A/N: Ok, I decided to scratch Holly's mysterious past. Too cliché. It's still sitting in my computer, though, so one day I might dredge it up and make it into a story. This means this chapter will be a bit shorter than normal, since I just scrapped about 4000 words, and I've been typing away madly to make up for it, but not madly enough. And thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed! Stardust Firebolt, Kitty Rainbow, Rhapsody, Rockerbaby 2383, weirdo, Blue Yeti, slime frog, animefanatic07, Flamewing, Artemis Fowl the Second, Red Moon Kree and... well, everybody else who gave a review. I really appreciate it...

***

Artemis was meditating on the cold cement ground, racking his brain for something, anything that would help the captives. But he was drawing a complete blank. The problem was that they had absolutely nothing to work with. The cell was utterly empty. All of them were extremely irritable. They were bored out of their minds, and the fact they hadn't eaten in a considerable amount of time didn't help either.

For at least the tenth time, and unexpected outburst of humming erupted from the other side of the cell, distracting him. He frowned. Despite the fact he had read more works on psychology when he was ten than some psychologists read in their whole lifetime, Artemis was finding that it was impossible to penetrate the mind of Holly Short.

Artemis didn't know her well enough to understand why she was acting the way she was. Holly Short hated being caged and useless. When she had been a captive in Fowl Manor, she had a plan, she had something to do, and she felt in control. But here, she was wasting away. Rather than feeling miserable, she was trying her best to busy herself, which was the only way to keep from succumbing to despair. Most unfortunately, Artemis mistook her efforts to stay active in at least some form for a sort of insanity.

"Captain, must you continue this maddeningly bothersome humming?" asked Artemis.

"Nope," said Holly obligingly, and continued anyway. Artemis sighed.

"I'm afraid as a last resort, Captain, I'm going to have to order you to stop." Holly couldn't ignore eyeball orders, but she had another alternative. Without missing a beat of the song, which was an old fairy battle hymn, she began whistling instead. "Captain," Artemis began testily, but Holly interrupted.

"Aw, just shut up Fowl, don't make me use the mesmer."

"I'm hungry," pouted Mulch. A noise came to Artemis's ears that sounded suspiciously like Holly smacking the dwarf. His suspicions were confirmed by Mulch's groan. Artemis felt affronted – he liked the dwarf, and felt a need to come to his defense.

"Captain, this situation is dangerous enough without us beating on each other. Have you really gained anything by needlessly harassing our fellow prisoner?"

"Yes," she said plaintively. "It made me feel better."

They continued on in this vein for some time, each of them having a role to play in the conversation. It was Mulch's role to insert random complaints into the dialogue, Artemis's to act testy and try to get Holly to shut up, and Holly's to punch people who got on her nerves and sing battle hymns. The endless commentary did not abate for 2 hours, and probably would have gone on longer, had not there been an interruption.

***

Dinsmore Manor, outskirts of Haven

Things had definitely taken a turn for the better for Opal Koboi. She had been unable to believe her bad fortune when Holly Short had evaded the bomb by sheer luck, taking away her surprise attack. It would have been an ideal warning to the LEP to have blown the captain to bits, and would have caused Foaly a great amount of grief. But Opal didn't give up.

Opal had a contact in the LEP, and through this contact she had found out that Commander Root had guessed she was behind the attack on Holly. And she had been delighted to learn that the Captain had been sent aboveground to apprehend Mulch Diggums. If there was anyone Opal hated almost as much as Foaly, it was Mulch, the dwarf who had broken into Koboi Labaratories – twice. So she hadn't been able to resist the idea of getting back at both Mulch and Captain Short in one shot.

So Opal had begun tailing Holly, who was in turn tailing Mulch. It had been hard for Opal not to laugh aloud at the irony of it from time to time. But the greatest test of her restraint came when Captain Short and Mulch had met up with none other than Artemis Fowl. It had taken all her self-control not to shriek with glee. Things couldn't possibly have gone better if she had arranged them herself. Of course, she was only equipped with two tranquilizer darts, but it would be easy enough to subdue the human with the mesmer. It was truly remarkable how sometimes the world seemed to bend to her will.

She was now sitting with her feet propped up, in the home of some poor, unfortunate young pixie who now lay unconscious on the floor. The first thing Opal had done when she snuck out of prison was to hack into Haven's records. What she had needed was a young, outcast female pixie who lived alone and was unemployed. It had taken almost a month of searching, but she had finally found a lonely, reclusive pixie named Phoebe Dinsmore who lived in a huge manor. Her family, who seemed to hate being around people as much as the hermit pixie, had moved into an unpopulated rural area. Phoebe had wanted to keep her job as a reporter for Haven Daily, so she had stayed at the manor. But a few days ago, Phoebe had been fired. She was the perfect candidate.

Opal had knocked out the girl, and assumed her identity. The two looked nothing alike, but Phoebe's face was dominated by huge, thick-framed glasses which sufficiently hid her most of her facial features. With hair dye, colored contacts, and some huge glasses identical to hers, it was highly doubtful anyone would notice the difference.

