Thanks to: Crazy Female LEPrecon, Sandd, Shadow Huntress, Fowl Star 57, Holiday Boredom, 2whitie and Steinbock for the reviews - you're all ace!

WARNINGS: Bit of swearing and bit of violence. Nowt too bad though really... in my opinion.

Apologies for the wait for the update.

Unusually for this fic, the start of this chapter leads straight onto where we left off on the last one so, without further ado, onwards!

CHAPTER TWELVE

Mistaken Identity

The door opened so swiftly that Kamar almost fell through it. Recovering himself quickly, he stared down the behemoth on the other side of the threshold as best he could and spoke in his best 'Mafia' voice.

"I'm here for Artemis Fowl."

"Yes?" the man stated.

Kamar didn't think that was much of an answer to his statement, so he decided to clarify what he meant.

"Where is he?"

"You're speaking to him," Art told the two men standing outside the house.

"Ha! Hear that? He say he is Fowl. Him!" Kamar appealed for a laugh from his audience. Mikhael chuckled slightly but the man in front of him remained stonily silent. The others of his team were currently securing the exits and were supposed to be hidden, and so laughter from them would have been highly punishable. "I am not a man with whom you may joke, sir. Now, tell me. Where is the boy?"

"The only boy living here is called Zoridon Kochanski. My name is Artemis Fowl," the man said, frowning.

Kamar sighed. "Fine. I have asked politely, but now we must resort to the hard way."

He drew a gun swiftly and pointed it at the man. Although very surprisingly, it was not nearly swiftly enough and he found himself staring down the barrel of his opponent's before any of them had even registered the man's hand snapping to his waistband and back.

He might not remember his past life, but his subconscious did and the muscles retained the memory of many thousands of hours of training. In actuality, it has been suggested that, like working dogs such as Border Collies, bodyguarding is a trait passed down through the generations in the very genes of the family he came from. Natural. Instinctive. Skills present from birth that need only be polished throughout life to perfect them.

Kamar couldn't hold back a gasp of surprise, but he quickly swallowed it as Vassikin backed him up.

"Whoever you are, it won't matter very soon. Allow us to search the house and no-one will come to any harm."

Art stared at the man before him with some degree of distain. "You're not coming in."

"Fine," Kamar said coolly. "Vassikin? Give the order."

Had his conscious mind been aware of his training, Art might've thought to shoot the man before he gave 'the order' into the walkie-talkie. As it was, Vassikin shouted so loudly that most of thethe men heard him without electronical aid and Art took his eyes off the two men at threatening to come through the front door.

Although with good reason to.

The back door seemed to implode, smashing inwards under the attack of a small two-man battering ram. The holders stepped aside and another man burst through it, quickly followed by several others, all bellowing orders and brandishing guns.

Aramazd was thrown back into his chair and Zory was grabbed round the mouth and waist, secured roughly in one of the larger men's arms.

"Nobody move! We're taking the boy. Do I have to kill you to make you understand that attempting to stop us would be futile?" Vassikin yelled, silencing his men instantly.

Art knew he was at a disadvantage, but he couldn't help thinking there must be something he could do.

"You!" Kamar snapped. "Put the gun down or we kill the old man."

Art looked at the stranger and realised he wasn't simply threatening. They'd kill them all without a second's thought. He dropped his gun grudgingly, cushioning the blow with his foot so as not to dent it. The action felt familiar.

Too familiar, idiot, some part of his mind grunted sourly. You've let this happen before, haven't you?

"Good," Kamar said smugly. "Now let little Master Fowl come quietly and we might let you all live."

He strode past Art, leaving Vassikin watching the man, and stood in front of Zory.

"Now then young sir," he sneered sarcastically, cupping the boy's chin mockingly in one hand. "Seems to me you are overdue a little chat with the Menidzher."

"I don't know what you mean," choked Zory, grabbing at the hand helplessly. "I'm not Artemis! He is! He's Art! He's Artemis Fowl!"

"Oh spare me the drama, Irlanskii," Kamar rolled his eyes. "Come on. We're leaving, men."

The men began to file out of the narrow doorway, Vassikin not taking his gun off Art for even a second. He had a horrible feeling the man was familiar to him. An old target? An old enemy? He was making him uneasy, whoever he was.

"Kneel down," he ordered sharply. "And put your hands on your head."

