Ooops.
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In the first strands of morning, Jason Grace sat and worried.
The others were gone, and although it seemed like there was a perfectly good explanation- investigating Artemis Fowl's world- he couldn't shake the feeling that something was very, very wrong.
The door opened, and the butler stood there. "Your turn in the Envoyer," he rumbled.
The man led Jason along the lavishly carpeted passageway and through a doorway to a simple room lined with shelving. Artemis sat in an office chair in the center. There was no sign of futuristic/magicky technology. There was no sign of his friends.
"Jason Grace," said Artemis cooly. "The last one. Welcome."
The door clicked shut, and a sort of suppressed panic overtook Jason's mind. Suddenly he realized. It's a trick.
Quite calmly, the mountainous butler reached up with what looked like a modified taser gun and, without any affectation of ceremony, pulled the trigger.
When the bolt of light hit his body Jason fell to the floor on automatic but forgot to act limp, to act as though the current of electricity (or whatever it was) had actually had an effect on his body.
The two men's eyes widened, and that was all the pause Jason needed to jump up, whip out his coin and flip it to the spear. He backed into a dusty corner, holding the weapon out in front of him to keep his attackers at bay.
"Don't come any closer!" he snarled, a fierce anger overtaking his usual collected demeanor. "What are you doing? Why are you attacking us? What did we ever do to you?!"
Artemis' eyes narrowed to slits, but the butler lowered his taser slightly.
"We don't want to hurt you!" screamed Jason, the last shreds of his self-control breaking. "I don't know who in Hades you are, or what you are, and I don't care! None of us give a fig whether you're monsters or gods or something else, and if you just let us go we'll never, ever bother you again!"
For what seemed like an eternity, no one spoke a word.
"Something else," said Artemis finally. There was a strange look in his eyes, like that of someone who wanted desperately to have behaved differently, but was now utterly set on the path he had misguidedly chosen. "We are not of your world. We are, for lack of a better word, humans."
"For lack of a better word?"
"Yes. We know about the different worlds on this planet. Or, well, we know about what might be referred to as the Underground, and about you, and therefore by extension so many other worlds that could exist." He paused for a moment, as though pondering how much to say. "We know who it is who's trying to kill you."
"You mean you?"
"No. The archer."
Jason had almost forgotten about their unknown assailant. "Yes?" he asked cautiously.
"A son of Apollo. One who most likely suffered from brain damage at some point in the past. He is being controlled through a method not unlike your young lady's charmspeak, by the younger brother of the man who is still tied up in my study." Artemis frowned. "Speaking of which, he has probably woken up by now, and is most likely considerably aggravated."
"A son of Apollo who got hit on the head?" repeated Jason, racking his brains. "I don't think that rings any bells. But why would the younger brother want us dead?"
But before Artemis answered, a sudden realization struck Jason. His eyes widened. "Oh, gods…" he whispered. "Hand of a brother…"
"What?" demanded Artemis and the Butler at the same time.
Jason closed his eyes for a moment, then snapped them back open and squinted at the pair. "Can I trust you to keep our world a secret from whatever other worlds you have contact with?"
Artemis looked shifty, but the butler answered immediately. "Yes."
"All right." Jason took a deep breath. "You know I'm a demigod. I'm the son of Jupiter, but I feel more at home with the Greeks. At their camp, they have what is known as an oracle, a woman who—"
"—delivers prophecies that don't make any sense at the time, yes, I'm familiar with the concept," broke in Artemis impatiently. "Please continue."
"A few hours ago, we got a message from camp detailing a new prophecy. It didn't sound good. There was a line… 'The golden, the fallen, again will he rise/Hand of a brother through starless eyes'."
A look of comprehension grew on Artemis' face. "Hand of a brother," he repeated. "Yes. Grub Kelp's puppet. 'Starless eyes'. That's a reference to how he's being controlled. This branch of charmspeak, mesmer, damages the iris, thereby removing the 'star', as it were. As to his being 'the golden', well, he's a son of Apollo, whose color is gold. And at some point he must have fallen from somewhere and suffered brain damage."
Artemis was smiling, not the sly grin Jason had previously seen on his face, but a true smile, that of someone to whom knowledge was the impetus to excitement. "It all makes sense!"
Suddenly he seemed to realize that he was still in the presence of a person he had attempted to have electrocuted. He straightened up. "My apologies, Jason Grace. I seem to have overreacted somewhat."
Jason couldn't tell if he was referring to his rapid prophecy translation or the kidnappings. And yet for some reason, he felt inclined to listen to what Artemis had to say. It was an illogical step to take, what with everything the youth had done, but somehow this glimpse of a mind fueled by curiosity instead of ambition reassured him.
"Me too," he said lightly, letting a small smile grace his lips. "I think… perhaps we should compare notes. Work together to get this whole mess sorted out. And then leave each other alone."
Artemis nodded slowly. "It seems to me that that might be for the best."
Jason smiled in full. "Great," he said. He turned to Artemis' manservant. "In that case, do you mind my asking what your name is? I keep thinking of you as 'the butler', and I don't even know if you really are one."
"I'm not, not really, but my name is actually Butler," explained Butler. "I supposed you could consider me Artemis' bodyguard."
"Nice to meet you, Mr. Butler. And what was the Envoyer?"
"A ruse Artemis came up with. Nothing of the sort exists."
