Author's Note: I am so sorry you had to wait so long for this chapter, my beautiful readers. I've been holding off to edit this chapter. Partly, because I was working on other AF fanfics, partly, because I don't want this story to end, haha. But, I'll make amends. You'll get chapter 22 next Wednesday and the last (sob!) chapter the following Wednesday. 😊

A special thanks to the lovely Assan, who offered to translate my fanfic into German. I tried to add the link here, but it doesn't seem to be letting me post it. So, if you are interested in reading the story in German, please write me a DM and I'll send you the link per mail. :-)

Another big thanks goes out to Space-Dweeb (as always) for your lovely comment. My knowledge of Rome is a mixture between having been there (not in the Archive, though!) and Google Maps, to be completely honest, but I am glad I can convey it in a way that sounds realistic. And although I can't make this story go on for forever (as much as I would like to), I hope, I can get you excited for another few fics that are currently in the making. Turns out that there are a few stories, some people felt like sharing...

Disclaimer: Eoin Colfer owns all the characters from Artemis Fowl, I only own my imagination and the characters, I have created. Although owning is debatable and would probably earn me a beating from Lucifer and a lecture from Sofia.


Chapter 21

The low gravelly voices of the Butler men formed the background noise on the otherwise silent floor. Sofia had read the old document's passage again and again. Her fingers had begun to tremble ever since she had returned to the start of the page for the third time. She swallowed hard, praying for the information to show up. Butler had only come along because she had told him she'd knew how to stop Lucifer and find Artemis. They had broken into the Vatican, for heaven's sake. She had to find something. Anything.

Focus, stupida, she ordered herself. You have a freaking doctorate, you freed Lucifer once, you can put him back. That or face the two behemoths, admitting that you are an utter failure. Think about this logically, she thought. How did they get him into the ring in the first place? It would have to be some kind of magic. If God had put Lucifer in the ring, why put hide it in the Basilica? Why not destroy it or put it somewhere, where no one would ever be able to find it again? If God was omnipotent – Sofia pushed down the mad laugh that threatened to break free – then the ritual had to be done by humans. Humans, who wrote the whole thing down to warn people like her not to free him. Or, she hoped, how to capture him, after a stupid little girl managed to break his bonds.

"But where would you put that information?" she murmured under her breath, staring into the distance. There had never been a thorough examination of the text. But someone must have catalogued them at some point, dating them, scanning the contents and bundling similar texts. So even if this document didn't hold any useful information, maybe someone had indexed an accompanying document closeby.

Sofia's fingers wandered over the cracked paper. The material, hemp she assumed was rigid, not very flexible. It would have only been used for a short time before switching to other materials, which would limit her search. She got up from the floor, her gaze wandering to the next file on the shelf. Out of reach and no Butler around to get it down. Even so, she didn't want to interrupt the two. They had to work through a lot of family issues.

She rose to her tiptoes, pushing the bottom of the magazine file with the torch towards her. If she managed to get it far enough out of the shelf, then gravity would do the rest for her and she could catch it. Sofia grinned as it tipped over. Just not into her hand but on her head before falling to the floor with a loud thud.

"I'm okay," she half shouted to the men at the other end of the hall, imagining them rolling their eyes at each other.

Rubbing her head, she opened the folder. Taking a double-take, she frowned. They weren't the documents she had been looking for, nor from the same era. It was a more recent murder that happened in Vatican City. Pictures, autopsies and profiles. Completely displaced among the Hebrew and Aramaic scripts.

"If you are next to my Devil text...," she murmured and reached for the file on the right side of the Aramaic text, holding on to one of the shelf boards for support.

"Just ask for help," the Major said gruffly behind her, making her almost lose her balance. She heard the ripping of a certain guard's uniform before she saw Butler's hand reaching for the file and pulling it out. She took it from his hands and leafing through its contents.

This one was from a similar time as the Devil text. Maybe 5th century, different paper, though. Also, different subject. She put the documents back into the magazine file and pointed to the next two on each side.

"Show me those, please," she told Butler when he had pulled the torn jacket from his shoulders and slipped back into his own that she had placed on the shelf board. She didn't blame him. There was no way, he could pull off the disguise of a security guard with the jacket hanging off him in rags.

