Raven spent a little longer than necessary hacking away at Pietor Furan's life-sized image, but she eventually passed off one of her swords to Wing.
"What should I be doing?" Franz asked watching his two companions gracefully render the exhibit to shreds. He had noticed the guards nod off, and he was more than eager to do anything to leave the vicinity as soon as possible.
"Take a seat," Raven said, tapping on a display. Franz hesitantly did so, only to find himself crashing to the ground as the display gave way beneath his weight.
Raven glanced down. "Again," she ordered. Wing offered him a hand, tensing as he helped support Franz's weight. Franz sighed, knowing Raven was not one to argue with, and hurried to find something else to sit on.
It wouldn't be long and the entire exhibit would be reduced to shambles.
Shelby left behind her first completed work and moved on to the "Villains of Olde" room. She inwardly groaned at the mess her fingernails were now in as she peeled the adhesive covers on the backs of her explosives. But, as per usual, all the nail polish was left at H.I.V.E. and she would have to correct the problem when she got home. Until then she would simply have to stick the devices around the room.
That's when she saw it. The crown.
Even from a distance, it was beautiful. In all her "business trips," Shelby had seen magnificently crafted jewelry, but this was surreal. Shelby crept towards it, utterly taken with the way the gold had been woven together in some areas and spread like butter in others. And the jewels! They almost seemed to have a glow of their own.
She read the description:
"The diadem of Queen Wren II worn during the conquest of Veronica the Vile. Donated by Opal Koboi."
Shelby glanced back at the door.
"Now Shelby," she murmured to herself. "You couldn't possibly let an ancient relic like this go to waste… Besides, no one will ever know…"
She went for her shoe. Wielding the expert tools she kept there, she had the glass case open in seconds, admiring her handiwork before storing it in her bag.
"The diadem should be in here," a boy's voice said from outside. Shelby immediately slunk to the shadows, watching in shock as three people—a mountainous man, glamour girl, and vampire child—entered.
Shelby turned to slip out of the room and finish disposing of her explosives.
"Is something burning?" Laura asked, glancing over at Nigel. The darkness of the room hid the expression on his face, but his silhouette froze, stopping to consider the question. Darkdoom turned back towards the entry room. A growing fire chiseled its way through the garbage they had scattered everywhere, soon enough it would threaten their route to the exit.
"Just a few more minutes," Darkdoom said, running to the other billboards and taking the small explosives there.
In the other room, there was an enormous crash as a piece of plywood as long as the room crashed to the floor.
"That's our cue," Nigel said nervously. Darkdoom nodded, and ushered the students through the flames.
"Let's get the others," he said. "I get the very distinct feeling we will not want to be here in about an hour."
Artemis stared. His eyes narrowed and a scowl wormed its way across his face, so his shock melded into annoyance. There was the pedestal, as promised, but where the diadem should have been, there was only thin air.
"We're not alone," Artemis hissed. "Foaly!"
"What?" the flippant voice asked. "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention."
"The diadem is gone!" Artemis snapped. "What happened?"
Foaly's keyboard clacked for a few seconds.
"It looks like all the guards are unconscious," he said. "Did you do that?"
"No," Butler said. This was not good.
"There are at least six others in the building."
"We're leaving," Butler said at once, grabbing Artemis's shoulder. "Come, Juliet!"
Butler turned to leave the room, startled to come face to face with a blond girl, maybe a little older than Artemis. She stared for a nanosecond at the gargantuan man, then turned and ran. Butler narrowed his eyes, and followed.
"We've got company!" Shelby yelled.
Raven immediately took her other sword from Wing. "Get Nero and Otto," she directed. "Wing, stay close." Wing assumed a fighting stance.
Shelby started running again, and crashed straight into Otto and Nero themselves. They all groaned, picking themselves off the floor, but Nero could not be distracted for long.
"What happened?" he demanded.
"There are three others," Shelby panted. "Strangers. I accidentally ran into them on my way out."
"Did you finish with your stickers?" Otto asked. Shelby nodded.
"Good," Nero said, herding his students closer towards their exit.
Artemis, Juliet, and Butler ran out, Butler already drawing his Sig Sauer. He tactically observed his six opponents all at once—immediately spotting the overweight kid in the back to be the weak link in their group.
"Hey!" A face Butler had hoped he would never see again forced itself to the front of his mind. "I'm the one you need to worry about!"
There was a second's hesitation between them both. At that same instant a bald man shoved a redhead and similar looking boy down the stairs.
"Time to go!" he shouted. The wild look in his eyes was enough to move Butler to unceremoniously grab Artemis and drag him out the door. Only Juliet looked back, long enough to see the glimmer of gold stashed in a certain blond female's bag. She was lagging behind, checking it, just as Juliet was.
She looked up, their eyes met for a moment.
"Juliet!" Butler roared.
"Shelby!" another voice yelled from up the stairs. They glared at one another for a second longer before running for their lives.
Juliet threw herself into the car, and Butler floored the pedal immediately. Ten minutes later, they still felt the aftershock from the explosion. Artemis looked out the back window—The Museum was gone.
He started brooding there in the back seat, frustrated to have come so close and yet having been beaten by these mysterious adversaries.
"That was too close," Butler grumbled.
"Well, we're not out of this just yet," Juliet said fiercely. "They have the crown, and we're going to get it back.
"Who were they?" Wing asked, uttering the first words any of them had spoken since fleeing the museum.
"I only know one of them, and that's enough to make me wary," Raven said. "The big man. His name is Butler. He can be dangerous, if you threaten him in the right ways."
"You mean you know this man?" Darkdoom asked.
"We ran into one another a long time ago," Raven said. "It was a brief meeting, but I looked him up afterwards just in case I ever met him again."
"I want to know everything about this man, and the people he was with," Nero said. "Raven?"
"I'm on it," she replied, booting up the computers.
"Well, that solves that," Shelby said. "Who was that chick with him?"
"Give me a break, Trinity, I haven't even opened a window yet," Raven snapped.
"I'm sure we'll have plenty of answers and even more questions later," Nero assured them. "In the meantime I suggest you all get some rest. We should leave in a few hours, but I want you all alert."
The students nodded, pulling out the cots and spreading out on them. There was the usual banter, joking and laughter that the students were so used to, mock pillow fighting and then stopping to laugh at Franz who was having trouble fitting onto his cot.
"I am missing my own bed," Franz groaned, finally finding an almost comfortable position.
"I think we all are," Otto said, doing his very best to not give Wing a furtive glance.
Shelby, however, said nothing, and didn't mind her peers' chatter, because then they would not hear her noise. She carefully rearranged the items in her bag, making sure the crown was carefully wrapped up in her jacket and moved towards the bottom so it would stay out of sight. She didn't need the world to know she had lifted it, and hoped their ignorance would last a long while longer.
"This has been some day," Otto groaned, tossing on his cot and falling onto the floor. "Ow."
"We never have normal days," Laura laughed. A few cots over, Wing began to snore gently.
"Remind me to do something about that when we get back to H.I.V.E.," Otto said, stuffing his pillow over his head.
"You do this every night?" Nigel grimaced.
"Yeah," Otto sighed, catching the glinting eye of Diabolus Darkdoom. "Now pipe down, or Raven will make us."
It was very quiet after that.