Artemis Fowl: The Eternity Code af-3

by Eoin Colfer

  Butler pulled into the set-down area.

  ‘Listen to me, Juliet,’ he said, catching his sister’s hand. ‘Spiro is dangerous. Look what happened to me, and, in all modesty, I was the best. If this mission weren’t so vital to humans and fairies, I wouldn’t let you go at all.’

  Juliet touched her brother’s face.

  ‘I will be careful.’

  They climbed on to the walkway. Holly hovered, shielded, just above the throngs of business travellers and holidaymakers. Mulch had applied a fresh layer of sunblock, and the stink repelled every human who was unfortunate enough to pick up his scent.

  Butler touched Artemis’s shoulder.

  ‘Are you going to be all right?’

  Artemis shrugged. ‘I honestly don’t know. Without you by my side I feel as though one of my limbs is missing.’

  ‘Juliet will keep you safe. She has an unusual style, but she is a Butler, after all.’

  ‘It’s one mission, old friend. Then there will be no more need for bodyguards.’

  ‘It’s a pity Holly couldn’t have simply mesmerized Spiro through the Cube.’

  Artemis shook his head.

  ‘It wouldn’t have worked. Even if we could have set up a link, a fairy needs eye-to-eye contact to mesmerize a strong mind like Spiro’s. I don’t want to take any chances with this man. He needs to be put away. Even if the fairies relocated him, he could do some damage.’

  ‘What about your plan?’ Butler asked. ‘From what you told me, it’s quite convoluted. Are you sure it’s going to work?’

  Artemis winked — a very unusual display of levity. ‘I’m sure,’ he said. ‘Trust me. I’m a genius.’

  Juliet piloted the Lear jet across the Atlantic. Holly sat in the co-pilot’s chair, admiring the hardware.

  ‘Nice bird,’ she commented.

  ‘Not bad, fairy girl,’ said Juliet, switching to autopilot. ‘Not a patch on fairy craft, I’d bet?’

  ‘The LEP doesn’t believe in comfort,’ said Holly.

  ‘There’s barely enough room in an LEP shuttle to swing a stink worm.’

  ‘If you wanted to swing a stink worm.’

  ‘True.’ Holly studied the pilot. ‘You’ve grown a lot in two years. The last time I saw you, you were a little girl.’

  Juliet smiled. ‘A lot can happen in two years. I spent most of that time wrestling big hairy men.’

  ‘You should see fairy wrestling. Two pumped-up gnomes having it out in a zero G chamber. Not a pretty sight. I’ll send you a videodisc.’

  ‘No, you won’t.’

  Holly remembered the mind wipes.

  ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘No, I won’t.’

  In the passenger section of the Lear jet, Mulch was reliving his glory days.

  ‘Hey, Artemis,’ he said, through a mouthful of caviar. ‘Remember the time I nearly blew Butler’s head off with a blast of gas?’

  Artemis did not smile. ‘I remember, Mulch. You were the spanner in an otherwise perfect works.’

  ‘To tell you the truth, it was an accident. I was just nervous. I didn’t even realize the big guy was there.’

  ‘That makes me feel better. Scuppered by a bowel problem.’

  ‘And do you remember the time I saved your neck in Koboi

  Laboratories? If it hadn’t been for me, you’d be locked up in Howler’s Peak right now. Can’t you do anything without me?’

  Artemis sipped mineral water from a crystal flute.

  ‘Apparently not, though I live for the day.’

  Holly made her way back through the aisle.

  ‘We’d better get you kitted out, Artemis. We land in thirty minutes.’

  ‘Good idea.’

  Holly emptied the bag’s contents on to the central table.

  ‘OK, what do we need for now? The throat mike and an iris-camera.’

  The LEP captain selected what looked like a circular adhesive bandage from the pile. She peeled back the adhesive layer and stuck the material to Artemis’s neck. It immediately turned the colour of his skin.

  ‘Memory latex,’ explained Holly. ‘It’s almost invisible. Maybe an ant crawling up your neck might notice it, but apart from that. . The material is also X-ray proof, so the mike is undetectable. It will pick up whatever is said within a ten-metre radius, and I record it on my helmet chip. Unfortunately, we can’t risk an earpiece — too visible. So we can hear you, but you won’t be able to hear us.’

