Is winged Cupid painted blind?
When Artemis returned to the living room all packed and ready to go, he caught Katherina holding onto a framed photo and staring blankly down. Butler swept behind Artemis and lifted the bags from his hands, adding them to the already heaving boot of the car. Artemis waited in the doorway for her to move, but her focus was hazy and distant. He cleared his throat.
"Oh," she said, hastily replacing the photo on the shelf and smiling sheepishly. "Sorry, are those your brothers?"
Artemis flicked his eyes to the photo and noticed that she had been taking in the family image Angeline had forced the family to endure. Not that Artemis was not used to family portraits – just that they usually had a fireplace in the background and a darkness to the pallet. This one was from the twins' first day of boarding school. Angeline was holding onto a young Myles, pulling him into her chest with a bright smile, her hands wrapped around the toddler's stomach. Beside her, Artemis Senior tried to hold on to Beckett whilst Artemis Junior was trying to wrestle a mouldy stick from his grasp. The Stick of Sticky Destiny, as Beckett had named it, aptly named by the fact it was always coated in some suspicious goop. Butler had taken the photo. He had taken several, including one where Beckett had been caught stood still for a fraction of a second (unheard of), yet Angeline liked the other shot the most and so it had been printed and framed.
"Yes, Myles and Beckett."
"And this is your mother? She is beautiful! She looks so young."
Artemis smiled, genuinely. "Yes, she is. Now, are you ready to go?" She nodded.
Katherina noticed Butler shuttling back and forth from the entranceway to the car loading bags and she scrambled to help. Artemis followed on behind and took hold of his laptop carrier and briefcase. The last bag was forced into the only remaining space in the boot and Butler opened the rear door for Artemis and Katherina. Artemis turned to her and with a flourish of his hands, welcomed her inside the Jaguar. Once she had ducked inside, Artemis swiftly followed. He remembered to text his mother as Butler started the engine, the sound quieter than a breath of air. He informed her that he would be going to England a day early, hoping she wouldn't cause too much fuss. The response came through almost immediately, simply saying 'have a good trip x'.
She must be pre-occupied. The last time he had spoken to her, she had been following the journey of a charity fundraiser on some live video as they ran a series of ultra-marathons through the desert. She had become so enamoured with the young environmentalist's passion that she had sworn to assist the teenager on his journey. She was helping to promote his activities, calling all her friends, and arranging coffee mornings in local schools. A twinge of guilt twisted Artemis' stomach … how long had it been since he'd spoken to his mother? Properly, not just passing greetings. She often came to see him, took time out of her day to pop her head in and ask how his day had been … He really needed to start giving back to his parents. Like most of his relationships with others, he was always receiving. He clearly had not changed at all.
Butler drove them across the Fowl grounds towards the short runway besides the aircraft hangar. Once nearby, Artemis pulled out his remote and initiated the opening of the heavy metal door. It rolled up slowly, revealing a beautiful, porcelain-white jet with a glitter of deep black solar panels along both wings. The solar panels were only about a hand's width along the front edge and generated enough power to run the air conditioning and the lights. Artemis was still working on making the solar panels themselves light enough to line the entire wing, but resilient enough to withstand harsh landings without shattering. And then there was the weight of the battery and the generator he'd need. Each day he chipped away at his blueprints and calculations, getting closer to a solution. If only he could dedicate more time to it. Beside him, Katherina was trying to keep her expression in check as her chin threatened to hit the floor.
"Artemis, do you mind if I ask how you got this much money? I mean, what does your father do?"
Artemis obviously couldn't tell her that his family's entire fortune was made from thievery and backhanded deals. Extremely clever deals albeit, but still illegal. True, his father made money now – more than the average person by several times – but he had made much more when his ventures were less … moral.
"The Fowl business covers quite a number of enterprises, but my father did inherit a substantial fortune. It has been the duty of each generation of Fowl to manage those finances over the years, and continue to grow our empire … business empire, that is."
"You live a completely different life," Katherina's voice was a whisper, almost melancholy in emotion. It made Artemis jump and all of a sudden, she felt completely out of his reach. She was sat next to him, and yet now a void had opened between them. 'A completely different life' … what did that mean? This 'void' flexed, shifted, then rose to swallow him up until he could not see her anymore. All he could see was his own reflection staring back at him from the inky blackness.
"Artemis," Butler interrupted. "Do you want me to pilot?"
