The safe house required another long walk, but this time no one followed them, providing much-needed relief from their most recent misadventures.
"There it is," Nero said, going to the door of the warehouse and entering the necessary passcode. As a stringy spaghetti blob, they coiled inside.
Weary eyes might have missed the subtle signs of intrusion, but that was no excuse. Raven cursed herself as the door thudded shut and their scent fell upon her. She only briefly glanced at Nero before engaging with a mountain of a man, dodging his bullets and reaching for her katanas. Butler deprived her of this luxury, cutting the straps loose and hurling them towards Juliet, forcing Raven to use her body as her weapon. Darkdoom edged around the sidelines, ready to reach for the katanas or something from the arsenal and toss them to Raven, but Juliet stepped in his way.
"Up to something?" she sneered. Before Darkdoom had the time to react she threw him down and knocked him unconscious, a smug smile creeping across her face. There was a sharp yell from the opposite direction and the force of Wing Fanchu at full sprint slammed into her, completely ERASING the smirk. At once she whipped out her favorite wrestling moves, grabbing for his arms and legs. It took her 30 seconds to realize she was seriously outmatched.
"A little help, Holly?" she yelled.
From across the room, Otto sensed a device power up, hovering in the air and drawing close to Wing. He saw nothing, but his technological senses didn't lie.
This thing is dangerous, he realized.
At once Otto called for the weapon—a foreign object, unlike anything had encountered as of yet—to hold. The pressure built up inside it, and before she could say "D'arvit!" Holly Short found herself uncloaked and bleeding hard, sprawled on the cement floor. She fought to remain conscious.
Tiny blue sparks began to jump from her insides, sealing split skin and returning bones to their sockets. Holly sighed as the pain dulled and reshielded. She didn't know what happened, but she was eager to find out.
"Foaly?" she whispered. "What happened?"
"An outside source somehow interfered with your Neutrino," Foaly said, sitting in complete awe. "Impossible!"
"Well, keep at it," Holly said, slowly flying forward. The boy with white hair and blue eyes searched the air where she hovered, and Foaly nickered uncomfortably.
"You're being probed," he murmured. Holly could just imagine the glazed eyes and hanging mouth of the centaur. It would have been surprising if a fairy were able to interfere with Foaly's wiring. Mud men were simply out of the question.
A sudden crash between Wing and Juliet as they rammed the arsenal made for an opportune diversion, and Otto ran to help, giving Holly the chance to fly down and catch Shelby off guard.
"Hello," Holly said, keeping her voice soft to avoid detection. "Look at me." The effect of the mesmer was immediate, and Shelby instantly looked into Holly's face. She wasn't so ugly, Holly decided. For a mud girl.
"I have an idea," Holly said. "Why don't you go stand by Artemis over there? It's probably safer."
"Maybe," Shelby looked doubtful. "I want to help my friends."
"I know," Holly agreed, her face puckering with sympathy. "I understand. But you will be able to help your friends by going and standing over by Artemis."
"I will?"
"You will," Holly promised. "You have the most important job of all."
Shelby contentedly waltzed across the room, sticking to the shadows as silently as one would expect for a former jewel thief.
"Are you Artemis?" she asked, stepping out of the shadows and making Artemis jump. "She said to stand by you."
"Ah," Artemis said. "Just right here is fine." Shelby stood, and they watched the fighting unfold.
Butler was beginning to get distracted, wanting to look after Juliet as she struggled against the tall Asian boy. Raven pressed her advantage, but Butler's large hands caught her. Raven struggled, and had to sink her teeth into the back of his hand before he relinquished even a little.
Both of them were reluctant to admit it, but they were growing tired. Death was something neither were interested in, but without her swords or a good night's sleep Raven was finding it harder to defend herself as usual. That, and it was Butler she was fighting. She did owe him, after all.
"That will be enough, all of you," Artemis said coolly.
Everyone gradually looked up, Holly and Juliet entangled with Nero and the H.I.V.E. students.
