Artemis watched in horror as Holly opened yet another can of lemonade.
It had all started when the elfin captain figured out that Nopal was averse to the beverage. After pressing the pixie for the reason (how could you hate Butler's lemonade?) and hearing Nopal's unfortunate experience with carbonation, Holly had insisted on teaching Nopal the proper form. Apparently, one of the skills she learned during her academy days was the art of imbibing a truly absurd amount of carbonated drinks. Or, as she referred to it as, chugging.
Which led them to the present, where Holly was chugging cans like she was at a particularly unhinged frat party instead of the venerable halls of Fowl Manor. Fortunately for her liver, she was drinking lemonade instead of sim-beer. This did not, however, spare her pancreas the resulting sugar crash. Holly promptly ended up falling asleep on the carpet, surrounded by a bunch of empty cans. Artemis was almost glad. He had learned that he was not the partying type.
Afterward, he struggled to pick her up before Nopal helpfully assisted him in moving Holly to the couch. There was the option of relocating the snoring elf into a guest bedroom, but Artemis was only willing to swallow his pride so much. Nopal could lift shuttle pieces and ham radios for him all day, but Holly? He had to have some standards. Thus he fetched a blanket, a much lighter prospect, and tucked Holly in there.
For a moment, Artemis and Nopal stood awkwardly in the can-ridden living room. The genius decided after about a minute that he could probably get some work done. Halfway back to his study, he found that Nopal had silently tottered after him. He thought about telling her not to follow, a resolution which lasted all of two seconds as she looked at him like a duckling would a mother duck. Well she could probably help him.
He was going to have to extract some working schematics from Foaly, anyways. Like pulling teeth would be an appropriate metaphor for the process.
Artemis silently padded into his room, Nopal dutifully following. He opened his drawer and pulled out a live dragonfly. However, once Artemis began pulling out insect care supplies and feeding it some jelly, Nopal broke and gave him a weird look.
Artemis turned back and the pixie had neither the tact nor the reflexes to hide her open confusion at the fact that Artemis Fowl II kept a dragonfly as a pet. In his drawer no less. It took Artemis a second to realize that looking in, what he was doing was completely ridiculous. No wait, more importantly, how much did she trust Nopal with Fowly's most secretive project yet, and the only thing that allowed them to communicate despite Opal's destruction of mankind's entire satellite network? The answer was "not very much."
At that, he realized he may not be being very fair. After all, she was demonstrably a genius and could certainly help out. Furthermore, sabotaging any trust that there could be by preemptively assuming her to be someone she wasn't didn't sit well with him. Were he still twelve he could have sat in front of another person, exploiting them while fully dismissing them in his mind, but not anymore. At least, not with Nopal.
Or maybe, he could just say nothing and no problem would arise that he would need Nopal's input on. Hah.
A man could dream.
Just in case though, he looked back at the pixie.
"Nopal, try to remain out of sight. Ideally I would like you outside of the room, but I understand that you may be able to think of things that neither Foaly nor myself may catch. That being said, try not to reveal your presence in any fashion, alright?"
Nopal nodded seriously, miming the action of blowtorching her mouth shut. Artemis had to admit that the gesture was adorable. He had his hand half-way to Nopal's head before he knew what he was doing. His old physical contact habits almost kicked in and he nearly removed his hand when he saw Nopal's pleading eyes. Hellfire. When did he get so weak? He buckled, giving the pixie her desired headpats.
Obligatory physical affection over with, Artemis turned to the ARClight on his desk.
"Foaly, can you hear me? I've got news. First, connect with my satellite. You can at least communicate with me through that now that everything has settled down somewhat."
He waited several seconds. Was he busy…? Artemis turned to look at Nopal, who suddenly had a frown on her face as if she were trying to remember something. He gave her a questioning look to which Nopal seemed not to have a real answer for.
Then Artemis's screen crackled to life, displaying a grinning centaur mug.
"'Settled down?' Nice to see you've developed a sense of humor, mud-boy. While you were sending me around as errand-colt I had to try to prevent the whole LEP building from crashing into the ground."
"Yes," Artemis responded without missing a beat, "and I prevented the genocide of my entire species. Roughly equivalent tasks, I'd say."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll make sure to rustle you up a medal or something. Now what's the call for? I'm not made of time."
"I need assistance getting into space."
"Sorry, fresh out of spaceships," Foaly replied, not missing a beat. Artemis sighed.
"Luckily for the both of us, I will not require one wholesale. I simply need some advising and potentially parts to retrofit the Cupid."
