Right, I was going to post this chapter as a separate story and put it as an 'M'. I've changed my mind. So as THIS CHAPTER is an 'M' I'll just give you plenty of warning and keep it in with the rest - because the rest is 'T' worthy. So yeah, read this:
TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN (YES, THAT'S YOU!)
I'M TERRIBLY SORRY BUT I SHAN'T BE ABLE TO CONTINUE THIS STORY... AT A 'T' RATING. THE NEXT CHAPTER CONTAINS A FEW THINGS THAT I CAN NO LONGER JUSTIFY KEEPING AT A LOWER RATING.
THIS CHAPTER IS 'M' RATED FOR VIOLENCE, LANGUAGE AND SEXUAL REFERENCES - BUT NO ACTUAL SCENES OF A GRAPHIC SEXUAL NATURE.
BUT YEAH - IT'S AN 'M' FOR A REASON, SO JUST BE WARNED BEFORE YOU READ! THE NEXT CHAPTER WILL PROBABLY STAY AT A 'T'... BUT I'LL DECIDE WHEN I'VE PROPERLY FINISHED IT. BUT YEAH - YOU'VE BEEN TOLD!
YOURS,
HOLIDAYBOREDOM
P.S. Enjoy, ma dear...
THIS IS AN 'M' RATED CHAPTER
THIS IN AN 'M' RATED CHAPTER
THIS IS AN 'M' RATED CHAPTER
THIS IS AN 'M' RATED CHAPTER
THIS IS AN 'M' RATED CHAPTER
AGAIN, THIS CHAPTER IS 'M' RATED FOR VIOLENCE, LANGUAGE AND SEXUAL REFERENCES - BUT NO ACTUAL SCENES OF A GRAPHIC SEXUAL NATURE.
Okay? You got it? Well warned? Okay...
Disclaimer: Yeah. No.1 would have been long ago killed off along with Doo Dah Day (was Colfer seriously lucid when he decided on that name?). The twins would be called 'Hector' and 'Meringue'.
Sound Track: Seven Devils by Florence and the Machine
'Ninety per cent of accidents occur in the home.'
Chapter 12 – Incident and Accidents
Artemis woke with difficulty. His alarm clock was ringing but it sounded faint, muffled almost. He opened his eyes and released a hiss of pain. His brain was throbbing, pounding. He felt vaguely like he had the morning after his first taste of vodka.
My first taste of Annie…
He shut his eyes, overwhelmed by the pain in the right side of his frontal lobe. He took several deep breaths.
What happened?
He tried to sit up properly but a bolt of pain shot through his shoulder. His eyes began to water.
THIS IS AN 'M' RATED CHAPTER.
He took a moment, gritted his teeth, and dragged himself upright. He hobbled across the carpet, noticing the ache in his ribs and the stiff resistance in his knees. Eventually he reached the bathroom, and the bathroom mirror.
He drew a sharp breath.
There was an angry, half-scabbed graze above his right eye that stretched across his eyebrow and up onto his temple. He touched it gingerly, then tugged back the sleeves of his pyjama shirt. His arms were mottled with bruises. Some were darker than others, especially two that ran parallel at his forearms, a line of violet, as if he'd fallen on something hard but thin.
"The stairs," breathed Artemis.
He could remember something about a step… about a fall. He unbuttoned his shirt and with much wincing, pulled the flannel back from his shoulders.
There was a knock at his door. "Sir?" called a voice, stuffy but polite.
"Don't come in!"
"Breakfast has been served in the main dining room, sir," continued the voice. "The Master and Lady are expecting you."
"Tell… tell them I'll be down shortly."
"As you wish, sir."
He heard muffled footsteps as the old butler walked away. The teenager's expression was drawn as he met his own eyes in mirror.
I must have fallen on the stairwell.
But then why had he no recollection?
Head injury. By the marks on my forehead I have clearly suffered a blow to the cranium.
His eyes wandered to his arms again, to the row of finger-shaped bruises lining his upper-arm.
I have been handled. Butler perhaps? Did he pick me up and take me back to my room?
Sudden heat rushed to his cheeks and he shrugged his shirt off completely. How embarrassing, to have stumbled like a clumsy child and have to be carried to bed. He snatched a towel off a nearby rack. Shower first, then breakfast, he decided, though God knows what mother will say of my face...
There was a sharp gasp as Artemis entered the dining room. "Artemis!" exclaimed Angeline. "What happened?"
Artemis Senior glanced up over the top of his broadsheet.
"I lost my stepping on the staircase last night and took a hard tumble," said Artemis calmly, taking his seat at the table. "It is nothing to worry about, Mother." He picked up his napkin and spread it neatly onto his lap, nodding to a nearby footman that he would indeed take tea.
"You look as if you've been in a fight."
"In which the staircase won," commented Artemis Senior dryly, flicking out his newspaper. "Has Butler seen to you yet?"
"I assume so," said Artemis. "He must have escorted me back to my room last night."
"Must have?"
"I woke up this morning in my bed, dressed in my night clothes. He must have helped me up."
"It was I who helped you."
"You?"
"Yes. You remember. On the stairway."
"No," said his son quietly. "I don't."
Artemis Senior licked the tip of his thumb and turned a page. "Not surprising. You had hit your head quite hard. I picked you up and took you back to your room."
Angeline was aghast. "What if he had had a concussion?"
"He didn't," said the man simply. "A few scrapes and bruises, nothing more." He smiled tightly and took a sip from his coffee.
The doors to the dining room burst open.
"Mummy!"
