Operations Booth, Police Plaza

Foaly gulped nervously. "Why, Cudgeon?"

"Why? YOU HAVE THE GALL TO ASK ME WHY?" Cudgeon roared. Foaly backed away slightly. This guy had gone from submissive and quiet to a raging lunatic in a matter of seconds. Obviously, he wasn't very stable. This was not good.

"I was the Council's golden boy! I would have been chairman in fifty years! And then that stupid Artemis Fowl kid comes along, and in less than one day, all of my hopes are dashed. I ended up deformed and demoted! And all because of YOU, Foaly! You and Root!" the elf ranted. Foaly decided that it would be a bad idea to point out that it was Cudgeon's fault that he had chosen to send a troll into the Manor in the first place.

"Soon Julius will be dead and dishonored, and you will be blamed for all of the goblin attacks," Cudgeon finished evilly.

We'll see about that, baboon face, Foaly thought. Surreptitiously, he reached for his personal laser defense button. His triumphant smirk fell when he realized that, to his personal horror, nothing was working.

"No plasma defenses. No voice activated lasers," Cudgeon jeered. "You really are slipping, Foaly. I would have expected you to realize by now that everything you used to control from your precious ops room is now wired into this little beauty."

Foaly looked at the little, innocent-looking remote control that Cudgeon held in his other hand. "You mean…?" Dear Frond.

"Yep, that's right. Nothing works until I press the button. So long, Donkey Boy – I'm off to persuade the Council that everything is your fault."

And Foaly was caught directly in the chest with his own laser gun.

Ah, sweet irony.

Downtown Haven

Trouble Kelp was in a bit of… a pickle.

With Commander Root out who-knew-where, command of the field was given to him. Normally, that would be something he would relish. Normally.

But no one sane would ever be happy when goblins had overrun Haven with smuggled weapons. The fact that none of their weapons were working, either, was also a factor in convincing Trouble Kelp that this was absolutely his best day ever. Just a slight factor. I mean, weapons were just weapons. It wasn't as if they were a difference between life and death.

And to top it all off, his men responded with their normal calm and bravery.

"WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!" Grub wailed, clamping his eyes shut and clutching his pointed little ears. Trouble would have rolled his eyes at his younger brother's immature antics, but for once what the boy said had plenty of truth.

The goblins had positioned themselves on the rooftops, catching his squad in a deadly crossfire of softnose lasers and fireballs. Five seconds later, all of their weapons stopped working. He and his younger brother were now taking cover behind an upturned advertising stand, defenseless and overall helpless to stop the madness that was raging behind them.

"We are ALL GOING TO DIE!" Grub repeated, in tears by now. "You were supposed to look out for me, Trubs! Mummy said!" he sobbed.

"We are NOT going to die!" Trouble scolded his younger brother. How that kid ever even graduated from the Academy was beyond him. "Pull yourself together, Corporal. And it's 'Captain Kelp' while we're on duty. For your information, little brother, I AM looking out for you. We need to get over fast."

But Grub wouldn't budge an inch. "No chance. No way. I'm not moving. Don't mind if I stay here for the rest of my life."

Trouble watched as the goblins' firing advanced even closer to their spot. He grabbed his brother's shoulders firmly and shook them. "Wake up, you fool! If you stay here, the rest of your life will be about thirty seconds!"

If they were going to survive, they needed some extra armor. Trouble looked around, and his eyes fell on a sideways folding stand. Or something close to it, he thought. Hastily, he draped it over himself. "Brace yourself, little brother. We're in for a ride." And before Grub could register his plan and protest, Trouble grabbed the kid by the collar and ran to safety, nearly throwing the boy across the ground in his haste.

"I'm never doing that again."

"Grub. Is he okay?"

"Yeah, just frightened," the medic grunted. "You, on the other hand, good sir, are going to have a lot of nasty bruises in the morning." Trouble winced as an antibiotic was injected into his already sore shoulders.

"Any word on the Commander?" he asked hopefully. The medic shook his head.

"Nope. Nothing. Zip, zero, nada. He's still missing, and Cudgeon's been reinstated. And even worse, they're saying that Foaly, your technician, is behind all this."

Foaly? No way. Not the centaur. Trouble thought about the situation – all of the lasers dead like sabotage…only Foaly could control it like that. Then again…Trouble had a nasty feeling that it had to do something with Artemis Fowl. A highly intelligent person who could successfully breach Foaly's defenses and then blame it on the centaur himself – yeah, that sounded a lot like him. Ever since the entire hostage incident, he never fully recovered his trust for the Mud Boy, even if he had kept his word about everything else.