"No," as the car stopped, Artemis stepped out and set about for the stairs. "I'd like to. I need the thinking time."
Butler watched his charge disappear up the staircase beside the jet without another word and begin to unlock the cabin door. Meanwhile, he decided to load the baggage trolley ready for Artemis to open the rear door where a conveyor belt had been set up. Katherina took a moment to stand awe-struck in front of the jet, and then scrambled to assist Butler.
"I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name?" She smiled, brightly.
"Butler," Butler said.
"… Oh." She replied. She didn't ask any more questions.
Eventually, they had the jet loaded up. Katherina was marvelling at Artemis' self-designed info-tainment system whilst Butler poked his head into the cockpit. "Good to go, Artemis." He said, like Artemis was not already aware having conducted all the pre-flight checks. Artemis nodded, but continued poking at buttons silently. "What's the sudden mood swing for?" Butler asked, abruptly. Sometimes he tiptoed around Artemis' emotions, sometimes the boy just needed a bit of rationale throwing at him. Artemis immediately floundered, too shocked to continue changing the aircraft controls whilst he recovered.
"Mood swing?"
"Artemis, apologies for the stark simile but your face looks like a slapped arse."
Once again, Artemis found himself aghast for words and his lips mouthed like a goldfish. Eventually, he laughed softly, a small smile finally gracing his expression. "Shut the door, old friend. We'll discuss it." Butler did so and settled himself into the co-pilot's seat as Artemis started the engines. The jet began to rumble and trundled forwards out of the hangar. Upon sensing the absence of the jet on the floor's weight pad, the hangar door began to close behind them. They rolled out onto the runway and Artemis checked the flaps were functioning as normal.
"I'm hoping those birds will have the sense to move." Butler commented, gesturing at the flock of pigeons pottering across the tarmac. Artemis hummed, disapprovingly.
"I told mother we should get a trained falcon. She didn't like the idea. However, I'm sure she'd prefer a falcon pecking at the pigeons to her son's untimely death."
Thankfully, the pigeons cleared, and the runway was clear for take-off. Artemis took a second prior to firing up all the engines to speak into the Tannoy.
"Katherina, we're about to take off. Apologies for leaving you on your own but Butler is going to sit in the co-pilot's seat for a little while. If you're worried about anything, the screen in front of you displays all the aircraft data. It will also tell you our ETA. Plus, you can stream any film you'd like. Although my favourite trick I programmed is the language app. The AI allows you to have a conversation with it in any language. You type out a message and it will correct your grammar. You can use speech as well." Beside him, Butler was shaking his head. Artemis decided to wrap it up. "Enjoy the flight. Hit the speaker button above you if you need anything."
Five minutes later and they were at altitude, soaring through the skies at speed whilst barely making a sound. Artemis eased off the controls and sat back, for once in his life, sighing disgruntledly. Butler was ready to listen.
"I don't particularly understand why I'm feeling down either, old friend." Artemis conceded, and indeed his expression was perplexed. "We were talking about what my father does and she was admiring the jet. Then she said, 'you live a completely different life'. And I don't really know why but I didn't like that."
Butler hummed, knowingly. Artemis clicked his tongue. "I don't want any romance talk from you either, Butler. I don't want to marry every female I meet. I would rather you did not make my friendship with her awkward from suggestive comments."
Butler raised his huge palms, innocently. "I won't say a thing."
"Go on then, what do you think?"
"Friendship often comes about due to similar interests and an empathy that builds between you. It is based on understanding. When she said that you live a different life, it suggested that you could never understand each other and therefore cannot be friends."
Artemis nodded slowly. "I would have said the same thing. It's unusual to me … I'm trying very hard to be friends with her, Butler. And there's a part of me that keeps saying 'stop'. I have this dual impulse to be both over-friendly and dismissive with her."
"That's because you don't want to get hurt." Butler clapped his hand on Artemis' shoulder, reassuringly. "Unfortunately, people around you have tended to have ulterior motives as I'm sure you have noticed. You don't want her to turn out to be the same."
"I know," Artemis sighed again, running his hand through his hair. His attention was suddenly switched to one of his monitors, which displayed the letter F in large, translucent text. The F stood for Faery activity and required his fingerprint to access the full data. This was in case, for some reason, there was an ordinary person in the cockpit, for example his father. He unlocked the data and scrolled the map to view the radar view. A large aircraft had appeared onscreen. They were heading directly towards it as the craft was hovering. He would stay on path, as no doubt the craft would make way for them. It would only be suspicious if a human aircraft changed flight path.
