Artemis' reason for going home was actually a very normal and genuine one. It was his father's birthday.

His mother had organized two days of celebrations. Yesterday had been presents and different people had come around the entire day, wishing Artemis Fowl Senior a happy birthday. Today they were having a small family dinner. Juliet was in the kitchen, cooking a feast large enough to feed eight people, even though only three were eating. Butler was doing a routine patrol of the grounds and so Artemis was left alone in his study. He was touching up an artwork he had been working on before he returned to school. Unlike most of his pieces, this one was his own, completely original. He had been planning to sell it, under a different name of course, but now he thought he might keep it. Give it to his father perhaps, as a late birthday present...

He was enjoying the almost meditative state he went into when painting when he heard a quiet knock on the study door.

"Yes?" Artemis said, expecting it to be his mother, telling him to come down for dinner.

"Artemis," Butler said, walking in. "Are we expecting visitors tonight?"

Artemis looked up from the painting.

"No," he said.

"I thought not." Butler said, "There are some school kids hanging around the gate. I asked them what they were doing, and they said they had come to see you."

"Are they from St Bartlebys?" he asked. Who would come to visit him? All the other boys at his school ignored him, as he ignored them.

"One is. The others are girls. They're from the high school in Wicklow."

Girls? Girls from Wicklow High had come to see him? But who? And why?

"I'll come out and see who they are," Artemis said. He stood up, put his coat on and led the way down the stairs and out into the garden. It wasn't quiet dark yet, and Butler had a torch which he turned on. They proceeded towards the front gate.

Butler walked besides Artemis, looking around at the dark garden, searching for possible dangers. He had no idea why Artemis was insisting on coming outside to see these school kids. It was unlikely that Artemis would recognize them- he had never seen them before, and Artemis never paid any attention to his classmates. Or anyone his age.

As they got closer to the gate, the silhouettes of the four teenagers could be seen just outside.

Viva saw the bodyguard returning first.

"Shh, he's coming back!" she whispered to the others, holding up her camera but trying not to make it to obvious.

They all laughed. They'd been in hysterics since they'd started walking to Fowl Manor. They hadn't walked the whole way of course- they'd hitchhiked with some uni students for most of the way. Kat had paid them thirty dollars for the ride and two beers. The beers were warm, but they had drunk them anyway. Half a beer each wasn't enough to get them anywhere near drunk, but the combination of the alcohol and risk presented by going to Artemis' house was making them all a little crazy.

After her initial displeasure at Rob being there, Kat had quickly warmed to him. They had been friends for a long time, even dated once or twice. Kat hated the way Rob loved soccer more than any human, and Rob hated the way Kat was such a drama queen. But when they weren't fighting they were pretty close.

The size of Fowl Manor had surprised all of them- none of them had seen a larger house.

"Woah, he's rolling in it!" Kat had said as they made their way towards the gate. "If he wasn't such a jerk I'd marry him."

"You still could," Viva had replied. "Then murder him and get all his cash."

Kat had looked a little too enthusiastic about that idea.

When the bodyguard had come out they had sobered up pretty quick- he was almost as big the house. He was intimidating, but Kat had confidently requested Artemis, while Rob watched wide eyed and Viva and Tali tried not to giggle.

A little shiver ran up Viva's back as she noticed that there were two people approaching- the giant form of the bodyguard, and a much smaller, slimmer one next to him. Had Artemis Fowl actually come? If he had, it could be slightly problematic. None of them had expected him to really, they just wanted to know what his interests were, but if Artemis met Tali now, Tali wouldn't know his interests and Artemis wouldn't like her as much.

Kat seemed to realize this the same time Viva did. Glancing at each other, they grabbed Tali and pushed her behind them, hissing at her to stay quiet and hidden. Tali looked confused, but did as she was told, hiding behind the wall created by Viva, Kat and Rob's bodies.

Butler heard their laughter. They had not seemed drunk when he'd first spoken to them, but they weren't exaclty sober either. He didn't think they posed any threat to his principle, but he kept close to Artemis anyway. The tall boy looked fit, and the girl who'd spoken to him, the one with the ridiculous purple hair; there was something about her that made you think she was more dangerous than she looked.

As they got closer, one of the girls- the small one- stepped behind the others. Butler watched this with interest. The girl hadn't been worried about him seeing her, but now that Artemis came out, she wanted to be hidden.

He reached the gate and shone the torch into their faces. The brighness at their head level made the rest of their bodies seem extra dark, but he could still make out a small object that the African girl was holding in her hand.

"Hi," the girl with the purple hair said. She didn't seem bothered at all by the bright light- her black eyes seemed to absorb it, while the silver eyeshadow surronding them made them sparkle.

