by Eoin Colfer
Stay sharp, Specialist, she told herself. If you can do nothing else, you can gather intelligence.
Angeline Fowl cinched back her long blond hair into a ponytail with two deft movements that would not have seemed out of place in a martial-arts kata and began.
“Myles took the Tachyon out for a spin. Oh, I know Beckett was along for the ride, and he does so love to go fast, but I have no doubt it was Myles who instigated the entire affair. Timmy and I were on a trip to Castle Leslie, where we were married more than two decades ago.” Angeline paused as a thought occurred. “Whenever I go away for more than thirty minutes, it seems that one mastermind son or another takes advantage of my absence to open a wormhole or jump on board a nuclear train or some such nonsense. Well, no more. I trusted NANNI, but it seems Myles has corrupted her mainframe, so NANNI has been shut down and all my future trips have been canceled.”
Angeline clenched a fist, digging her nails into her palm, and Lazuli realized: She blames herself. And so she quoted the pixie poet laureate Quintain Honoraria. “‘The heart follows the mind through water and fire.’ That’s from a poem.”
Angeline smiled. “Such a beautiful quote,” she said. “Especially in your accent.”
“I learned English the old-fashioned way,” explained Lazuli. “No gift of tongues for me.”
“Ah, yes,” said Angeline. “You are a pixel. I am a hybrid myself, in a way. My family left Russia at the turn of the last century under something of a cloud and made our winding way to Ireland. So now I am neither Russian nor Irish but a little of both.”
Lazuli smiled now, fully trusting this human woman.
“If I interpret your quote correctly,” Angeline continued, “it means that Myles cannot help his pursuit of knowledge and we cannot halt his quest.”
Lazuli nodded.
“Thank you for that absolution,” said Angeline. “The fact that you think of others at such a time tells me all I need to know about you, Specialist Heitz.”
Lazuli recognized that she was being charmed. Or could it be that Angeline Fowl was as genuine as her son Beckett?
Angeline clapped once lightly. “Anyway, to continue my—or should I say your—story…Myles took the jet for one of his heart-following-mind missions and they encountered you attached to a missile. Once my boys rescued their dear friend from the aforementioned missile, they were forced to eject in the escape pod before missile and jet collided explosively.”
Lazuli half remembered the events, mostly in bright colors and sweeping sound waves. “And then?” she asked.
“And then the escape pod went subaquatic and was drawn to the nearest tethered facility.”
Angeline paused here, seeming almost embarrassed.
“Which facility?” Lazuli pressed.
“Timmy has a dozen or so lairs around the world. Decommissioned now, but still with basic life support and emergency facilities.”
“Lairs?” said Lazuli. “Like supervillain lairs?”
Angeline rolled her eyes in a melodramatic fashion. “That’s it precisely. Supervillain lairs. I know—it’s too clichéd. Timmy loves his lairs and can’t bear to let them go. He swears that the plan is to develop them into eco-habitats, but I think a part of him is nostalgic for his glory days.”
“Fowl boys.” Lazuli smiled.
Angeline smiled right back. “Fowl boys. I love them all, and they drive me to distraction.”
“I understand that,” said Lazuli. “And I’ve only known them for a year.”
“It doesn’t get any easier,” confided Angeline. “But somehow you grow to love them all the more.”
“What happened in the…uh…lair?” Lazuli asked.
“Ah yes, the lair. Even the word is ridiculous,” said Angeline. “In the lair, which was in the mid-Atlantic trench of course, NANNI scanned you and decided a full-body purge was the best way to get whatever drugs were in your system out of your system.”
Full-body purge? Lazuli did not like the sound of that, though she could vaguely remember the sound of it.
“So, once that necessary unpleasantness was completed, Myles loaded everyone into a torpedo jet, and six hours later, you were back here. Needless to say, we were quite surprised to see a torpedo wash up on the beach. Though not as surprised as one might think, given the family history. In fact, I remember thinking Angel—that’s what my mother used to call me—Angel, it’s only a torpedo jet. It could have been a lot worse.”
