Artemis Fowl chapter one; bad engineering
Artemis was at the local library, reading up on something only possible to be pronounced by a scientific chemistry expert. Which of course, Artemis was. A recorded message echoed through the library. 'Attention all library goers, please exit the library. The library will be closing in five minutes. Please leave via the front exit. Thank you' the speaker phone tuned out. Artemis ditched his book in the chemistry section and walked briskly to the door. It was snowing outside and the automatic doors grudgingly rumbled open a little too slow for Artemis' quick pace, he banged his forehead on the desperately receding door. Artemis swore too loud for a quiet
library.
Artemis basically skidded all the way from the doors to Butlers modified Audi coupe. "Doors iced up again?" Butler asked.
"Blame it on bad engineering," Artemis said. "How'd you know?"
"Beckett would be able to hear you swearing from Fowl manor" said Butler as they pulled out on to the icy road
They arrived at Fowl Manor an hour later, and Artemis typed in the nine digit code to open the tall, barred, black gates that lead to the courtyard and they drove into a wonderful garden. Butler pulled his car into the basement garage to accompany five other flash cars parked neatly in a line.
Artemis hopped out of the car as butler shut the automatic garage door. He walked up the concrete steps out of the basement and into the foyer to find Becket and Myles gleefully playing on the couch.
The latter ran up to him.
"Artemis! Artemis!" he persisted. "My mould jar is growing mushrooms!" Myles said enthusiastically.
"That's very…interesting, Myles" said Artemis.
"Come" said Myles impatiently, pulling Artemis up the steps and into his laboratory/room. The room was clustered with test tubes and jars containing various bugs and moulds as well as an eternally messy bed jammed into the corner,(the new) professor primate (Myles' soft toy monkey), was sitting on an old desk, and heaped piles of books were gathered around the room. The toy monkey suddenly shouted in a somewhat electronic voice.
"IT'S ALIVE! IT'S ALIVE!" Its voice activated speaker reacting to the noisy blabbing coming from Myles' mouth.
Myles walked over to a particular jar and held it up to Artemis. "Look" said Miles, a very impressive florescent blue mushroom stood out among all the musty brown mould that had crawled its way up the sides of the jar. "I believe that this specimen is Entoloma hochstetteri" Artemis said "eentoromer hooshsterwhattie?" Asked Myles.
Two thousand miles away in England, a lone ice-cream van trundled its way along the busy streets of London, humming its annoying tune to passers by with the insignia of Mr. whippy painted proudly along the side of the cream coloured van. A hunched man sat in the driver's seat, happily licking a cone of blueberry ice-cream and holding the grey steering wheel loosely. The holographic image of the man flickered and then disappeared. Everyone who noticed screamed, Which resulted in the whole square screaming yet not knowing what they were screaming at, their confusion was quickly stemmed. Some panels dropped off the sides of the van and some very menacing and very big looking guns protruded from the revealed holes. The screaming got noticeably louder. Suddenly a small hatch opened on top of the ice-cream van and, a pixie matching the size of the hatch hopped up, dragging an oversized megaphone with it. It picked up the megaphone, apparently struggling against the weight to lift it to its lips.
"Citizens of earth" it addressed the panicked audience in a shrill feminine voice. "Stop and shut up" it said without any results. "STOP AND SHUT UP OR ILL BLAST YOUR HEADS OFF WITH PLEASURE" ' it' or 'she' commanded this time with avail. In a softer tone "Ill just do it anyway you lousy idiots" she exclaimed as a matter of factly. Every one scattered in every possible direction but not quite fast enough. Opal Koboi jumped back into the truck and activated the weapons.