Foaly frowned, trying to think of what Artemis would need a spacecraft for. He snapped his fingers, looking at Artemis in genuine awe.
"Are you trying to help us get into contact with the lunar base? Without the People having to bribe you?" Foaly added that part in a tone that would have been right at home in a 90's telenovela.
"Of course not," Artemis retorted, mock offended, "I'll require that the lunar base be renamed after me."
The two shared a chuckle. Foaly, in all honesty, was ecstatic that everything seemed to be fine up top. He wasn't exactly thrilled upon stealing—an admittedly unguarded—pixie clone and sending it out of Haven. If it came out that even after all that his friends had ended up dead… Luckily that didn't seem to be the case and Foaly could engage in banter to soothe some of his anxiety away.
Also, Artemis was the goddess of the moon. It wouldn't be all that bad if it were renamed after him.
"But if you're serious about helping us out, that'll really be a load off my mind."
Artemis nodded, pulling a cylinder out of his desk. Nopal had pried it out of a turbine where it had been electrically welded to the inside. It had the appearance of a lead pipe capped with a rotating semi-circle and neither of the geniuses present at the manor had any inkling of what it did. That was patented Foaly-tech for you; if somebody else can understand what the part does at a glance, it's not paranoid enough.
"Well there's more to this plan Foaly, but first I want to know whether this is broken and needs to be replaced or not."
"Hm. Uh…"
Talking to Foaly was not in itself a problem. This was the pulling teeth part.
The fatal design flaw of paranoia was that the opacity of design extended to the inventor as well. Foaly tried his best to examine it through the webcam, but while he had an inkling of what the part was, diagnosing any issues with it from beneath the Earth's crust was beyond even him.
"Delightful. You have no idea, do you? Shall I go ahead and send it down?"
"With what, mud-boy? The mining egg is a one-way ticket up. And I'm not made of those either. If I knew what it was, I could walk you through it, but as it is…" Foaly broke off, muttering to himself and rifling through his many drawers.
Artemis sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. While he could certainly see the logic of obfuscating your design to this extent, this was rather sloppy. After all, what kind of cryptographer loses the key to their own code?
Suddenly, he was broken out of his own thoughts by a gentle tap on his thigh. He looked down to see Nopal, hidden right in the blindspot of his webcam. She had somehow managed to crawl over there without a sound, and doubtlessly remained out of sight. Foaly wasn't the kind of centaur that would have masked his surprise at Opal Koboi crawling around Artemis's lab.
Actually, now that he thought about it, the fact that she had so adeptly evaded detection and pinpointed the blindspots of the camera was slightly unnerving.
Resolving to address that bit of uneasiness later, Artemis gave Nopal a questioning glance. He was rather curious what she needed that warranted his attention at the moment. She pointed up at something on his desk. Following her gaze, he glanced at the ARClight that was scuttling around his desk. Artemis frowned.
You want this? he mouthed.
In response she nodded vigorously. Hm. Why not?
"Foaly," he called out to the centaur, who was now retrieving and organizing several carrots from his drawers.
"Yeah?" came the distracted response.
"Would you mind turning off your ARClight for the moment? I would like to try something."
Foaly's head came back into frame, hand covering his mouth.
"You're going to experiment on that living creature? How could you?"
"You made these, Foaly."
"And don't you forget it Fowl," the centaur replied smugly. "Sure thing. Just give me a second and… there."
The dragonfly on Artemis's desk shut down, as if asleep. Foaly glanced at it lovingly.
"Works like a charm, doesn't it?"
"Holly is asleep at the moment, but I'm sure she would like me to pass the message that you should not get a 'swelled head,' as she puts it."
Foaly snorted dismissively and went back to hunting for a parts manifest. The ARClight safely disabled, Artemis covertly scooped it up and handed it to Nopal. He had some doubts, but he trusted that whatever Nopal was going to do it was going to be helpful. Whether or not it was all an act was the real question.
As the pixie scampered away and began disassembling his 3-D printer, Artemis wondered if his faith had been misplaced.
—
Nopal was irritated. She had no idea why, though.
It was truly perplexing. She hadn't felt like this… well, ever. The closest she could really recall to feeling like this was when Holly had cruelly denied her fruit, but that blow was softened by Holly's giggling. There was a radiant quality to the elf's joy that was altogether missing here. No, it was the centaur.
Foaly? Or at least that was what Arty called him. They seemed like friends judging from the fact that they had a similar quality to them that Holly and Arty sometimes shared. Shared history.