Both parchments in the file were Hebrew scripts, one old prayer from a community around Israel, the other was an annual report from the court of Solomon. Sofia handed them both back. She scratched her palm, painfully aware that both men were watching her. Expecting her to deliver.

She turned to the Vatican murder file, she had left on the ground. Picking it up, she checked the label. Cal 5 Tri, following Cal 4 Tri, followed by Cal 6 Tri. It was the right file with the wrong content. No indication, where it belonged, though. She skimmed through the autopsies, checking the dates. 1998.

"Someone switched the files," she said, hoping that she sounded more confident than she felt. She took the murder files as well as the old Aramaic text before handing Butler the empty magazine files.

"Did someone expect us to look for them?" the Major asked, scanning the floor for attackers.

"I think, someone wanted to hide this one." Sofia held the murder file up and stepped out of the aisle.

"Why switch it and not destroy it?" Butler asked.

"The old Prefect might have mixed them up or expected aliens to steal them and tried to hide them. He… went a bit cuckoo in the end," Sofia confessed quietly, returning her attention to the autopsies in the murder file. When she showed no indications of moving, the Major became impatient.

"Well, where to?"

Sofia gritted her teeth. "I'm thinking."

"Hurry up then. We don't have time to wander the corridors all night."

"I am aware of that," Sofia snapped. "But that's exactly what's going to happen if I get it wrong."

Not waiting for the Major's reaction, she tapped a name on the autopsy report. "It's probably not in the restricted area, but it is still a murder investigation. It won't be on Level 1 with the rest of the Administration files, but… a level lower with all the documents that need to be approved by two officials from the Vatican. Hopefully."

Sofia pointed down the corridor. Leaving the restricted area, they descended another level down and stopped in front of a heavy door, this one secured by a simple lock. Butler pulled the guard's keychain from his jacket, trying several keys until the lock clicked open. Taking a deep breath, Sofia stepped into the vault, ignoring her shaky knees.

"Why are the ceilings so low here?" Butler asked as he and the Major ducked their heads to not scrape their scalps on the stone ceiling.

Sofia threw him a quick look over her shoulder, before returning her attention to the cryptic tables on the shelves.

"These vaults are part of the ancient necropolis that the Vatican was built on. This place was used for storage until the Archive ran out of space. That's when they started putting shelves in here too."

Butler lifted an eyebrow. "A cemetery?"

Sofia nodded, finally stopping in front of a shelf. Butler had no idea how she managed to keep track of the whole place with only the abbreviated tables on the shelves for orientation. There didn't seem to be an apparent system apart from being somehow separated from different ages or subjects. This one simple said Mon-Nud.

Shining the light along the shelf boards, he watched her work away. She seemed completely immersed in the labels, at times tapping one file only to jump to a different row, murmuring under her breath. He wondered if she was aware of it.

She began pulling out files, returning them almost immediately.

"What are you looking for?" Butler eventually asked.

"The Aramaic texts were organized by language and then by age, but the documents I have found belong to another filing system. All the files in here are associated with one specific Monsignor," she explained with a sigh, without stopping in her search.

"Monsignor Mulcahy led the murder investigations and most of his files are indexed in here. But they are labelled inconsistently and without the inventory, it's simply a guessing game," she said, pulling out another file with a bit more force than was necessary.

"There should have been a reformation for the Archive at some point, but that's a bit of a touchy subject for the Catholic Church."

Butler's lips curled into a small grin, which Sofia missed as she went through an inquiry by Monsignor Mulcahy. Another magazine file was filled with documents from an investigation in 1997. Finally, she opened a folder which had no modern documents in it.

Sofia let out a shaky breath, her knees almost giving out, lifting the three old parchments into the light. She turned the pages over, her eyes jumping from line to line. It was the same author as her devil's text, but they weren't talking about the same subject. Or were they?

"This one might be about the binding. It's about–," she stopped in mid-sentence as she held the script against the torchlight.

"Do you see this?" she asked, looking up. The Major squinted at the document, not seeing anything special whatsoever.

"Some of the letters are darker than the others."

She pointed them out. The Major shrugged.

"Could be due to age."

"They would have faded evenly. Also, you can't see it if you don't hold the torch directly in front of it." She took the document out of the light beam and the colour of the letters was uniform again.

"What's the message?" Butler asked.

Sofia held the document up again, reading the single letters. It was all gibberish. She held every parchment into the light. They all had single highlighted letters, but none formed a coherent sentence.

