The Fowl Twins Deny All Charges

by Eoin Colfer

  Myles had been somewhat pleased though not delighted to be reunited with his less-than-ideal glasses, but even that was short-lived, as now, mere minutes later, he was irritated that his trouser legs and 3-D–printed loafers were soaked from repeated dunkings in the salt water. The twin had never enjoyed entering into possibly fatal confrontations wearing sopping shoes. The squelch could be quite distracting. But at least these spectacles had heated hydrophobic lenses to ensure they would not mist even in these saturated conditions.

  “I imagine these dolphin chaps are doing their best, and I don’t wish to appear ungrateful,” he said more to himself than to Beckett, who appeared to be balancing on the starboard dolphin. “But a slightly higher waterline would have been appreciated.”

  Beckett pivoted one hundred and eighty degrees, commenting, “Moles. I think we have moles.” Which would appear to be quite the non sequitur, though Myles did not so much as raise an eyebrow in surprise.

  Lazuli seemed perfectly comfortable behind Beckett, even though this was, in fact, the first time she had straddled a common dolphin. She had once ridden a larger killer whale, but that mammal had been an even-tempered LEP agent wearing a translator. This dolphin was skittish and not affiliated with the fairy police force. Nevertheless, Lazuli resisted the urge to clamp her knees together and instead leaned forward into the spray.

  “Myles,” she called, “remember, this is an action situation, so I’m going to take point.”

  “Watch out for that rock,” said Beckett, executing a backflip.

  “I am aware, Specialist,” said Myles, ignoring the rock warning. “You tackle the physical and I shall concern myself with the climactic supervillain showdown.”

  Lazuli spoke in short sentences between bounces. “Are you for real, Myles? A supervillain showdown? Those only happen in books.”

  Myles smiled tightly, thinking, Oh, Specialist Heitz, how little you know about supervillains.

  Aloud he said, “There will most certainly be a showdown. Have no doubt about that. The moment General Horteknut lays eyes upon me, the verbal sparring shall begin. Our debate should buy you time to defuse the explosives. You should be fine, unless the Reclaimers catch you. Will that be a problem, if they catch you, do you think?”

  “No problem,” said Lazuli, then spat out a mouthful of salt spray. “There won’t be more than three.”

  Three Reclaimers, she thought. No single individual has ever dispatched three Reclaimers.

  But she would find a way. She had to, or thousands would perish, and she could not stand by and watch that happen.

  In front of her on the dolphin, Beckett turned a cartwheel, which surely defied the laws of physics.

  “I can see Mum in the window,” he said, pointing across the River Liffey.

  Another irrelevant comment.

  Beckett will not be able to help me this time, Lazuli knew. Not in person, at least.

  As previously instructed, Ah-ah-eh-eh-eh and Eh-eh-eh-blooeee pulled in beneath the iconic Samuel Beckett Bridge. Both dolphins reared up so that their passengers would slide backward, and then, with coordinated flicks of their powerful tails, they launched the bipeds toward the docks.

  Lazuli stumbled a few steps forward before catching her balance on the concrete, thinking, Myles will never manage to stay upright. That Mud Boy would trip over his own shadow.

  In fact, she had once thrown this accusation at Myles, who had replied, That is a ridiculous assertion, Specialist. You embarrass yourself. A shadow is simply the lack of light on a surface upon which a light source projects. It is barely more than a photon in depth and cannot be held responsible for trips or stumbles.

  Which was probably the most Myles-y thing Lazuli had ever heard the twin say.

  However, she was amazed to see that Myles had so catastrophically misjudged his landing on the service jetty that he had come back around to coordinated, if that made any sense, and actually landed walking as though the ground had come up to meet him.

  “Beckett believes that this bridge was named after him,” he said conversationally, as if he had not just stuck one of the greatest dismounts in history. “But between us two, it is the other way around. He is named for the person this bridge is named after.”

  Beckett ignored this comment and contented himself with squatting low, as though hiding behind an invisible ditch, and squeaking like a rat.

