[FIC] The Doppelgänger Effect, (3/?)
The Doppelgänger Effect, (3/?)
Disclaimer: AF is the property of Eoin Colfer. I'm merely taking them for a spin.
A/N: Just an apology here, guys: this chapter's a bit of a whopper.
//
Fowl Secondary Mansion, Dublin, Ireland
Foaly had volunteered to speak to Trouble regarding the new evidence, leaving the trio to their own devices until his return.
The atmosphere in the main dining room was incredibly tense. Mulch, in a typical fashion, went about his usual business despite the heavy mood - helping himself to plates of this and glasses of that, all the while disseminating a few snide comments at his comrades' noticeable lack of zeal. Holly, in a similarly typical fashion, definitely wasn't holding back in reprimanding the ex-convict, at one point threatening to knock him unconscious with her Neutrino and tie him with his own boot strings to the rain pipe outside. Even Artemis tugged once or twice at his blue paisley tie, no doubt deep in thought regarding the issues of their findings.
"Of course," he commented thoughtfully, almost to himself. "It's unlikely that Commander Kelp will refuse aid or even involvement on this case, when the evidence is almost irrefutable."
Mulch snorted. "Irrefutable? More like practically slapping him in the face. He'd better, if he knows what good for him."
"Mulch, you know as well as I do that Trouble's a great commander," retorted Holly, coming to her friend's aid. "And Artemis, there's no we here." She gestured at the pictures on the wall, ones Juliet had put up of Artemis and his family (and the two Butlers themselves), the papers on his desk, the unheard answering machine messages from acquaintances flashing red on the phone. "Apparently, you've got a life now, surprising as that may be, and I think you should just live it. Let us deal with this."
Artemis would hear none of this. "Absolutely not, Holly. If you do not recall, it was my younger brother who called for my aid on this case. I intend to exhaust all my available resources in order to find him some answers. Besides," he smirked. "I hardly think this search will be as successful without my interference. I found it first, after all."
Holly narrowed her eyes at him. A warning.
Mulch looked between the two, amused. "Oh, please. You're not going to fight, are you? 'Cause the smart money's obviously on Holly." He considered. "Well, unless it was a debate or something. Then you'd be an idiot to bet on her."
Thankfully, the screen flickered back on before any blood was shed.
Holly rushed over to the monitor. "Well?"
"My, you're happy to see me," grinned Foaly. "It's alright, I have that effect on people."
He shut up when she slammed both palms on the table. "The briefing, Foaly. Now."
"Okay, okay." Foaly inched visibly away from the camera. "Well, I've gone over the footage again and as Artemis pointed out, the arm most definitely belongs to a female."
Oh no. "Opal Koboi?" Please, thought Holly. Let me be wrong.
"No. There's no way. Her pituitary gland implantation has been creating a few health problems for her recently. An enlarged heart, if I remember right. So she's been put under strict medical watch, and it looks like they're succeeding in reversing the damage. However, Opal's stuck with the med team for round-the-clock surveillance, so it looks like she'll be there for a while yet. At least if she wants to get better. Plus, she's been petitioning for her release like clockwork, so we know it's really her in there." Foaly frowned. "It looks like we're up against a new evil."
Holly considered. "Then what about the whole human-sized thing? A cross-breed, maybe? These days it's taboo, but still possible, right?"
Artemis answered her question. "Though my research into the People's historical texts suggests that this was once definitely genetically feasible and may still be, I have my reasons to believe that we are not dealing with a hybrid."
"And exactly how did you get access to said texts?" Foaly asked disapprovingly.
Artemis coughed, opting not to answer this. He adjusted the wall projection to a more appropriate height (he had gotten quite tall, Holly noticed) and walked over, tapping a pen against the visible bone nub displayed on the extrapolated image. "Humans do not possess the vestigial wing joint - this one here is clearly as pronounced as your own, Holly. Additionally, the structures present in the upper arm may be similar, but this isn't so for the forearm. Notice that it's narrower here, suggesting lighter bone mass for any flight capabilities the People once possessed. And in addition to that, there appears to be two muscles straddling the elbow - likely to lock and protect the joint during a difficult healing."
Foaly shook his head. "Still, that doesn't provide an airtight case for a pure-breed. It's an objective diagnosis."
"I am aware. However, this certainly does." Artemis stood up and keyed in a command. The image zoomed and focused in on an almost invisible trail of blood that traced a line down the upper arm. Tiny, blurred particles appeared to dam its path. "Magical sparks, if I'm not mistaken."
It was all terribly logical, of course. But that didn't mean it made sense. "So, what, Artemis? One day, a fairy just accidentally grew a little bigger than the rest? That's a lot bigger. A lot. Something's clearly going on here."
