Aunt Melissa

A more-or-less Myles-centric series of 5. Continuity dependant. The second and fourth are 150 words, the third, 200.

Myles (or Melissa) was 10 when Holly got pregnant. Holly was at 50 weeks' gestation, and wearing one of Mum's old maternity shirts as a dress, when Melissa (or Myles) walked into the room, burst into tears, and ran out again. Artemis went after her, but she was too fast, despite having left her Iceland-crazy phase behind years ago.

He found her later, still teary, but resigned.

"I won't ever ..." she started to explain.

"If anyone can fix that, it's you," Artemis replied, kissing the top of her head, "and I'm sure Flora will just love her Aunt Melissa."

Flora was almost three months old by the time she and Holly were well enough to return to the surface. Artemis was wearing a hole in the carpet by pacing, waiting for Juliet to return from Tara (Melissa didn't officially know, but it was obvious) with them. Finally, there were tyres on the gravel.

"Artemis, this is our daughter, Flora."

"She's beautiful."

"Must favour my side."

"That's Beckett's nose. And ... " he gasped, "oh, Holly, she's got our eyes."

Practically as soon as they got inside, Flora was handed off to Juliet.

"I haven't seen my girlfriend in nearly five months," Artemis pointed out to the world in general, and they disappeared up the stairs.

"I really didn't need to know that," Juliet said to the empty staircase.

Melissa looked past Juliet's elbow at Flora, and her brother's exclamation made more sense. Flora had the same heterochromia as Holly and Artemis.

"How could she have inherited acquired heterochromia?" Melissa asked Minerva over the phone later that day.

"It isn't an abnormality, as heterochromia usually is. I haven't been allowed to learn enough to even pretend to understand, you should ask one of their experts."

"Like I'd be allowed either. I only know they exist because Holly lives here. They weren't allowed to unmesmer Dad until the day she moved in."

"Since when do Fowls follow the rules?" Minerva asked, a little mockingly. "I'm sure your brother's files are only properly protected against outside attack."

That was a point, they probably were.

They weren't. Melissa didn't even realise she'd been caught until she looked up to find Artemis leaning beside the ancient poster of Stephanie and Trixie on the back of the door.

"Minerva might be our friend, but you can't trust her further than you can throw her. She doesn't mean any harm, but for the safety of the People that information cannot be leaked. Your computer isn't nearly as well-protected as mine, which I don't doubt she knew and was planning to use." He turned it off and took it. "I trust you have back-ups of your work."

When Flora was just under a year old, Commander Kelp visited them. He, Artemis, and Holly talked for a while in the fairy language, which was boring, but Melissa didn't leave the room. If they were going to be rude and speak in a language she didn't know in front of her, they could just put up with her being there.

"Who's the child?" he eventually asked them in English.

"Melissa. She's Artemis's sister."

"I thought you had two brothers, Fowl. Myles and Beckett, wasn't it?" He then cast her an appraising look. She squirmed, sure he could tell. Wondered if she'd tucked properly, padded her bra enough. Nobody had told her to expect visitors, after all.

"That's Myles," Holly said, unconcerned. How dare Holly out her to a stranger?

Kelp stood and walked over to her, offered her his hand to shake. " Ég er Trouble Kelp. Ég var Theresa."

The media kept calling her "transsexual science prodigy, Myles 'Melissa' Fowl", and claiming "he'd" invented male pregnancy. Given that she hadn't been able to get it to work in male test animals whose hormone balance had been altered after puberty, it didn't seem likely to be any use to her 'sisters' who'd transitioned as adults, let alone men. 'Male pregnancy' was just a bizarre fanfiction sub-genre, not what she'd accomplished.

It had been rather reckless testing human implementation on herself, but it seemed to be going better than Holly's had. Mum was looking forward to another grandchild to spoil.

50 weeks gestation in the first drabble, plus the two months underground pre-partum after that implied in the second are intentional, I figure Fairy pregnancies would take a bit longer.

And the Icelandic in the fifth is supposed to say "I'm Trouble Kelp. I was Theresa." I don't actually speak it, just picked a few words up from LazyTown/Latibær fandom, so I may have totally D'Arvitted the second sentence up.