Artemis unbuttoned Butler’s shirt, exposing a barrel chest hard with muscle, scars, and tension. A cursory examination told him that there was no heartbeat. Butler’s body was dead; only his brain was left alive.
“Hold on, old friend,” murmured Artemis, trying to keep his mind focused.
He pulled the defibrillator paddles from their holsters and peeled back their disposable safety covers, leaving a thin coating of conductive gel on the contact surfaces. The paddles seemed to grow heavier as he waited for the unit to charge, and by the time the GO light flashed green, they felt like rocks in his hands.
“Clear!” he called to no one in particular, then positioned the paddles firmly on Butler’s chest and hit the shock button under his thumb, sending three hundred and sixty volts of electricity into his bodyguard’s heart. Butler’s body arched, and the sharp smell of burning hair and skin assailed Artemis’s nostrils. Gel crisped and sparked, burning twin rings where the pads had made contact. Butler’s eyes flew open and his massive hands gripped Artemis’s shoulders.
Is he still Opal’s slave?
“Artemis,” breathed Butler, but then frowned in confusion. “Artemis? How?”
“Later, old friend,” said the Irish boy brusquely, mentally progressing to the next problem. “Just rest for now.”
This was not an order he would have to repeat. Butler sank immediately into exhausted unconsciousness. But his heart beat strongly inside his chest. He had not been dead long enough to have suffered brain damage.
Artemis’s next problem was Opal, or more specifically, how to get her out of his mother’s body. If she did not vacate soon, Artemis had no doubt that his mother would not recover from the ordeal.
Gathering his nerve with several deep breaths, Artemis switched his full attention to his mother’s hovering body. She was twirling below the chandelier as though suspended from it, clawing at Jayjay, who appeared to be taunting her by waving his hindquarters in her direction.
Can this situation get any more surreal?
Just then Dr. Schalke entered the room brandishing a pistol, which seemed too large for his delicate hands.
“I am here, you creature. Though I must say, I don’t like your tone. I may be spellbound, but I am not an animal.”
“Do shut up, Schalke. I can see I will have to fry a few more of your brain cells. Now, please, fetch that lemur!”
Schalke pointed four fingers of his free hand toward the chandelier. “The lemur is at a considerable height, yes?
How do you suggest I fetch him? Perhaps I could shoot him dead?”
Opal swooshed low, arms and legs twirling like a harpie. “No!” she shrieked, striking him around the head and shoulders. “I would shoot a hundred of you, a thousand, before I let you harm one hair of that creature’s fur. He is the future. My future! The world’s future!”
“Indeed,” said the doctor. “Were I not mesmerized, I suspect I should be yawning.”
“Shoot the humans,” commanded Opal. “The boy first; he is the most dangerous.”
“Are you certain? The man mountain looks more dangerous to me.”
“Shoot the boy!” howled Opal, frustration sending tears streaming down her cheeks. “Then Butler and then yourself.”
Artemis swallowed. This was cutting things a bit fine; his accomplice had better get a move on.
“Very well,” said Schalke, fiddling with the safety on Butler’s Sig Sauer. “Anything to escape these theatrics.”
I have seconds before he figures out that catch, thought Artemis. Seconds to distract Opal. Nothing to do but to reveal the hole in her ace.
“Come now, Opal,”Artemis said with a calmness he did not feel. “You wouldn’t shoot a ten-year-old boy, would you?”
“I absolutely would,” said Opal without a heartbeat’s hesitation. “I am considering cloning you so that I can kill you over and over again. Heaven.”
Then all of what Artemis had said registered.
“Ten? Did you say you were ten years old?”
Artemis forgot all about the danger surrounding him, lost in the sweet moment of triumph. It was intoxicating.
“Yes, that is what I said. I am ten. My real mother would have noticed immediately.”
Opal chewed the knuckles of Angeline’s left hand, thinking.
“You are the Artemis Fowl from my time? They brought you back!”
“Obviously.”
Opal reared backward through the air, as though taken by the wind.
“There is another one. Here somewhere, another Artemis Fowl.”
“Finally!” said Artemis, smirking. “The great pixie genius sees the truth.”
“Find him,” shrieked Opal. “Find him immediately. At once.”
Schalke straightened his glasses. “At once and immediately. This must be important.”
Opal watched him go with real hatred in her eyes.“When this is over, I am going to destroy this entire estate just for spite. And then, when I return to the past, I shall—”
“Don’t tell me,” interrupted ten-year-old Artemis Fowl. “You will destroy it again.”
Almost Eight Years Ago