked against the tree trunks just above Race’s head as he flew by them at phenomenal speed. Low-hanging branches rushed at him. Each time he saw one approaching, he yelled at Van Lewen—still facing backwards—and ordered 1-rim to duck

Van Lewen was firing hard with his M-16 at the two Nazi riverbikes close behind them, but the Nazis found cover behind the tees, and after an extended burst of fire Van Lewen suddenly went dry.

Seeing the chance the two Nazi Jet Raiders closed in.

One of them pulled up quickly alongside Race and Van Lewen’s riverbike, sped along the water on their righthand side, and the Nazi rider immediately drew a Glock from his saddlebag. With nothing else to call on, Van Lewen swung his empty M-16 like a baseball bat, hitting the Nazi’s pistol clean out of his hand—just as the trees all around the two speeding jet Raiders splintered violently under the weight of a burst of G-11 gunfire!

Van Lewen and Race ducked instantly as the second Nazi Jet Raider roared out of the trees to their left and slammed into the side of their riverbike, Race was almost jolted out of his seat by the impact but somehow he managed to hold on. He kept his speed up banked quickly to avoid an onrushing tree. Then he glanced left; tried get a look at his new assailant—and found himself staring into the barrel of a G11 supermachine-gun.

Race looked up from the barrel and saw the face of its holder, grinning evilly, smiling with delight.

And then—SMACK!—the Nazi was crunched out of sight as his jet Raider slammed at full speed into the centre of a thick black tree trunk and his riverbike exploded into a great billowing fireball Race’s head whipped around It had happened so fast! it was as if the tree had just swooped past them and collected the Nazi on its way by.

The other Nazi—the one immediately to their right snapped round to look at the explosion too. Van Lewen caught him looking and in one swift movement, M-16 in hand, he jumped across onto the man’s speeding let Raider, landing on its saddle right behind him!

The Nazi rider turned in surprise, As he did so, however, Van Lewen looked forward at the river ahead of them—and his eyes widened—and then with the reflexes of a cat he ducked just as the Nazi turned to look forward and caught the full force Of a speeding branch whipping by at head-height.

The branch ploughed into the bridge of his nose, drilled itself into the back of his brain, killing the man in an instant, and the Nazi toppled backwards, over Van Lewen’s bent-over body and off the back of the riverbike.

A few seconds later, Van Lewen and Race now on separate jet Raiders—pulled alongside Doogie and Molke’s speeding riverbike, Renee and Schroeder were up ahead of them, racing along in the safety of the trees.

‘Doogie, You okay?’ Van Lewen said into his throat mike.

‘I’ll be okay. The bullet went right through,’ Doogie’s voice came back.

While Van Lewen checked on Doogie, Race kept watch for more Nazis. There were no more coming through the trees behind them. But through the flashing rush of tree trunks to his right, he could see a couple of the silver Rigid Raider assault boats racing across the river’s surface parallel to them. Armed Nazi commandos lined their decks, peering into the flooded forest, searching for them, waiting fo them to emerge again.

Van Lewen said. ‘All right, everybody, listen up. Doogie’s taken a hit but he’s okay to keep going. Here’s the plan. We want that command boat, okay. The way we’re going to get it is between you two BKA guys’—he nodded at Renee and Schroeder ‘I want you two to grab one of those Pibbers. If we’re gonna hold that cruiser we’re gonna need some heavy fire support and that means getting our hands on one of those 20 turrets. Think you can manage that?’

‘We can try,’ Schroeder said.

‘Good; Doogie. You, me and Molke are gonna go for the command boat, you up for that?’

‘I can handle it,’ Doogie grimaced.

‘What about me?’ Race asked.

‘I got a special job for you, Professor.’ Van Lewen said.

‘Owing to your lack of special forces training, I kinda figured you wouldn’t want to go storming any boats.’

‘Good thinking.’

‘So I thought that, instead, you could run decoy for us.’

Decoy?’

‘I want you to scoot around in front of those Nazi gunboats as fast as you can and draw their fire while we take the command boat and a Pibber. Once we’ve got those two boats we’ll bring you aboard the main cruiser.’

Race swallowed. ‘Okay…’