  And so Lazuli and Myles faced each other beneath the spar and cables of the harp-shaped Samuel Beckett Bridge, both clad in matching black suits complete with golden ties, both a little the worse for wear due to the various exertions of the past few days but still reasonably functional.

  “Do you think Beckett is all right?” Lazuli wondered aloud.

  Myles focused on his scar. “He’s fine. Communing with one rodent or another, I imagine.”

  “Maybe so,” said Lazuli. “But I can’t help thinking—”

  Myles held up a hand, palm out. “Stop, Specialist Heitz. There is no percentage in second-guessing ourselves. Our odds are poor, but they are the best available to us. We shall, each of us, play to our strengths and hopefully prevail.”

  Lazuli was not so sure. If this situation were a virtual mission scenario, she would bet against the Regrettables every time. Could it be that Myles Fowl had just made an illogical statement?

  The entire tableau reeked of ominous portent. The port should’ve been quiet on a Sunday, but instead the area was thronged by costumed teenagers and their attendant parent taxis, and an eerie half-light had settled over the city like a shroud.

  Myles held out his hand for a formal shake. “Good luck to you, Specialist Heitz. Should we not meet again, it has been a privilege.”

  Lazuli took the boy’s hand. “For me, too, Myles. A con-fusing privilege and a frantic honor.”

  Myles was not finished. “And should we beat the odds and meet again, I would expect the LEP to delete Beckett and me from the LEP humans of interest list. And of course, I shall be submitting my expenses.”

  “I would expect no less,” said Lazuli, surprised to find that she could muster a smile.

  We are probably going to die, she thought while smiling. And I never even got to take the captain’s exam. But all she said was “Myles, your tie is crooked.”

  Myles’s response to this was to stalk up the service steps, muttering to himself. “How on earth is a chap supposed to maintain a reasonable level of decorum when he arrives astride a dolphin?”

  Beckett crept on all fours beside his twin, whispering over and over again, “Something smells badly. Something smells badly.”

  Myles noted that his twin had used an adverb when he should have used an adjective, but even though he took issue with his brother’s grammar, he agreed with the intended sentiment.

  They split into teams. Fowl and fairy. The twins elbowed their way through the crowd at the convention center’s front door, while Lazuli ran around the side of the building, hugging the wall until she reached the underground parking deck’s pedestrian exit, which swung open easily. She encountered some humans on the short journey, but most did not spare her, a “child,” a second glance. White-blond hair was no more than slightly unusual in this cosmopolitan city, and even blue face paint was occasionally seen slathered on the features of Dublin’s cosplaying youths, who often turned up at movie theaters dressed as their favorite characters. And even if there had not been thousands of costumed children milling about the area, if a human’s frontal lobe is forced to decide whether a small blue humanoid is a costumed human or a relatively diminutive unknown species, the brain’s confirmation bias would opt for costumed human nine times out of ten.

  One gangly teen even held out his fist for a bump, commenting, “Go, Neytiri.”

  Lazuli accepted the bump, wondering what or who a Neytiri was.

  I’ll Bugle that later, she thought. Bugle being her preferred fairy search engine, named for the instrument of Euphonius, the legendary centaur bugler who woke the gnome army during the gre
at exodus.

  But back to business. The stairway was wide and seemed like it had been built to accommodate serious foot traffic, but Lazuli didn’t pass anyone on the way down, which annoyed her a little bit, because Myles had predicted that she wouldn’t.

  There shouldn’t be anyone in the stairwell, but the Reclaimers might have tapped into the security feed, so watch for cameras, he’d told her earlier. The parking deck is closed for renovation, but they’ll leave the exit unlocked in case a fire marshal checks. When you reach level minus four, that’s when you might meet resistance. The Reclaimers will wait there until the last minute to guard the charges, then take cover when it is almost too late. That’s your window.

  Great, thought Lazuli. My window stretches from almost too late to too late. I wonder how long that is, exactly.