“And you called Commodore Short?”
“Yes,” confirmed Angeline, then qualified this statement with: “Well, technically, we called Artemis in space, and he called Holly. They were quite worried about you, and there are some who believe that you may have assaulted Foaly, who was found unconscious in the hallway.”
Lazuli was suddenly alarmed. “Assaulted Foaly! I would never—”
Angeline covered Lazuli’s small blue hand with her own. “Do not fret. The venerable centaur is fine, and neither Holly nor Foaly himself believe you were involved. But something is undeniably afoot, and the LEP must find out what.” Angeline’s eyes narrowed a degree. “Without involving my twins. Either of them.”
This made sense to Lazuli. Whatever was happening here was a fairy problem and needed to be sorted out by fairies. Adding the Fowl Twins to any equation would only serve to make that equation infinitely more complex. Though she could take some comfort in the fact that the twins would be safe, she would miss both boys quite a lot and was surprised to find her emotions surging to the surface, so she put a lid on them with a semiofficial-sounding question.
“So, you know all about the People, Mrs. Fowl?”
“Not all, but certainly some,” said Angeline. “It’s complicated. Arty pulled the wool over our eyes for years, but he came clean before blasting off into space, in case some enemy or other, possibly fairy, launched a convoluted revenge scheme against our family. Classic criminal-mastermind safeguard if you’re taking a trip. Arty even stimulated my hippocampus, and Timmy’s, too, with Myles’s clever eyeglasses. It tingled a little, but the results were extraordinary. I already had some memory fragments, but after the treatment we remembered everything. Timmy not only recollected his own fairy encounters but those of all his ancestors going back to Red Peg Fowl. DNA-encoded memories, Arty called them. That is fascinating, don’t you think?”
Lazuli nodded. It was fascinating, and no doubt Myles was already looking into reproducing the effect for his own gain.
“When will Commodore Short arrive?” asked the specialist.
“It all depends on magma flares,” said Angeline. “Some-time in the next couple of days, I imagine. And you should rest till then. After all, you have been in and out of consciousness for several days.”
The human woman’s casual use of the phrase magma flares confirmed that she had indeed been in contact with Commodore Fowl, as LEP craft often rode magma flares to the surface. Angeline Fowl should not know this, unless her recently resurfaced memories had contained the information, and even if they had, surely they would not have included a timetable. Either way, it seemed that in this particular house there were very few secrets between humans and fairies.
“And in a few days, you will depart this island forever. No good-byes, no further contact, no surveillance. Fowl and fairies are friends forever, but allies no more. The arrangement is over.”
Lazuli was shocked.
This was a momentous statement, as the Fowls had come to the fairies’ aid on numerous occasions through the centuries, though very few people on either side of the Earth’s crust were aware of it. Lazuli had only been fully briefed since being appointed Fowl Ambassador. The litany of Fowl/fairy-related incidents read like a series of ever more outlandish morality tales, where the unlikely and impossible were everyday and commonplace.
Angeline squeezed the pixel’s tiny blue hand. “It’s tough love, my dear. No more shenanigans. My children must survive. Myles is a gifted boy, but though he understands mortality in theory, he, like
all boys, doesn’t truly believe in it, so he must bend to his parents’ will or he will get himself and his brother killed.”
As if summoned by the utterance of his name like some cursed demon, Myles entered the room in an unusual state of undress, that being solely clad in satin boxer shorts.
Angeline seemed bemused by this rather than panicked, though she should have been panicked.
“Wait outside, dear,” she said. “No fairy contact, as I am certain you’ve been told. And do put one of your suits on.”
Myles blinked with a certain low-lidded dullness that Angeline would never have associated with either of her twins.
“Myles,” she said, releasing Lazuli’s hand, “are you unwell?”