Maybe that was it. Jealousy. Did she have any history to share with Arty or Holly? Or any history at all? She began to disassemble Artemis's custom 3-D printer with practiced ease. Really it was just keeping her hands busy. She did need a part though. Just the scanner.
Once she had the scanner free, she could connect that to the curious little insect contraption that Arty had. Initially, Nopal had imagined the thing to be some kind of tiny mechanical contraption that was expertly camouflage. But after handling it, there was probably no way. But what if…?
Nopal gave it a lick. It tasted like a bug and now was mildly wet.
Alright, it wasn't nanotech—or at least, nanotech of a strictly mechanical origin—but that would make things a little bit more difficult, at least on the receiving end. But he could at least do that much work, the blasted centaur—
Huh. Where had that come from?
Nopal revised her initial analysis. Was this irritation just the surface of something deeper? Hatred bubbling through her subconscious into something more benign? She had no idea. She hadn't even really experienced anger yet.
The problem of internals was going to be a little different. Certainly she could drill a hole into the shuttle part, but what if that compromised the integrity of it? What if it required specialized tools to fix and it was never broken to begin with? No, far safer to perform some kind of ultrasound. But with what equipment?
Ah, maybe… Nopal remembered it now. It was that odious centaur that dragged her out of her bed and stuffed her into a pod. That entire uncomfortable ride up is one more sin to his long running tally.
Wait. That ride brought her to Arty and Holly. Why would she feel bitter at Foaly for that? Was that hatred? Nopal didn't like it very much.
It seemed that the antennae of the dragonfly were designed to function as microphones. Perhaps that could be amplified in some way? Surely Arty had some speakers around. But she needed something stronger. The metal that the piece used would doubtlessly both be thick and resistant to undue vibration. The entire shuttle would shake itself to pieces otherwise.
Perhaps just like the Sonix boxes in Madagascar.
Of course! Just like the Sonix boxes in Madagascar. But where those had been high frequency sounds used to attract lemurs, all she needed to do was direct those frequencies through the metal at just the right frequency and amplitude.
Nopal found a speaker and got to work.
A bead of sweat dripped down her forehead. This was fear.
The pixie was not an idiot. She had never been to anywhere called Madagascar, much less needed a silky sifaka lemur for anything. These thoughts weren't hers. And she didn't know who they belonged to. Nopal had known that since the beginning. Everything didn't add up if she were her own person. No, much more likely that she was a clone of some sort. But then she would have to be a soulless husk.
And yet.
The thought that another person's soul occupied her body was… unnerving. And most of all, she couldn't tell or ask Arty or Holly anything about it. She saw the fear and trepidation in their eyes whenever anything close to that topic came up. If they knew she was getting… memories from that soul, she didn't know what they would do. Definitely nothing good.
She didn't want to be alone.
So Nopal closed her eyes. And got to work.
—
Thirty-some minutes later, Foaly still had not found the requisite papers he needed.
"Foaly," Artemis began, a hint of impatience entering his tone, "surely I can introduce you to somebody that can help you organize your lab. Captain Short, perhaps?"
"Hah," the centaur replied, finding a carrot that was still good. He placed that with the rest of the "good" pile, all arranged neatly in order of size. The "not-good" ones went straight into the compost. "Mud-boy, I'd like to see you try to keep someplace looking good after some lunatic pixie blows up half of your city."
In response, Artemis calmly glanced at his pristine desk. He looked out the window, the Dublin skyline completely dark, before returning a flat gaze to Foaly.
"Okay, Fowl—"
"The Ops Booth looked like that before any of this, I seem to recall," Artemis said, interrupting whatever excuse the centaur was going to dig up. Said centaur whinnied in indignation.
"Shut up."
"Ah, learning rhetoric from Holly I see."
"I don't know why you're in such a hurry," Foaly said, quickly changing the subject. "What are you so nervous about?"
"I'm not nervous," the nervous Irishman defended.
Alright, he admitted to himself, I'm frankly terrified you'll turn your ARClight back on and realize that I've been harboring what may be Opal Koboi reborn.
It seemed to be getting more likely by the second because every minute or so, with the sound of various power tools ringing in the back of Artemis's workshop. He knew he had a soldering iron, but did he really have a blowtorch back there? Thankfully, Foaly was making such a mess of his own lab that he wasn't really paying any attention to Artemis's.
"Say, you said you had two weeks, right?"
"Certainly, but I'd prefer to have some leeway in the timing."
The centaur nodded, sagely.
