toward the edge.
Race saw it first.
'No!' he yelled, diving forward, landing on his belly, slidin.g quickly down the muddy slope after it.
Van Lewen yelled, 'Professor! Wait, no—!'
But Race was already sliding fast through the mud, M-16 and all, heading straight for the idol.
Eight feet away.
Five feet.
Three feet.
And then suddenly the Mosquito returned and let fly with another burst of machine-gun fire and a line of exploding impact craters shredded the mud in between Race and the idol.
Race reacted quickly. He reeled away from the bullet impacts, shielding his eyes from the flying mud—and abandoned his dive for the idol, shifting his weight so that he was now sliding down the slope, away from the ragged line of impact craters.
He saw the ledge at the bottom of the embankment rapidly approaching him—saw the sheer drop beyond it, saw the black Mosquito hovering above it—but he was sliding too fast, too quickly, and then suddenly, before he even knew what was happening, he was shooting out over the edge of the rock tower into clear open space three hundred feet above the bottom of the canyon.
As he went over, Race shot out a hand and caught the lip of the ledge.
He came to a jarring halt as he hung one-handed from the edge of the ledge, three hundred feet above the bottom of the crater!
The roaring downdraft of the Mosquito helicopter above him blasted against the top of his Yankees cap as he threw his spare hand—the hand still holding his M-16—up onto the ledge and began to haul himself up.
Whatever you do, Will, don't look down.
He looked down.
The sheer side of the rock tower stretched away from him into darkness. The rain just seemed to fall away into it, disappearing into the impenetrable grey mist.
“ With a heaving grunt, Race got his elbows up onto the ledge and hauled himself onto it and looked up just in time to see Van Lewen—with Cochrane draped over his shoulder-hurrying off into the stand of trees to his right.
He also saw the Nazis—all twelve of them, all armed with G-11s—as they came swarming around the temple from both sides in perfect unison.
They saw the idol instantly, sitting on its side halfway down the steep muddy slope.
They fanned out quickly, taking up covering positions while a single man cautiously sidestepped his way down the embankment to retrieve the idol from its resting place.
The Nazi arrived at the idol. Grabbed it.
Race could have sworn.
But he never got the chance to, because at that precise moment one of the Nazis looked up and saw him— hanging half-off the ledge, staring up at them with wide frightened eyes.
The Nazis brought their G-11s up as one, all aimed squarely at Race's forehead, and as they all reached for their triggers, Race did the only thing he could think to do.
He let himself fall.
Race fell.
Fast.
Down the side of the rock tower.
He saw the uneven surface of the tower's wall rushing past him at phenomenal speed. He looked up and saw the ledge that he had fallen off receding into the grey sky even faster.
His mind reeled.
I can't believe I just did that! Stay calm, stay calm, you did it because you knew you could get out of this.
Right.
As he fell, Race quickly brought his M-16 round in his hands.
You are not going to die.
“ You are not going to die.
He tried to recall how Van Lewen had fired his grappling hook across the chasm earlier. Now how had he done it? He had pulled a second trigger on his gun to fire the hook, a trigger that had been situated underneath his M-16's barrel.
Still falling.
Race peered frantically at his weapon, searched for the second—
There!
