It seemed strange that something so obvious hadn't occurred to her before now. Still, it wasn't until Opal Koboi was sitting in LEP lockup, her mind wipe already completed, and the final preparations being made to send her back to her own time that it all clicked in Holly's head.
By sending Opal back they were ensuring that Julius would die.
Holly found herself in Trouble's office pleading with him and Foaly. Her arguments made no sense, she knew they made no sense, but she felt a burning desperation to do something. She couldn't let Julius die, she just couldn't.
Tears started pouring down her face before she even realized she was crying. Trouble and Foaly stood there frozen, looking helpless. There was nothing they could do. This was simply how things had to be.
She collapsed into a chair weeping uncontrollably. She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up to see Artemis, who until this moment had kept to the side as a silent observer. He now knelt before her so that their faces were level.
"Holly…" he started to say, his voice uncharacteristically tender.
Holly threw her arms around the boy's neck causing him to fall silent. She sobbed into his shoulder as he hesitantly put his arms around her.
"Artemis. Oh Artemis," she gasped out between sobs.
Artemis tightened his embrace.
"I know," he whispered. "I know."
A/N: Hopefully none of that seemed OOC. But yeah, was I the only one who read the end of TTP and couldn't help but think that by sending Opal back they were pretty much signing Julius' death sentence? Not saying that there's anything else they can do, but still...it seems a bit callous.