Art didn't have a choice but to comply and so formulated a plan that once he was on his knees, he would go for his gun, lying just out of reach on the floor. Unfortunately, he didn't have time to actualise this, as Vassikin hit him with a karate-chop to the side of the neck. This didn't, as it was supposed to, knock him out. But Mikhael Vassikin was used to fighting and the knee to the jaw that followed actually did. Art slumped against the stairs, unconscious and Kamar stepped over him with a small laugh.

"The bigger they are, the harder they fall, eh?" he chuckled as gestured for his partner to lead the way out of the house.

And then, just when everything was going right for once, an unplanned-for variable came into the mix.

Butler and Juliet walked, as casually as two people trained never to relax can walk, down the street.

All notions of leaving the situation be, soon vanished into the darkness as their sharp hearing picked up what was going on.

"I'm here for Artemis Fowl," the cold Russian echoed easily across the street to the trained ears.

The person at the door was as big as the elder sibling, but he still didn't manage to stop the men from entering the house. Within minuets there was a hefty banging and shouting before silence reigned once again. The watchers slunk to a safe distance, out of sight, but close enough for what they were about to do.

"He said Artemis Fowl. Even if it's not our Arty, we have to do something, right?"

"Exactly," Butler nodded.

"Plan?"

"Yup," he said, relaying his hastily improvised Plan B quickly to her. Artemis may need days or even weeks to plan a mission, but Butlers were trained to do so in seconds.

Before people even began emerging from the house, they were poised to move.

Juliet readied herself, checking her gun-holster was loose. Her brother didn't even need to ask.

"On my move," he murmured as there was movement at the front door. "Don't be afraid to shoot if you have to."

"I won't be," Juliet said determinedly, gritting her teeth grimly and psyching herself up.

Butler looked at her and couldn't believe he was actually considering taking his little sister directly into a fire-fight. But as much as he hated it, it would be stupid to attempt this himself. Besides, she was ready for it. And there had to be a time where he stopped ordering her to stay behind. She was growing up. She could look after herself now. Still, he would much rather have set her up as cover-fire from their lookout with a sniper. But there wasn't time for that. There wasn't even time for any more contemplation of their botched strategy before someone stepped out of the door and he leapt towards them with all the tensioned spring in his muscles.

It took at least a second for Vassikin to even realise he'd been hit. Then he was on the way down and face-planting in the snow. A heavy boot kicked off on his back and he heard someone else hitting the floor behind him. After that, there was scuffling and screaming, but Vassikin was too unconscious to notice that.

Butler went in first, clobbering the first man and using him as a springboard to throw himself at the next through the door. Before the smaller man with the gun could react, Butler had disarmed him. He grabbed him in a hold and forced him towards the kitchen like a shield, hoping they'd all be too shocked to shoot. Someone did manage to pull their trigger, but the bullets hit Kamar instead of its intended target.

"Don't shoot you idiots!" he screamed, writhing in pain as Butler carried him forwards another few metres.

The Blue Diamond pushed on into the kitchen until all the men were fumbling to holster their weapons, to swap guns for knives or at least free their hands for combat.

Then he dropped the leader and cleared the way for his sister.

Juliet went straight for the boy, tackling the man holding onto him. To be fair to him, the khulingany didn't have a free hand to fight her with and she pounced, easily squeezing a pressure point that made his eyes lose their focus and ripping his arms from his hostage, protecting him instantly in one of the many different moves taught at Madam Ko's Bodyguarding Academy for protecting young principals.

The others of the Mafia team rushed Butler, in an attempt to force him out of the kitchen where he could be shot without another mishap and actually simply lining themselves up in the narrow corridor for him to fight one-by-one.

"Keep your head down Arty," Juliet told the teenager as she dragged him out of danger.

Zory said nothing, utterly confused. Who were all these people? And what did they want?

Most of the men had turned from fight to flight now, shoving to get past eachother to get away from the man who was taking them out methodically, trying to find a better position to down him from. As had been proved, it was far too cramped to be shooting anything and those who had started off trying to fight him hand-to-hand and had suitably failed were amongst the first fighting their way to the exit.

The larger leader Butler had taken out first was up again, standing groggily and shouting. "Get the boy and get out! Get him and get out!"

Butler span to make sure he wasn't about to get shot in the back and meanwhile someone tried to grab hold of Zory. Immediately they had their wrist broken by Juliet and leapt back, bellowing in anger and pain. He backed out of the door, one hand clamped over the other in shock.

