REVIEW REPLIES:

DaughterOfHecate: I'm glad you liked the chapter! And don't worry, I get the goddess Artemis and Artemis Fowl mixed up all the time as well, even after reading all the books AND the spin-off novels*queue embarrassment*. As for Nico being more powerful than the wizards, he probably is, but everyone most likely just puts it down to the fact that he's some sort of genius like Artemis and Hermione, so it doesn't really stand out much. As for what Hermione thinks, well... it's about time she got a bit of time in the spotlight, isn't it? Hopefully this chapter will answer your questions about Hermione! Thanks a bunch for reviewing! Reading your reviews always helps me lighten up!

Summer: I'm glad that Artemis seemed in character! And yes, dark Artemis is pretty amazing, AND he's super fun to write. Unfortunately, you're going to have to wait a bit longer to find out what everyone thinks. Thanks for reviewing! I know that this seems repetitive, but reading reviews really DOES make me smile. I hope you like this chapter!

HERMIONE IS REALLY GOOD AT GUESSING GAMES:

Artemis wasn't usually the sort of person who jumps into dangerous situations with no concrete plan.

But this time, he was making an exception.

Artemis was no idiot. He knew perfectly well that someone out there was planning on stealing the stone. Which was why he was going to steal it first.

He felt a pang of regret as he lay down in bed that night, going over the details of his plan. He didn't want to lose the few friends he had actually made by betraying their trust, but he really didn't have any other options. Besides, what his friends didn't know wouldn't hurt them.

For the next two weeks, Artemis spent most of his time in the library, reading about three-headed dogs and any other obstacles that he may have to face in order to get the Stone. In any other circumstance, he would have whipped out his beloved laptop and spent hours browsing the internet for clues that could tell him what he was up against. But unfortunately for him, he was at a wizarding school, where electronics didn't work, and he couldn't even devote more than a few hours a day to his research, due to the fact that he had to do his homework.

See, this was why Artemis preferred to spend his time at home rather that at school. School could be very time-consuming, even for a genius.

After two weeks of plotting and planning, Artemis' grand plan was to sneak past the dog with a red rubber ball, steal the real Stone and leave behind a decoy, send the Stone to Butler via Athena, and hope for the best. All things considered, it wasn't really his best plan.

An opportunity finally presented itself on the day of the Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Apparently, if Gryffindor won this match, they would be in the lead for the Quidditch Cup. This obviously meant that the Slytherins were cheering on the Hufflepuffs, something which seemed to unsettle the badgers rather than put them at ease. The rest of the school had apparently decided to spite the Slytherins by supporting Gryffindor. Honestly! One generation of Slytherins joins hands with Voldemort and suddenly the entire school thinks that the whole house is evil.

But perhaps stereotypes could work in his favor, for once. With everyone so fixated on the match, sneaking out to the third corridor wouldn't be a very difficult job. Stealth wasn't really one of his strengths, but he could make do.

'Now,' he thought as he drifted of to sleep, 'It's time to put this poorly thought out plan in action.'

******Line Break******

"Come on Artemis! We're going to miss the beginning of the match." grumbled Blaise as he tried in vain to get Artemis to hurry up.

Artemis rolled his eyes. He wasn't very close to Blaise and Theodore, but they were very good company at times. Or more specifically at times when he was trying not to seem suspicious to Nico and Draco.

Artemis, Blaise and Theodore sat down next to Nico, who had been dragged out to the bleachers about 15 minutes ago by a very enthusiastic Draco. No doubt that Artemis would have befallen the same terrible fate as well, if he hadn't threatened to curse Draco so badly that he wouldn't be able to walk properly for weeks. Nico had also seemed like he wanted to add his own threat, but had seemingly remembered something and had shut his mouth and allowed himself to be dragged away. If he wasn't so worried about whether his plan would work out or not, he would probably have thought that was strange and added it to the ever-growing list of things that were off about Nico. But fortunately for the fate of both Nico and the mythological world, he was too wrapped up in his own problems to care.

Nico was reading the Daily Prophet, with a cup of cold tea resting next to him. He looked up as the trio sat down.