“The laws of physics,” said Myles, not seeming to register where he was exactly, “are the same for all observers in any inertial frame of reference relative to one another.”
Angeline stood abruptly. “Oh, my goodness,” she said. “Something is very wrong.”
Lazuli felt that something was indeed off, besides Myles’s all-too-obvious deficit in the clothing department, but she could not place what that off thing might be. “What is it?” she asked, climbing down from a bed built for someone twice her height.
“He’s paraphrasing Einstein,” said Angeline. “Myles considers Einstein his nemesis. He would never refer to him in any other tone besides disparaging.”
Lazuli was puzzled. “But Einstein was right about a lot of things, wasn’t he? Surely Myles should admire him.”
“You obviously don’t know much about scientists,” said Angeline, rushing to her son’s side just in time to catch him as his eyes rolled back and he swooned toward the floor.
In less than a second Lazuli joined them on a plush North African rug. They’d had barely a moment to make a cursory examination before Beckett burst in, also clad in his underpants.
Angeline was by now—understandably—thoroughly bewildered. “For heaven’s sake, Beck, what is going on here?”
Beckett’s eyes were red from weeping and, even from a distance, he smelled somewhat rank.
“I’m farting through my tears!” he proclaimed. “Is that so hard to understand? What is wrong with you people?”
But then he noticed Myles on the floor and his troll worries were instantly forgotten.
“Brother!” he cried, joining the huddled group on the rug. “What’s wrong? Speak to me, Myles.”
“I don’t know what happened,” said Angeline. “He came in and mumbled a vague Einstein reference, then fainted.”
“Einstein!” said Beckett, horrified. “And he’s in boxer shorts. I can’t remember the last time I saw Myles so undressed. He changes into his pj’s behind a screen.”
He shook Myles’s thin shoulders. “Wake up, Doctor O’Fill!” he pleaded.
“Doctor O’Fill?” asked Angeline. “Who on earth is that?”
“Doctor Klor O’Fill,” explained Beckett. “Myles’s fake name for his secret biology doctorate. Sometimes he responds to it.”
“Fake name?” said Angeline. “Secret doctorate? More deception. We’ll have words about this later.”
Lazuli was worried. Myles did not look at all well. His slick skin was as pale as a snail’s foot, and the pixel could feel his entire person thrumming as though he were reclining on top of an electric fence. She had a sudden idea.
“What does NANNI say?” she asked.
“NANNI,” called Beckett into the air, “could you please scan Myles with your doctor beams?”
There was no answer, and the conscious Fowls remembered at the same moment that NANNI had been deactivated and would have to be manually rebooted.
“I’ll go to your father’s office and bring NANNI online to scan Myles,” said Angeline, rising to her feet. “Keep talking to your brother. Perhaps he can hear.”
Beckett was crying now. “Dad told Myles he could only read one book per day. I think he’s gone into shock.” And then he sniffled and added, “I’m not blaming Dad. Making silly comments is how I deal with stress. It’s a coping mechanism.”
Angeline stroked his cheek. “I know, darling. Don’t leave your brother. I’ll be back.” And she sailed out of the bedroom in a billow of satin.
“I would never leave Myles,” said Beckett. “Never ever.”
Lazuli lifted Myles’s left eyelid with a swipe of her thumb. The human boy’s blue iris moved up and down like a rapidly bouncing ball.
“This looks like stress roll,” said the pixel. “But don’t worry, Myles, help is on the way. Commodore Short is coming, and she will have a warlock medic with her and definitely some diagnostic equipment for a scan.”
Beckett nodded rapidly as he digested this information without a silly comment. “Okay. That’s good. Fowl and fairy, friends forever. That still works, doesn’t it?”
Lazuli laid a hand on his shoulder. “Always, Beck. Nothing can change that, but Commodore Short won’t arrive for some time.”
Beckett took Myles’s hand and aligned their scars, closing his eyes for a long moment. “Good,” he said. “Because this isn’t Myles.”