"So do you think you have time to deliver a satellite to the lunar base then?"
"If you can develop it and send it up in that time. Having more than one project of that scale can only impede the progress of both."
"Hm. I'll see what I can rustle up. The Council can't say no to something like this, not with both of our best demons up there. I'll try to get it done within the week, and if you have any parts you'll need I can help you out with that. Sound good?"
Artemis nodded.
"I can run any diagnostics and see which parts I need. Do try to make them compatible, Foaly."
"Well, not like we need to worry about any more Koboi parts," the centaur snorted. Artemis suppressed a wince. Hopefully Nopal wasn't listening too closely. Artemis nearly leapt in his seat as he was poked in the side with something that was distinctly not a pixie finger.
He steeled himself and stole a glance downward. Instead of whatever frankenstein amalgamation of machinery he was expecting though, Nopal was poking him with something that looked like a golf trophy. Huh. It actually looked like a halfway marketable object if you ignored the duct tape running down the middle and the top half which was clearly a blender pitcher.
Artemis gingerly took it, a little surprised at the heft, and examined the machine more closely. It had three main components, which was really two-and-a-half since the plexiglass box at the center was solely for holding the ARClight. Nopal had thoughtfully poked holes in and left it some food and water so it wouldn't be uncomfortable.
On top of the box was a pitcher from a blender with a 3-D scanner stuffed into it. The scanner had some wires feeding into a pair of small dragonfly goggles. Furthermore, the insect's antennae were also encased by what appeared to be small headphone jacks. Those connected into a speaker-like device. After fiddling with the bottom he found a small compartment exactly big enough to fit the shuttle part.
Not bad at all for half an hour's work.
He gave Nopal an appreciative look, which she acknowledged with a contented grin. Then she crawled away, settling at a safe distance to watch Artemis use the device.
It was surprisingly intuitive. Open a hatch, slip in the part, and press a button. He had the sneaking suspicion it would be something of a headache to decode the data coming from the ARClight, but that was the centaur's soon-to-be problem and not his.
"Foaly?"
The centaur poked his head up, eyes finding the contraption sitting on Artemis's desk. He frowned.
"What is that? Is that duct-tape?"
"Yes, Foaly, and I believe it to be capable of sending a full diagnostic of our mystery part to you." Artemis looked with disdain at the mess of Foaly's workspace. "Particularly because it is unlikely we will find a parts list in the near future."
"Did you stick my poor baby into a blender?" the centaur gaped, ignoring Artemis's comment.
"Just turn it on, Foaly. I seem to recall you pointing out that you were on a schedule?"
"Yeah, yeah mud-boy. But if that… thing actually does anything I'll go and eat one of my old tin-foil hats."
Nopal felt a twinge of irritation, but quashed it. She was also curious whether or not it would work.
Artemis efficiently slotted the cylinder into the scanner and then the ultrasound chamber. The device made some sounds. As far as the ARClight itself, if a genetically modified cyborg-insect could look uncomfortable, that was what Artemis would have imagined it would look like. Foaly was staring at one of his monitors seriously, occasionally sending incredulous looks back at Nopal's contraption.
"Huh," Foaly said, finally.
"Did you receive anything legible?"
"Well, no," Foaly began, crossing his arms, "but this is actually pretty workable. I've got to hand it to you, I've got a garbled mess on my screens right now, but I can untangle this. A day, tops." The centaur nodded, begrudgingly. "Credit where credit is due, Fowl, this is pretty inspired."
"Glad to hear you concede it."
"Hardy-har, Fowl. Honestly, this is what I get for trying to be nice. I'll get cracking on this, so I'll get going. Tell me if anything else happens. Don't get Holly killed saving your sorry butt, alright?"
"I'll endeavour to try."
Foaly cut the connection, and Artemis was suddenly left in a darkened room. He swiveled in his chair to face Nopal, who straightened up from a crouch onto her knees. She cutely shuffled-walked over to Artemis.
"Did it work, Arty?"
He smiled. Slightly awkwardly, he raised his hand and gingerly patted Nopal's head. Apparently this was a good way to communicate praise.
Judging from Nopal's beaming smile, it was.
—
The next day, Holly woke up on the living room couch. Butler was picking up discarded cans and neatly putting them in a recycling bag.
"Good morning, Holly."
"Hey, Butler. You look like you're used to doing this."
The bodyguard hummed, the smile lines in the corner of his eyes crinkling.
"Well, let's just say you remind me of Juliet when she was younger."
Holly groaned.