DISCLAMER: Artemis and the people mentioned in the Artemis Fowl books, I do not own them. However, the character Amber and the names that you have not heard in the AF book, they are mine.
A/N: I'd like to thank starlight-no-tenshi, for proofreading this chapter. Don't worry the moment I see you I'll give you your cake XD hehehehe.
Also, I'd like to mention AbstractNightmare, for her contribution to the story (and also future chapter stories). Without you I would still have writer's block. LOL.
Anyways, without further ado…
Chapter 5- (A surprising turn of event).
Amber and Artemis have been quizzically staring at each other for a very long period of time, neither one of them moved away from their spot. The awkwardness wasn't helping either.
Finally, Amber decided to break the silence.
She slowly unwrapped herself away from the curtains, forgetting about why she was actually there in the first place and started to greet nervously.
'Hello, my name is Amber; it is a pleasure to meet you in person.' She said with a sincere smile on her face.
Amber was quite happy to demonstrate her etiquette to a human, since this was the first time she had actually met one. However, she was disappointed when she noticed that Artemis had embarrassingly turned his face away from her, only revealing his back.
This puzzled her.
From Amber's understanding of human interaction, she was quite sure that was not how a human responds to a greeting. Unless she had made a mistake.
'Is there something wrong, Artemis?'
Artemis' back flinched at the question. How could the girl not understand what was wrong? It was so painfully obvious.
Nevertheless, he answered.
'I am just bothered by the way you present yourself to me.' He said.
Amber's brow cocked up. 'What are you talk-'
Artemis didn't let her finish.
'What I'm trying to say is that you might want to put the remaining clothes on.' He said while pointing to 'his' clothes on the bed.
All Amber could do was blush and nod in agreement; it made sense that he wanted her to look decent.
She automatically went straight for the clothes, but then she paused halfway gazing at Artemis' back.
"Umm…would you mind leaving the room so I can change?" Amber asked Artemis, only to turn and see him already heading towards the door. She continued speaking.
"Your mind is telling me that my presence here is not within your expectations." She said while reaching for the black pants.
Artemis, who was halfway closing the door, halted at Amber's unexpected mind reading ability.
'I have dealt with many unexpected people and situations before.' Artemis said with a threat in his voice. 'I can assure you that I will be dealing with you as well.'
Artemis's tone sent a shiver down her spine.
Good thing the boy already closed the door, or he would have seen her reaction, which might have given him satisfaction.
A satisfaction she was not willing to give him.
Butler was doing his surveillance rounds of the mansion. Of course, just in case there was an intruder who might have outsmarted or evaded all the cctv's and booby-traps around the Fowl Manor area.
If the intruder ever comes across him, Butler will surely introduce him to Mr. Fist.
All of a sudden, Butler's thoughts on how to handle a potential intruder disappeared from him, when he saw Artemis Fowl II standing… outside his own room?
The bodyguard gave Artemis an uncertain look. After all, he wasn't sure why his principal was calmly waiting outside his own room. Unless, there was something or someone suspicious inside his room and Artemis was waiting for him to get rid of it.
'Artemis, why are you standing out here?' Butler asked as he approached Artemis.
Hearing Butler's concerned voice, somewhat distracted Artemis from his thinking state.
'Ah, Butler, just the person I need.' He said, relief that his trusted friend was with him.
'Do I even want to know what is behind that door?' Butler replied, his eyes looking back and forth between the door and Artemis.
'You can take a look if you want.' Artemis shrugged nonchalantly.
Butler took the suggestion and opened the door very slowly, until there was a tiny gap enough to let him to have a peek inside.
What he saw next baffled him.
As he took a peek inside, Butler found nothing out of the ordinary in Artemis' room.
Good it's doesn't look like it has been thrashed or have anything that indicates a break-in, Butler mentally noted to himself.
All of a sudden out of the corner of his eyes he saw a figure that was out of place. He looked more carefully this time and saw that it was a girl… in Artemis' clothes.
Butler hastily shut the door, alerting the person inside.
He turned to Artemis with a shocked expression and said, 'Oh no, Artemis… You… Didn't…'
Artemis was puzzled at Butler's reaction. What was so shocking about the creature in the room?
It was as if the girl was worse than fairies.
'He thinks you and I *mated',Amber said popping her head out of the now half-opened door.
Artemis frowned at Amber's revelation and started defending himself.