Once she had sorted out where she was going to go, she had returned to Howler's Peak. The goblins had done a fine job of pretending she was still there; all of them were eager for the extra rations that her absence gave them. Everything had gone according to plan.

Now it was time for her to make use of yet another one of the connections she was building up. This particular connection was a human by the name of Mikhael Vassikin. After the Mafia's plans had fallen through on the Bay of Kola, life had not been pleasant for Vassikin and his comrades. If there was anyone who would see to it that Artemis Fowl was destroyed, it would be them. Vassikin had been the easiest to contact, and Opal had got in touch with him as soon as she had stored the captives. Of course, she didn't reveal that she was a fairy, but claimed she was a human bounty hunter who believed the Mafia would be willing to pay good money for Artemis Fowl the Second. And Vassikin had made it very clear to the supposed bounty hunter that they were indeed prepared to give good money to get their hands on the treacherous little Irlandskii.

***

2 hours later, very little had changed in the dark cell. Mulch was still whimpering, Holly was still whistling the same song, and Artemis was still meditating in a corner – very unsuccessfully, it must be said.

At this point in time, Mulch felt an urge to liven up things. "Hey, I found a trapdoor!" he shouted. In half a second, Holly had followed his voice and was at his elbow, and in a second, so was Artemis.

"Where?" cried Artemis, patting the wall in an attempt to find it.

"Just kidding," Mulch sniggered. Artemis groaned, and Holly clouted him on the head. Or she tried to, but since she couldn't see him, she missed and hit the wall. Cursing, she watched as for a split second a flurry of blue sparks racing to heal her battered hand and illuminated the cell. In the short burst of light, she caught a glimpse of Mulch's ugly, squat face crinkled in pleasure, and Artemis, his ghostly features paler than ever.

Artemis, who had been sitting himself down again, straightened up. "Could you do that again?"

"Why?" she asked.

"I thought I saw something in the ceiling. It may have been nothing, but I'd like to confirm it either way." Holly never had a chance to answer, because that was when the aforementioned interruption took place in the form of a huge flash of light, effectively blinding them all. The pale, silvery-blue light that had emanated from Holly's magic was nothing compared to this, and all of them were used to the pitch black. None of them heard the creak of a trapdoor, because of the howls of "Owwwww!" "My eyes, my eyes!" and "D'arvit!" that filled the air. Neither did they hear the soft hiss of gas from above them.

Mulch was in agony. As any good obsessive Artemis Fowl reader knows, dwarves hate light. The poor kleptomaniac was sprawled on the floor, writhing and howling in pain.

"Shut up, Mulch!" Holly yelled at him. She might have been a mite nicer had she actually seen the dwarf rolling pitifully on the floor, but her fairy eyes hadn't adjusted to the light. Holly instinctively felt her way to corner wall and backed up into it, eliminating two possible ways in which enemies could approach.

Being the only above-ground resident, Artemis was first to adjust to the light. Eyes watering in pain, he squinted into the overwhelming radiance around him. He caught a glimpse of thin tendrils of mist pouring in before, as suddenly as it had come, the light vanished. It took Artemis a few seconds to register what he had seen.

"Don't breathe," he screamed. He sounded as if he was panicking, but in reality he was simply trying to be heard over Mulch's wailing.

"Don't breathe?" asked Holly incredulously. "What kind of advice is that?"

"Gas," he gasped, not daring to open his mouth for too long. Holly nodded. There was obviously some sort of ventilation here or they would have suffocated – if they could hold their breath long enough, the gas would filter out. But Holly doubted they would be able to withstand the knockout gas, or laughing gas, or whatever it was their captor was using, for that long.

She was absolutely correct. Within minutes, all three were slumped on the ground, fast asleep.

***

Opal just couldn't stop sniggering as she climbed through the trapdoor and into the cell via a makeshift rope ladder. This was absolutely scrumptious. The very definition of fun. It was worth everything she had endured; the pain, the imprisonment, the treachery. She realized now the things she had done wrong. She had wanted a partner, someone to brag with and share the success with, to realize her genius. But she was much wiser now.

Opal landed like a cat on the cold floor of the dingy cell. She had never had to do much physical labour, but it was no difficult feat to hoist the limp form of Artemis Fowl on her shoulders and climb back up the ladder. She cast one last look at the two other figures in the cell. The dwarf was sprawled out on the floor, his open mouth drooling in the dirt. The elf was in the shoved in a corner, her head drooping against a wall. Opal grinned devilishly. It would be interesting to see the effect taking Fowl would have on them. She hoped it would inspire fear, frightened anticipation, maybe suspense – but in reality, she knew the LEP officer and the thief were above such petty feelings. She would have to something much more drastic to scare them.

AN: Ok, Opal Koboi's getting psychopathic... but it's so much fun to write criminally insane villains. And it's not completely out of her character. I can honestly see her doing everything she does here. I never decided the way she should act, or any other character should act for that matter. They just act that way. It's like they're writing the story, not me.

Ok, I'll shut up now... write a review, even if it's pointless! They're so much fun to read.