"Yes, yes," broke in Artemis testily. "That's all very well. But what about this prophecy? Could you recite it in full?"
"Definitely," Jason nodded confirmation. "Here it is:
Daughter of shadows, descendant reborn
Of lost innocence and loyalty mourn
The golden, the fallen, again will he rise
Hand of a brother through starless eyes
Lost to the depths will six short lives be
For down under, above, segregation is key."
He paused. "At first glance, we thought that the 'daughter of shadows' part referred to Hazel. She's the daughter of Pluto, the god of death and the underworld and that sort of stuff. Her brother Nico…" he glanced up at Butler and Artemis, and decided in a wild gamble to trust them with everything. "Her brother Nico can control shadows. And he just ran off and told us he never wants to see us again."
"That seems to fit," Artemis agreed. "This Hazel is mourning the betrayal of her brother, who she used to be close to, and now has grown up too quickly, losing his innocence and loyalty to the rest of you."
Jason slumped. "I was desperately hoping this wouldn't happen," he muttered, almost to himself. "Nico… he's a good kid at heart. But the world hasn't been nice to him. No one at camp likes him. If he wasn't so damn good at defending himself he'd have been beaten up every day. And the worst part is, he never stayed at camp long enough to learn all of that self-defense. He must have figured it out through experience in the outside world."
There was a look close to guilt in Artemis' eyes, but Jason was too wrapped up in his monologue to notice.
"Anyway," rumbled Butler at length, "That's the first part of the prophecy explained. The next part: Grub Kelp has been mesmerizing this son of Apollo to be his living weapon. Why? What could he possibly get out of this?"
"He wouldn't need a logical reason," realized Artemis. "He's Grub Kelp. He craves attention. What if he's convinced himself that he has something akin to the Atlantis Complex?"
Jason frowned. "What, a PTSD-wannabe? What sort of person wants to have symptoms of past trauma?"
Butler sighed. "Grub Kelp."
"So we're fighting someone who does random things of a vaguely villain-like nature in the hopes that he'll become the center of attention?" Jason asked incredulously. "But how did he know we'd be here?"
"I don't think he did," Artemis theorized. "He wasn't after you. He was after me. He was trying to get me to retaliate. He wanted to be my new arch-nemesis. After all, I do have a history of fighting the brothers of LEP Commanders."
"But then Commander Trouble showed up," filled in Butler. "And Grub completely lost it. He had spent so long trying to develop a mental health condition that he ended up actually having one."
"That is one of the most idiotic things I have ever heard." Jason shook his head, mystified.
"That's Grub Kelp for you."
"So that's the first two thirds sorted out. The last lines are the worst, though. Lost to the depths will six short lives be/For down under, above, segregation is key."
Artemis swept a hand through his hair and sank onto a stool. "I think it might be best if we woke up Commander Kelp for this."
Jason gaped at him. "You mean the brother of the guy we're fighting? The man Hazel and Frank tied up with watches? You don't think he might be a little… upset?"
"Trust me, Jason, 'upset' is the good Commander's default state, so I don't think you have anything to worry about."
"All right," Jason agreed, pursing his lips. "We'll wake him up. But not before you explain your hypothesis about those lines. You clearly think you know something."
Artemis hissed out through his teeth. "Fine. The world I referred to, what I called the Underground, it's, well, under the ground. As in, down under. And if 'above' refers to the home of the gods, which I assume is on Mount Olympus, then what the prophecy is telling us is that by no means should we allow the two worlds to discover each other's existence."
It all made sense to Jason. Suddenly, everything fit. "You're right. It's not about keeping Jupiter and Pluto, or Zeus and Hades, apart, it's about keeping my world away from yours. But what about the bit about six of us dying? Are you planning to kill my friends?"
His heart stopped. "Are they already dead?!"
"Good gracious, no." Artemis looked rather offended at the suggestion. "I would never murder six people in cold blood. Neither would Butler, no matter what appearance he might give."
Butler nodded confirmation.
"Oh. Okay. I'm sorry, the thought just cropped up, and I didn't think…" Jason stopped mid-sentence, his brow furrowing. "Wait. Six short lives are going to be lost to the depths? Yes, we're only teenagers, but Hazel's in particular has not been a short life. She was born in the 40's."
Artemis opened his mouth, paused for a moment, and then shut it again.
"What?"
"I know what that line is about," said the youth in a low voice. "But you're not going to like it."
"As long as my friends don't die, I'm happy with anything!"
The expression on Artemis' face was unreadable. "Really."
"Yes."
There was a pause.
"Then let's go see about getting our hands on some LEP technology."
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Well... ummm... hi.
On the bright side, highschool applications are over! Yay!
On the dark side, I've been going through a tough time in terms of loved ones dying and me feeling like life is really pointless and why am I wasting valuable hours watching shows about trigger-happy demon hunters and goofy mystery writers and their relationship problems.
On the bright side, I've finally decided that I don't care that life is short, and I am now firmly in the here and now and determined to spend my time doing as many pointless but fun things as I possibly can.
On the very bright side, I had fun writing this and hope to have it finished within the month.
On another side, there will be a sequel! I have it all planned out, unlike for this!
Thank you, everyone.
~Kero
P.S. Also, does anyone here listen to Night Vale? I have some theories I want to talk about with people.