Shock, thought Lazuli. Beckett is in shock and is grasping at straws.
“I know he’s not himself,” she said gently. “But this is your brother.”
“No!” Beckett insisted. “I know Myles. I can feel him through the scars. And he’s not in there. Myles explained it to me once. He said our connection was something to do with amniotic fluid from Mum’s tummy, but I get bored with science and didn’t listen. We have a magical connection when we touch scars. You know, like when you lick an electric fence.”
Lazuli nodded, even though most people would have no idea what it was like to lick an electric fence. “And you don’t feel Myles?”
“I do feel him,” corrected Beckett. “Close by, but not in here. On the island somewhere, but he’s moving away.”
Could Beckett be right? Lazuli wondered. Was there any chance that this person who looked exactly, 100 percent the spitting image of Myles Fowl was not actually Myles Fowl?
Some nefarious plot was unfolding, that much was undeniable. After all, she had been strapped to a rocket and fired at the Fowl jet, perhaps by dwarves. But even so, Beckett’s theory was unlikely.
“Let’s wait,” she said. “We need a second opinion. NANNI will do a complete scan.”
“I’ve done a scan!” snapped Beckett, losing patience for perhaps the third time in his life. “A magic scar scan. This is not Myles. There’s nothing in here but blood and gristle.”
Blood and gristle? thought Lazuli. How could that be?
It was just so far-fetched. But then again, far-fetched might as well have been the Fowl family motto.
Beckett talks to trolls, and Myles brought down an entire intergovernmental organization armed with a pair of glasses and his own big brain.
Lazuli had made a similar comment to Myles once and he had noted that My brain is no bigger than the average, Specialist. It is simply that my anterior insula and anterior cingulate cortex are more actively connected with the other regions of my brain.
Which taught Lazuli never to casually compliment Myles Fowl.
And she realized now that, should Myles be taken away from her by LEP orders or illness, she would for some reason miss his willingness to dissect almost everything she said. Nevertheless, she made a final appeal to Beckett.
“Let’s say I believe you,” she said, “and I accept that this is not Myles.”
“Believe me,” said Beckett. “It’s not my brother.”
Lazuli laid her hands on Beckett’s shoulders in an attempt to get the blond boy to focus on her words. “So, we wait for reinforcements and see what they say.”
Beckett shook off the pixel’s small hands. “They’ll say what everyone always says when I know what’s going on and they don’t: You’re wrong, Beckett. Leave the thinking to Myles, Beckett. You’re the dumb brother, Beckett. Animals can’t talk, Beckett Fowl, and even if they could, they woul
dn’t talk to you, because you’re the stupid twin.”
Lazuli had never heard Beckett speak this way. “I don’t think that. Myles doesn’t, either.”
“Not you, Laz. I know that. Now, I have a plan, which I know is not how it usually goes, but I do have one, and I think it’s good. Mostly action-based, because that’s my talent. Do you want to hear my amazing plan?”
Lazuli thought that she should hear Beckett out, if only to keep him talking. Perhaps Angeline would return while Beck was laying out his great plan. She stood and looked Beckett in the eye. “Yes, I’d love to hear it.”
“Good,” said Beckett. “So here it is. I’m going to present it in points like an argument, which is a trick I learned from…”
“Myles,” guessed Lazuli. “A trick you learned from Myles.”
Beckett shook his head so that his curls rustled. “No. I learned this trick from a seal that lives in the bay. Seals are wise and good at arguing, and also moody when they lose. Never debate a seal.”
“I’ll remember that,” said Lazuli with more conviction than she might have a year ago.
Beckett took a breath. “So, here we go. There are two things that might be true, and then two actions we can take, depending on which thing we think is true, but only one action that is the right thing to take no matter what’s true and what isn’t. With me so far?”
Lazuli nodded. She was indeed with Beckett but felt there might be a faster way to get to the point. Still, that was fine by her.