  Artemis swallowed, feeling the mike ride on his Adam’s apple.

  ‘And the camera?’

  ‘Here we go.’

  Holly removed a contact lens from a jar of fluid.

  ‘This thing is a marvel. We’ve got hi-resolution, digital quality, recordable picture with several filter options, including magnification and thermal.’

  Mulch sucked a chicken bone dry.

  ‘You’re starting to sound like Foaly.’

  Artemis stared at the lens.

  ‘A technological marvel it may be, but it’s hazel.’

  ‘Of course it’s hazel. My eyes are hazel.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it, Holly. But my eyes are blue, as you well know. This iris-cam will not do.’

  ‘Don’t look at me like that, Mud Boy. You’re the genius.’

  ‘I can’t go in there with one brown eye and one blue eye. Spiro will notice.’

  ‘Well, you should have thought of that while you were meditating. It’s a little late now.’

  Artemis pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘You’re right, of course. I am the mastermind here. Thinking is my responsibility, not yours.’

  Holly squinted suspiciously. ‘Was that an insult, Mud Boy?’

  Mulch spat the chicken bone into a nearby bin.

  ‘I have to tell you, Arty, a cock-up this early in the proceedings doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence. I hope you’re as clever as you keep telling everyone you are.’

  ‘I never tell anybody exactly how clever I am. They would be too scared. Very well, we will have to risk the hazel iris-cam. With any luck, Spiro might not notice. If he does, I can invent some excuse.’

  Holly placed the camera on the tip of her finger, sliding the lens under Artemis’s lid.

  ‘It’s your decision, Artemis,’ she said. ‘I just hope you haven’t met your match in Jon Spiro.’

  11 P.M., O’ HARE AIRPORT, CHICAGO

  Spiro was waiting for them at O’Hare’s private hangar. He wore a fur-collared greatcoat over his trademark white suit. Halogen lamps blasted the tarmac, and the downdraught from the chopper blades snagged his coat tails. It was all very cinematic.

  All we need now is background music, thought Artemis as he descended the motorized steps.

  As per instructions, Mulch was putting on the gangster act.

  ‘Move it, kid,’ he snarled, quite convincingly. ‘We don’t want to keep Mister Spiro waiting.’

  Artemis was about to respond when he realized that he was supposed to be the ‘terrified kid’. It wasn’t going to be easy. Being humble was a real problem for Artemis Fowl.

  ‘I said move it!’ repeated the dwarf, stressing the point with a firm shove.

  Artemis stumbled the last few steps, almost colliding with a grinning Arno Blunt. And this was no ordinary grin. Blunt’s teeth had been replaced by a custom-crafted porcelain set. The tips had been filed to sharp points.

  The bodyguard looked for all the world like a human shark hybrid.

  Blunt caught Artemis’s stare.

  ‘You like ‘em? I got other sets too. One is all flat. For crushing stuff.’

  A cynical sneer was forming on Artemis’s mouth before he remembered his role, replacing the sneer with a set of quivering lips. He was basing his performance on the effect Butler usually had on people.

  Spiro was not impressed.

  ‘Nice acting, sonny. But pardon me if I doubt the great Artemis Fowl has fallen to pieces quite so easily. Arno, check the plane.’

  Blunt nodded curtly, ducking inside
the private jet. Juliet was dressed in a flight attendant’s uniform and was straightening the headrest covers. For all her athletic ability, she was finding it difficult not to fall out of her high heels.

  ‘Where’s the pilot?’ growled Blunt, living up to his name.

  ‘Master Artemis flies the plane,’ replied Juliet. ‘He’s been flying it since he was eleven years old.’

  ‘Oh, really? Is that legal?’

  Juliet put on her best innocent face. ‘I don’t know about legal, Mister. I just serve the drinks.’

  Blunt grunted, charming as ever, and had a quick poke about the jet’s interior. Eventually he decided to accept the flight attendant’s word.

  Lucky for him, because had he decided to argue, two things would have happened. First, Juliet would have clobbered him with the jade ring. And second, Holly, who was lying shielded in an overhead locker, would have blasted him into unconsciousness with her Neutrino 2000. Of course, Holly could simply have mesmerized the bodyguard, but after what he had done to Butler, a blasting seemed more appropriate.

  Blunt stuck his head through the hatch.

  ‘No one in there except some dumb attendant.’

