And She Said, Better Once Than Never, For Never Too Late
"And on the basis of this lecture and the previous, along with your own individual essays, the next assignment will be a group task, tackling the effects of Africa's geography on its future political prospects."
The graphite stick in Artemis' mechanical pencil snapped. He lifted his head, horrified at what he was hearing. A group task? He was expected to work with someone else? On an assignment he'd be assessed by? He wanted to stalk down to the front of the hall where a large map of the world hung, grab the lecturer's ridiculous pointy stick and ram it onto the tiny dot called Dublin. Not Shanghai. Not Tokyo. Dublin. Which, in case the lecturer wasn't aware, was an individualistic culture that promoted independent achievement and competition, not group tasks. If he was going to be assessed as an individual, he wanted his work to be entirely his own. The collective groan that echoed in the hall told Artemis that fifty other students were thinking exactly the same. Well, almost the same. The lecturer ignored the cries of dismay.
"Your individual essays were each written on a particular country within Africa and how climate change would have an effect on their economies going forward. Now I'd like you to combine all that research into an overview of how you expect Africa to change, as well as possible mitigative and adaptive solutions. There's a handout coming around." A sheet of paper passed under Artemis' fingers, but he was still having an intense internal argument with the lecturer on the reasons why this was a terrible idea. Inside his head, the lecturer saw the error in his ways and declared the project an individual assignment. Outside, students were chattering as they waved across the hall in an attempt to recruit potential members to their group.
"I've divided the class into groups as will appear on the board." The despair in the room escalated; only Artemis was unperturbed (assigned groups made it easier for him). The slide changed and the designated groups flashed up one by one.
If there's one thing that makes this situation worse, thought Artemis bitterly, it's the fact that he dedicated perhaps ten minutes to making each of those names appear separately.
The class was soon to end, and the groups were beginning to clump into different parts of the room. The sound of chattering built, tasks were divided out and strangers shared phone numbers. Artemis was too irritated to move, already planning swift revenge for his lecturer. Truly, university was doing him no good. He'd taken classes he'd hoped would stretch his intellect and help him solve the world problem of global warming – instead it was just stretching his patience. It turned out he didn't need to move as his group migrated to him.
"You're … Artemis, right?" A tousle-haired young man smiled cautiously, standing on the next row of seats in front so that his eyes were level with Artemis' from where he sat. Be civil, Butler's voice in his head pleaded. Before he could respond, another two people approached – two girls arm in arm.
"Artemis! Do you remember me? I introduced myself a couple of weeks ago." One girl tittered excitedly, her accent only standard English – a strange accent. There was usually a hint of somewhere to an English accent: a Scottish tongue, a northern warmth, a far-southern drawl. She had nothing but a Harry-Potter-esque, middle-class intonation. "My name is Emma, in case you don't remember. And this is my best friend Elizabeth."
"Lizzy, please," Lizzy rolled her eyes. "I hate my full name." Lizzy was short but what she lost in her inconspicuous size, she made up for in the vibrancy of her hair. It was bright pink and tied in a messy bun atop her head. Artemis had seen - or rather, heard - Lizzy around the university. She was difficult to miss, a laugh louder than howling dogs, hair that seemed to change colour every time she walked in the door and even her body language was audacious. She was a stark contrast to the perfect politician's daughter hooked onto her right arm.
"I'm Connor," the quiet Irish lad from before said, extending another one of his cautious but genuine smiles to the girls.
"Have you got whatsapp?!" Lizzy pulled her phone from her bra and Artemis couldn't help how his lip curled in disgust. Luckily, the expression went unnoticed.
"We're supposed to be in teams of five, right?" Emma mused, glancing around. "Who are we missing?" Whilst she looked around the room, Lizzy squinted her eyes (which, Artemis noted, were decorated with huge flicks of eyeliner) at the projected slide.
"Katherina Palmer."
Katherina. Like from the Taming of the Shrew, Artemis pondered, and as he did so, he laid eyes on a girl with vibrant red hair – bright enough to challenge Lizzy's. She looked lost and was frowning. As she turned to the door and saw most groups beginning to leave, a slight look of panic came over her. She chewed a fingernail.
"Katherina~!" Lizzy bellowed into the hall. Several students raised their eyebrows, and a few made unheard remarks to their friends, some covering their ears in jest to the laughter others. The red head span around and looked hopeful.
"Ah," Connor breathed. "I think that's her."
"Are you Katherina?" Lizzy beamed broadly as the girl hurried over, looking apologetic.
"Sorry, I didn't know anybody." She caught Artemis' eyes and tried to smile; something made him avert his gaze. "Call me Kat."
"Lizzy!"
"Emma."