She sighed, shaking her head and putting the paper on top of the pile. The Major might have been right and it simply was faded ink. About to admit defeat, an idea struck her. Lifting the pile of paper against the torch. All the highlighted letters still appeared in a jumble on top of each other. She began exchanging the order, pushing the top paper to the bottom and moving the middle piece around until the letters shifted and she was able to read the message.

Her eyes went wide.

"The text is talking about a blood ritual," she murmured, moving her finger along the lines. "That ring was somehow charged. That's not the correct translation, but it is something similar," Sofia continued, translating the text as she went along.

"Does it have to be the same ring?" the Major asked with his arms crossed in front of him. Sofia went back and forth, mumbling the Aramaic words under her breath.

"I don't think so," she finally said. "However, there are some prayers. No, it's like engraved spells, keeping his soul and body inside the object. I guess anything will do if we can put the spells on it," she finished, her head swimming from switching between the languages.

"What kind of spells?"

It must have been the first time, the Major ever asked her that many questions about magic, but somehow his interest seemed to have an ulterior motive. Sofia gave him a curious look, before checking the other pile of documents, she had found ten years ago and tried to hold each of them against the light. Only one document had a hidden message to reveal.

"It's a katadesmoi. An ancient curse. Pretty graphic, too. 'Soul will be tortured in the pit of eternal pain'. But I have no idea if it needs to be written on an object to work."

The Major reached into his jacket and pulled out a small box, offering it to Sofia.

"What about this one?" he asked.

Sofia lifted her gaze from the documents, squinting into the darkness until she could make out the outlines of the object. Handing the Major the pile of papers, she carefully took the box from his hand. Its smooth surface was cold to the touch as she brushed her finger over the inscribed letters.

...and he shall suffer eternally... torment begin at every day... soul devoured again and again... no rest for the one, I, Lucifer Morningstar, are naming on this tablet...

She stared up at the Major, clearing her throat uncomfortably. "Lucifer gave you this?"

The Major nodded.

"What is it?" Butler asked Sofia, who held the box firmly in her hands as if it would start floating away otherwise.

"The box is inscribed with a curse. It has your name on it," she told the Major, who wasn't surprised.

Butler frowned. "What's the point of cursing you? He could kill you, couldn't he?"

He was right, why go to such lengths if Lucifer could strike him down? Unless…

"What if he can't?" she asked, her excitement growing. "Lucifer wouldn't bother plotting such a curse to get rid of you… or destroy the temple to kill us."

Realization struck her as soon as the words had left her mouth. "He tried to stab me with the sword, but it didn't work. So, there must be something that keeps him from attacking us."

But something that hadn't stopped him from manipulating Artemis or kidnapping him. Butler rubbed his neck. There wasn't anything that connected the Major and Sofia. He was dead, over 7 ft tall and the only thing he ever questioned was the security protocols of any given place. Sofia was the complete opposite. They both knew Lucifer personally, but that was it.

Butler regarded the small blue stone hanging from his uncle's neck.

"The only thing you two have in common is that stone," he said, nodding to it. Sofia followed his gaze.

"He did say it would keep us safe from any angelic or demonic attack. But I can't imagine Lucifer giving it away if it had some special powers that could protect us from him. That wouldn't be very clever," she thought aloud.

If the Major knew one thing about Lucifer then that he didn't make decisions based on logic but his current mood. He was as changeable as the weather in April.

"Lucifer doesn't strike me as someone who plans very far ahead," he said with a huff.

Butler thought the same. The angel was full of himself. The reason he was cast out of Heaven in the first place if Butler remembered correctly.

"He might come back for it," Butler said. The Major made an affirmative sound, looking at the box in Sofia's hand.

"How does this thing work?"

"As soon as you open the box, you'll be sucked in and sealed away for... forever." She left out the eternal torture and pain, he could imagine it regardless.

"Then it's like the ring for Lucifer?" Butler asked, making her pause. Would Lucifer try to trick the Major into the same prison, he had been cast to, thousands of years ago? Yes, he would. Sofia glared at his engraved name on the box.

"Hang on," she said, all of a sudden. "Does anyone have a pocket knife?"

Butler bent down and pulled a throwing knife from his boot, holding it out to her. Sofia stared at the blade, before giving Butler a bewildered look. What else had he stuffed down his pants? He gave her a wry look as if reading her mind.