  Spiro was not surprised.

  ‘I didn’t think so. But they’re here somewhere. Believe it or not,

  Digence, Artemis Fowl did not get suckered by a goon like you. He’s here because he wants to be here.’

  Artemis was not surprised by this deduction. It was only natural that Spiro should be suspicious.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ he said. ‘I’m here because this odious little man threatened to crush my skull between his teeth. Why else would I come? The C Cube is useless to you, and I could easily construct another one.’

  Spiro was not even listening.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, whatever you say, kid. But let me tell you something.

  You bit off more than you could chew when you agreed to come here. The Spiro Needle has the best security on the planet. We’ve got stuff in there that even the military don’t have. Once those doors close behind you, you’re on your own. Nobody is coming to save you. Nobody. Understand?’

  Artemis nodded. He understood what Spiro was saying to him. That wasn’t to say that he agreed with it. Jon Spiro might have stuff that the military didn’t have, but Artemis Fowl had stuff that humans had never seen.

  A Sikorsky executive helicopter whisked them downtown to the Spiro Needle. They landed on a helipad on the skyscraper’s roof. Artemis was familiar with helicopter controls, and realized how difficult it must be to land in the bluster of the Windy City.

  ‘The wind speed must be treacherous at this altitude,’ he said casually. Holly could record the information on her helmet chip.

  ‘You’re telling me,’ shouted the pilot over the rotors’ din. ‘It gets over sixty miles an hour on top of the Needle. The helipad can sway up to ten metres in rough conditions.’

  Spiro groaned, giving Blunt a nod. Arno reached forward and whacked the pilot’s helmet.

  ‘Shut up, you moron!’ snapped Spiro. ‘Why don’t you give him the blueprints to the building while you’re at it?’ He turned to Artemis. ‘And in case you’re wondering, Arty, there aren’t any blueprints floating around.

  Anybody who goes looking in City Hall is going to find that file mysteriously missing. I have the only set, so don’t bother getting one of your associates to do an Internet search.’

  No surprises there. Artemis had already run several searches himself, although he hadn’t really expected Spiro to be so careless.

  They climbed down from the Sikorsky. Artemis was careful to point the iris-cam at any security feature that could be useful later. Butler had often told him that even a seemingly insignificant detail, like the number of steps in a stairwell, could be vital when planning an operation.

  A lift brought them down from the helipad to a key-coded door.

  Closed-circuit cameras were strategically placed to cover the entire rooftop. Spiro moved ahead to the keypad. Artemis felt a sharp sting in his eye and suddenly the iris-cam magnified his vision by four. In spite of the distance and shadows he could easily discern the entry code.

  ‘I hope you got that,’ he muttered, feeling the mike vibrating on his throat.

  Arno Blunt bent his knees, so his extraordinary teeth were a centimetre from Artemis’s nose.

  ‘Are you talking to someone?’

  ‘Me?’ said Artemis. ‘Who would I be talking to? We’re eighty floors up, in case you hadn’t noticed.’

  Blunt grabbed the teenager by the lapels, hoisting him off the tarmac.

  ‘Maybe you’re wearing a wire. Maybe you have someone listening to us right now.’

  ‘How could I be wearing a wire, you big oaf? Your miniature hit man hasn’t let me out of his sight for the entire journey. He even accompanied me to the bathroom.’

  Spiro cleared his throat noisily.

  ‘Hey there, Mister I-Gotta-Make-My-Point, that kid slips over the side and you might as well throw yourself off, because that boy is worth more to me than an army of bodyguards.’

  Blunt set Artemis down.

  ‘You’re not going to be valuable forever, Fowl,’ he whispered ominously. ‘And when your stock falls, I’ll be waiting.’

  They took a mirrored lift to the eighty-fifth floor, where Doctor Pearson waited, along with two more muscle-bound minders. Artemis could tell by the look in their eyes that these two weren’t exactly brain surgeons. In fact, they were as close as you could get to Rottweillers still balanced on two legs. It was probably handy to have them around to break things and not ask questions.

  Spiro called one of them over.

  ‘Pex, do you know what the Antonellis charge if you lose their personnel?’

  Pex had to consider it for a moment. His lips moved as he thought.

  ‘Yeah, wait, I got it. Twenty grand for a metal man and fifteen for a monkey.’