"Hey." he said casually.

"Where's Draco?" Theodore asked, looking around.

"Draco's gone to torment a few Gryffindors for something or the other," Nico said with a frown.

"And you didn't stop him?" Theodore squeaked, "He's just helping people believe that all Slytherins are bullies!"

Nico shrugged, "Hey, I tried. But the kid seemed pretty set on telling Granger and Weasley that Harry's going to fail miserably." he explained before turning his attention back to the Daily Prophet.

Artemis may have been distracted, but he was still rather observant by normal standards.

"How are you reading that?" he asked suspiciously.

Nico raised an eyebrow at him, "What do you mean?"

"You have dyslexia. You shouldn't be able to read that."

Nico sighed, "Oh that! After the whole 'not being able to read a newspaper' affair, I asked my dad if there was a way to temporarily cure my dyslexia." he reached out and gently plucked a contact lens from his eye, "It's almost completely transparent, and helps me to read like a normal person. To be honest, I'm surprised that it took you this long to ask, Fowl. Looks like you're losing your touch." he teased.

Artemis didn't smirk and tease back like he usually would. He really was losing his touch. After so long in a normal school environment, with normal friends, he had let down his guard. It had taken months for him to notice that Nico could read properly. What sort of child prodigy was he?

He was vaguely aware of Nico frowning at his blank expression, looking concerned.

"Artemis, are you okay?" he asked.

Artemis didn't bother replying. He watched as the two teams made their way out onto the field. Immediately, he felt the gazes of Blaise, Theodore and a few other curious students who had been eavesdropping on their exchanges turn away from him and towards the match that was about to begin.

As the players kicked off the ground, Artemis made his escape. He stood up and quietly made his way out of the quidditch pitch. Just as he started to head for the third floor, he felt someone tap him on the shoulder.

"What are you doing?" asked Nico, narrowing his eyes.

Artemis forced himself not to let his shock show, " I'm feeling rather under the weather today, you see, so I thought that I'd spend the morning reading in the common room. I'm simply not in the mood to watch an group of adolescents fly on broomsticks today." he lied through his teeth.

Nico nodded reluctantly, "Alright, I guess. Are you sure you don't want any company? I hate quidditch as well."

Artemis shook his head, trying not to seem too desperate, "I'll be fine. I just want a bit of solitude, if you get my meaning."

Nico sighed but turned to leave, "See you later then."

Before leaving, Nico turned back to him.

"Artemis," he began softly, "You've been acting... weird for these past two weeks. If there's anything you want to talk about, just... I'm always around." he said, offering him a smile. Artemis forced himself to smile back, although it seemed more like a grimace than a smile.

Once Nico was out of view, Artemis released a breath he hadn't realized he had been holding. Pulling of crimes was much easier with Butler around. He wondered what Butler would think if he knew what Artemis was up to. Most probably, he'd remain as impartial as ever. Although, he might feel a bit concerned that Artemis was planning to pull off a manual theft without assistance.

Artemis smiled as he thought of the man who had acted as more of a father to him as his actual father had. He stiffened, suddenly remembering why he was here, and that he really shouldn't be worrying about homesickness(or in this case, butler-sickness), seeing as the success of this heist was imperative, if he wanted to get his father out of Russia alive.

He spun on his heel decisively, and made his way to the third floor corridor.

He didn't notice a shadow watching him from around the corner.

*****Line Break*****

Nico frowned as he watched Artemis walk away.

Artemis had been acting strange ever since he had almost told him about a secret that for some reason, could reduce Artemis to a trembling mess. He had been avoiding Nico, Draco and the others ever since.

So when he saw Artemis get all tense and leave in the middle of the match, obviously he had followed him, in hopes of finally getting to the bottom of Artemis' strange behavior. But apparently, there was a lot more to the young genius' behavior than he had thought.

Artemis wasn't heading for the common rooms.

The Slytherin common rooms were downstairs, under the lake. So why was Artemis heading upstairs? Nico made up his mind. Whatever was going on with Artemis, was going to stop today. Without stopping to think about it for any longer, he began to follow the young criminal mastermind.

