Temple

It was quick, insistent—almost impatient—but oddly muffled. It seemed to be coming from within the stone steps beneath his head.

Race frowned.

It sounded like claws scraping against stone.

He sat up instantly and looked over at Nash and the others.

He thought about saying something to them about the scratching noise but he didn't get the chance to, because at that moment—at that precise moment—two hawk-like attack helicopters exploded through the veil of rain above the rock tower with their rotors roaring and their guns blazing, illuminating the tower top with powerful beams from their spotlights.

At exactly the same instant, deafening automatic gunfire rang out all around Race and a series of bullet holes smacked into the stone wall inches above his head.

Race dived for cover behind the corner of the temple and looked back just in time to see a small army of shadowy figures burst out from the treeline at the edge of the clearing, long tongues of fire spewing forth from the muzzles of their guns, dark wraiths in the night.

THIRD MACHINATION

Monday, January 4, 2110 hours

VILCAFOR AND SURROUNDS

VILCAFOR t

Race covered his head as another volley of automatic gun fire slammed into the stone wall next to him.

And then suddenly—shockingly—another source of gunfire exploded out from somewhere right above his head.

Somewhere very, very close.

Race opened his eyes and looked up and found himself staring directly into the spotlight of one of the choppers. He squeezed his eyes shut, saw spots, reeled from the blinding light.

As he shielded his eyes with his forearm, slowly his vision returned and it was then that he realized that the source of this new gunfire was someone standing over his own prone body, firing up at the light.

It was Van Lewen. His bodyguard.

Defending him with his M-16.

Just then, one of the attack helicopters roared by over- head—its rotor blades thumping loudly, its white spotlight playing over the tower's peak—and pummelled the muddy ground in front of Van Lewen with a burst from its side- mounted cannons, the incredible noise of the cannons drowning out the clatter of automatic gunfire on the tower top.

Frantic voices shouted over Race's earpiece: “—Can't see where they—”

“—too many of them!'

And then suddenly he heard Nash's voice: “Van Lewen!

Cease fire! Cease fire!”

A second later, Van Lewen's fire stopped and with it the gun battle, and in the eerie stillness that followed—bathed as it was in the harsh white light of the two attack choppers circling the tower top—Race saw that he and his companions were completely surrounded by at least twenty men, all of them dressed in black and armed with submachine-guns.

The two attack helicopters began to hover above the clearing in front of the temple, illuminating it with their powerful spotlights. They were American-made AH-64 'Apache' assault choppers—skinny, evil-looking attack birds.

Slowly, the group of shadowy figures began to emerge from the foliage at the edge of the clearing.

All of them were heavily armed. Some held compact German-made MP-5s, others carried extremely high-tech Steyr-AUG assault rifles.

Race was surprised at himself, surprised at his knowledge of the range of weapons before him.

It was all Marty's fault, really.

Apart from being a design engineer at DARPA and the world's most annoying Elvis Presley fan (all of his PIN numbers and computer passwords were the same number—53310761—the King's Army serial number), Race's “brother Marty was also a walking encyclopaedia on guns.

Ever since they were kids, right up to the last time Race had seen him nine years ago, whenever they visited a sporting goods store, Marty would be able to identify for his younger brother every make, model and manufacturer of the guns in the firearms section. The strange thing was that now, thanks to Marty's incessant observations, Race suddenly found that he, too, could identify them all.

He blinked, came back to the present, resumed his view of the phalanx of armed commandos gathered in front of him.

They were all dressed in black—jet-black combat fatigues, jet-black webbing, jet-black gloves and boots.

But by far the most striking feature of their uniforms was on their faces. Each soldier wore a charcoal-coloured porcelain hockey mask over his face a solid black featureless mask that covered everything but its wearer's eyes. The masks made the soldiers in front of Race look cold, inhuman, almost robotic.

Just then one of the masked commandos hurried over to where Van Lewen was standing and snatched his M-16 away from him, hastily relieved him of his other weapons.

Then the black-clad man leaned down toward Race and smiled through his menacing black mask.

'Guten abend,” he said wryly before yanking Race roughly to his feet.

The rain continued to fall.

Nash, Copeland and Lauren stood by the portal, their hands clasped tightly behind their heads. The Green Berets stood next to them, disarmed.