Artemis glanced at over at the centaur on the display. "I have my theories, Holly, but from Foaly's lack of protestation at my fairy accusation, I presume he will be able to explain it to you at length."
"Er - right. Nothing gets past you, eh, Artemis?"
The young man made a gracious gesture.
"Any day now," interrupted Holly, crossing both arms expectantly.
"Well, Opal's last scheme with the pituitary implant had me thinking. HGH, or human growth hormone, can create tons of problems with excessive growth in internal body structures - specifically the heart and reproductive organs."
Artemis nodded. "Hypersomia. Gigantism."
"Exactly, kind of like the issues Opal's dealing with now. So instead of something that blindly tells the body to grow with no specific design or intent, why not rewire everything? Have everything tailored to a specific goal. A rewritten genetic code makes more sense, of course, one that would ideally occupy the user's cells for a set period of time, attach itself to the existing DNA and suppress the relevant genes before expressing their own. Then they'd safely disappear, causing the subject to revert to his or her original form."
Mulch gulped down a piece of breaded shrimp. "That's a lot of thinking. Sure you didn't hurt yourself?"
Foaly gave him a withering look. "Anyway. Eight years might not be enough for Artemis to grow a decent beard, but it's more than enough time for my lab to come up with considerable breakthroughs in research." He grinned. "Post-maturity gene alteration, strictly for recon purposes only, with safer vectors. Induces growth and needed organ alteration. Patent pending, of course." He winked at Artemis.
The young man nodded, taking a mental note. "The vectors. Viral, are they?"
Holly's patience was wearing painfully thin. "Yes, no, maybe so. Now can we move on?"
"Testy today?" Foaly caught Holly's look. "-Ah, to answer your question, Artemis: nope, and maybe if the patent goes through, you and I could sit down and chat about the ingenious alternative I managed to dig up. But in a nutshell, we've had the go for a fourth clinical trial of the cocktail since last April."
Mulch burped loudly. "Sounds like you'd be a little stretched after turning back."
"Er - that was a problem for the first round of trials. We spent a fortune in cosmetic tucks. Like I said, it hasn't been perfected yet. The decently working mix we've got only goes with a full healing right after growth and following the reversion. It solves the stretch problem."
Holly scoffed, swiping a bottle of water out of Artemis' hand in mid-sip. "Sounds bogus to me."
"Hardly," answered Artemis, a little miffed. He went to the kitchen for another bottle of Irish spring water. "Logically speaking, the gene must be able to enlarge organs to compensate for the change in weight. I presume Foaly would not omit a step so integral to subject's survival."
The centaur scoffed. "Presume? Oh, please, Fowl. Don't insult me."
Artemis rewarded this with a rare grin. "This is simple for internal organs, but the skin is a different matter entirely. Even if the size of the skin is altered to compensate for a weight change factor, there is no guarantee that it may necessarily fit. One humanoid creature weighing the same as another may still possess a noticeably different physiology. This could be due to a number of factors: the variation of fat and muscle concentration, differing bone proportions, even bad posture."
"I see," lied Holly. Mulch winked at her appreciatively.
"In short," supplemented Foaly. "Different bits stick out on different folks. So we've got to have a few zaps of magic to make sure everything tucks in nicely at the end of the day."
Mulch groaned; even the dumbed-down version of all this science was giving him a headache. "So, the moral of the story is that it can be done. Right?"
Foaly huffed indignantly. "No, you plebe. What I'm saying is that millions of hurdles in this overwhelmingly complicated area were overcome, boundaries unbroken were pushed at, sweat was sweated, labs were irreparably damaged in the empirical process, and all so -"
"- So it can be done," Mulch finished for him, twirling a chicken bone through his fingers like a baton.
"Er… Yes. So it can be done."
"I can't believe you, Foaly," said Holly in disgust. "How could let something like this get out?"
"I didn't. At least, not that I can recall," replied the centaur. "But here's the thing: it was a suggestion by one of my lesser scientists that we put this kind of plan into action. Naturally, I had thought of it ages ago, but didn't go through with it."
Mulch raised an eyebrow. "Why not? I thought you'd be slobbering all over another patent like this."
Foaly whinnied indignantly. "Like Holly said, human-esque transformation ranks up there with human-fairy relations: it's fairly taboo. I guess my nub and thrust is that the idea might have been floating around for a while, at least if Dr. Peat managed to figure that out - the guy has trouble with tachyons, for Frond's sake."
"Almost common knowledge, then," said Artemis, who had been listening to all this with a distinctly troubling gleam in his eye. "It would be ludicrous to assume that no one present Underground would even think of putting it into action."
