The Arctic Incident (Artemis Fowl 2)

“No, I have not,” protested Luc. “What kind of doctor are you?”

The man’s pulse skyrocketed. He was lying.

“Answer the questions, Monsieur Carrère,” said Butler sternly. “Just one more. Have you ever had dealings with goblins?”

Relief flooded through Luc. The police did not ask questions about fairies. “What are you? Crazy? Goblins? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Butler closed his eyes, concentrating on the pounding beneath his thumb and palm. Luc’s pulse had settled. He was telling the truth. He had never had any direct dealings with the goblins. Obviously the B’wa Kell weren’t that stupid.

Butler stood up, pocketing the bouncer. He could hear the sirens on the street below.

“Hey, Doctor,” protested Luc. “You can’t just leave me like this.”

Butler eyed him coldly. “I would take you with me, but the police will want to know why your apartment is full of what I suspect are counterfeit bills.”

Luc could only watch with his mouth open as the giant figure disappeared into the corridor. He knew he should run, but Luc Carrère hadn’t run more than fifty feet since gym class in the nineteen-seventies, and anyway his legs had suddenly turned to jelly. The thought of a long stretch in prison can do that to a person.

CHAPTER 7

CONNECTING THE DOTS

Haven City, Police Plaza

Root pointed the finger of authority at Holly.

“Congratulations, Captain, you managed to lose some LEP technology.”

Holly was ready for that one. “Not strictly my fault, sir. The human was mesmerized, and you ordered me not to leave the shuttle. I had no control over the situation.”

“Ten out of ten,” commented Foaly. “Good answer. Anyway the Safetynet has a self-destruct, like everything else I send into the field.”

“Quiet, civilian,” snapped the Commander.

But there was no venom in the LEP officer’s rebuke. He was relieved, they all were. The human threat had been contained, and without the loss of a single life.

They were gathered in a conference room reserved for civilian committees. Generally debriefings of this importance would be held in the Operations Center, but the LEP were not ready to show Artemis Fowl the nerve center of their defenses just yet.

Root jabbed an intercom button on his desk.

“Trouble, are you out there?”

“Yessir.”

“Okay. Now listen, I want you to stand down the alert. Send the teams into the deep tunnels, see if we can’t root out a few goblin gangs. There are still plenty of loose ends. Who’s organizing the B’wa Kell for one, and for what reason?”

Artemis knew he shouldn’t say anything. The sooner his end of the bargain was completed, the sooner he could be in the Arctic. But the entire Paris scenario seemed suspicious.

“Does anyone else think this is too easy? It’s just what you all wanted to happen. Not to mention the fact that there could be more mesmerized humans up there.”

Root did not appreciate being lectured by a Mud Boy. Especially this particular Mud Boy.

“Look, Fowl, you’ve done what we asked. The Paris connection has been broken off. There won’t be any more illegal shipments coming down that chute, I assure you. In fact we have doubled security on all chutes, whether they’re operational or not. The important thing is that whoever is trading with the humans hasn’t told them about the People. There will, of course, be a major investigation, but that’s an internal problem. So don’t you worry your juvenile head about it. Concentrate on growing some bristles.”

Foaly interrupted before Artemis could respond. “About Russia,” he said, hurriedly placing his torso between Artemis and the commander. “I’ve got a lead.”

“You traced the e-mail?”

“Exactly,” confirmed Foaly, switching to lecture mode.

“But that’s been spiked. Untraceable.”

Foaly chuckled openly. “Spiked? Don’t make me laugh. You Mud Men and your communications systems. You’re still using wires, for heaven’s sake. If it’s been sent, I can trace it.”

“So, where did you trace it to?”

“Every computer has a signature, as individual as a fingerprint,” continued Foaly. “Networks too leave micro traces, depending on the age of the wiring. Everything is molecular, and if you pack gigabytes of data into a little cable, some of that cable is going to wear off.”

Butler was growing impatient.“Listen, Foaly. Time is of the essence. Mister Fowl’s life could hang in the balance. So get to the point before I start breaking things.”

The centaur’s first impulse was to laugh. Surely, the human was joking. Then he remembered what Butler had done to Trouble Kelp’s Retrieval squad, and decided to proceed directly to the point.

“Very well, Mud Man. Keep your hair on.”

Well, almost directly to the point.

“I put the MPG through my filters. Uranium residue points to northern Russia.”

“Now, there’s a shock.”

“I’m not finished,” said Foaly. “Watch and learn.”

The centaur brought up a satellite photo of the Arctic Circle on the wall screen, with every keystroke the highlighted area shrank.

“Uranium means Severomorsk. Or somewhere within a hundred miles. The copper wiring is from an old network. Early twentieth century, patched up over the years. The only match is Murmansk. As easy as connecting the dots.”

Artemis sat forward in his chair.

“There are two hundred and eighty-four thousand land lines on that network.” Foaly had to stop for a laugh. “Land lines. Barbarians.”

Butler cracked his knuckles loudly.

“Ah, so two hundred and eighty-four thousand land lines. I wrote a program to search for hits on our MPG. Two possible matches. One: the Hall of Justice.”

“Not likely. The other.”

“The other line is registered to a Mikhael Vassikin on Lenin Prospekt.”

Artemis felt his stomach churn. “And what do we know about Mikhael Vassikin?”

Foaly wiggled his fingers like a concert pianist. “I ran a search on my own intelligence files archives. I like to keep tabs on Mud Man so-called intelligence agencies. Quite a few mentions of you by the way, Butler.”

The manservant tried to look innocent, but his facial muscles couldn’t quite pull it off.

“Mikhael Vassikin is ex-KGB, now working for the Mafiya. The official term is khuligany. An enforcer. Not high level but not street trash either. Vassikin’s boss is a Murmansker known as Britva. The group’s main source of income comes from the kidnapping of European businessmen. In the past five years they have abducted six Germans and a Swede.”

“How many were recovered alive?” asked Artemis, his voice a whisper.

Foaly consulted his statistics. “None,” he said. “And in two cases, the negotiators went missing. Eight million dollars in lost ransom.”

Butler struggled from a tiny fairy chair.

“Right, enough talk. I think it’s time Mister Vassikin was introduced to my friend, Mister Fist.”

Melodramatic, thought Artemis. But I couldn’t have put it better myself.

“Yes, old friend. Soon enough. But I have no wish to add you to the list of lost negotiators. These men are smart. So we must be smarter. We have advantages that none of our predecessors had. We know who the kidnapper is, we know where he lives, and most importantly, we have fairy magic.” Artemis glanced at Commander Root. “We do have fairy magic, don’t we?”

“You have this fairy at any rate,” replied the commander. “I won’t force any of my people to go to Russia. But I could use some backup.” He glanced at Holly. “What do you think?”

“Of course I’m coming,” said Holly. “I’m the best shuttle pilot you have.”

Koboi Laboratories

There was a firing range in the Koboi Labs basement. Opal had it constructed to her exact specifications. It incorporated her 3-D projection system, was comple