Angeline was immediately distracted, hoisting the baying three-year-old up onto her lap. "Oof! Good morning, Beckett."
Artemis continued to look at his father.
"Did you sleep well?" asked Angeline.
"Adequately," replied Myles, clambering up onto a chair beside Artemis and reaching for a croissant. "Although the mattress could do with turning; I do not care to risk lumbago."
The nanny hovered apologetically by the door.
"It's alright, Tara." Angeline smiled. "You go and get some food now."
The young woman curtsied and left without a word.
"Wah's appened t'er ace'?" demanded Beckett through a mouthful of jammy toast.
Artemis raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"
The toddler swallowed. "What's happened to your face?"
"I fell. Apparently."
Artemis Senior's eyes flickered.
"That was silly," decided Myles. He was carefully buttering a crumpet now, the over-sized cutlery awkward in his grasp.
"Was it when you was investigating?" asked Beckett.
Artemis frowned. "When I was what?"
"Beckett," snapped Artemis Senior. "Eat your breakfast."
The-three-year old returned begrudgingly back to his plate.
Investigating? thought Artemis. Then he caught sight of the clock over the mantelpiece.
"I must go," he said, dropping the napkin onto his plate. "Butler will be waiting for me."
"Oh, must you rush off, Dear?" called Angeline.
Their eldest son glanced back as he reached the door. "I will be home in six and a half hours, Mother. I shall see you then." The door closed.
Angeline sighed. "You won't be like that, will you?" she asked Beckett, who was now spooning copious amounts of nugget-shaped cereal into his mouth. "Always rushing out on me?"
"He has school, Angeline," drawled Artemis Senior. "A worthy commitment to meet."
"You and I both know he has hardly a need for further schooling."
"There are lessons he needs to learn besides the academic."
"Such as?"
Artemis Senior only smiled and went back to his paper.
"Good morning–What's happened to your face?"
"Good morning to you too, Butler."
"Artemis." Butler put a hand on the teenager's shoulder, stopping him just as he was about to step into the car. "What's happened?"
The boy sighed and his manservant began to probe his injuries. "Apparently I lost my footing on the stairway and… this was the result."
Butler's brows drew so close they almost touched. "Apparently?"
"According to my marks and my father."
"Then I take it you don't remember what actually happened?"
"Not completely."
The elder man let his hands fall. "I should take you to a hospital; you could have a concussion."
"No." Artemis took his opportunity to slip into the Bentley's back seat. "No, I am not going to a hospital."
"Artemis–"
"Butler, please. If you would get in the car and drive."
The manservant walked to the driver's side, his jaw clenched. Once in his seat, Artemis caught the elder man's eye in the rear-view mirror.
"Butler," he said in clipped tones. "I know you are concerned but I do not want to waste my day being fussed over because of a few superficial cuts and bruises."
Butler pulled off and ground the gearstick straight into third. "If it's just bruises then why can't you remember anything?"
Artemis frowned and they drove along the rest of the grove in sullen silence.
Butler felt, and not for the first time, the frustrating constraints of his and Artemis's relationship. He was not simply the boy's servant, he knew that, but yet there were still things he couldn't quite say. Fears he couldn't express due to the barriers between them having not quite been smashed asunder. So he offered what he could.
Twenty minutes later and Artemis was staring hard out the passenger window, the fingers of one hand pressing lightly to his grazed forehead.
I should contact Volga; perhaps she would have more insight on the whole 'Neck' debacle. Hopefully Tuley will also have more information within the next few days.
Butler glanced at him in the rear-view mirror.
"Artemis?"
It's safe to assume that the coin is a lost cause. I could meet with him again but that would be too much of a risk. No doubt it would only end with–
"Artemis?"
The teenager looked up. "Yes?"
He met the dark eyes of his manservant. "Is everything alright?"
There was a pause.
Artemis cocked an eyebrow. "Yes…"
"And you're sure?"
"Yes. I mean, obviously there is the problem of my somewhat battered visage but besides that…"
"Because you can tell me if… if there isn't something right."
Artemis' face was calm. Inside, worry stabbed in his stomach bleeding into a wrenching dread that he hadn't even realised he'd been harbouring. It all pushed against mental floodgates, threatening to burst at any moment. His tongue grew hot with the taste of it. He swallowed.
"Yes," he said. "I know."
They pulled into the driveway of the school. Children were leaving their guardian's cars, doors slamming, hands waving, voices calling out their goodbyes. The Bentley stopped and Artemis stepped out without waiting for Butler to open the door for him.
"I'll be back at four," boomed the manservant through the open window. He saw the boy raise a hand behind him as he walked away, and with a soft grunt Butler pulled the car back into gear.
Artemis glanced back just as the Bentley was disappearing around the corner.
Then something slammed into his aching shoulder causing him to shout out. A blonde boy with a heart-shaped face looked round at him.
"Oh!" he said, the smile falling from his face. "Fowl. Sorry, I– Jesus! What's happened to your face?"
Artemis hitched his satchel back onto his good shoulder.
"Hey! Hey!" shouted the boy, as Artemis passed him without looking back.
The noise drew more attention and stares, and the whispers accompanied him all the way to registration and into his first lesson. In his second lesson someone actually kicked his chair. He turned around angrily.
What happened to your head? mouthed the frog-faced owner of the foot. Behind her, at least a dozen of his classmates were waiting eagerly for his reply.
The teacher chose that moment to turn from the white-board. "… which led to the French making war against –? Mary!"
On the first read through, it sounded more like he was cutting himself off because he noticed her doing something he didn't like.