"Probably not," said Foaly, rather dodgily. "But that's a probably." The entire room what this meant: when Foaly admitted to any likelihood, the probability of it being true rose nearly exponentially.
Holly took a sip of her stolen water, suppressing a shiver. "Turning into a human. Sounds horrible."
Across the table, the centaur wrung his hairy hands. "Then you're probably not going to like what I'm about to say next."
Police Plaza, Lower Elements; Earlier that Day
"Oh gods," said a very stressed-looking Trouble Kelp. "It's you."
"Now, Trouble," tutted Foaly. "Is that any way to greet your one-of-a-kind, handsome, genius centaur extraordinaire?"
Trouble rolled his eyes. "I'm guessing this is a lead on the Fowl incident?"
"The latest one, yes. Is this a bad time?"
"More than you know," answered the Commander, rubbing his eyes. "But that won't change for the next few weeks at the very least. I haven't slept in two days. The goblins committed their first act of unified decision ever: they're trying to rock the boat a little harder down at Howler's Peak. All those goblins in one place - there are fireballs up through the ducts at all hours, Foaly, it's a nightmare."
It was more than a nightmare. The reason fireballs were generally prohibited was because they were composed of unique blend of gases ignited by the friction between the goblins' fingers - gases that, near a chute or tunnel, could easily be released above ground. You see, a goblin's fire was unique to their race, their own breed of magic. And magic, as everyone knew, had an affinity for itself.
So, in addition to causing myriad problems with the ozone, the escaped gases had a nasty tendency of grouping towards any magical being above ground (this explained halos or auras around fairyfolk seen in human folklore). In and of itself, this wasn't the main issue - you'd smell somewhat smoky for your aboveground stint, but outside of that, there were no serious repercussions. Unless you had a whole bunch of gases gathered in one place.
And then you shielded.
Then, the vibration would send the gaseous molecules thrumming at twice their usual velocity, inducing them to violent, strange-hued flames. This strange phenomenon had caused the destruction of many a city throughout history. Foaly could still remember the day when Rennes had gone up in blazes. The whole of North-West Europe smelled of burnt crepe for days.
"We'll get it all under control eventually. But that 'eventually' still means a lot of sleepless nights at the office. Shielding is banned aboveground, by the way." Trouble shook his head. "No, really, Foaly. Totally banned, so make sure Holly knows. I've had 1,049 phonecalls in the last hour from tourists wondering why their vacations have been postponed. Not to mention the Council's been jumping down my throat for authorizing the overtime payments for the officers that were stuck down there with me."
"Bureaucrats," agreed Foaly. He was starting to see exactly why Julius had always been so red.
"Tell me about it. So how about some good news for me?"
The centaur paused nervously. "Well… That depends on what your definition of 'good news' happens to be."
Trouble sighed, his desk phone ringing. He hit the ignore button with a vengeance. "That bad, huh?"
"You have no idea."
When Foaly had finished relaying the details of their recent finds to Trouble, the only sound that could be heard was the occupied tone of the Commander's phone.
"D'Arvit," he breathed, a moment later.
A sharp rapping was heard from the door, breaking the brief spell of despair that hung heavily in the office. "Commander Kelp," called the slightly harassed-sounding voice of the Plaza secretary, Pepper Smart. "The press, Sir. They're being quite insistent on having a word with you."
Trouble rubbed his eyes. "Send them away, Pepper. I'll arrange for a press call on the Howler's Peak situation first thing tomorrow."
"Er, Sir…"
"What is it, Pepper?"
"It's just that you called for a press call first thing yesterday. For today. Ten minutes ago, in fact. It's why they're all at the Plaza, Sir."
Trouble groaned, flicking today's date on his desktop calendar - it had been a congratulations gift from Holly. It also read HP PRESS CONF. in bold, red letters.
"D'Arvit." He opened the door briefly, where the fairly diminutive secretary was physically blocking a herd of larger reporters from barreling down the door. Foaly chuckled at the sight of it. "Alright, give me five more minutes, folks," Trouble said, taking Pepper's arm and pulling her into his office. "And watch that you don't stampede Miss Smart." He shut the door on their protesting faces.
Pepper waved at Foaly through the comm. line. Trouble turned back to face him, a sudden glint in his eyes that looked more than a little reckless. A throwback to the good old days.
"Alright. I'll take time to digest this all later, but I trust you, Foaly. And I trust Holly. Let that be known. In light of that, I'm going to do something that I shouldn't and give you unlimited clearance for this mission. Three weeks - and then I'll have this fiasco cleaned up and I'll send a full recon/retrieval squad to look into this."
Pepper opened up the file on the desk and whipped out a large stamp that really shouldn't have fit in her back pocket. She began furiously stamping the sheets for the mission's approval as Trouble went on.
