Prologue:
Life felt slow after Artemis came back to life, and he didn't know why. Although there was a brief period of rehabilitation and blank memories, that horrible period was over. Since then, Artemis' life had changed a little. He was more sociable. He no longer had that silly crush on Holly, and he had an even better sense of humor (in his opinion). And he got more family time than ever. However, there was no one for him to talk to at the moment except his computer. Father, Mother, Miles, and Beckett were on a trip that Artemis refused to go on. Butler and Juliet were visiting Madame Ko. And since then, Artemis had been feeling empty - and horribly, horribly, bored.
Not an unknown feeling for the child genius (teenage genius now), but not one he had experienced in a while, not since he captured Holly all those years ago. As his boredom grew, Artemis let his mind wander.
'How am I to cure this boredom?' he thought. 'Such a state is surely unbefitting an accomplished person like me.' Artemis smirked, letting some his old smugness in.
As his mind wandered, he suddenly remembered something. An interesting scenario one of Foaly's satellites had caught, and that he had found by hacking Foaly's firewalls…
Artemis opened his laptop and drew up the file which he had accessed from Foaly's computer. It was a video recording of something very strange.
It was a boy of about 13, green eyes, black hair. He was standing on a bridge with a Chihuahua…. Artemis blinked. Was it really a Chihuahua? He looked again, and this time it was a huge monster.
Artemis watched in fascination as the boy tried to fight and failed miserably. The bridge was destroyed and the boy fell down into the water. Artemis winced, moving his hand to end the video. He was sorry for the boy's death. He knew the feeling of dying very well.
Suddenly, before Artemis ended the video, the camera switched focus. Apparently, a few minutes had already passed.
Artemis wondered if the satellite had broken somehow. 'If it did,' he thought, 'it would be very entertaining to tease Foaly about how one of his precious babies broke down.' But what he saw next completely distracted him from his thoughts of teasing Foaly and the like. What he saw should have been humanly impossible for anyone: the boy that had fallen off the bridge emerged from the water, looking fine – maybe even better than he was before he fell. And he was completely dry.
The video ended there, but not before Artemis saw a girl and a boy (wait, did he have hooves?!) run toward him and shout "Percy!" in relief.
Artemis grinned his vampire grin and rubbed his hands. Finally, something entertaining! He would surely look into this. But then he hummed thoughtfully. Even if he did look into this, he couldn't spend all his time on it. Juliet and everyone else would throw a fit. But if he didn't spend all his time on the case, he would have to babysit Myles and Beckett. He shuddered at the thought.
Artemis tried to think of something time consuming he could do away from home that would entertain him. His brain lit up. A job…..
Now, all he had to do was decide on one.
What job would he like?
Of course the job would have to pay well, but first thing first was that it had to be amusing. If Artemis wanted money, all he had to do was return to his old ways of masterminding evil plans, or, even simpler, draw from the millions upon billions he had in his bank account.
So he thought about a job he could enjoy and relate to.
Suddenly, his face lit up.
He would be…..
A psychologist.
Somewhere out there, in hospitals all over the continent, famous and intelligent people shuddered in their bed. The only thing these people had in common was that they had all played advisor/psychologist to Artemis. And in return for their "care", the young Artemis had sent them babbling and infuriated to the hospitals with their genius.
Right now, they had a very, very, bad feeling…
By the end of the year, Artemis had gotten several PhDs from several Ivy Leagues and internationally acclaimed schools and had the choice to become anything he wanted. Of course, he went right up and set up a clinic and became a psychologist/advisor.
Truly, the world did not pity those poor, poor souls.
Maybe not the world… Maybe it was just Artemis.
But aren't those two things basically the same in importance?
Just kidding…. Probably.