The frog-face girl gaped. "Er…"
"You don't know, do you? Well maybe if you spent more time paying attention, Mary, and less time mooning over Artemis perhaps you'd learn more! Caleb, the answer please!" There was a soft knock at the door. "Come in!"
A coffee-skinned boy with close-cropped hair entered, a small note clenched in his clammy hand. Doctor Gradgrind read it quickly. "Artemis, you're wanted in the East Wing, room 306."
The Fowl heir raised an eyebrow. "Why?"
The teacher arched an eyebrow of his own. "Ours is not to question why, boy! Shift!"
Artemis sighed and rose from his seat.
Whatever it is, it'll be a welcome escape from this drudgery.
He shoved his pencil-case and book into his bag and walked out, the eyes and whispers of his classmates following him into the corridor. The messenger boy walked ahead of him.
"Are you to take me to the room?" asked Artemis.
The boy shook his head. "Nah, I've got to go back to class. You can find your own way."
Artemis scowled. "And who sent the message? Who am I going to see?"
The boy shrugged. "I dunno. A woman in the office just told me to give it to Gradgrind. I dunno her name."
And then he turned right, barging into a classroom door and back into class. Artemis was left alone. He frowned, his mood already dark from a morning of obnoxious interrogation. He stalked onwards, wondering vaguely which teacher wanted him this time. Once, once, he'd done a good turn for the music master, Professor Horn, performing in a school concert when they'd been desperately short of accomplished soloists. He'd been called on for favours ever since, from everydepartment.
He reached the East Wing, unperturbed by the silence. It was always quiet in this wing; it was the reason he had chosen it for his private rendezvous with Tuley.
Not so private in the end.
He sighed and walked on.
301, 302, 303…
His curiosity stirred lazily. What would be greeting him in this room? A nerve-shot chemistry hand? A frazzled English professor? A baby grand?
306, here.
He twisted the knob and pushed open the door. The classroom beyond was in darkness. He walked forward. "Hello?"
There was no answer. His brow creased.
Perhaps I have arrived too early for them–
At that moment, he felt something seize hold of him from behind.
Artemis twisted, shouted out, but his screams were muffled as a heavy arm clamped over his mouth. He struggled harder, clawing at the alien skin over his face. He kicked back his legs, writhed left and right. His feet were lifted off the ground. There was a stabbing pain in his left shoulder and he was released. He staggered forward, colliding heavily with the corridor wall. His head began to swim.
Run. Run.
The world was blurring. His knees gave in and his face slid down cold plaster. Voices were speaking over him but their words were warped, deep; he couldn't understand a word. His feet slipped from under him. The figures were looking at him, and Artemis tried to look at them. He tipped sideways, his hands clapping against cold stone.
'No…' he mumbled on all fours. His lips felt dipped in lead.
The figures moved closer.
Run. Run.
His elbows buckled. His head hit stone.
Holly woke and sat bolt upright. She panted into the darkness, her heart hammering and her skin sheening with sweat.
"Oh gods," she gasped. She dropped her head between her knees. It didn't help. "Oh gods."
She swung her legs off the bed. Five strides and she'd reached the sink, vomiting into the basin. The smell seared up her nostrils causing her to wretch again. She welcomed it; she welcomed anything that would replace the stench of Gelli Aur. She could still hear it: the hiss of the flesh as it melted into the earth, the soft squelch of boots on mud, the casual conversations. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply through her nose. The trees still murmured above her, the headlamps still glowed, the faces still stared up from their holes. She heaved.
Once she was finished she sat on the floor of her kitchen, her head tilted against the cabinets at her back.
Artemis…
His face swam to the forefront of her mind, smiling that wry smile of his, the one that almost always hinted of secrets. She dug the heels of her palms into her eye sockets. A kaleidoscope churned behind her hands and two dark-haired teenagers waltzed at the centre.
"I go, you go,"they whispered.
Holly's arms fell. There was a sharp pain in her chest now, a persistent stinging.
Artemis.
She swallowed.
Buzzz.
"Holly!"
Her gaze flicked to her intercom.
"Holly, let me up! Quick! I've got someone with me."
"It's me, Holly!" called another voice, younger, brighter. "And Foaly's told me all about your crazy visions! We're here to help!"
There was a hissing noise and a muffled response. Holly didn't know whether to giggle or cry.
"Holly, please," said Foaly's voice. "Just let us up."
The elf pushed herself from the floor. "Door, release," she said clearly, and Foaly and Nº1's faces disappeared from her com-screen.
Seconds later the centaur burst into her flat, dragging a squat cart behind him. Nº1 bounced past his flank and ran to Holly.
"Hello, Nº1," said Holly, unable to quell a smile as his scaly arms wrapped around her waist.
The little warlock looked up at her. "Hello, Holly, how are you? Foaly said you were in a pretty bad way when he left you, and by bad I mean anguished, agonised, despairing–"
"I get it, Nº1."
Behind them, Foaly had unloaded the cart and was busy setting up a fat, microwave-sized machine on Holly's coffee table. He hummed tunelessly as he worked, his mouth drawn into a thin line of concentration.
Holly was confused. "The Retimager?"
Something sparked on the machine's panel and Foaly swore. "Nope," he said, sucking a finger. "The Retimager wouldn't be any use in investigating the validity of your dreams.Even with Artemis's eye, there's nothing you've seen that he couldn't have seen elsewhere, on Mud Man TV or somewhere else, and we don't have any pictures of Annie." He flicked another switch and the machine whirred. "No, this is merely a distant cousin: the Somnimager. It monitors your brain activity, logs it via a program which registers neural patterns, and then converts said patterns into images. Of course it's really far more complicated than that but I don't reckon your brain could handle the specifics right now–"
Holly cut him off. "Foaly. I'm really not in the mood. What are you going to do? In plain Gnommish please."