But there was no time for that now. They had to get to the operations booth, and find Foaly.

Trouble eventually got his squad together. He was forced to call a retreat back to Police Plaza – there was no way they were going to live in this situation.

Retreat, tactical maneuver, whatever you called it – to him, it still felt like running away. At least they were headed to Foaly – and hopefully, Root.

Speaking of Foaly…

Operations Booth, Police Plaza – fifteen minutes ago

Foaly groaned and sat up, rubbing his head. Taking a laser directly – that had to hurt. He looked around. The doors were fused shut, obviously the work of Cudgeon. And now that idiot was going to the Council to pin the blame on him.

"Open doors, exit code one-two-one, Foaly override," he tried. Nothing happened. "D'Arvit." He kicked the metal as hard as he could with one of his back legs, hoping that the animal half of him could provide enough power to weaken the cracks. Naturally, all he got for his trouble was a smarting hoof. He should have known better, really: when he had designed this door to keep intruders out he had tested its physical strength with himself.

He was trapped in his own room! Things couldn't get any worse.

His control screen buzzed, and Opal Koboi's face appeared in front of him, with a maniacally triumphant grin.

Then again, things probably could get worse.

"Hello, Foaly."

"Opal Koboi."

"Haven't you figured it out yet, Foaly?" she taunted. "Nothing works unless I say so. No communications out of this room. No weapons, no entry, no exit, nothing."

So, Opal was behind all of this. He should have known. She provided so many weapons for the LEP – of course she would have been able to shut everything down. This was madness. She was mad. Cudgeon was mad.

"Opal, think about what you're doing!" Foaly pleaded. "Cudgeon's insane! He's just using you for your brains. Once he gets what he wants and everything is over, he'll dispose of you in a heartbeat!"

"You're wrong, Foaly," Opal said serenely. "Briar needs me. He really does."

So, she was hooked on the idea of world domination, too. There was no convincing her. Foaly decided to just have a little fun with her. "You still sore because I won that science medal back into university, huh?"

As intended, Opal flew into a rage. "That medal was mine, you stupid centaur! My wing design was far superior to your ridiculous iris-cam. You just won because you were MALE. And that's the ONLY REASON!" Then, she smiled unnervingly. "Would you like to see a movie, Foaly? Look at this," and she hooked him up to a bunch of security cameras downtown. "While you were unconscious, there was a little change to the natural order of things.

"The B'wa Kell are waging open war on the LEP all over the city. And guess what? All of the LEP weapons seemed to have stopped working." Foaly watched in horror as two officers – Trouble and Grub Kelp – were hiding behind fallen structures, clicking their lasers uselessly. "And you know what the best thing is, Foaly? Briar is with the Fairy Council right now, making sure that you get the credit – for everything. Happy viewing!"

Foaly swore loudly as her face disappeared off the screen.

Hogwarts

"Right, Fowl, spill it. What are you still doing out here?" Root growled.

Draco looked at Artemis. "You know them?"

"Not for anything good, unfortunately," Artemis confessed. "We met in the summer before second year…and let's just say, it was not for tea."

"I never thought I'd see elves out and about like this…"

"They're a different species that live underground, Draco. Just like the goblins. And unlike your house-elves, you can't order these folk around. They are in no way magically bound to follow our requests out here. Oh, and they're ten times smarter and twenty times more vicious, too," Artemis explained.

"What do you mean by vicious?"

"As in, the summer before second year, I captured one of their LEP officers – like our Aurors. Yes, they are capable of forming their own civilizations under the Muggles' noses without discovery, and yes, they have their own government and law enforcement organizations. Anyway, in their attempt to get him out, they sent a troll into the manor," Artemis said.

"A troll – " Draco began.

"Hey, that was Cudgeon's idea. Don't blame us."

"Yeah, well, you guys were going to pull a time-stop on the manor and send in a bio-bomb, anyway," Artemis said.

"Time-stop? Bio-bomb?" Draco breathed. "What are those?"

"Exactly what they sound like," Artemis shrugged. "One stops time within a certain area, and the other destroys every trace of life within its range. Used together, they can completely wipe out any target they wish without affecting the surroundings or causing collateral damage."

"Are they going to kill us?" Draco asked.

Artemis shook his head. "Just don't assume otherwise."

"That's right, Mud Boy. Now, why are you still here?" Root snapped.

"That's what I would like to know," Artemis said. "We were just attacked by goblins out of nowhere. I would ask you to just please let us go and maybe drop us off back at our usual destination, but something tells me that they're going to be back."

"Your deduction skills astound me," Captain Short said sarcastically.

