The Time Paradox (28 page)

Holly arrived before the villagers, gliding in from the north and touching down soundlessly on the sea stack.

“You’re flying,” said Artemis, as though he had never seen this before.

“I borrowed a suit from N
^o
1’s bodyguards. Well, I say borrowed . . .”

“How did you find me?” asked Artemis, though he could guess.

“Oh, I saw a huge explosion and wondered, Now who could that be?”

“Hmm,” said Artemis. “A bit of a giveaway.”

“Also, I followed my old suit’s radiation trail. I’m still following it.” Holly touched a finger to her visor, and the filter changed. “That’s quite a pile of rocks you dumped on Opal. It’s going to take a Retrieval team some time to dig her out. She’s cursing like a tunnel dwarf down there. What did you do to her?”

“The seventh kraken,” explained Artemis. “The one Foaly missed because it was tubular rather than conical, I would guess. I picked it up on a weather satellite.”

Holly placed a finger on Artemis’s forehead. “Typical Artemis Fowl. Beaten to a pulp and still he delivers a lecture.”

Magical sparks flowed from Holly’s fingertip, engulfing Artemis like a cocoon. He felt comforted and peaceful, like a baby in its blanket. His pains were wiped away, and his shattered collarbone liquefied, then solidified whole.

“Nice trick,” he said, smiling. His eyes were glassy.

“I’m here till Tuesday,” said Holly, smiling back. “N
^o
1 filled my tank.”

Artemis gazed up at his friend through a red haze. “I’m sorry I lied to you, Holly. Truly. You’ve done so much.”

Holly’s eyes were distant. “Maybe you made the wrong decision; maybe I would have made that decision myself. We’re from different worlds, Artemis. We will always have doubts about each other. Let’s just carry on and leave the past in the past, where it should be.”

Artemis nodded. That was as good as he was going to get, and better than he deserved.

Holly pulled a tether from her belt and looped it under Artemis’s arms. “Now, let’s get you home before the villagers start building a gallows.”

“Good idea,” mumbled Artemis, drowsy with the aftereffects of his magical makeover.

“Yes, believe it or not, other people do have those occasionally.”

“Occasionally,” agreed Artemis; then his head lolled back and he was asleep.

Holly reset her wings for the added weight and launched them both off the lip of the sea stack, flying low to avoid the flashlight beams of the locals, which strobed the night sky like searchlights.

Foaly tuned into Holly’s helmet frequency while she was airborne.

“The seventh kraken, I’m guessing. Of course, I had my suspicions.” He paused. “This would be a good opportunity to mind-wipe Artemis,” he said. “Save ourselves a lot of grief in the future.”

“Foaly!” said Holly, horrified. “We don’t wipe our friends. Artemis brought Jayjay back to us. Who knows how many cures lie in that lemur’s brain.”

“I’m kidding. I’m kidding. And guess what, we won’t even have to ask Jayjay to donate some brain fluid. N
^o
1 synthesized it while he was waiting for the shuttle. That kid is one of a kind.”

“I seem to run into a lot of those. By the way, we need to send a team in for Opal.”

“They’re en route. I think you’re in for another rake over the coals from IA when you get back here.”

Holly snorted. “What’s new?”

Foaly fell silent, waiting for Holly to share the details of her adventures. Eventually he could wait no more.

“Okay, you win. I’ll ask. What happened back then— almost eight years ago? My gods, it must have been mayhem.”

Holly felt a phantom tingle on her lips where she had kissed Artemis.

“Nothing. Nothing happened. We went, we got the lemur, we came back. A couple of glitches, but obviously nothing we couldn’t handle.”

Foaly didn’t press for details. Holly would tell him when she had processed it herself.

“Do you ever think you might like to go to work and then just come home? No drama?”

Holly watched the ocean flash by below her and felt the weight of Artemis Fowl in her arms.

“No,” she said. “I never think that.”

CHAPTER 16

Less than an hour
later they landed at Fowl Manor. Artemis woke up just as Holly’s heels hit the gravel, and was instantly alert.

“Magic is wonderful stuff,” he said, pinwheeling his left arm.

“You should have held on to yours,” quipped Holly.

“Ironically, if I had not attempted to cure Mother, Opal would have allowed her to recover. It was my journey into the past that gave Opal the basis for her plan, which she instigated by following us to her future.”

“I liked you better asleep,” said Holly, retrieving her tether. “My head hurt less.” “It’s the big time paradox. If I had done nothing, then nothing would have needed to be done.” Holly touched her helmet. “Let me get Foaly on the com. You two could both talk at the same time.”