The centaur repressed an eye-roll. "I'm going to show what you're thinking."
"What?"
"Only your subconscious thoughts! The Somnimager isn't advanced enough to show accurate images of conscious cogitations but it does a good job of showing dreams. I built it when my kid started having nightmares; I wanted to see exactly what it was that was scaring him."
Holly looked at the Somnimager. "So you think that with this thing–"
Foaly nodded. "We can observe your dreams. And with Nº1 here, I thought he could monitor whatever psychic link you think you've got with them."
Nº1 smiled at her encouragingly. "We're going to get to the bottom of this, Holly. We're here to help."
Holly's expression closed off. For some reason she felt suddenly hostile. Annie was hers. Hers.
Someone whispered gently in her ear.
"Holly?"
The voice stopped.
Nº1 was watching her closely. "Holly? Are you alright?"
The elf looked straight past him to the centaur. "Okay. I'll let you watch me." Her voice was high, accented Irish. "But you're not going to like what you see."
Annie was waiting for her.
"I'm sorry," said Holly. "I didn't know they'd find a way to get to us."
The teenager shook her head. "Don't worry, Holly. They'll only come as far as I let them."
She smiled and disappeared.
Night had descended on Fowl Manor. The sky was clear, unveiled, showcasing stars which shone unusually bright. A teenage boy was staring at them from out his bedroom window. His phone was clenched tightly in his left fist. Holly could just make out the text on its front: no new messages.
"Where are you?" muttered the boy, and he drew back from the window.
His room was empty but for him. A fire was crackling in the grate, casting contorted shadows onto every wall. As the boy began to the pace the carpet, his own silhouette curved from floor to ceiling: a twelve-foot behemoth in bespoke Armani. He glanced at the carriage-clock upon the mantle.
Past midnight.
His stomach dropped another notch.
Annie.
Artemis hadn't seen her since the night with the bodies – the night he had melted the objects of his childhood nightmares only to fall headfirst into a new nightmare of his own. He had been so ill. Oh so very ill. He had woken in the morning with half his body hanging out of the bed, his head drooping towards a bile-spattered waste-paper bin. With a grunt, and what would barely pass as a groan, he'd levered himself back onto the mattress and spotted a glass of water on his bedside table. There had been a shakily written note leaned against it.
Gon home. Hope u are ok. Sory about last nite. Don no wat u remember. But dont wory about it. Ill c u soon.
Anne
The teenager had closed his eyes and pushed his aching skull back into his pillow.
His agony had relented little since then.
We kissed. Wekissed.
What did… what did that mean? For them? For how they were now to proceed?
But don't worry about it.
Well he was worrying about it! How could he not? Was sheworrying about it?
Don't know what you remember.
So she didremember. Did she truly believe he had forgotten? Or was he meant to play along with that idea: pretend that he had no memory? Did she want to think that he had forgotten? Or had she simply judged him so inebriated that night that she thought he was incapable of recollection?
Does she think we made a mistake?
Every day he observed couples in school. The Sixth form of St Bartleby's accepted female students, and almost every one of them had been snapped up and paired off within a week of term beginning. They kissed everywhere: on the lawns, in the corridors, in classrooms, even in store cupboards (as he had once unhappily discovered) and Artemis had heard many names for it: snogging, necking, making out. But making out what precisely? How far a tongue could be pushed into another's mouth without triggering the gag reflex? It seemed to him to be a most pointless past time.
But is that what we did? I… necked Annie?
Artemis grimaced sharply. No. They hadn't done that. He couldn't call it that. He wouldn't call it that.
But your tongue–
No. But… but was that truly the crux of the matter? Had he been so terrible to kiss that she wanted him to pretend it hadn't happened? Was she taking pity on him? He had been so drunk. He had acted so completely on instinct and it had felt… it had felt… But was there some technique he was supposed to have applied? What was it he had written in those terriblenovels?
Alejandro looked at Cassie with genuine affection.
"Oh, Cassie," he intoned. "Of all the women on earth, you are my favourite."
"Really?"
"Yes."
He conquered her mouth. Then, precisely thirty seconds later, he inserted his man-spear into her woman-sheath.
Artemis sank down into his armchair. Heat waved across his face and burned against the sallow skin of his cheeks. He looked down at his phone again.
No new messages.
She had told him she would see him soon. She had confirmed that fact in a new message he had received four days previously: a text, short and to the point.
Comin friday. Callums not at home so dont want 2 b arownd. C u soon.
Anne
"Callum's not at home," whispered the thirteen-year-old.
He knew enough of Annie's home life to realise what significance that held. Callum was Annie's older half-brother. They shared a father in Harold Shinner but Callum's mother was Irina Kostovich, a gold-digging thirty-something who now travelled the world seeking loaded geriatrics to marry and fleece. Callum spent the majority of the time with his father in Dublin, but occasionally Irina would whisk him away, introduce him to a new beau and enlist his assistance in conning them. She would always drop him off again once she was finished, leaving Callum more heartbroken and bitter with every abandonment. Whenever Callum was away with his mother, Annie would be left unshielded against their father. Artemis had only ever glimpsed the resulting bruises.