"Eh, Connor."
Eyes fell expectedly on Artemis, who had by now retrieved his phone and was checking the time with a scornful expression.
"You're Artemis Fowl, right?" Lizzy said loudly, and pointedly. Artemis glanced up and plastered a fake smile on his face.
"Ah, yes. Pleasure to meet you all."
"You too," Emma nodded, curling a strand of straight brown hair over one finger. "To start with, how about we compare individual essays?" She retrieved hers from a laptop carrier. "I conducted mine on Egypt."
"I did mine on Sudan." The pink-head waved hers.
"Kenya." Connor was still rummaging for his.
"I uh," Kat flicked through a neatly organised folder, "Tanzania …"
"I also did mine on Tanzania." Artemis sighed, not even bothering to locate his essay. "No matter, I will change to South Africa." Kat's green eyes blinked.
"That means you'll have to re-do all the research!" Lizzy's mouth was so aghast, the piercing in her tongue became visible.
"Yeah, that's a little unreasonable to ask of you." Emma nodded. "We should stick to four case studies."
Artemis waved a hand. "It won't take long to find the research. The lecturer put us into groups to ensure we each had a separate case study. One of us must have changed without letting him know." By process of elimination, Artemis knew who had changed.
"Sorry, I changed. Halfway into the essay I realised I could find more information on Tanzania in terms of bottom-up strategies, so I decided to change countries because I didn't think the professor would mind." Kat looked slightly embarrassed, her eyebrows knitting together. "I'll do the research. I started it on South Africa anyway."
"No, honestly," Artemis sighed aloud. "It'll be faster if I do it." Hindsight was a spectacular thing and in hindsight, that was the wrong thing to say. She looked insulted, even though she didn't rebuke him. Lizzy did that for her.
"Don't be so rude!" Lizzy scolded, thrusting her hands onto her hips. Artemis drummed a finger impatiently, noticing that the room was almost empty now, save for their group.
"That's not what I meant," it was exactly what he meant, "I would rather just get this sorted instead of debating over it."
"Well, if you're sure," Kat looked like she wanted to say something and was biting her tongue reluctantly. Artemis stared her down and she began to chew her lip – he could practically see the cogs in her head spinning. There was something he didn't like about her eyes. They were searching him. He could see her judging him somehow, but for once he felt entirely in the dark. What was she thinking?
"I'm sure. Now, let's get these tasks divided out between us, eh? I'd like to get back to my car before I get a parking ticket."
In truth, Artemis had paid for a day's parking since he had arrived in Dublin ridiculously early in the morning. Fowl manor was situated roughly an hour away from the city centre and he had set off at 5 in the morning. Not even the quaint cafés littering the streets were open yet to serve breakfast, so he had to put up with the small complaining his stomach made until 9am when he eventually found somewhere. In the meantime, he walked over to where he liked to spend most of his free time between lecturers – the area known as Dublin's playground: Phoenix Park. He sought out a bench and laid down a thin jacket he had brought with him to protect the seat of his chinos from the fresh morning mist that wet the wood. Across the field before him, a couple of deer watched him with bright eyes. He closed his eyes and let the morning air chill his skin, making him feel alive.
And this was where Artemis found himself again after his first lecture. He had one more at 2 o'clock, so he had roughly twenty minutes to breathe this fresh air into his lungs and soak up the shadows of the trees he sat under. He couldn't stay in the city for long without needing to find this escape. On the way out of the grandiose stone archway of the university, the two females in his group had chased him down.
"Uh, Artemis!" The one called Emma shouted. He'd heard her the first time, but dearly hoped he could get around the corner before she caught up with him.
"ARTY!" Lizzy screamed, cupping her hands around her face like a megaphone (which she wouldn't have needed). Artemis winced for two reasons: number one, a stranger had called him by a pet name he had grown to find very endearing and two, this Lizzy was not afraid of breaking conventional public behaviour standards. He realised he had to respond and stopped in the street, not even bothering to smile at them. "You walk fast!" Lizzy panted, grabbing his shoulder with overfamiliarity that made Artemis' stomach churn.
"Have you had lunch yet?" Emma stepped into pace beside them and smiled widely without showing her teeth.
"I have," he responded, being careful to remain passive aggressive but not overtly so. He didn't want to cause any trouble. Using a military term Butler often mentioned, he wanted, as much as possible, to be the grey man.
"Do you want to grab a coffee then?" This Emma was still smiling, despite Artemis' curt tone.
"I need to get back to my car."
"You have a car?" Lizzy beamed excitedly. "Like a true adult. Although, I've heard you're pretty well off?"
"Lizzy!" Emma scorned in a whisper.