"Leave the old man, get the boy!" Vassikin yelled again.

Dropping Aramazd, three of the men rushed Juliet, the pressure-pointed one amongst them much more cautiously than the others. She went for him again first and dealt a punishing kick to his knee before turning on the others. He followed his colleague out of the door. If anyone asked later, he had been heading for the getaway vehicle to make sure they had a escape ready.

In the front room, Butler was finishing off the last of the more confident of the team and sent him flying backwards into the snow before turning on Vassikin. The co-leader didn't even attempt to fight, instead making a swift exit, leaving the shot Kamar and just two more of his men behind.

Butler turned on the spot and sprinted back through the door to help his sister as, working together to overpower her, the final two men cornered Juliet, pinning her with a gun as they snatched Zory and made their way to the back door.

It happened so quickly her brother had barely managed to begin to run at the gunman when, unfortunately, Art awoke and decided he had had quite enough of the strangers in his house and tackled him, stunning Butler with a hefty punch he wasn't expecting from behind.

"I'll get him!" Juliet yelled, the very second the gunman was out of the door. And before Butler could order her otherwise, she had jumped over the toppled table, past a shocked Aramazd and out of the back door.

"Juliet!" Butler bellowed, blinked stars out of his eyes and berated himself mentally as he turned to face his attacker.

In the stranger's eyes, he was no better than the others and Juliet gave chase and disappeared after the others as he parried a blow from his latest opponent. Butler risked a glance across the floor, in the hope to at least grab the ratty little man who had first entered the house, once he had subdued this man. But the Mafia leader was gone. Instead, the massive man who had hit him swung at him again and he regretfully decided that Juliet would have to fight for herself. He was in no doubt that she could, but he would never lose the over-protective big-brother instinct.

But in the meantime, he had this problem to deal with.

The giants clashed, each blow being blocked and each block being countered with another punch. Butler went for a leg hook and was almost downed himself in a way that was unsettling familiar in a way he couldn't remember in the heat of the fight. He went for a pole-punch to the stomach, half-expecting the arm to be grabbed and countering with a hit to the collarbone when it was. The man hauled him to the side and he hit the wall. Butler used it as an anchor to push off and send the man crashing into the couch, they almost went over in a tangle of limbs but somehow steadied eachother at the last moment and broke apart, standing a foot out of eachother's reach and panting in air to repay their oxygen debt.

Butler settled into a defensive hand-to-hand combat position, eerily mirrored by the person opposite him. After the initial attack was over, he waited again for the first punch of the next round, as his training dictated. He could grab the offered arm and use it to down the man, using his own weight to bring him to the floor.

So he waited.

But so did the other man.

Butler made it a habit never to look more at his opponent than to weigh up their physique, interpret their body-language to predict their next move and to gauge how much effort it would take him to defeat them. He preferred not to start up a staring match with men he was about to kill, maim or otherwise incapacitate.

The man in front of him was big. Butler-big. He must have matched him pound for pound and most of it was muscle. He was as serious an opponent as the troll had been all those years ago. And so Butler focussed, trying to work out why the man hadn't made another move and planning his own should they be stood like this for more than another few seconds.

Finally, he made eye-contact to check the man wasn't searching the room for a weapon.

And suddenly he almost relaxed. Everything about the man was familiar now. The stance, the way he countered attacks, even the feel of his fist against his blocks. He had more hair and a closely cropped beard, but even with it the head atop the giant body would be entirely recognisable.

It was a trick. It had to be a trick. Butler tensed up his guard again, trying to wipe all emotion from his mind. He was good at that.

But something was happening to the other man too. He made a noise like he was choking and suddenly grabbed his own head in massive hands, stumbling into the staircase bannister.

Butler, although it went against all training, automatically held a hand to his arm to steady him and was immediately pushed away roughly.

"Art, are you OK?" Aramazd asked concernedly, wary of coming any closer to the stranger in his house. His friend barely looked at him, instead focussing entirely on the man he had been fighting with.

"Who are you?" he growled in English. "Who. Are. You?"

Even Butler was shaking slightly now, his muscles vibrating with contained energy and shock.

"Who the hell are you?" he countered, eyes blazing with distrust. A trick. It was a trick to distract him from his charge. How could it be anything else. He was dead. Dead. No-one came back from the dead. Butler knew that. Had been taught it through many harsh lessons. Not even him. Not even he could beat that.