He suspected that Harold Shinner had always beaten Annie, ever since she had been pushed into his life twelve years previously; the unwanted child of a prostitute he had frequented once too often. The truth was, Harold Shinner had almost dashed his daughter's head against a doorframe the moment her new-born body had been pushed into the world, her mother dying on the carpet behind, but he had restrained himself. After all, the birth was unrecorded. No one official knew the baby existed. The government couldn't check on her wellbeing or force her away into school. She was his to use as he wished; a proper little protégée. He had named her there and then after a phrase half-heard on the screaming radio and rammed her under his smoke-stained wing.
Artemis narrowed his eyes at the fire.
They had hardly spoken about it. Never properly. She had always steered the conversation away from herself, pulled a jumper over the marks on her arms; Harold Shinner was her problem, hers.
I should have pressed her. I should have forced her to let me help her. And now–
A pain seared in his throat and his fists clenched. No. There would be a simple explanation for her absence. Why did his mind always jump to the most dramatic of conclusions?
I didn't want to hurt her. I wanted to remain the escape.
He looked at the phone again.
No new messages.
He pressed it to his ear. The dial tone trilled three times before switching to voicemail. He cut the connection. The clock above the mantle-piece struck one.
Holly stood behind his hunched shoulders. His mind whirled through hers, a chaos of unuttered dreads and wild, half-made suggestions. Minutes passed. She suddenly felt a hand on her arm. The palm was small and rough. She turned and saw Nº1's ashen features.
Holly! he gasped, and then he was gone. There was a mild burning feeling where his fingers had touched her skin.
Before her, Artemis made his decision. He stood from his chair and swiftly began to gather what he would need.
Holly sat beside him in the darkened taxicab. The interior was warm, musky, tinged with the smell of cigarette smoke.
"Crook Lane, yeah?" asked the driver.
The teenager looked up. "Yes. Just keep straight ahead."
The driver grunted and drove on. Artemis had hired him twenty minutes earlier from a lucrative chauffeur service his father had sometimes used in the old days. Their cars were filthy, their drivers equally so, but they would also ferry you to any place you wanted without asking questions, regardless of what you put in their boots. Of course the thought had crossed his mind to simply use Butler, but that would have required too much explanation. It would have cost him time. Time he feared he might not have. So his bodyguard was now snoring a little louder than usual, tucked under his Spartan bedclothes back at the manor.
"Just here," said Artemis, unclipping his seatbelt.
The car pulled over and the teenager got out, pulling his hood up over his hair. He shoved a small, stuffed envelope through the driver-side window.
"Here's four hundred," he said lowly. "If you remain here for the next half hour they'll be another four to follow."
The driver quickly flicked through the notes and nodded. "Right cha' are."
Artemis set off down the pavement, with Holly following close behind. Grimy terraces lined both sides of the road, some boarded up, some missing roof tiles and doors. A car was jacked up in front of one, all four of its wheels missing, and someone had smashed all the windows of another. A tomcat was hissing in the shadows. Above him a street lamp spluttered, and somewhere in the dark houses ahead a radio was blaring.
Charming, thought Artemis grimly.
He scuffed a trainer on a crack in the flagstones, leaving a black streak along the rubber. It hardly mattered; they were wrecked already. He was dressed to match his environment, in a faded T-Shirt and over-worn hoodie that Annie had left behind on some past visit. The jogging-bottoms and plimsolls were his own, raided from the costume box he used to disguise himself on certain thefts. He had added a spattering of acne across his forehead and stained his teeth a dull yellow. The fake eyebrow-bar had been a last-second thought.
There was a shriek from ahead, a single burst of laughter that cracked, whip-like, into the night. Artemis looked out from under his greased fringe. He walked quickly towards the noise, turning down a side lane, the music growing ever closer. And then he saw it.
Harold Shinner's house was the only occupied building on the street. Dim light was glowing from two of its three floors along with shouts, cries and snatches of song. Music was blaring from downstairs, pop hits from the late last century. The sound of upbeat, carefree voices and rhythms felt out of place.
Artemis noticed someone staggering down the garden path. She was unsteady on three-inch heels, a beer-can in one hand, an unlit cigarette in the other.
"Aw, c'mon yer daft molly!" jeered the man following her. "Come back 'ere!"
"Feck off!" laughed the woman. "I've 'ad enough o' yer!" The she spotted Artemis. "Oi! You! You got a light fer me?"
Artemis walked closer, digging a hand into his pocket. He flicked back the lid of the golden zippo lighter and the woman leant her cigarette into it. She stood back and smiled gratefully, blowing her smoke away in a hurried stream.
"There." She smiled at the man at her shoulder. "Now this lad is a gentleman."
The man spat onto the pavement. He was almost wider than he was tall, with a ruddy nose and about four days of untrimmed beard growth. "What're ya looking fer boy?" he demanded. "If it's free booze ya' kun fuck right off!"
Free alcohol? I never want to taste alcohol again.
Artemis gave his best impression of Annie under pressure, scowling and cocking his chin. "Callum told me t' come."
"Callum?"
"Harry's lad," whispered the woman in his ear.
The man sized Artemis up.
"Callum, ey?" Something flickered in the recesses of his coin-sized pupils. "Ah! Callum! Oh, feck aye! Yeah. Probably tanked up somewhere. No. An't he wit' that slut o' a mam o' his?"
"He teld me I gotta pick somefin up fer him while he's gone," said Artemis. "Said no one'd mind."
The woman pouted at the squat man. "Aw, Dara, let the poor lad by. He's ony trying ta do somefin fer a friend."