*******Line Break*******

Hermione had had enough of all these secrets.

She had watched as Artemis walked away from the bleachers, soon followed by Nico. Both of the boys looked worried and tense(for completely different reasons). Even worse, they had left without telling anyone, not even their friends, her first indicator that something was wrong.

Second, Artemis wasn't wearing one of his trademark suits. This wasn't necessarily important to most people, but everyone knew that Artemis loved his signature Armani suits, and wore them whenever he was allowed to. He simply wouldn't pass up the opportunity to wear them on a Saturday, one of the days when students could wear their own clothes. Unless, he was planning on doing something that would require casual attire.

Her third indicator, both Slytherin boys had looked worried. Neither of the boys were the type to get easily ruffled, so whatever had them both so worried couldn't be good.

Fourth, something about them didn't add up. Nico especially. That was something that had been on her mind for weeks. Both of them had something to hide, something they didn't want anybody else to know about.

She had done some research during the holidays and had come up with a lot of information about Artemis Fowl. Articles proclaiming that he had the highest IQ in Europe, news channels claiming that he was a criminal. The main gist of it was, 'Stay away from Artemis Fowl if you value your sanity'.

She was a bit uncomfortable with the fact that one of her closest friends was rumored to be a criminal, but to be honest, she was more worried about Nico, who according to the internet, didn't even exist.

Nico had told them that he had grown up in the muggle world, which meant that he must have had some sort of contact with technology. But there was nothing. No Facebook page, or Instagram posts, not even school records. The last member of the di Angelo's was supposed to have died in the 1940's. She supposed that since Nico was a half-blood, one of his parents might be a wizard, which would explain why he wasn't on any social networking platforms, or why he seemed to know next to nothing about technology.

But there was something missing, a key component that she couldn't piece together. With Artemis, she had plenty of information, but no way of figuring out if it was true. There was no solid proof. With Nico, there was no information at all, false or not.

"Is it just me, or have Artemis and Nico been acting weird?" she asked Ron, as she watched Harry look for the Snitch.

Ron shrugged, "Those two are always pretty weird. That's nothing new. Bloody Hell! Harry's seen the snitch!" he yelled as he watched Harry suddenly dip into a dive.

She grabbed on his arm and cheered as she watched Harry grab the snitch moments before hitting the ground.

"Yes!" she cheered triumphantly, "He did it! Gryffindor is in the lead!"

Draco sighed, "I should have known better than to bet against a criminal mastermind." he said remorsefully, "He told me that Hufflepuff would lose, but I still bet him ten galleons that we'd win. That's another 10 galleons to add to his enormous fortune I suppose."

"In your face Malfoy!" she heard Ron yell.

But her mind shut out all of the noise around her as she pieced together the clues. She didn't like what the evidence was telling her. Artemis had tried to sneak out of the match, looking tense and worried, at a time that no one else would be around. He had been acting weird ever since they had found out about the Philosopher's Stone, which could turn any metal into gold.

Criminal Mastermind. Enormous fortune. Philosopher's Stone.

She knew then with chilling certainty that her assumptions were right.

"Artemis is trying to steal the Stone." she whispered, a look of plain, unmasked horror on her face.

A.N:

Sorry to disappoint anyone who thought that the confrontation would happen in this chapter! Unfortunately, that honor is reserved for Chapter 24.

*drumroll*Time for excuses:

I'm really sorry that I haven't been updating as often as I used to. The government has said that schools can reopen from November 1st. Actual school, not online classes. I haven't actually been to school in 1 and a half years! So I've been super busy getting ready to go back, and I've got a Speech Competition coming up this week as well. I really wanted to get this chapter out before I get buried in last minute school work, so I hope it doesn't have TOO many errors.

Okay, that's enough personal drama.

So right now, Artemis is looking for the Stone, Nico is following Artemis because he thinks that Artemis is acting weird because of their conversation earlier, and Hermione has figured out what Artemis is actually up to. And she doesn't like it.

I'll try and get the next chapter up as soon as I can!

As usual, please Review!

-Keera(∪.∪ )...zzz