  ‘That’s dead, right?’

  ‘Dead or incapaci. . incatacip. . broken.’

  ‘OK,’ said Spiro. ‘I want you and Chips to go over to Carla Frazetti’s and tell her I owe her thirty-five grand for the team. I’ll wire it to her Cayman account in the morning.’

  Mulch was understandably curious, and not a little apprehensive.

  ‘Excuse me? Thirty-five grand? But I’m still alive. You only owe twenty grand for Loafers, unless the extra fifteen K is my bonus?’

  Spiro sighed with almost convincing regret.

  ‘This is the way it is, Mo,’ he said, punching Mulch playfully on the shoulder. ‘This deal is huge. Mammoth. We’re talking telephone numbers.

  I can’t afford any loose ends. Maybe you know something, maybe you don’t. But I’m not about to take the chance that you might tip off Phonetix or one of my other competitors. I’m sure you understand.’

  Mulch stretched his lips, revealing a row of tombstone teeth.

  ‘I understand all right, Spiro. You’re a back-stabbing snake. You know, the kid offered me two million dollars to cut him loose.’

  ‘You should have taken the cash,’ said Arno Blunt, propelling Mulch into Pex’s gigantic arms.

  The dwarf kept talking, even as he was being dragged down the corridor.

  ‘You better bury me deep, Spiro. You better bury me real deep.’

  Spiro’s eyes narrowed to wet slits.

  ‘You heard the man, boys. Before you go to Frazetti’s, bury him deep.’

  Doctor Pearson led the party through to the vault room. They had to pass through a small antechamber before entering the main security area.

  ‘Please stand on the scanner pad,’ said Pearson. ‘We wouldn’t want any bugs in here. Especially not the electronic kind.’

  Artemis stepped on to the mat. It sank like a sponge beneath his feet, spurting jets of foam over his shoes.

  ‘Anti-infection foam,’ explained Pearson. ‘Kills any virus you might have picked up. We’re keeping some bio-technology experiments in the vault at the moment. Very sus
ceptible to disease. The foam has the added advantage of shorting out any surveillance devices in your shoes.’

  Overhead a mobile scanner bathed Artemis’s frame in purple light.

  ‘One of my own inventions,’ said Pearson. ‘A combination scanner. I have incorporated thermal, X-Ray and metal-detector beams. The beam basically breaks your body down into its elements and displays them on this screen here.’

  Artemis saw a 3D replica of himself being traced out on the small plasma screen. He held his breath, praying that Foaly’s equipment was as clever as the centaur thought it was.

  On-screen, a red light pulsed on Artemis’s jacket front.

  ‘Aha,’ said Doctor Pearson, plucking off a button. ‘What have we here?’ He cracked the button open, revealing a tiny chip, mike and power source.

  ‘Very clever. A micro-bug. Our young friend was attempting to spy on us, Mister Spiro.’

  Jon Spiro was not angry. In fact, he was delighted to have the opportunity to gloat.

  ‘You see, kid. You may be some kind of genius, but surveillance and espionage are my business. You can’t slip anything past me. And the sooner you accept that, the sooner we can get this thing over with.’

  Artemis stepped off the pad. The decoy had worked, and the real bugs hadn’t caused a blip in the system. Pearson was smart, but Foaly was smarter.

  Artemis made sure he had a good look around the antechamber.

  There was more here. Every square centimetre of the metal surface contained a security or surveillance device. From what Artemis could see, an invisible ant would have trouble sneaking in. Not to mention two humans, an elf and a dwarf— assuming the dwarf survived Pex and Chips.

  The vault door itself was impressive. Most corporate vaults looked impressive, plenty of chrome and keypads, but that was just to make an impression on stockholders. In Spiro’s vault there wasn’t a tumbler out of place. Artemis spotted the very latest computer lock on the face of titanium double doors. Spiro keyed in another complicated series of numbers, and the metre-thick doors slid back to reveal another barrier.

  The secondary door.

  ‘Imagine you are a thief,’ said Spiro, an actor introducing a play, ‘and you somehow get into the building, past the electronic eyes and the locked doors. Then imagine you somehow cheat the lasers, the sensor pad and the door code, and open the first vault door — an impossible feat by the way. And while we’re imagining all this, let’s pretend you disable the half dozen cameras, and even then, even after all that, would you be able to do this?’