"He is in my arse!"
"Dara."
"I means it, Shelley! He could be trying ta rob ta feckin' place!"
"O' what? Go on, lad, get what it is that cha want."
Artemis slipped by. He could hear Dara and Shelley still arguing as he entered the house. People were laughing and staggering in the shadows, lurching in and out of a room to his left that stank of smoke and mildew. They were all older, mostly over thirty from what he could tell, though that may have been because of the darkness. He could hear shouting above the music, and the occasional slam of a door.
"Outta the way!" bellowed a voice, and Artemis was forced to flatten himself against the wall as a balding man holding a bottle in one hand and a broken bat in the other steamrollered down the stairs in front of him. The man ran, cackling, into the other room and there was a strangled yell. The music and the laughter didn't pause.
Upstairs,thought Artemis, pushing aside his rampant emotions. She's probably upstairs.
He climbed upwards, ducking occasionally as fragments of shattering glass rained down on him from above.
"Get off!" screamed a voice and there was a loud thud.
Artemis whipped his feet out of the way as something heavy clattered past him down the stairwell. He looked up the stairs. There was a crashing from the shadows overhead and another yell.
He reached the landing, stepping over the broken bottles and what looked to be a pair of ripped leggings. He couldn't see anyone. He could only hear them, the pants and the screams, and the groans behind half-closed doors. Somewhere, someone was singing.
"I saw the light on the night that I passed by her window! Dah dah dah dah!"
Artemis mounted the second flight.
"I saw the flickering shadows of love on her blind!"
He took the steps two at a time. There was no glass, only the scuffed marks of boots having climbed this way and back for many years before him.
"Sheeee. Waaaas. My womaaaan!"
He reached the landing. There were only three doors in front of him. Somehow, he knew the only one ajar would be hers.
"As she deceived me I watched and went out of my miiiind!"
At first he didn't see her. It was dark inside and stank of damp and neglect. There was another smell too, something sickly and heavy that Artemis couldn't quite place. He reached a hand around the wall for a light-switch.
Within the dim glare of the single light bulb, not one part of the room was either undamaged or unstained. The walls were grey with mould, the wallpaper clinging in half-rotted ringlets to the plaster. There wasn't a bed, only a bobbled double-mattress with a sagging dip in the centre and a crumpled, half-ripped blanket. The wardrobe and what was left of a dressing table were both on their sides in the corner. There was a doorway at the far side of the room, a broken toilet bowl and the edge of a bathtub just distinguishable past its frame.
Crumpled on the bare-boarded floor, her fingers holding tight to her battered arms, was Annie. She wasn't looking at him. She was staring through purpled slits at a point just past his feet.
Artemis dropped to his knees on the stripped floorboards, putting his hands to her swollen face. She tried to pull away.
"Annie." She wouldn't look at him. "Annie, it's me," he croaked. He ripped his hood back from his head.
Her swollen mouth parted. "Art...?"
"Yes. Yes, that's right." He pulled the jumper over his head, laying it carefully over her. "And I'm going to get you out of here."
She sucked in a sudden gasp of air. "No!" she half-screamed, shoving him away. "No! You have to go! You have to go! He'll come back! He'll get you! He'll get you! He'll get you!"
She staggered to her feet, dark hair swinging wildly. She was wearing only her underwear and an ill-fitting T-Shirt, and for the first time Artemis noticed the damage done to her legs. She was covered in bruises and scrapes, angry blotches that flared from her ankles right up to the insides of her thighs: finger print-like bruises.
Annie noticed where his eyes had fallen and snatched his hoodie from the floor. She glared at him, clutching the material to her legs like a battle-shield.
All heat had drained from Artemis's limbs.
"Who?" he whispered.
She didn't answer, riding out his gaze.
"Who?" He got to his feet. "Who?"
The pain was scratched in every mark on her face. Anger burned there, as well as resentment, disgust and–
Shame.
His eyes widened. "No."
She must have seen it, the realisation on his face. Her breath hitched.
"No, no."
"So, before, I come to break down the do-oooor!"
There was a crash from behind them and suddenly they were no longer alone.
"Forgive me, Delilah, I just couldn't take any mooore!"
Their intruder bellowed out the last note, both hands raised high into the air, his almost toothless mouth sagging open. When he was finished he clapped his fat arms back to his sides.
"Tank you!" he boomed, with a clumsy bow. "I'm 'ere till Tursday…"
Grey, twisted chest hair poked through the top of Harold Shinner's shirt, a stretch-marked and beer-swollen stomach spilling from the bottom. He was unshaven, and possessed the rheumy eyes and elastic skin of a longtime alcoholic. His legs, short and slightly bowed, were clothed in brown trousers, scuffed shiny at both knees and scagged along the hemlines. His jacket was missing, and an empty gun-holster was rigged haphazardly over one shoulder.
At that moment, Artemis made his decision.
Shinner noticed Artemis's stares. "Who the–?" He cut off and gave a sharp, broken laugh. "You wanted some more, ey, girl? Feckin hell, you ony had ta ask and I'd a come back! You'd lie down and take it in the nettles wouldn'cha?"
Shinner continued to chuckle as he crossed the room, bending over the broken dresser and pulling a brown bottle of spirits free from a drawer. Artemis closed the door. When Shinner turned back around, his daughter had stopped her quivering and the pale boy with the eyebrow piercing was pointing a gun at his head.
His bloodshot eyes narrowed. "What the feck…?"
"Go to the bathroom," said the boy. He voice was flat, devoid of emotion.