"Seeing as you are not holding me at laser-point, I would assume that something below ground has prevented the LEP weapons from working on a mass scale?" Artemis asked. He elbowed Draco, silently telling him to "shut up and just go with the flow – I'll explain everything later."

"Pretty much."

"And you want to know if I know anything."

"Not quite. What we want to know is if you can help us with the Goblins, and who that other Mud Whelp is."

Artemis elbowed Draco again. "Just don't protest. Yes, I know your pride is wounded. But they're used to calling anything humanoid but without pointed ears that."

"This would be Draco Malfoy, who you helped just a few months ago, and who recently saved my life while battling these goblins that I am now assuming are part of the B'wa Kell hit squad." Draco was looking as bemused as ever, but wisely kept his mouth shut.

"I thought we told you not to say anything – we had a promise, Fowl!"

"And I kept my promise. I never told Draco anything. He just followed me out here when he saw that I was in trouble." All right, so Draco had been following him long before that because he had been too careless to check if someone was tailing him, but the LEP did not need to hear him admit that. "As you can see, it is quite easy to make one's own deductions after being assaulted by a bunch of manic fireball-throwing goblins after your blood."

"And how was he able to see them?" Root asked.

"We can do magic too, you know," Draco couldn't help saying.

They glared at him, but seemed to accept this. "Can't we just mind-wipe him?"

"Mind-wipe?" Draco asked. "Is that like Obliviate?"

"Yes it is," said Artemis, "but there are a few key differences."

Draco was stunned. "And what are these 'key differences,' may I ask?"

"Different form of magic, same end result," said Artemis. "Their mind-wipes are simply easier to control and more difficult to remove, unless you have a good enough knowledge of psychology. Then you could just store key trigger memories in a secret file somewhere and open it up later, when you need the memories again."

"Shut up, Fowl!" Root roared.

Draco ignored him. "Can they really mind-wipe my dad? I mean, he knows Occlumency…"

"These mind-wipes are powerful enough to leave you wondering what color the sky is, Mud Boy," Root growled.

"Then no, you can't just mind-wipe me," Draco said, glaring. "I prefer my memories whole and intact, thank you very much."

Root glared. "You're in no position to be making demands. Be glad you're actually getting a chance. Personally, I think that there are two humans too many knowing about our existence now."

"Three, if you count Butler," Artemis pointed out unhelpfully. "Juliet, too, so that's four."

"Heaven forbid."

"Can't we just curse them?" Draco asked.

"Can't we just get back on the topic of the B'wa Kell?" Captain Short asked. "I can't contact Foaly. The networks are all down."

"It sounds as if we have a leak. Someone's infiltrated the LEP and sabotaged all of the equipment. That must have been the reason why the goblins needed Muggle batteries for the softnose lasers," Artemis mused. "They must have been told in advance that eventually, all of the LEP lasers would not work."

"That means there's probably a rebellion going on underground this very moment!" Captain Short exclaimed.

"At worst, the B'wa Kell have already taken over Haven City, which may be why no one can send or receive any messages," Artemis deduced.

Commander Root turned to Captain Short. "Can't you pull something up?" he asked, trying to make it sound like an order, but hints of desperation leaked through anyway.

Holly sighed. "No, I can't just pull something up. All of the communication lines are down."

"What – " Root began, but Holly cut him off again.

"Phone cords, landlines, radio, tin cans attached to bits of string! 'Hello? Is anyone there?' No! Because the entire LEP network is down!" she snapped.

"So what do we do now?" Root yelled back angrily.

"We have to get back underground without anyone noticing us," Artemis cut in before anything turned violent (it probably had gotten bloody below the surface, anyway). "Something tells me that things won't be pretty."

"Well, of course, if nothing is working!" Root exploded.

Artemis had an idea. "How about this. We help you put down the B'wa Kell, and Draco gets to keep his memories. Oh, and you'll have to take us back home and mesmerize our teachers and friends into thinking we never left."

"Fine. Another deal with you, Fowl?"

Artemis tried not to let his surprise show. He hadn't anticipated that Commander Root, of all people, would be so quick to negotiate. That meant that the situation underground was even more desperate than he had originally gauged.

"Believe me. The feeling is mutual." But they shook hands on it anyway. Artemis could tell that Root had already been planning to ask for his help, and was only too glad that he hadn't asked for anything more. At this point, Artemis could care less. So long as sacrificing a few of his material desires or technological curiosities could earn him the trust of the People – People who could very well be indispensable allies later on.

A/N: "Phone cords, landlines, radio, tin cans attached to bits of string! 'Hello? Is anyone there?' No! Because the entire LEP network is down!"

I stole that from Torchwood ^^ Ianto's awesome. I miss him.