“The laser is untested,” said Artemis. “I would never unleash this kind of power unless there was absolutely no alternative. And from what Myles told us, we have no other card to play.”
“And Juliet doesn’t know about this?” asked Holly.
“No, I kept it to myself.”
“Good. Then we might have a chance.”
Butler outfitted them all in camouflage gear from his locker, and even forced Artemis to endure the application of waxy stripes of black and olive makeup on his face.
“Is this really necessary?” asked Artemis, scowling.
“Completely,” said Butler, energetically applying the stick. “Of course, if you would stay here and allow me to go, then you and Myles could relax in your favorite loafers.”
Artemis put up with the dig, correctly assuming that Butler was still a little miffed about the super-laser deception.
“I must come along, Butler. This is a super-laser, not a point-and-shoot toy. An entire activation system is involved, and there is no time to teach you the sequence.”
Butler slung a heavy flak jacket over Artemis’s thin shoulders. “Okay. If you must go, then it’s my job to keep you safe. So, let’s make a deal: If you do not voice all the withering comments about the weight or uselessness of this jacket that are no doubt swirling in that big brain of yours, then I will not mention the super-laser episode again. Agreed?”
This jacket is really cutting into my shoulders, thought Artemis. And it’s so heavy that I could not outrun a slug.
But he said, “Agreed.”
Once Artemis’s security system assured them that their perimeter was clear, the group snuck in single file from the office, out of the kitchen, across the yard, and slipped into the alley between the stables.
There were no sentries, which Butler found strange. “I don’t see anything. Opal must know by now that we escaped her pirates.”
“She can’t afford to commit more troops,” whispered Holly. “The gate is her priority, and she needs to have as many Berserkers watching her back as possible. We are secondary at this point.”
“That will be her undoing,” gasped Artemis, already suffering under the weight of the flak jacket. “Artemis Fowl will never be secondary.”
“I thought you were Artemis Fowl the Second?” said Holly.
“That is different. And I thought we were on a mission.”
“True,” said Holly, then she turned to Butler. “This is your backyard, old friend.”
“That it is,” said Butler. “I’ll take point.”
They crossed the estate with cautious speed, wary of every living thing that crossed their path. Perhaps the Berserkers inhabited the very worms in the earth, or the oversized crickets that flourished on the Fowl grounds and sawed their wings in the moonlight, sounding like an orchestra of tiny carpenters.
“Don’t step on the crickets,” said Artemis. “Mother is fond of their song.”
The crickets, which had been nicknamed Jiminies by Dublin entomologists, were seen all year round only on the Fowl Estate, and they could grow to the size of mice. Artemis now guessed this was an effect of the magical radiation seeping through the earth. What he could not have guessed was that the magic had infected the crickets’ nervous systems with a degree of sympathy for the Berserkers. This did not manifest itself in bunches of crickets sitting in circles around miniature campfires telling stories of valiant elfin warriors, but in an aggression toward whatever threatened the Berserkers. Or, simply put: If Opal didn’t like you, then the crickets didn’t care for you much either.
Butler dropped his foot slowly toward a cluster of crickets, expecting them to move out of his path. They did not.
I should crush these little guys, he thought. I do not have time to play nice with insects.
“Artemis,” he called over his shoulder, “these Jiminies are giving me attitude.”
Artemis dropped to his knees, fascinated. “Look, they display no natural prudence whatsoever. It’s almost as if these crickets don’t like us. I should really conduct a study in the laboratory.”
The biggest bug in the cluster opened its lantern jaws wide, jumped high, and bit Artemis on the knee. Even though the bug’s teeth did not penetrate his thick combat pants, Artemis fell backward in shock and would have landed flat on his backside had Butler not scooped him up and set off running with his principal tucked under his arm.
“Let’s leave that lab study for later.”
Artemis was inclined to agree.
The crickets followed, pistoning their powerful hind legs to fling themselves into the air. They jumped as one, a bustling green wave that mirrored Butler’s path exactly. More and more crickets joined the posse, pouring from dips in the landscape and holes in the earth. The wave crackled as it moved, so tightly were the crickets packed.
At least these ones can’t fly, thought Butler, or there would be no escape.
Artemis found purchase and ran on his own two feet, wiggling out from Butler’s grip. The big cricket was still clamped to his knee, worrying the combat material. Artemis slapped at it with his palm, and it felt like hitting a toy car. The cricket was still there, and now his hand was sore.
It was difficult even for Artemis to think in these circumstances, or rather it was difficult to pluck a sensible thought from the jumble zinging off his cranial curves.
Crickets. Murderous crickets. Flak jacket heavy. Too much noise. Too much. Insane crickets. Perhaps I am delusional again.
“Four!” he said aloud, just to be sure. “Four.”
Butler guessed what Artemis was doing. “It’s happening, all right. Don’t worry, you’re not imagining it.”
Artemis almost wished that he were.
“This is serious!” he shouted over the sound of his own heart beating in his ears.
“We need to get to the lake,” said Holly. “Crickets don’t swim so well.”
The barn was built on a hilltop overlooking a lake known as the Red Pool because of the way it glowed at sunset when viewed from the manor’s drawing room bay window. The effect was spectacular, as though the flames of Hades lurked below fresh water. By day, a playground for ducks; but by night, the gateway to hell. The idea that a body of water could have a secret identity had always amused Artemis, and it was one of the few subjects on which he allowed his imagination free rein. Now the lake simply seemed like a safe haven.
I’ll probably be dragged straight down by the weight of this flak jacket.
Holly crowded him from behind, elbowing him repeatedly in the hip.
“Hurry!” she said. “Get that glassy look off your face. Remember, there are killer crickets after us.”
Artemis picked up his feet, trying to run fast like he had seen Beckett do so often—on a whim it seemed, as though running for half a day took no particular effort.
They raced across a series of garden plots that had been sectioned off with makeshift fences of shrub and posts. Butler barged through whatever blocked their way. His boots kicked new potatoes from their beds, clearing a path for Artemis and Holly. The crickets were not impeded by barriers, simply buzz-sawing through or flowing around with no discernible loss of pace. Their noise was dense and ominous, a cacophony of mutters. Scheming insects.
The lead crickets nipped at Holly’s boots, latching on to her ankles, grinding their pugnacious jaws. Holly’s instinct told her to stop and dislodge the insects, but her soldier’s sense told her to run on and bear the pinching. To stop now would surely be a fatal mistake. She felt them piling up around her ankles, felt their carapaces crack and ooze beneath her boots. It was like running on Ping-Pong balls.
“How far?” she called. “How far?”
Butler answered her by raising two fingers.
What was that? Two seconds? Twenty seconds? Two hundred yards?
They ran through the gardens and down the plowed hill toward the water’s edge. The moon was reflected in the surface like the white of a god’s eye, and on the far side was the gentle ski-slope
rise of Artemis’s runway. The crickets were on them now, waist high for Holly. They were swarming from every corner of the estate.
We never had a cricket problem, thought Artemis. Where have they all come from?
They felt the bites on their legs like tiny burns, and running became next to impossible with a writhing skin of crickets coating each limb.
Holly went down first, then Artemis, both believing that this must surely be the worst possible way to die. Artemis had stopped struggling when a hand reached down through the electric buzzing and hauled him free of the morass.
In the moonlight he saw a cricket clamped to his nose, and he reached up to crush it with his fingers. The body crunched in his fist, and for the first time Artemis felt the adrenaline rush of combat. He felt like squashing all of these crickets.