"What the fuck?" Shinner threw down the bottle, smashing it to the floor. Golden liquid pooled into the lines along the floorboards. He thrust a hand towards his attacker. "Who the feck's this?" he demanded.
Annie just stared at her father, her breath beginning to hitch again.
"Go to the bathroom," repeated the boy.
"You berrer put that feckin gun–"
Click.The gun was cocked. Shinner's eyebrows shot up. "Gonna shoot me are you?" He laughed, staring incredulously at the scrawny figure in front of him. And then he realised. "Hell's bells," he whispered, taking in the black hair and the ice-cold eyes. "You're… You're Timmy's boy aren't cha?" He laughed again. "What the feck are you doin' 'ere?"
The gun advanced and the man was forced to take a sharp step back. He glanced once over his shoulder. Through the open door of his barely-used bathroom, he could see the pea-green, scum-layered bathtub, filled to the brim from months beneath a leaking roof.
He smiled at Artemis with teeth that were almost black. "What reason you got fer threatenin' me, eh? What harm as I done you?" Annie released a shaking sob from the corner and Shinner's grin widened. "The girl? Is that'ow it is, Fowl? Well, if it's really fer fuckin' that cha' want her, I'll warn yah, it's like pumpin' a dead whippet." He shook his head. "You won't shoot me. Yer smart like yer Daddy. You know that if you did there'd soon be a hundred men out lookin' for the man who pulled the trigger."
Artemis's voice was dead. "Ninety percent of accidents occur in the home."
A dart shot from the teenager's modified pistol, spiking into the skin of Shinner's gullet. The elder man slapped at his neck, wrenching the hypodermic out by the chamber, but it was too late. Artemis took two steps forward, swung his trainer up onto Shinner's planet-like stomach and kicked. The elder man stumbled through the bathroom door, hitting the backs of his knees against the side of the bath and toppling backwards into the turgid pool behind him. There was a tremendous bang and a splash, and stagnant water rose in a tsunami onto the floor. Annie screamed and Artemis stepped after Shinner, tucking the gun into the back of his waistband and slamming the door closed behind him. The room was thrown into darkness.
He could hear the man's arms flailing, splashing, his legs kicking over the tub's plastic sides. A sliver of light seeped from under the door and as the boy's eyes adjusted he saw the bath water darkening to scarlet. Shinner heaved his torso half out of the water, gasping for breath and blood pouring from the gash in his head.
"Fowl!" he choked. "I'll kill you! I'll–"
But by this time Artemis had approached the bathtub and, lacing small fingers into his thinning hair, forced him back under. Shinner screamed silently, a stream of bubbles rising from his mouth like froth from an underwater volcano. Water continued to slap over his face and front but the boy could feel the drug slowly beginning to take its effect, sapping the strength from Shinner's limbs. The batting and punching of the man's arms slowed, his wrists flicking like the tails of dying fish. His legs twitched, knocking pathetically against Artemis's knees. The teenager sank his arms into the water. He undid the man's belt, dragging his waistband under his body and out over the side of the tub. He let the boots fall with a bang against the bath's side and then stood back, his hands dripping.
Shinner's jaw muscles were twitching in the half-light; his limbs jerking like a haunted marionette. Artemis watched, waited…
And then he was still.
Holly was stood between the toilet and the sink, a hand clamped over her mouth to muffle the scream. She was quivering from head to toe, her back pressed to the wall.
Artemis took several steady breaths before pushing the door open with a creak. Annie was waiting in the light. She stood in the centre of the room, looking at her friend with an expression torn between fear and quiet reverence.
He found it hard to meet her gaze. "Get my jumper." She moved away, and he pulled his T-Shirt over his head, stepping back and wringing it out over Shinner's wide-eyed corpse.
Annie clutched the sweatshirt in her hand.
He pointed at the floorboards, where the crimson-tinged liquid from the tub had spilled over and flooded a portion of the bedroom. "Lay it down there, but not in the water. Then go to the wardrobe and get me some dry trousers." He toed off his trainers and began peeling down his tracksuit bottoms.
She cranked back the plywood doors and searched through her and her father's scarce belongings. Artemis gave his hair a last few squeezes. Then, with one hand braced on the door frame, he vaulted over the pool that had settled out of the bathroom doorway and pushed himself on the splayed hoodie. He made sure he was steady before holding out his hand for the clothes, apparently Annie's own, and pulling them on quickly. There were no drips.
"Bag?" asked Annie.
"If you have one."
She pulled one of her old, love-heart graffitied backpacks from the closet and passed it to him. He stuffed his own sodden shirt, trousers and shoes into it, and after a last few pads on the hoodie, trying to remove every last bit of water from his sodden feet he could manage, stepped off onto the floor. Annie held the bag as he pulled the sweatshirt back over his head and jerked up the hood.
"No one should see the wet on the black," said Artemis. He swallowed. "No one should… My feet and clothes aren't dripping. Without a trail, no one should have reason to suspect the involvement of a third person–"
Annie pressed a hand to his arm. "Shoes?"
He nodded. The trainers she handed him were two sizes too small. He stamped them on, one hand braced on Annie's shoulder. She held him steady until he stepped away from her.
"Get back on the floor."
She retreated to the wall, lying down in the exact spot where he had first found her. She lay with her arms and legs eschew.
"Like this?" she asked.
"Yes. Good."
He pulled the gun out from the back of his waistband and checked that the chamber hadn't been permeated with water.
"Thank you," said Annie quietly.
Artemis looked up from his pistol. "Don't thank me," he whispered. "Please…Not for this."