The exterior lights cast a soft glow on the gravel, setting the stones shimmering like gems. Lofty evergreen trees swayed in the gentle breeze, rustling with life. Like Tolkien’s creatures.

Artemis watched Holly stride toward the main doors.

If only, he thought. If only.

N
^o
1 sat on the front step, flanked by a squad of LEP officers bristling with the latest weaponry. Artemis knew that his DNA was coded into their guns, and all they had to do was select his icon from a list and there would be no escape. Jayjay had wrapped himself around the demon’s crown like a hunting cap and seemed most comfortable there. He roused himself when he saw Artemis and leaped into the boy’s arms. A dozen LEP rifles instantly beeped, and Artemis guessed that his icon was being selected.

“Hello there, little fellow. How do you like the present?”

N
^o
1 answered for the lemur. “He likes it fine. Especially now that no one will be sticking any needles in his head.”

Artemis nodded. “You duplicated the fluid. I thought that might be an option. Where is Dr. Schalke?”

“He collapsed once Opal departed. Butler put him in a guest room.”

“And Artemis Junior?”

“Technically, you are Artemis Junior,” replied N
^o
1. “But I know what you are trying to ask me. Your younger self has been transported back to his own time. I sent a Retrieval captain and stayed here as a marker. I thought you would want him out of the way as soon as possible, what with your father and the twins on their way home.”

Artemis tickled Jayjay under the chin. “It might have proved awkward.”

Holly was troubled. “I know we promised not to wipe him, but I’m not particularly thrilled that there’s a little Fowl running around with fairy knowledge in his devious skull.”

Artemis raised an eyebrow. “Devious skull? Charming.”

“Hey, if the flap fits . . .”

N
^o
1 was a little pale. With a flex of his tail, he lifted his squat rump from the step. “About this no mind-wiping promise. The thing is, nobody told me.”

Holly stared at him. “So you wiped him?”

N
^o
1 nodded. “And Schalke. I also left a residual spell in young Artemis’s eyeballs so Butler will get it too. Nothing fancy, just a blanket memory loss. Their brains will fill in the gaps, invent believable memories.”

Holly shuddered. “You left a spell in his eyeballs? That is revolting.”

“Revolting but ingenious,” said Artemis.

Holly was surprised. “You don’t seem too indignant. I was expecting a speech. Rolling eyes, flapping arms, the whole Fowl thing.”

Artemis shrugged. “I knew it would happen. I didn’t remember anything, so I must have been wiped, therefore we must have won.”

“You always knew.”

“I didn’t know what the cost would be.”

N
^o
1 sighed. “So I’m off the hook, as you humans say?”

“Absolutely,” said Holly, clapping him on the shoulder. “I feel a lot better now.”

“On the positive side, I bolstered your atomic structure. Your atoms were a bit rattled by the time stream. I’m amazed you are still in one piece. I can only imagine how hard you were forced to concentrate.”

“Well, you
had
bolstered my atoms, and I have to beg one more favor,” said Artemis. “I need you to send a note back in time.”

“I’ve been ordered not to open the time stream again, but maybe we can squeeze back one more thing,” said N
^o
1.

Artemis nodded. “That’s what I thought.”

“When and where?”

“Holly knows. You can do it from Tara.”

“How do you spell
stupendous
?” said Holly, smiling.

Artemis stepped back and craned his neck to peer upward at the front window of his parents’ room. Jayjay mimicked the action, climbing onto Artemis’s shoulders and tilting his tiny head back.

“I’m afraid to go up, for some reason.”

He noticed himself wringing his fingers, and stuffed both hands in his jacket pockets.

“What she must have been through, all because of my meddling. What she must have . . .”

“Don’t forget us,” interjected N
^o
1. “We were submerged in animal fat. You have no idea how gross that is. Eyeball spells are the epitome of good taste compared to animal fat.”

“I was turned into an adolescent,” said Holly, winking at Artemis. “Now,
that
was gross.”

Artemis’s smile was forced. “Strangely, all this guilt-tripping is not making me feel any better. The DNA cannons aren’t helping either.”

Holly gestured at the LEP squad to stand down, then tilted her head slightly as a message came through.

“There’s a chopper coming in. Your father. We’ve got to fly.”

N
^o
1 wagged a finger. “And that’s not just a figure of speech. We actually have to fly. I know humans use that expression even when they don’t intend to actually fly, so just to avoid confusion . . .”

“I get it, N
^o
1,” said Artemis softly.

Holly raised her forearm, and Jayjay jumped onto it. “He will be safer with us.”

