Temple is a thriller novel written by Australian author Matthew Reilly and first published in 1999. Like Reilly's other books, Temple's major attractions are the fast pace and the complexity of the action scenes.
At the time of publication, Reilly hinted at the possibility of a sequel starring the same protagonist, Professor William Race, but the release of such a book has never been officially confirmed.
Introduction
Temple is split into two stories, both set in South America: One set during the Spanish Occupation of South America and one set in 1999 at the same place.
The main focus of the former story is the journey of a monk named Alberto Santiago who becomes a traitor to his country after witnessing Spanish atrocities among the Incan civilisation. Aiding an Incan Prince named Renco Capac to escape, Santiago begins a quest to protect a special Idol - 'The Spirit of the People', an idol carved from black stone with purple veins running through it, actually carved from a meteorite that fell on earth, from the invading Spaniards. Upon his return to Spain, Santiago records his story in a transcript in San Sebastian Monastery in France.
Four hundred years later, a group of German armed militia known as the Stormtroopers raid the monastery, executing all but one of the Jesuit monks living there, recovering the Santiago manuscript. Meanwhile, another party raids DARPA (The Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency) headquarters in order to capture a new superweapon known as the Supernova. DARPA sends Colonel Frank Nash to Peru with the aid of NYU linguistics professor William Race to recover the idol before anyone else can retrieve it. Their mission: to retrieve 'the Spirit of the People' (as the natives call it), carved out of Thyrium-261, a nuclear material from a binary star system that came to Earth via a meteorite. Thyrium has the potential to provide virtually limitless clean energy, which can fuel the Supernova, a next-generation weapon of mass destruction with the power to decimate a third of the Earth's surface and bring about Doomsday.
Plot summary
William Race's adventure Professor William Race is a young linguist, working for NYU is approached by a retired Col. Frank Nash, a physicist from the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, to translate a manuscript written in ancient Latin, to find an ancient Incan idol in the South American jungles. Race is told that his brother, Martin Race, was the one who suggested his name, and that his ex college sweetheart, Lauren O'Connor is also accompanying them. Race reluctantly agrees.
En route to Peru, Nash provides Race with photocopied pages of a copy of the Santiago Manuscript, which describes the adventures of Alberto Santiago, a Spanish missionary in ancient Peru, whilst also holding the key to the final resting place of a legendary Incan idol, allegedly made of thyrium-261, an element that, when combined with the mass destruction weapon called Supernova, would destroy a third of the Earth's mass throwing it off from its orbit and effectively killing the planet. The team travels to Cuzco, Peru with physicists Troy Copeland and Lauren O'Connor, archaeologist Gaby Lopez, anthropologist Walter Chambers and a team of six Green Berets, including Race's personal bodyguard Leo Van Lewen.
Race, translating the copy of the manuscript that Frank Nash's team had acquired prior to the flight to Peru, discovers that Santiago and his expedition ended up in Vilcafor, an Incan town deep in the Amazon. However, this was only a partially completed copy, so they didn't know what occurred after Santiago's arrival in Vilcafor. The team decide to use the information in the manuscript to make their way to Vilcafor and find out if the idol resides there.
After arriving in Cuzco, Race's team makes use of Huey helicopters to travel into the Amazon and find Vilcafor, making use of the totem pole clues detailed in the manuscript. After some time in flight, the team finds Vilcafor and lands in the town center. Using a Nucleotide Resonance Imager (NRI), the team discovered a source of Thyrium-261 to the west of Vilcafor, and headed for the source.
This led them to a finger of rock in the middle of a canyon, on which sat an ancient temple, which Lopez and Chambers deduced to be pre-Incan. Nash decided to blow open the temple's entrance with C-2 plastic explosive. However, as this was happening, the two Green Berets left to guard Vilcafor, Corporal 'Doogie' Kennedy and Corporal 'Tex' Reichart, were ambushed by a German assault team. The Germans took the town then with use of 'Apache' attack helicopters took the temple from Nash's team, taking them prisoner and putting them in the town.
The Germans decided to open the temple themselves. However, this unleashed the inhabitants of the temple known as rapas. Rapas, big cats likened to jaguars and previously considered no more than myth, emerged from the temple to first decimate the German temple team then descended on Vilcafor to tear apart the rest of the Germans. Nash's team, separated, had to take drastic option to avoid their own deaths, but were able to survive with only the loss of Walt Chambers to the caimans, crocodilians lurking in the river next to Vilcafor. They were also able to pick up five members of the German team; two soldiers (Lt. Marc Graf and Corporal Molke), two members of the German's equivalent of the FBI, the BKA (Bundes Kriminal Amt), which included Renee Becker and Karl Schroeder, and finally zoologist/cryptozoologist Johann Krauss.
Going on the assumption that the rapas would be averse to daylight, the team sent Green Berets Cpt. Scott and 'Chuck' Wilson as well as one of the German soldiers (Lt. Graf) to the temple to make a second attempt at getting the idol. This failed in a massive bloodbath, with all three soldiers being killed by the rapas after a rapa ambush. They had wrongly assumed, with the rapas using the shade to attack.