"I wonder what they're watching," Artemis hummed, already completely fixated on the screens before him. His baffled emotions were quickly buried in the back of his mind. "Why would a faery craft be hovering over Wicklow?"
Butler wanted to tell Artemis to leave it, but he knew that was a redundant request. It was in the boy's personality to question everything. He would find the answers to his question no matter what. This obsession with information was both a boon and his bane. Artemis was cursed to cling to problems like a Jack Russell snatches a rodent. There was no way he was letting this go. Already, Butler was recognising Foaley's files up on the main screen as Artemis hacked away, searching for hits on various relevant terms. Some, Butler could comprehend and follow Artemis' thought path. Others, as usual, made him feel completely estranged from the boy and his alien mind. Wicklow, Broad Lough, The Wendy, Black Castle, Kraken, Red Mist, Piper's Stones …
Artemis began to trawl through the information at an astonishing speed. He thought aloud, which was rare, and Butler decided it was his way of being social and inviting him into the conversation.
"The Piper's Stones are in Wicklow. It's a set of stones arranged in a circle, roughly 23m in diameter. The interesting aspect of these stones is the tree within the ring of stones. When I was doing my original research into faeries prior to our initial escapade, this area was on my list of places to visit. Fortunately, we ended up successful on the first try at Tara. However, this would have been high on my list of choices."
Butler listened silently, barely interested but not wanting to deter his charge from things that made him happy.
"It is said that humans were dancing in this field when God turned them into stone. Obviously, this is likely to be another tale passed down from some overzealous storyteller, however I have been reading into the stories about petrification. Mostly following our jaunt with the demons and No1." Butler refrained from a sarcastic comment, barely. Artemis' journey into the demon world was still a contentious issue. He found it hard to think of that period with any rose-tinted glasses. As usual, Artemis was too involved in his thought process to notice the tension in Butler's brow. "What if, old friend, all these stone circles were the work of Warlocks. The existence of these stone circles is mostly inexplicable and furthermore, they all began and stopped around a similar timeline to our demon friends' disappearance."
Butler had to admit that this was intriguing. However, he was staunchly against Artemis getting involved in the faeries business. This already smelled like another world-ending plot hurtling towards them.
The aircraft's dash began to glow orange and a phone icon flashed up on the screen. "Interesting." Artemis commented. "Suspicious. Oh, and I've also been wanting to ask your opinion on something. If I were to make these jets public, I'd need to consider the interface. I used the icon of an old telephone for the screen, you see?" He gestured to the flashing icon. "I don't know if that has become outdated. Some youngsters will grow up without ever seeing an actual telephone. Maybe we should invent a new icon. What do you think?"
"I'm thinking, are you going to answer that?" Butler asked. Artemis gave him a look of disgruntled disappointment and accepted the call with a slight protrusion of his lower lip.
"Hello," Artemis chimed, already covering his pout with a smirk of self-satisfaction. "When did you manage to hack my jet, Foaley?"
"As much as it pains me to admit it, Artemis, I haven't. I noticed your aircraft come within a kilometre of ours and knew you'd put 2 and 2 together to make 400. I had my files open and my computer sensed some dangerous activity. I imagine that's you, mudboy."
"What did you ring for?"
"To try and assess how much you know." Foaley replied. Artemis tapped a few buttons and soon Foaley's face emerged on the screen. He didn't look happy.
Artemis shrugged, lightly. "Not much." Foaley glared and let out a frustrated whinny.
"I'm warning you, Artemis. Stay out of this one. This is faery business. Oh, and hello Butler. How are you doing?"
"I'm getting increasingly 'less fine' as time goes by. Artemis, what is happening?"
"I had a hunch." The boy replied, nonchalantly. Foaley was drumming his fingers on his e-board.
"If I tell you what it is, will you leave it be?" He bargained.
"You know, the more you overreact, the more interested I am." Artemis couldn't have looked more content with himself if he had tried. Foaley, meanwhile, stomped his hooves.
"Alright, mudboy. You asked for it. I'm telling Major Short. If needs be, I'll tell your mother, too, and then mindwipe her after she's given you a scolding." The feed cut out, leaving a smug Artemis to turn to Butler, the glint of excitement in his eyes.
"No," Butler said, firmly. "Whatever it is, no."