"If you must persist, Butler, take it outside," Artemis sighed. Raven and Butler obliged, each eager to take a short reprieve and calculate their strategy.
"And the rest of you will keep it level," Artemis turned to the others. "Or else I will shoot your friend." Shelby stood pleasantly, as if she were oblivious to the gun barrel pointing in between her shoulder blades.
"Very well," Nero said carefully, as always ready to do anything to preserve the well-being of his students. "Wing, Nigel, move Diabolus out of the way. This may get out of hand."
Nigel carefully set his father to the side, glaring daggers at Juliet Butler. She guarded beside Holly, fingering a pistol and smiling triumphantly at the dark anger in Wing's eyes.
"Very well, Artemis," Nero said, looking the boy straight in the eye. "What happens now?"
Artemis hesitated, and for a moment wondered whether this was in his control at all.
"Did you get soft since Cairo?" Raven smirked. The battle was still underway, still tiring, and still slow going. Butler lunged, drawing a knife simultaneously with his movements.
"No," he said indignantly. "You just got better."
"Perks of the job," Raven shrugged, pulling her own blade from her boot. "There's no end to the amount of practice I get."
"Like the crown?" Butler asked. He swung at Raven, who hit his hilt with her own and dodged another fist from the side. He kicked, rolling out, Raven managing to slice off the heel of his shoe with her blade.
"What crown?" she asked, narrowly missing the bodyguard's swing.
"At The Museum," he said. "You trashed the museum and took the crown."
Raven's knife whistled past his ear, and the hunter in Butler momentarily quavered.
"No," Raven replied. "We were to destroy The Museum due to the display of classified information without authorization."
"Then why did you take the diadem?"
"What diadem?" Raven asked impatiently.
"Okay, stop," Butler said. They paused, catching their breaths but keeping their hands at the ready. "We were only in The Museum because we needed a valuable crown—diadem—on display there. The surveillance showed us that one of your students took it, so we were tracking you down to retrieve it."
"We were only destroying The Museum, as I said," she said, narrowing her eyes. "We were told to leave nothing."
Butler frowned. "Perhaps there has been a mistake."
The assassin nodded. "Perhaps."
"Artemis?" Foaly said frantically. "What in Frond's name is going on?"
"What do you mean?" Artemis asked, looking to the H.I.V.E. students as though he were talking to himself.
"Someone is infiltrating my network," Foaly said unhappily, whinnying with concern. "They're trying to shut down the grid!"
"What?" Artemis demanded.
"My suit's on the blink," Holly agreed urgently. "It's going through information. All our information!"
"What's going on?" Artemis now directed his question at the H.I.V.E. students.
"Forgive my intrusion," Otto smiled menacingly. "But as it was once said, "Know your enemy." I know you now, Artemis Fowl."
They stared at one another for a moment.
"All we need is the diadem," Artemis said. "Hand it over."
"What diadem?" Nero asked.
"If that's the game you're going to play," Artemis taunted, and looked to Juliet, who cocked her gun.
"Juliet, put the gun down," Butler said, bursting into the room with Raven. Raven ran to get her katanas, now quick to point one at Artemis, and the other at her own students.
"We have a problem," Raven said. "We may have been tricked."
"Surprise, surprise," Laura grumbled, distaste spelled out on her face.
"Holly, release the girl," Butler said. Holly hesitated. "NOW." Holly obeyed, and Shelby returned to her senses, blinking and confused. She sped to join her team.
"Now," Raven said, her voice steely cold. "Someone arranged for us to meet, perhaps with the intent to destroy us both. We were sent to destroy The Museum, and those with Butler were to retrieve an article. We both might have been successful, had not the article they were searching for went missing."
Raven's cold, blue eyes sent shivers down the spines of her audience.
"We tried to retrieve the item, a diadem, without catching onto this," Butler continued. "Assuming you were our enemies."
"Tell me, Master Fowl," Raven said. "Have you been working with a man named Sebastian Trent?"
"No," Artemis replied, looking slightly bewildered. Raven nodded.
"I don't understand," Nero said. "What's going on?"