Discovering that the Stormtroopers were on their way to Vilcafor, but with no knowing of when they would arrive, Nash's team set to work. The German team had a completed copy of the manuscript, so Race started translating it. Making use of information from the German manuscript, the team decided to make a third attempt on the temple at night, this time sending Corporals 'Buzz' Cochrane and 'Tex' Reichart as well as Sgt. Van Lewen. They made use of monkey faeces acquired by Cochrane to put off the rapas and avoid attack.
However, as this occurred, the Stormtroopers finally made their appearance in Vilcafor, coming out of the rainforest. Using futuristic G-11 assault rifles, they ripped apart the rapas, taking the town. Their communications jammed, Nash sent Race ahead to warn their temple team. He caught up to the temple team as they emerged from the temple with the idol, also discovering a skeleton he presumed to be Renco Capac, the Incan prince in the manuscript. However, the Stormtroopers had also caught up with their own attack helicopter, killing Tex Reichart and wounding Buzz Cochrane. Reichart, having been in possession of the idol when he died, dropped the idol, sending it sliding down the hill. Race attempted to recover it, but almost fell off the top of the rock, using the grappling hook on his M-16 assault rifle to avoid being shot by the Stormtroopers. The Stormtroopers recover the idol and escape, while Race and Van Lewen, the last remaining mobile people on the rock, escaping as well, leaving Cochrane on top of the rock.
Race, Van Lewen, Doogie, Schroeder, Renee and Molke, using an Incan royal escape route under Vilcafor's citadel, give chase to the neo-Nazi Stormtroopers, including Heinrich Anistaze, second in command to Odilo Ehrhardt. Using German jet skis, the team pursue the Nazis, losing Molke in the initial phase of the battle. The team disperses across the Nazi river armada, using divide and conquer techniques to make their force seem larger and disorienting the Nazis. Renee and Race are captured by Ehrhardt and Van Lewen and Doogie Kennedy manage to escape with the use of a Nazi seaplane. Karl Schroeder sacrifices himself using a chlorine isotopic charge that wipes out the rest of the Nazis.
Ehrhardt's helicopter lands in the Nazi's base of operations, a Peruvian gold mine, with Anistaze, Renee and Race aboard as well as Ehrhardt. Ehrhardt announces his plan to use the idol with his own Supernova to ransom the fate of the world to the U.S. Government in order to crash the American economy and build himself a new world. He then sent Race and Renee to be executed by two of his Nazi soldiers. However, they were saved by Uli Peck, a BKA undercover agent who had infiltrated the Nazis and allowed Renee's German team to acquire their manuscript. Race stole the other Nazi's kevlar breastplate from his body, then Renee, Uli and Race set off to stop Ehrhardt. They were confronted by Anistaze and Ehrhardt, with Race decapitating Anistaze and Uli being wounded.
Race managed to stop Ehrhardt and disarm the Nazi Supernova with only two seconds to spare before detonation, after the U.S. Government failed to come up with the ransom money. He had deduced that the weapon's creator, Dr. Fritz Weber, a Nazi scientist who had been killed by Ehrhardt, had used his supposed execution date as the disarm code. However, the secondary explosion of hydrazine drums almost killed Race, but he managed to climb into the Supernova's chamber, and was launched out of the area by the explosion, being recovered by Doogie's seaplane along with Renee and Uli.
At this point, Race makes a litany of discoveries. He learns that Frank Nash is actually not retired, and is an active U.S. Army colonel, and that Nash's team is the Army's bid to justify their existence to the U.S. Congress and avoid liquidation, attempting to undercut the U.S. Navy and Air Force's own bids to acquire the idol. Race also discovers that the idol is a fake, as it didn't resonate when doused in water when the sprinkler system inside the room that the Nazi Supernova was housed had been triggered. His suspicions are confirmed through his final reading of the manuscript, this time using the original manuscript that the Nazis had stolen from the monastery.
Race returns to Vilcafor to join the others, and proves that the idol is indeed in an Incan village past the rock, which is where the NRI scan had actually pointed, not at the temple like the team had first assumed. The real idol is found at an altar, and the Incans there revere and worship Race, as he is found to have a birthmark below his left eye that is similar to Renco Capac's birthmark, reputed to be the Mark of the Sun. Race is made to fight a caiman in order to prove he really is the Chosen One. Race with much difficulty manages to kill the caiman and is celebrated by the Incans. At this moment, the Navy expedition attacks, attempting a snatch-and-grab operation on the idol. Nash's backup team also arrives, attacking and killing the Navy team's Super Stallion helicopters with their own Comanche helicopters. Nash's team arrived in Vilcafor, where they captured the Navy's civilian team, which included Race's brother Marty. Nash began executing the Navy civilians, Van Lewen, Renee and Race helpless as they were held at gunpoint by Troy Copeland. Marty is revealed as Nash's co-conspirator, the man who had provided Nash with his copy of the manuscript. Race attempts to reveal that Lauren, Marty's wife, had been cheating on him with Copeland, but Race is silenced by Marty. Van Lewen is killed by Nash after Van Lewen stepped in front of Nash's gun. Nash attempts to kill Race, but is interrupted by the Incan natives who shoot Nash in the arm with an arrow and ambush the town. Race is again saved after the escaping Nash's gunner is killed by Doogie while attempting to kill Race and Renee with the Army helicopter's cannon.