Abruptly turning to the Major, she gave him the box. "Hold it like this, please?"

Butler directed the torchlight to the small wooden box as she began to scratch parts of the inscriptions away. The Major raised his eyebrows, watching her work away.

"How is this going to help?"

"The last part says 'I, Lucifer Morningstar, are cursing this man', followed by your name. I should be able to scratch out your name, leaving his."

Butler understood immediately. "Would this turn the curse around?"

She shrugged. "In theory. Either way, the curse will probably not work on you anymore. There, done."

The Major took the box back. He suspected that his subconscious tricked him, but somehow, the box seemed lighter and… less menacing. He pushed it back in his jacket and gave her a nod. The closest thing to praise, he had ever given her.

"Now what?"

"We need a distraction. Something to get Lucifer's attention."

Grabbing the watch around her neck, Sofia lifted it to her face, checking the time. It was past midnight. They would never manage to get to Lucifer before sunrise and without the Major, their chances for success were extremely slim.

She bit her lip. They had no way of getting to Lucifer. He was like a ghost, appearing whenever he wished to. The Major paced along the corridor, coming to the same conclusion.

"How did he know you were in the hotel that night?" Butler suddenly asked.

"I texted the Major that I had a lead on the angels."

The Major stopped in his tracks. "No, you didn't."

"Yes, I did. I remember it because that was before the angel stabbed me," she said pointedly.

"You did not text me," he insisted, pulled out his phone and handed it to her. Giving him a doubtful look, she eventually flicked through his messages. All from her. She clicked on the last message, glancing up triumphantly before she scanned it once more.

"I didn't write this one," she said with a tight voice. Butler stepped behind her and read it over her shoulder.

"Check the number."

"It's not mine," she whispered, lowering the phone to see a muscle twitch in the Major's jaw as the full meaning of it sank in. Lucifer had played them. Whichever message they had been writing, the angel had intercepted them. He curled his hands into fists, looking as if he was about to punch a hole into the wall.

"That's perfect!" Sofia exclaimed. And after the Major kept giving her an incredulous look, she elaborated, "This is our connection to him. We can pretend that you are texting me and get him to meet us anywhere. We can, how do you call it… regroup and think of a strategy."

"Do it," Butler said. "Tell him to meet you…"

"Villa Borghese? It has a huge park. It's about half an hour away from here," Sofia said, giving both men a questioning look.

"Are there enough places to take cover?" the Major asked.

"Plenty."

Butler and the Major exchanged glances and Sofia couldn't shake the feeling that they were having a conversation before her very eyes without saying a single word.

"Do it," Butler repeated and Sofia began typing the message.

Meet fountain of seahorses Villa Borghese. Have found what you were looking for.

Sofia turned the phone for the men to read the message, sending it, once they were both happy with it. She gave it back to the Major, before pulling her necklace with the blue stone from her neck. She held it out to him as well.

"As a precaution," she explained. "Lucifer will try to get yours and if he succeeds, we'll be on our own."

The Major nodded after a moment and let the necklace drop into his pocket. Sofia's shoulders dropped in relief, a half confident smile pulling at her lips.

"Now, let's kick some ass."

Both Butlers gave her the same dark look that would have frightened the whole Army of Hell off. If she had ever questioned their relation, this would have been the moment she would have been sure they belonged to the same family.

"What?" she asked, busily sorting the documents in her hand. "Isn't this the time, where we do some macho talk? Rambo style?"

The Major's voice rumbled low in his throat. "Move."


A/N: And we are done for this week. I hope you enjoyed this week's detective episode in the Vatican! Was it too much? This chapter was supposed to be half as long, but somehow, the guys kept stumbling over one roadblock after another. This one time, I was with the Major and got really frustrated when they just wouldn't get on with it!

Anyway, will they manage to trick Lucifer? And… what happened to Holly and Trouble? Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about them, they will get their big moment next time. I am super excited as always!

Also, if anyone is interested in some real-life murder mystery (and the inspiration for the files, Sofia found), search for "Murdered Swiss Guard in the Vatican". I am not saying that anything was hushed up, but it is a very curious case indeed. Please use caution if you are checking it out as the topics might be triggering for some.

I hope to see you all next week. Until then, take care!