Art clamped his eyes shut. At the sound of the voice, images and lightning bolts of white brain-light shot across his vision.

"I… I know you," Art muttered under his breath. "I know you."

It was almost a question and the man before him took it as one, nodding slowly, his face drawn into a frown of confusion. It was a familiar expression. And not just because Art often saw it on his own face in the bathroom mirror. The man looked like him. Slightly younger and minus the hair Art had grown over the years to keep his head and face warm, given, but it was more than that. Art had the feeling he been looking at the face for years. And at the same time, he was sure he'd never seen it before.

There was an uneasy silence before the younger of the two giants spoke again.

"You're not going to try to hit me again, are you?"

Whoever or whatever was before him, could still be an enemy and Butler had to ensure that he wasn't about to find himself under attack again.

"No."

"Good," Butler seemed steadier now, despite the shock. But inside he was reeling.

This was all getting too complicated. This was supposed to be a simple mission. Find Artemis and go home. But now this? His mind struggled to comprehend what must have happened for his uncle to be alive, yet clearly not recognise him. If it was him at all. His thoughts immediately jumped to the fairies. Mind-wipes, cloning and other technology ran through his mind and pure rage began to seep from the place he kept it careful controlled and locked away. Had they made it seem that The Major was dead? Had they been the ones to do this to him and Juliet? Why? What would be the motive?

His mind snapped back to the present. His sister should be back now. Something had happened to her whilst he had been stood here like a stunned boulder.

"I need to find Juliet," he said numbly. "Then I'll work out how you're alive."

And with that, he left out of the back door, leapt over the back fence and disappeared into the night leaving a man who had gone by the name of 'Art' for as long as he could remember and by 'The Major' for so, so much longer than that.

Juliet knew she was going against her brother's wishes and that her actions were entirely stupid, but as she sprinted past the old Russian man and scrabbled her way over the back fence after the kidnappers, she hoped she could at least get a description of the vehicle that took the boy.

Instead, her half-plan, did not turn out how she had hoped at all.

She flew over the fence, grateful for once for Madame Ko's ridiculous assault courses. This piddly little six-footer was nothing on the concrete barricades she and her fellow students were forced to scramble over on a weekly basis. Unfortunately, whilst she was contemplating this thought, she forgot one of the essential rules of jumping over a barrier.

Look before you leap.

Her sensei would often fill the pit on the other side of 'The Wall' with various pleasantries to remind her students of the rule and Juliet could not believe it had slipped her mind in a real-life situation. And it left her in a very difficult situation defence-wise.

Although it must be said, her sudden arrival into the alleyway did take the men by surprise as they dragged the struggling boy to a reversing vehicle.

"Holy shit!" the one bringing up the rear swore in Russian, immediately before Juliet's fist connected with his neck and he sank to the floor, choking. Another man was being helped to the car, but was unceremoniously dropped on the floor as his fellows turned their gun on their attacker. Before anyone else could move, Juliet had drawn her gun and pointed it at the man she reckoned was the leader. The flicker of everyone elses eyes to him for instruction had given it away.

"Give the boy back," Juliet said firmly. They looked at her blankly so she approached very slowly and pointed at the boy who was becoming more and more subdued. "Give him to me, or I start shooting."

Admittedly, it sounded like one of her brother's lines and probably would have had more effect coming out of his mouth, but at least she had tried.

"You are in no position to be giving orders," the leader said, recognising the word but being unable to answer in the same language. "You are lucky you are not dead already."

Juliet switched to the language her uncle had insisted she learn fully to fit in with their Bashkir cover-story after its first major use during the 'Carker Incident' or as she liked to call it; 'The time me and Harvey manned the fort while Uncle got shot'.

"Just put the boy down and leave. You aren't best set to be ordering me around either," Juliet said, indicating where her gun was pointed with a minute movement. No exaggerated gestures leaving herself wide-open for her.

"Perhaps, but there is only one gun pointed at my head. I count six on yours."

There was too. Even Broken-Wrist and Pressure-Point-Guy managed to aim weapons relatively well and Juliet was forced to admit she was outnumbered. Even her brother would've had second thoughts... probably.

"Submit quietly and we'll leave you without bullets in your skull, yes?"

"Fine," she muttered, lowering her gun.