  Seconds, maybe. A moment, probably.

  Lazuli pitter-pattered down each step, farther and farther below sea level, and felt a little comforted by the slight change in air pressure. Like it or not, fairies belonged underground. They were generally safe there.

  But not today, thought Lazuli. This fairy is not going to enjoy being underground today.

  This prophecy fulfilled itself fourteen steps later, when Lazuli more or less bumped into Vigor, the first of the Reclaimers, who, conveniently enough for him, had already drawn his blade.

  WE HAVE arrived at that point in our narrative where, traditionally, the protagonists engage in an ultimate showdown. Our account breaks from this tradition, as we have not one but three—and arguably, four—showdowns. In order to keep these narratives straight in our heads, let us remind ourselves how our main combatants are arranged:

  Gveld Horteknut and Gundred, her second, are in a central transparent elevator on the first floor, both disguised from head to toe as human little people in manga cosplay that makes them look less homicidal than they are. Gundred has interfaced with the elevator’s control panel and from there with all the non-central elevators, of which there are eighteen cable-free, multidirectional, magnet-based drive units running through a network of vertical and horizontal shafts. Gveld’s intrusion into the security systems has triggered an alarm, prompting the building’s workforce of over three hundred ACRONYM agents to flash burn their computer drives and stride in rehearsed formation into sixteen of the aforementioned eighteen elevators, which promptly lock behind them. The lucky ones take the stairs, which proves to have more health benefits than simply getting their steps in, for they avoid getting stuck in the shortly-to-collapse building. And, of course, the building is bathed in the unnatural glow of its own lighting system, as the sun has tucked itself behind the moon and will be out of commission for a little more than seven minutes, ensuring that, even should the plan go awry, the Horteknut Reclaimers will have some leeway for their escape. It is a dastardly scheme that even Artemis Fowl would have to admire, if not approve of, and that was without even mentioning the cosplaying horde that seemed to be setting up camp in the basement.

  Picture if you will twin central elevators constructed of silicon nitride, which is the hardest and toughest transparent spinel ceramic ever made. The right-hand elevator serves a dual purpose, both as a private escape pod for the ACRONYM station chief and as an unbreakable safe for the group’s greatest treasure should the building’s integrity be breached by missile attack or seismic activity. Currently, Gveld and Gundred are calmly riding in this right-hand elevator toward the top floor while all around them armed ACRONYM agents are wondering why the heck those two kids are traveling up while they themselves appear to be locked down inside their respective flimsier elevators. These agents are not trying to shoot their way out just yet, but it won’t be long now.

  This does seem like a lot to take in. So many plans and counter plans. Fortunately, our lead protagonists are fond of both monologuing and dialoguing, so the situation will shortly become abundantly clear.

  Gveld shall begin:

  “At last,” she said, as the NOK-NOK burrowed deep into the ACRONYM network. “I am on the verge of taking back the lost Horteknut treasure. Our world shall be made whole. I am tempted to actually laugh, Gundred, honestly I am.”

  Gundred was not in the least tempted to laugh. “Gveld, I am not comfortable with this. We are exposed here, with all these witnesses.”

  “Oh, dear Gundred,” said Gveld, deciding that it was time to come clean(ish). “We are not in the least exposed. The sun is safely behind the moon and we are in an indestructible box. And I have decided to not simply steal the gold but also wipe out the last remaining agents from this most despicable of organizations with a sequence of explosions.”

  This second strand of the plan was news to Gundred. “But aren’t those humans in reinforced elevators, like ours? They are safe.”

  Now Gveld did laugh, though it segued into a consumptive cough. “I am afraid, my kindhearted friend, that the two central elevators are the building’s only silicon nitride capsules. The other elevators are mere toughened Plexiglas. Those humans will be squashed by the very earth they poison. ACRONYM will be finished.”

  Gundred stood between her leader and the elevator interface. “This is not our way, Gveld. We do not create martyrs for others to follow.”

