Holly clamped a hand on either side of Butler’s head. The vibrations traveled the length of her arms and through her body.
“Hold him, Holly. Hold him!”
Holly leaned across the pod, placing the weight of her body on the bodyguard’s head. In all the confusion, she couldn’t tell if her efforts were having any effect whatsoever.
“Here it comes!” said Foaly in her ear. “Brace yourself!”
The magical lattice spread along Butler’s neck and across his face. Blue sparks targeted the eyes, traveling along the optic nerve, into the brain itself. Butler’s eyes flew open, rolling in their sockets. His mouth was reactivated too, spewing out long strings of words in various languages. None of which made any sense.
“His brain is running tests,” said Foaly. “Just to check that everything’s working.”
Each muscle and joint was tested to its limit; rolling, swiveling, and stretching. Hair follicles grew at an accelerated rate, covering Butler’s normally shaven dome with a thick growth of hair. Nails shot out of his fingers like tiger claws and a raggedy beard snaked from his chin.
Holly could only hang on. She imagined that this was how it must feel to be a rodeo cowboy straddling a particularly bad-tempered bull.
Eventually the sparks dissipated, spiraling into the air like the embers on a breeze. Butler calmed and settled, his body sinking into six inches of water and coolant. His breathing was slow and deep.
“We did it,” said Holly, sliding off the pod onto her knees. “He’s alive.”
“Don’t start celebrating just yet,” said Foaly. “There’s still a long way to go. He won’t regain consciousness for a couple of days at least, and even then who knows what shape his mind will be in. And of course, there’s the obvious problem.”
Holly raised her visor. “What obvious problem?”
“See for yourself.”
Captain Short was almost afraid to look at whatever lay in the pod. Grotesque images crowded her imagination. What kind of misshapen mutant human had they created? The first thing she noticed was Butler’s chest. The bullet hole itself had completely disappeared, but the skin had darkened, with a red line amid the black. It looked like a capital I.
“Kevlar,” explained Foaly. “Some of it must have replicated. Not enough to kill him, thankfully, but enough to slow down his breathing. Butler won’t be running any marathons with those fibers clinging to his ribs.”
“What’s the red line?”
“At a guess, I’d say dye. There must have been writing on the original bulletproof jacket.”
Holly glanced around the surgery. Butler’s vest lay discarded in a corner. The letters FBI were printed in red across the chest. There was a small hole in the center of the I.
“Ah, well,” said the centaur. “It’s a small price to pay for his life. He can pretend it’s a tattoo. They’re very popular among Mud Men these days.”
Holly had been hoping the Kevlar-reinforced skin was the “obvious problem” Foaly had been referring to. But there was something else. The something else became immediately apparent when her gaze landed on the bodyguard’s face. Or more accurately, the hair sprouting from his face.
“Oh, gods,” she breathed. “Artemis is not going to like this.”
Artemis paced the yard while his bodyguard underwent magical surgery. Now that his plan was actually in progress, doubts began to chew at the edges of his mind like slugs on a leaf. Was this the right thing to do? What if Butler wasn’t himself? After all, his father had been undeniably different on the day he had finally come back to them. He would never forget that first conversation. . . .
Excerpt from Artemis Fowl’s diary, disk 2 (encrypted)
The doctors in Helsinki were determined that they would pump my father full of vitamin supplements. He was just as determined that they wouldn’t. And a determined Fowl usually gets his way.
“I am perfectly fine,” he insisted.“Please allow me some time to reacquaint myself with my family.”
The doctors withdrew, disarmed by his personality. I was surprised by this approach. Charm had never been my father’s weapon of choice. He had previously achieved his aims by bulldozing over anybody stupid enough to stand in his way.
Father sat in the hospital room’s only armchair, his shortened leg resting on a footstool. My mother was perched on the armrest, resplendent in white Armani faux fur.
Father caught me looking at his leg. “Don’t worry, Arty,” he said.“I’m being measured for a prosthesis tomorrow. Dr. Hermann Gruber is being flown in from Dortmund.”
I had heard of Gruber. He worked with the German special Olympics squad. The best.
“I’m going to ask for something sporty. Maybe with speed stripes.”
A joke. That wasn’t like my father.
Angeline ruffled her husband’s hair.
“Stop teasing, darling. This is difficult for Arty, you know. He was only a baby when you left.”