'First of all "mating" is a very primitive way of saying it…and secondly, I would never do such a preposterous thing.' The youth said accompanied by an irked expression on his face.
Butler let out a big sigh of relief. Of course, Artemis wouldn't. I mean he is a genius after all. And geniuses are people who think first before they act.
There must be a logical explanation for this. Butler concluded.
And a logical explanation there was.
'It'll be safer, if we discuss this issue inside my room, without letting anyone else see the girl.'
Butler agreed and stepped into Artemis' room.
Now finally safe in his own room, Artemis explained the situation to Butler.
After Artemis finished, Butler was left dumbfounded.
Finally, Butler spoke, 'So you're saying that she's the gemstone from earlier?' looking directly at the Irish youth.
'Do you not believe me Butler?' Artemis frowned.
Well, Artemis was right when he said that fairies existed, so why not gemstones turning into humans?
'Ok, Artemis. I believe you. Beside she doesn't look quite human.'
Butler examined the girl's appearance.
She had long golden hair, amber eyes and glistening skin. But the most disturbing of all was that an amber stone could be seen stuck on her chest, glistening between the shirt flaps where she had failed to button up.
'So…Artemis, what's the plan?' Butler said as he shifted his focus to the Irish youth.
Artemis, who had already grasped the situation, formulated a simple plan.
He stood behind his cluttered desk, and pressed a button underneath the table revealing a hidden safe box on the wall. Artemis went towards it and entered the pass code.
The safe box obediently opened itself to reveal a fairy communicator inside.
Artemis carefully took out the communicator and started dialing a complicated gnomish number. By now, Amber was standing behind Artemis; curious of his plan.
The screen lit up almost instantly, revealing a static image of a person. As the signal strengthen, it became clear that Artemis was contacting one of his best allies, Holly Short.
The former LEP wasn't in a top-notch mood. Not that Artemis cared much. This was an urgent situation after all.
Holly was now glaring at Artemis, annoyed with the fact that the boy genius was calling for the second time in a row. She had a feeling this was about something concerning the previous break-in.
'What's this call about?' Holly curiously asked Artemis. 'I thought we did a fantastic job on securing the gemstone from the other mud men. Was there something wrong with it?'
Artemis was impressed with Holly's quick intuition. He needs to ask her next time if those intuitions of hers were magical or not.
But now is not the time to marvel on such thing.
He cleared his throat and said, 'No, Holly. You and Mulch did a great-job. However, we do have some slight complication, regarding the gemstone.'
Holly rolled her eyes. She was not surprised, Artemis was a magnet for trouble, yet she couldn't resist the adventures.
'Alright, alright. What is it this time?' Holly finally asked.
Artemis moved away from the screen, so that Holly could see the subject that was causing them the problem.
When she could see what/who it was, Holly gave a big gasp. Now everyone in the room was puzzled with her reaction.
Finally, Holly spoke.
'D'arvit! It's her!' Holly uttered. Her eyes still wide from shock.
'Have the two of you met each other before?' Artemis said as he claimed the screen again.
'Well, yes… and no.' Holly replied, perplexed.
Artemis was all ears now. He was curious, as to how Holly knew the girl.
'Go on.' Artemis insisted.
Holly couldn't find the right word to explain it to them without sounding ridiculous.
Finally, the elf gave out a sigh of defeat.
'I just had a dream a while ago'. Holly confessed.
'And that girl was definitely in it.' She concluded.
Amber's eyes widened. Somehow, she had managed to read the female elf's mind.
'What is that mysterious figure doing in your dream?' Amber asked with a horrified expression.
Holly quickly replied, 'I don't know. I thought it was just a silly dream.'
Amber wanted to stop herself from reading the elf's dream, but she couldn't. She doesn't know why, but all she knew was that she had to stop.
Finally, she managed to reply weakly to the others,
'It's more than just a dream… It's a message… A dangerous… message.' Amber uttered, before she lost consciousness.
Amber passed-out because the dream contained a powerful curse. Her powers were able to deter the invading spell, but it left her physically weak, sending her system to shut down.
PITCH BLACK
And then, they were…
Voices…
'Please, spare us.' Said a pleading voice
'You must destroy them! You know it's your duty to control them.' An angry voice said out of
nowhere.
'Please don't!' The pleading voice was now desperate.
'Do it! You have no choice. Sooner or later they will rebel against us.' The other voice commanded.