"Someone's trying to get us to kill each other," Raven replied. "According to Butler they were able to research us on the Internet but—"
"—that's not possible," Nero finished with her. He looked to Butler. "Who would want to kill you?"
"My family has many enemies," Artemis shrugged.
"Opal Koboi," Holly suggested.
Shelby perked up. "I know that name," she said. "That was the name of the donor."
"Donor?" Nero raised an eyebrow.
Shelby withered, stumbling over her words. "Well, um, the donor of a crown, uh, at the, like, museum," she stammered.
"Filthy little thief," Juliet muttered. At once Butler and Wing pushed the blond terrors to the floor as they threatened to go for each others' throats.
"Do you have the diadem?" Butler grunted. Shelby, slowly released by Wing, nodded. She carefully pulled it from her backpack. At once, Holly zoomed over, but Shelby held it out of her reach.
"Ah, ah, ah," Shelby chided. "Finders keepers. You haven't convinced me yet. And trust me, that whole hypno-thing did not help your case."
Holly frowned, eyeing the diadem protectively.
"And where did you find this?" Nero asked, raising his eyebrows, but smiling as if amused.
"They left it lying around," Shelby said dismissively. "And you know me! I was telling the truth, though. Opal Koboi was written as the donor."
Artemis frowned.
"She reported that diadem missing ages ago," Foaly seethed.
"Wait a moment," Otto spoke up. "This mesmer—the ability to control humans—could they have force a group of people to stop what they were doing and pursue us?"
"It might be a little complicated," Holly admitted. "But yes. How did you know that?"
"I read your files," Otto said simply.
But those drones were definitely from H.O.P.E.," Raven said. "Would they have motivation to team up?"
"Opal Koboi is a weapons contractor," Butler filled in. "Among other things."
Raven and Nero exchanged glances.
"Well that explains it," he sighed.
"Okay, hold on," Laura said. "I don't mean to be rude, but what are you?" She looked at Holly. "I don't understand what anybody's going on about right now."
"My name is Holly Short," Holly started to say, but she was cut off.
"Captain Short," Nero supplied. "Is an elf. She is a member of the Lower Elements Police, as well as a citizen of the group of fairies who live underground."
"Butler and I met a long time ago on a mission in Cairo," Raven also said. "We teamed up for a while. It was definitely before most of you were born."
"You failed to mention you were on the same team when you said you had met him," Shelby grumbled.
"I promise we'll explain everything later," Nero said. "But we may be in considerable danger right now."
Holly was gaping. Artemis stared. Nero gave them both a look and returned to business.
"We are obviously being provoked and turned against one another," he said. "If Opal Koboi and Sebastian Trent are working together then I imagine we would benefit by working together, too."
"We should be careful," Raven said. "For all we know they could be watching us right now."
Everyone fell silent.
"Butler, Juliet, Holly, may I speak with you for a moment?" Artemis said. They conjoined in the corner.
"I don't trust them," Juliet said immediately.
"Hold your tongue," Butler ordered. He nodded to Artemis.
"Butler, what is your tactical appraisal of the situation?" the teen asked.
"As far as Koboi goes, and if she's paired up with this Trent person, then the person we want most on our team is Raven," Butler said. "She's the best."
Artemis nodded.
"Do you think we can trust them?"
"No."
"Very well. We need leverage. Foaly?"
"I can threaten to leak their coordinates on the Internet," Foaly said.
"They obviously value privacy," he agreed.
"Be careful, Artemis," Butler said. "You've already underestimated them once today. It would be unfortunate were it to happen again."
Across the room, a similar conversation was taking place.
"Really, Shel?" Laura asked, throwing her hands up into the air with exasperation. "What would Ms. Leon say?"
"That's enough," Nero said. "Regardless of what has happened our possession of the diadem gives us something to trade—their allegiance for the crown."
"Butler is a good man," Raven said. "Having them—as long as we work together—can only be an asset."
Nero nodded. "See if you can wake Diabolus. I don't think he'll want to miss out on this."