Chapter 4: I Officially Break And Enter

"Mfffghmal fah fooh bbfhlw," said Mulch cheerfully through a mouthful of soil as he churned along.

"What?" I yelled, hardly able to hear myself over the throbbing chomp of earth between teeth.

He ceased his digging and let out a last squib of air.

"I said, 'We're almost to the wine cellar,' Mud Maid."

I sighed, annoyed. "No need to call me that. Now, how close are we exactly?"

He licked a bit of soil off the tunnel wall.

"Hmm. About .2 klicks northwest, I'd say. This clay is amazing! California red, I believe. 1992 at the latest. A tad overbearing, but still good. Would you like to try some?"

I backed away cautiously. "No thanks. I'm on a diet that doesn't include… um… dirt."

"You don't know what you're missing, you non-soil-eating creatures. Now let's go."

.2 klicks later, I heard the sickening sound of stone-hard teeth hitting wood. A minute later, Mulch- and by extension me- burst through the floor into the wine cellar.

"We're here," he said proudly, looking at his handiwork on the floors.

"You don't say," I muttered, brushing dust, splinters, and dirt off my ruined shirt.

"Let's go."

Fowl Manor was like a maze of passages and doors. Everywhere you turned, two more hallways and a security camera waited for you. Foaly's loop kept us unseen, but I knew that wouldn't last for long.

"So, tell me about the future. Do I ever get a girlfriend? What happened to Cousin Nord on the 76th charge? What's the trending color of the future?" Mulch asked hopefully.

"I don't care, I don't know, and plaid. Now shut up and hurry," I snapped at him, not wanting to run into trouble, or worse, Butler.

Finally, Mulch peeked into an imposing door and motioned for me to follow. I went inside and immediately noticed a painting on the wall. "It's in there," I hissed.

"Wait, what is? If you're from the future and know everything, you should remember what's inside."

"It's a copy of the Book, which Artemis got from dealing with an alcoholic sprite. I just remembered."

Which was true.

"Oh really? And how do you know that?"

I whirled around. That wasn't Mulch's voice. In the shadowed doorway, there stood a figure. A figure not much taller then me, with raven-black hair and an Armani suit.

Artemis Fowl.

I stood there gaping. It was the boy I'd dreamed about for years. Him. The subject of so many girls' hearts. And he was standing right in front of me! An unconscious shiver ran down my back.

"Um… hi," I started nervously. "We're here because… WATCH OUT!"

I said that last bit because Mulch, next to me, was aiming his posterior at Artemis. No, not Artemis. The shadowy person next to him. Butler! I stumbled out of the way, partly because I didn't trust Mulch's aim, and partly because I wanted to see Butler better.

Butler was exactly how the book described him: huge, shaved, and fierce. But under those harsh features, I could see the sentimentality that made him so likeable.

Ah, whom am I kidding? I didn't see any sentimentality. Just a big gun. Artemis also stepped out of the way, alarmed, while Mulch fired. But- wait- he fired in the wrong direction! His aim was… oh no… backwards. He made his wind like a rocket, shooting him out the wall into another, safer part of the house. Leaving me, his partner, behind.

Artemis looked at me critically. "I assume you have allied yourself with the fairies?"

While I was mulling over my response, Butler flicked his gun up and then everything went black again.

I woke up in a cement holding room. Groggily, I looked up. A blinking red light stared me in the face. Security cameras.

I whistled loudly in the general direction of the cameras.

"Hey, genius boy! Got your attention now, didn't I? Let me out! I have no magic! I'm not from the LEP! What do you want?"

Artemis's voice issued from a radio concealed somewhere.

"I am very preoccupied at the moment, so I would highly appreciate if you were quiet for the time being."

I fumed. "YOU'RE asking ME to be quiet? I will not be quiet! I don't care about a word you say, and I'll keep on talking until you let me out!"

So I did. I sat down on my bead defiantly and started talking. I talked mostly about useless things, things that would annoy Artemis but not provoke him. Finally, when my throat was getting dry and my voice cracked, there was an electronic squeal and a whine, and the speakers crackled off.

I softly began speaking, not animatedly enough that Artemis would notice, but not too quietly either.

"Charlie- err, Mud Girl, to base. Artemis caught us, Mulch bailed, and now I'm stuck. I'd really appreciate some help," I muttered.

A minute later, Foaly's rough voice came in. "All right, Mud Girl. Artemis was clever- he found most of our bugs- but not as clever as me. I obviously still have your iris-cam and your throat mike. That's good."

"Get to the point!" I hissed. "How do I get out of here?"

"Ok, ok. First, you take out your iris-cam."

I did so.

"Next, blow gently on the inside. That'll reawaken some of the megabytes and allow me to-''

I blew and cut him off. "Foaly, we don't have time for this."

"I'm logging into your data system now. It's not attached, but I can activate self-destruct."

"Why would you do that?"

"Just place it by the wall nearest the security camera and wait."

I did and stood back nervously. A millisecond later, a red explosion blossomed out of the camera and the wall fell down like a child's stack of blocks."

"A little nitprogeniten fluid goes a long way, it seems," Foaly chuckled in my ear. I didn't bother to ask what nitprogeniten fluid was.

Instead, I slipped out of the gaping hole, making my way to wherever Artemis's study was.

The genius boy should've watched out, because I was coming.