"What? You don't have to answer if you don't want. I'm just saying what I've heard."
"He's the son of Mr Fowl, of course he's well-off. I have huge respect for your father, Arty."
"Artemis," he winced immediately.
"Sorry, don't you like Arty?"
"I think it's cute," said Lizzy. "But Artemis it is!" She clapped her hands lightly. "Then, show us your car! What is it? Audi? Bentley?"
Artemis knew he wasn't going to escape from these two easily. The little woman was like a fierce Jack Russell, one which wouldn't let go of its toys. "Jaguar XJ," he was getting a headache. Lizzy's mouth dropped open wide again and this time, Artemis noticed her piercing was a bright pink gem.
"Can we have a ride?!" She exclaimed. Her friend pulled her arm again, but Lizzy wouldn't be dissuaded. "Or just look inside!"
"Let's just go for a coffee." Emma interjected quickly. "You've got class later, haven't you? Once you've extended your ticket, we can meet up and discuss this project a bit more."
"I'm not going for coffee." Artemis finally snapped. He heaved a sigh and stopped walking to make direct eye contact with both individually. Even Lizzy managed to shut up for a second when his ice-blue eyes cut into her. "I don't want to go for coffee. I have things to do. If you'll excuse me."
And that was when he finally managed to break off from the irritating women and meander back towards his favourite place.
Now. Twenty minutes. Time to get some work done.
He unfolded his laptop, a slick silver device with scratches of wear around the joints where Artemis had repeatedly taken the device apart. It wasn't his most up-to-date laptop – he couldn't risk one with faery technology being stolen (he'd learned that lesson), or if one of his alumni managed to get hold of it for long enough to find the laser function. But it was unique, to say the least. The fingerprint scanner immediately gave him access to his desktop and from there, seven new emails flashed up. Usually, he linked emails to his smart watch, but there were some emails he didn't want illuminated for everyone to see. A couple were confirmed transactions, one from a potential business partner, one from his lecturer and one from Foaly that simply said: checkmate.
Artemis scowled to himself and checked through a couple of the programmes Foaly was likely to be referring to. His first guess was the manor security cameras, as he'd recently blocked the centaur from a live feed by sending him long loop feeds from the past year that Artemis thought he had connivingly compiled into a realistic story. Loop Artemis even disappeared at 10, and returned at 5, and on weekends Loop Artemis read in the library and played chess. His first guess had been correct and now instead of a live feed from his own house playing across the laptop, a gif of Mulch's behind danced eternally. He tutted and decided to leave the CCTV problem for another day.
His remaining emails blinked at him. One was from Butler saying – check the CCTV. Another was from an address he didn't recognise. He scanned it for potential viruses and then opened the message.
Artemis
I have attached all the research I conducted for South Africa. Please let me know if you need anything.
Kat
Since Artemis didn't have any form of social media account, they'd all exchanged emails instead which worked in Artemis' favour – no irritating group chats bleeping every four seconds. Artemis opened the document attached and was impressed with the level of detail and research he found. He checked the time stamps and realised that some of the work had been added less than half an hour ago. She must have done some extra research for him, probably out of a little guilt. Still, his impression of her improved slightly. At least she was responsible - and clever, if this piece of work was anything to go by. He grew curious and clicked the icon next to her email to open her account details. She had no images uploaded. No obnoxious 'status' or cover photo. Now even more intrigued, Artemis searched her name on one of the social media platforms he knew of and quickly found her vibrant red hair on the list of profiles.
He scrolled down. She didn't have much on the profile. Two individuals appeared in most photos, likely her best friends. She'd checked into places in Ireland for the past year but looking at her uploaded photo albums showed she'd lived in northern England for a while. There were a couple of holiday albums, too, including Japan where she posed under a blooming sakura tree. She was extremely pretty. He closed her account and decided to reply to the email.
Katherina
Thank you for the research. I'm sure it will be useful. There's plenty of information on South Africa so it won't take me long to do, but I appreciate your help.
Regards,
Artemis
He was about to shut the lid of his laptop and head over to his next lecture when a familiar tune sounded to indicate he had received another email. It was Katherina's reply.
Found an article published an hour ago on Cape Town, sorry for the double email, thought it'd be useful as well
Artemis flicked through the article.
No problem. He paused and an entirely uncharacteristic thought popped into his head. Would you like to meet for coffee and- He typed, and then immediately erased the text, flustered. He sent the email as it was and snapped the laptop shut before he could be taken over by any more unreasonable impulses. Right, to class, he thought, leaving Phoenix Park behind and once more merging into the Dublin crowds.
AN:
I wrote this story a while ago, but with the hype of the film coming I'd really love the AF fanfic community to take off again!