  Gveld shrugged. “What martyrs? The earth swallows a building. Will the humans punish the earth? Indeed, can they punish it any more than they already have? Trust me, no one except agents of ACRONYM would suspect mythological creatures. And the ACRONYM agents…”

  Gundred inferred the missing clause: will all be dead.

  A horrifying thought occurred to her. “But, my general, what of the innocent children?”

  Gveld waved this question away. “There are no innocent humans.”

  From the atrium beyond came the muted sound of gunfire as a few quick-witted agents realized that they were, in fact, under attack. This gunfire had the effect of galvanizing the Supermassive fans, who decided en masse that perhaps a walk-on part in a TV show was not worth getting caught in whatever cross fire was going on here. Pandemonium erupted and ensued.

  Meanwhile, Gundred chewed on Gveld’s argument and could find no fault with it aside from the massive body count, which was only a human body count after all, which she shouldn’t have cared about. But she did, because…

  Gundred had a secret.

  “We could simply take the treasure,” she offered weakly, “and be gone before the sun shows her face.”

  This argument was so pathetic that Gveld returned to her work while she dismissed it. “In that scenario we become fugitives, and I will not set humans on our trail. These Mud People die, and that is the end of it. Our work can finally be done, and I can rest contented.”

  A bullet pinged against the casing of their elevator and cut short the conversation. The agents were growing restless.

  “The eclipse won’t last forever,” continued Gveld gruffly. “The time has come to destroy this den of fairy killers.”

  The Fowl Twins went without hesitation into the building that was about to collapse around them. Myles had something of a spring in his step now that he had a pair of graphene eyeglasses cupping his ears, and he lapsed into his habit of lecturing while he walked.

  “The convention center was more or less demolished some years ago, and the mortgage was picked up for a song, supposedly by an American vulture company,” he explained to a disinterested Beckett.

  “Worms are useless for conversation,” said Beckett, determinedly off-topic. “It’s all romantic poetry with them.”

  Myles rolled his eyes. “I don’t know why I bother.”

  But he did know. The more Myles lectured, the less he worried, and so he continued to talk as they strode through the giant glass barrel of the open atrium against the tide of costumed teenagers whose flight seemed almost comical, made awkward by platform space boots and vision-obscuring masks.

  Myles put a pin in his lecture when they reached the central double elevator shaft.

  “Hack the building’s systems, NANNI,�
� Myles told his glasses. “Give me access to all security. I want to control everything from the sprinklers to the elevators. And, for heaven’s sake, shut off that emergency siren.”

  “Yes, Myles,” said NANNI.

  And to Beckett, for appearances’ sake, Myles said, “Keep up, brother mine. We have a city to save.”

  And a treasure to win, he thought, but kept that morsel of info to himself for the moment. A person could never tell who was listening. Myles knew this to be true, as he was usually the one listening.

  The deafening siren mercifully sputtered out with a Morse code of final shrieks, and Myles estimated that his concentration levels increased 15 percent as a direct consequence.

  Very well, he thought. Time to share a few painful truths with the Horteknuts.

  The central elevator shaft had two cars. The right-hand car was elevated and peopled by two small figures.

  Gveld and Gundred, Myles surmised.

  The left-hand car was at ground level and waiting for someone with an authorized thumbprint to access it.

  And guess who now has an authorized thumbprint? thought Myles, pressing his thumb against the sensor.

  “Access granted,” said the elevator in a voice that was, in Myles’s opinion, a little smug. It seemed to say, I am not just a common elevator; I am a private executive elevator.

  Elevators in general are smug, thought Myles, who was somewhat of an expert on the subject of smugness. But not as smarmy as sat navs, which are completely insufferable.

  Nevertheless, Myles stepped inside when the doors whooshed open, with Beckett close to his side, still muttering his complaints about worms and their lack of conversational skills. “Worms are all me-me-me,” he said. “They never think outside the tunnel.”

  The elevator took off remarkably smoothly.

  Very low friction, thought Myles. But not as low as the cable-less multidirectional units, I imagine.