"I'm Kat Silver," she said confidently. "This is Viva, Tali and Rob," she didn't point out individual people, just said the names. Butler matched up the faces himself- the boy was obviously Rob, the dark girl likely to be Viva, which left the small girl, hiding behind the group, to be Tali.

Butler looked at Artemis, waiting for him to reply. He did so, his voice cold enough to power a freezer.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

Kat smiled, slowly.

Tali watched Artemis and his bodygaurd approaching from over Rob's shoulder. It was hard to see anything, he was so tall. When they got there, it was hard to see Artemis- the boyguard was shining a torch in their eyes.

Kat introduced herself and then the others. Tali understood now why she was hiding, and was glad Kat didn't point her out. When Kat had finished talking, she waited for Artemis' response.

"What are you doing here?" he asked them. His voice sent cold shivers through her. She'd never heard anyone so frosty.

Kat paused, and Tali could feel an elaborate cover story coming. After all, Kat was an actress. Tali hoped Viva was getting all this on film. Because she had a feeling this was the kind of thing you'd want to see again.

"Well," Kat began, "Our friend Tali is new at our school, Wicklow High. And it's a small school, compared with yours, I mean. There's not a huge amount of seriously acedemic people. But Tali is really into computers and stuff, and she's always talking about computers and hardrives and Apple's latest model and we're all like 'Tali, shut up! Gp find someone who cares!' But no one at Wicklow High really does care about computers, and so Tali inflicts her tech talk on us all the time. I mean, we love her, but she is incredibly annoying, you know what I mean? So we were visiting Rob, at his school, and Tali launches into a story about her new software or something, and Rob says, 'Go tell Artemis Fowl, he'll know what you're talking 'bout'. So we go to find you, and discover you've come home. And Tali was super disappointed, weren't you Tals? And so we thought we'd come see you, and beg you to talk computers with Tali and get it out of her system so we don't have to endure it."

Viva couldn't help smiling as she listened to Kat's story. She knew Kat was making this up completely on the spot. It was a safe bet that Artemis did like computers- he was a nerd, after all. And maybe if Tali did talk to him, they could find out some other interests, which Tali could also pretend to share. This had actually worked out okay. Now they just had to wait for Artemis' reaction.

Artemis didn't normally feel threatened by people his age. Not really threatened anyway- none of them were going to pull out guns and start shooting at him. But there was something about a group of four young people that made him feel... not scared, exactly, and there was no way he was intimidated (their IQs couldn't be a quarter of his), but he did feel something. Worried, perhaps. And so, when he spoke to them, he tried to make them worried. It didn't seem to work. The girl at the front, who had introuced herself as Kat, simply smiled after his coldest voice. And then launched into a long story about one of the other girls called Tali. He had absolutely no interest in talking to this girl about computers. He gussed that Tali was the one at the back, and she didn't look like she knew what a computer was. So what was their real reason for being here?

He was about to reply- to tell them to get off his property and back where they'd come from- when he heard a voice calling him.

"Artemis? Butler? What are you doing?"

Artemis stiffened. His mother.

"What are you two doing out here? Dinner's almost ready." Angeline Fowl asked as she approached them. She caught sight of the four teenagers on the other side of the gate.

"Oh! Hello! I'm Angeline Fowl, Artemis' mother. Are you friends from school?" she asked them.

Angeline knew that Artemis never had friends visit him from school, but that didn't stop her being delighted that some had come- and three of them were girls. Slightly odd looking girls, but girls nonetheless.

Her son opened his mouth to reply, but the purple-haired girl at the front spoke first.

"Yeah, we're Artemis' friends. We just came to talk to him, but if you guys are having a family dinner..."

"Oh, how nice!' Angeline said happily. "Artemis, don't let your guests just stand outside the gate. Invite them inside, there's plenty of food, you can all join us for dinner..."

"Guests?" Artemis stared at his mother. "Join us?"

But Angeline was already instructing Butler to open the gates. The four teens filed in, smiled politely at her.

"Come inside, come inside, dinner will be ready in a minute. What were your names...?"

She continued to chatter to them as they all walked towards the door.

Artemis was left standing at the gate, still staring at his mother as she led complete strangers into his house.

"Guests?" he repeated.

"I think your mother is rather enthusiastic about the idea of you having friends." Butler observed.

"But they... they're..." There it was again- one of those weird occasions when he was lost for words. "They're teenagers!"

"Like you, you mean."

"No! My IQ is at least four times theirs! And they are not welcome in my house!"

Butler chuckled as Artemis stormed off towards the house. This was going to be interesting...