"Don't shoot her. Bring her in. I have a feeling she's important some way," Vassikin muttered to one of his men, gesturing them to grab her. But as one approached, Juliet grabbed his gun arm, redirecting the gun and swinging the man into his colleague. Unfortunately, they were ready for her this time.

To her credit, none of the three men who tried to attack her escaped without some form of broken bone, but the end result was the same.

And that was why she woke up in the boot of a car, crammed in alongside a terrified boy.

"Urgh…" the next few words out of Juliet's mouth would not have sounded out of place in the roughest of Irish jails. And she would know, having spent a night in one once after a misunderstanding with someone in a club. She took in her surroundings. Dark. Very dark. Not even a glint from a tail-light seeping through the car's bodywork. Reinforced trunk. No popping the lid then. And no kicking out a tail-light to gain attention.

"Hello?"

"What?" she grumbled, whatever had been said wasn't English.

Zory took a second to try to work out what the girl that had rushed into his house after the Mafia men had said, before he spoke again. His English had improved slightly, but it would still be difficult to communicate, crammed as they were into the boot of a moving vehicle.

"My name is Zory," he said carefully. "What is yours?"

"Its Juliet," she said, moving quickly to her need for facts. "Listen - do you know long was I unconscious for?"

"Sorry, I don't understand."

Juliet ground her teeth and tried to roll over, checking her head for wounds and trying to force her brain to translate what she wanted to say.

"Asleep. How long was I asleep for?"

"Uh… two minutes, maybe less."

Was that a question or a statement? Madame Ko would have snapped at that, but it was good enough for Juliet. A few minutes. Probably concussion then, but at least her brain still worked so far as she could tell.

"Right. Are you hurt?"

"No."

"Good. Wait. You said your name is Zory, right?"

"Yes."

"You're not Artemis, then?"

"What? No. My friend. Back at the house. He is Artemis."

"Listen mate, that was definitely not Artemis Fowl. The guy was about ninety."

Zory wondered if she had said the wrong thing, then realised what she meant.

"Uh… no. My grandfather. The other man is Art."

"Art? As in Artemis?" Juliet paused, tried to think. "Zory, me and my brother were here looking for an Artemis Fowl. Do you know him?"

"Yes. Art is Artemis Fowl."

Juliet decided to give up for now. Obviously there was some sort of language barrier and she either wasn't saying the right thing, or she wasn't translating his answers correctly. The other man in the house, other than the Mafia, had been a guy as big as her brother and definitely not an Artemis Fowl of any variety.

There was silence for a short while and Juliet could swear the boy was shivering slightly in fear.

"Zory?"

"Yes?"

"Don't be scared. My brother will get us out of this."

"I'm not scared," the teenage boy retorted. "And Art will be the one who finds me."

"Huh. I'm gonna bet you my big brother finds us first."

The slang, directly translated from English, didn't quite make sense, but the message was there and Zory suddenly thought that he could get to like Juliet. But he had no answer for the claim. He did not know her brother and even if he was the man that had been fighting with the Mafia team, Zory had no idea if he would be capable of freeing them.

"This isn't the first time I've been locked in the trunk of a car, you know," Juliet said conversationally.

"Well I'm hoping this is the last for me," Zory said, a little of the fear he was feeling slipping into his words.

Juliet couldn't disagree with that, so she shuffled round uncomfortably, trying to asses their situation better. Her hands were still free and they hadn't taken her bulletproof vest off her yet. She could try to make a break for it when they opened the boot. But that would likely end with her getting shot, leaving the young Russian boy alone and, if possible, even more traumatised by the ordeal.

He may not be her brother's charge, but she still felt the old Butler inbuilt protection instinct firing up. But yet again, instead of saving the person she was supposed to be protecting, she had put them both in even more danger.

You've really gone and done it this time, she thought to herself.

And indeed she had.

If I don't die, she groaned mentally. Dom is going to fecking kill me.

Well that was a semi-showdown sorta thing. Hope you enjoyed the first compulsory Wolfy-fic fight-scene of this one.

The quote was from 'Transporter 2' - an ace film in my opinion. Plus it has Jason Statham in it, who is also awesome and is tipped to play Butler if the series ever gets filmed. He's got the look and the personality for him, but they'll have to use some pretty good camera angles coz he's only about 5'8"/5'9"... but then again they'll have to do something to get the fairies the right height anyway so they should still be able to have him fine :)

Thanks for hanging in there so far!

Wolfy
ooo
O

14-06-12