Suddenly, there was third voice. But this time, the voice was familiar. It was full of guilt and sadness, yet it knew that it had no choice and it must do what it was told to do. At last the third voice said,
'Then I must…'
And the darkness turned to light…
'Young lady, wake up.'
Hearing the familiar voice, Amber's eyes slowly opened.
At first her vision was a bit blurry. The area around her was still trying to find its form and shape.
When she regained her vision, she realized that the one calling out to her was the big burly man.
She sat up straight from the couch and looked up at Butler. It was obvious that she had caused the person to be concerned about her well-being.
She had to at least ease the Eurasian man's worry, and the only way to do this was to respond nicely.
'Please, call me Amber.' She kindly replied to Butler.
Below Haven City
A group of specialised-retrieval fairies; armed with protective magical suits, were sent to an unspecified location to retrieve a suspicious object.
Apparently, the object in question was causing a major problem to anyone that gets too close to it.
It caught the fairy council's attention, since the object was emitting enough dangerous magic to kill anyone that comes across its path.
Two retrieval fairies carefully approached a dug-out hole, which was emitting a red light.
The two fairies were safe enough to get close to the object, since they themselves were covered with protective spells.
One of fairies unlocked a titanium-steel case to reveal a gun, which looked almost exactly the neutrino gun.
The other fairy took out the gun and pointed it towards the hole. He carefully aimed the gun and pulled the trigger.
Green laser light came out from the gun, and hit the mysterious object.
Except the gun's purpose was not to destroy the object, but to pull it out of the hole.
The fairy holding the gun slowly moved the object to a red-box container. When the object was safely inside the box, the other retrieval-fairy closed and sealed the box by placing a circular disk with gnomish writing on it.
The mysterious object reacted against it, but the circular disk containing fairy magic was powerful enough to subdue it.
As the situation became safer, the retrieval fairies sent a message to HQ via transmission.
'We have secured the black gemstone, over and out.'
Meanwhile,
James Brax's Mansion
It had been 2 days, since Mr. James Brax's precious gemstone was stolen by a mere brat. Obviously, he had underestimated the kid's ability and now…now.
Given that he no longer possesses the gemstone, all Mr. Brax could do was to stare blankly at the ceiling.
The black-haired kid had obviously ruined his future. Now, he was broke. He had invested everything on the gemstone, hoping to profit from it.
Plus, there was also the fact that he had installed ridiculously expensive security devices around his mansion…
He sure was in a lot of trouble.
He didn't know who the little punk was, and he sure as hell didn't know where to get a large amount of money for an investigation.
Just as Mr. Brax was about to give up all hope, loud footsteps could be heard approaching the hall.
Could it be Ralph? That bumbling servant left fuming as soon as he heard me say he was fired… which was obviously wasn't intentional. Mr. Brax thought to himself.
Mr. Brax's attention was diverted away from his train of thought, when the footsteps stopped and with it a tall figure, in a business suit appeared in front of him.
'I can help you retrieve what you have lost, Mr. Brax.' The mysterious man said, mischievously.
This caught Mr. Brax's full attention. He looked at the mysterious man. The guy was in his mid-20, and has a middle- white streak on his perfectly short, neat hair.
However, one thing stood out, the young man's eyes. They were purely gray in colour and the outer-side of his pupil was…red.
'What's the catch?' Mr. Brax hesitantly replied.
An unpleasant smile crept across the mysterious young-man's face.
'I just need your full co-operation.' He smirked
Mr. Brax paused and stared quizzically at the young man. This is very risky.He told himself.
Yet, he couldn't defy the man's offer… as if it was a command.
'You got yourself a deal, young chap.' Mr. Brax said with his right hand extended to the man.
The mysterious young man noticed Mr. Brax's extending of his right hand as a sort of contract and he confidently shook it with his right hand.
'Glad to hear it.' The mysterious man coldly replied.
Wait 'til I get my hands on that kid. I'll finally get my revenge. Mr. Brax thought with a wicked smile on his face.
A/N: End of chapter 5! Whew, that was pretty long. Artemis better be careful. Mr. Brax is out with a vengeance.
If you enjoyed this chapter, a review is certainly appreciated. Stay tuned for the next chapter!
Amber: You sure make a lot of enemies, Artemis
Artemis: It's to be expected. Challenges are no fun without obstacles.
Holly: Oh, Great… Here we go again. (Rolls- eyes)