She shook her head.
He blinked once, took aim, and fired. Annie's head slumped against the skirting board, the sedative taking control of her ill-nourished body far quicker than it had her father's. Artemis knelt and pulled the dart gently from her arm before pocketing it, glancing back briefly towards the bathroom. He could see Shinner's limp, bare legs hanging over the side of the tub. It was how Shinner's friends would find him later: his daughter, beaten, knocked unconscious against the wall, and then Shinner himself, drowned, with his trousers gathered about his ankles, too drunk to stand steady when taking a piss: the fool's own fault.
Artemis swung the backpack over his shoulder, feeling the damp already beginning to seep through the hemp. He took the stairs carefully. Noises returned to him; the shouts and the singing that he had been temporarily deafened to. Better smells came in through his nose and filled his lungs, clean air drifting from the open front door only slightly masked by tobacco smoke. As he left the house he saw two familiar figures swaying and groping each other by the gate.
"Well would cha look who's it is!" bawled Dara, pointing unsteadily and spilling half his beer. "It's yer man, Shelley! Yer knight with the feckin lighter!"
Shelley squinted briefly before her weathered features split into a smile. "And so it is! How are yah, lad? Did yah get what it was that cha came for?"
The couple waited for him to answer, both their pupils swollen to the size of hubcaps.
"Aye," said Artemis, flicking up his hood. "I did."
He can see the curve to the world here: the inside of the air. He's out, up, beyond the sun and then plunging to the floor. The world beneath his back is turning.
"Shit. Shit– No, don't move him!"
Faces smile and twist themselves into butterflies. They fly away with wings wrought of words and cello concertos. He smells pomegranate. It laughs at him and shoves him away. He spins.
"Is the ambulance here yet?"
The colours are waving at him. Purple winks, yellow grins, and a nasty shade of scarlet scowls and gives him the finger.
"They're on their way. Graham's just trying to get a hold of his parents."
The colours have turned. They're jostling each other, fighting to get to him. Green screams at turquoise and black opens its mouth wide.
"What are they going to do when they see this?"
"He's waking up!"
"Artemis? Artemis, can you hear me?"
The world is rushing together; paint running up a canvas.
"Okay, Artemis, try to stay still."
"Nuh…"
Sound became clearer as if his head had surfaced from a pool.
"Just stay calm. The ambulance is on its way."
He didn't understand.
"Have we got a coat? Something we can put over him?"
Something rustled over his torso.
His tongue felt fat and heavy in his mouth. "Waz… Waz 'appen?"
"You're… You've…"
"There's been an incident, Artemis."
"Incy…wha?"
Incy wincy spider climbed up the water spout.
He wanted to giggle.
"Just lie still."
No.
"Artemis–"
"Ah!"
Pain hit him and suddenly scarlet was swearing again. Then the world was back. His eyelids wrenched open.
THE NEXT THING WE REMOVE IS THE NECK.
"Wha?" he gasped, blinking erratically. "What?"
The words stared down at him from the ceiling above. He didn't understand them.
"Artemis, you need to lie still!"
He closed his eyes, his mouth twisting, his head rolling to the side. When at last his eyelids slid up, his gaze landed on a mass of white. He stared at it, confused.
Toilet paper...?
He looked away and tried to sit up, but the pain caused him to cry out.
"Artemis! For God's sake, Geoff, where are the paramedics?"
His head settled back to the side.
The white mass had moved closer.
"Wha?" he gasped. "Wha?"
"Artemis–"
He tried to get away but the white followed and the agony increased.
"Artemis!" shouted a voice. "You're going to hurt yourself!"
He groaned, half sob, half whine.
Get away!
He tried to swing his arm out but the pain reached such a degree his eyes rolled back in his head. He lay there, panting, fighting for consciousness.
"It's alright, Artemis," said a second voice. "Just stay calm, there's a good lad."
Artemis stared blearily at the mass beside his head. He squinted.
Bandages.
Then he realised that was all he could see. He couldn't see his hand, his wrist, or his forearm. He could feel his shoulder beneath his chin and see the start of his pale bicep. Then there were only the bandages. His elbow disappeared into them, then—nothing.
His brow furrowed.
"Where...?"
There was a pause.
"Where... Where the rest?"
His gaze flicked up to the two teachers hovering beside him. They exchanged a glance.
"Artemis–"
His breath was coming faster now. He couldn't seem to make himself speak right. "Where... Where the rest... arm?"
"Artemis, please try to stay calm–"
"Where is my arm?"
The words seemed to ring in the room, and the faces silently gaped at him.
He looked down from his shoulder.
Bandages.
Pain.
The scarlet was back.
And suddenly he could hardly breathe for screaming.
Annnnd, I'm officially evil! But in good company with the already twisted Ceilo Crimisi, and the newly tainted Rocket Axxonu! Thanks so much guys! Seriously, both of you went above and beyond in beta-ing this - couldn't have asked for better.
In the next chapter: Artemis forgets a lot of things - but not his birthday (Ha! Subtle.)
Please be kind and leave a review! You've all been so fantastic at it so far!
And you know you want this thing updated quickly...there's only three chapters to go.
On another note: You're all probably WAY ahead of me on this, but if you haven't started reading it, go and read "The Other Paradox" by Rocket Axxonu. It's by far and away one of the best on-going fics currently live on the site and if you love a bit of Holly - go and READ. You'll find the link to it on my "favourite stories" list on my profile but otherwise I think it's still on the first page of updates... Enjoy! :)
But review this first.