“I know.”

He turned to Holly, meeting her gaze. Blue and hazel eyes.

She gazed back for a second, then activated her wings, rising a foot from the surface.

“In another time,” she said, and kissed him on the cheek.

He was at the front door before Holly called to him.

“You know something, Fowl? You did a good thing here. For its own sake. Not one penny of profit.”

Artemis grimaced. “I know. I’m appalled.”

He looked down at his feet, composing a pithy remark, but when he looked up again, the avenue was empty.

“Good-bye, my friends,” he said. “Take care of Jayjay.”

Artemis could hear helicopter rotors in the distance by the time he reached his mother’s bedroom. He would have some explaining to do, but he had a feeling that Artemis Senior would not press him for details once he saw Angeline in good health.

Artemis flexed his fingers, summoning his courage, then pushed through into the bedchamber. The bed was empty; his mother was sitting at her dresser, despairing at the state of her hair.

“Oh dear, Arty,”she said in mock horror on spotting her son in the mirror. “Look at me. I need a team of hairdressers flown in immediately from London.”

“You look fine, Mother . . . Mom. Wonderful.”

Angeline ran a pearl-handled brush through her long hair, the luster returning with each stroke. “Considering what I have been through.”

“Yes. You were ill. But you are better now.”

Angeline turned on her dresser stool, reaching out her arms. “Come here, my hero. Hug your mother.”

Artemis was happy to do as he was told.

A thought struck him.
Hero
. Why had she called him a hero?

Generally victims of the
mesmer
remembered nothing of their ordeal. But Butler had remembered what Opal did to him, he had even described the experience to Artemis. Schalke had been wiped. But what of Mother?

Angeline held him tightly. “You have done so much, Arty. Risked everything.”

The rotors were loud now, rattling the windows. His father was home.

“I didn’t do so much, Mom. What any son would do.”

Angeline’s hand cradled his head. He could feel her tears on his cheek. “I know everything, Arty. Everything. That creature left me her memories. I tried to fight her, but she was too strong.”

“What creature, Mother? It was the fever. You had a hallucination, that’s all.”

Angeline held him at arms’ length. “I was in the diseased hell of that pixie’s brain, Artemis. Don’t you dare lie to me and say that I wasn’t. I saw your friends almost die to help you. I saw Butler’s heart stop. I saw you save us all. Look me in the eye and tell me these things did not happen.”

Artemis found it difficult to meet his mother’s stare, and when he did it was impossible to lie.

“They happened. All of them. And more.”

Angeline frowned.“You have a hazel eye. Why did I not notice that?”

“I put a spell on you,” said Artemis miserably.

“And on your father?”

“Him too.”

Below, the front door crashed open. His father’s footsteps raced across the lobby, then onto the stairway.

“You saved me, Artemis,” said his mother hurriedly. “But I have a feeling that all your spell-casting in some way put us in this situation. So I want to know everything. Everything. Do you understand?”

Artemis nodded. He couldn’t see how to escape this. He was in a dead end, and the only way out was complete honesty.

“Now we will give your father and the twins time to hug me and kiss me, then you and I are going to have a talk. It will be our secret. Understood?”

“Understood.”

Artemis sat on the bed. He felt six years old again, when he had been caught hacking the school computers to make the test questions a little more challenging.

His father was on the landing now. Artemis knew that his secret life ended today. As soon as his mother got him alone, he would be explaining himself. Starting at the beginning. Abductions, uprisings, time jaunts, goblin revolutions. Everything.

Complete honesty, he thought.

Artemis Fowl shuddered.

Some hours later, the master bedroom had been transformed by the whirlwind known as Beckett Fowl. There were pizza boxes on the night table and tomato-sauce finger paintings on the wall. Beckett had stripped off his own clothes and dressed himself in one of his father’s T-shirts, which he had belted around his waist. He had applied a mascara mustache and lipstick scars to his face and was currently fencing with an invisible enemy, using one of his father’s old prosthetic legs as a sword.

Artemis was finishing his explanation of Angeline’s miraculous recovery. “And so I realized that Mother had somehow contracted Glover’s Fever, which is usually confined to Madagascar, so I synthesized the natural cure preferred by the locals and administered it. Relief was immediate.”

Beckett noticed that Artemis had stopped talking, and heaved a dramatic sigh of relief. He rode an imaginary horse across the room and poked Myles with the prosthetic leg.

“Good story?” he asked his twin.

Myles climbed down from the bed and placed his mouth beside Beckett’s ear.

“Artemis simple-toon,” he confided.