"Unorthodox as it may be, I'm leaving the decision-making up to the two of you and, gods help us, Artemis Fowl. Put that big brain of yours to work and watch out for his tricks - we won't be abetting any of his moneymaking schemes." Pepper's head swiveled back and forth between Foaly's screen and Trouble's face. "You've got full lab access, weaponry, anything short of a bio-bomb or blue-rinse. We can't spare the administration needed for anything as big as a time stop, but seeing as this is a fairly high risk situation, I can give you one or two team's worth of backup with reasonable notice. Keep in mind, first and foremost, we need information."
"Reconnaissance above ground with the shielding ban?" Foaly asked. It would be impossible, really. Unless… Foaly grimaced. "Oh no. You mean the growth cocktail."
"You tell me, Foaly. Is it safe? Safe enough to use on Holly and Mulch?"
The centaur took a moment to mull this over while the pounding on Trouble's door grew in ferocity. "Yes, absolutely. Sure, a little more testing would be ideal, Trouble, but logically, it's been good to go since the first test run. If there are any problems, we can think on our feet. Fowl might not be good for much, but he's got a pretty big brain on his shoulders."
Trouble sighed while Pepper drew the deadbolt. "Logically never won a bucket of squid in Gnommish roulette, Foaly. If you lose my best officer or my best underground contact, I'll personally come knocking on your door."
12 Hours Later
Fowl Secondary Mansion, Dublin, Ireland
Holly dragged delicate fingers over her cheeks while the contents of her stomach rocked and roiled, threatening to make a surprise re-appearance. The last time she had felt this awful was when the captain of a recent training shuttle launch had lost consciousness. In the time it had taken to wrestle off her harness and take hold of the controls, nearly all the passengers had managed to lose their lunches in the zero-G chamber. Not pretty.
"Sorry, Holly," apologized Foaly in a rare moment, patting her awkwardly on the back. Foaly never apologized. That's when you knew it was bad.
"No," she said, waving a hand. "It's okay. I totally get it. With the goblin gas and… rioting and stuff. No aboveground shielding. Trouble made a good choice." That still didn't stop her from resenting it, though. Especially when racked by violent waves of spatial nausea and dizzy spells, not to mention the distinct feeling of her skin expanding around her body, shots of magic sparks playing around each sudden extension. It was a good thing Foaly had flown up here himself, or she would have pounded whatever lab lackey he sent right back down to Haven for making her feel this way. The blue light, coupled with her strangely unfocused vision, made her head spin like a whirligig. It was like the now-abolished entrance spell - except a hundred times worse.
Holly banged a growing hand on the counter, convincing herself between growth spurts. "I. Understand."
Mulch looked over from where he was parked on the couch, watching television. "Oh. Is that why you're retching into the sink, then?"
"You mean, instead of wringing your stupid neck?" retorted Holly, holding back a retch for the parting shot. "Bleagh."
"Kinetosis," said Artemis, handing her a warm, wet cloth. "Commonly known as motion sickness. That explains the nausea. The blurriness is an interruption with the vestibulo-ocular reflex - your eyes are having trouble centering the image on your retinas. Perhaps due to the sudden expansion of the vestibular system, retina or the combination of both."
Holly shot him a withering, sidelong glance. "Oh my gods, you're serious, aren't you? You're actually trying to make me feel better."
"Scientifically," inserted Mulch, a tad unnecessarily. "Gee Arty, you're a real poet."
"You're next, Mulch," warned Foaly, filling the dwarf's intended syringe with evil glee. "So laugh while you still can."
Artemis looked Holly over. "Based on my calculations, it looks like you're almost finished the transformation. Judging from your previous height relative to fairy average, and the average Northern European female height, and it looks you'll hit peak at 5"3."
"How very clinical of you," Holly snapped sarcastically. But it was true; her vision stopped rocking for longer bouts now and the nausea was even beginning to subside. Artemis was right. As always.
The young man bristled. "I'm just trying to -"
"Cool it, you two," chided Foaly, rummaging through the trunk old family clothes that Artemis had had Juliet bring over hours prior. In the meantime, both Holly and Mulch were wearing two of Artemis' old bathrobes, both of which were much too large for them (even after Holly's nearly completed growth), the hems and sleeves of the garments falling farther than they were supposed to. Foaly held up a pink cashmere v-neck sweater. "Hey Holly, what do you think? Very girl next door."
She rinsed her face under the tap (only grimacing briefly at the taste of chlorine in the water), before stomping over and snatching the garment from the chuckling centaur. "Ha ha. I'd never be able to hide my gun in this." Holly rummaged through the pile for a moment. "Skirt, dress, capris, skirt. Neon leggings? Skirt. Ugh, Juliet may be practiced at running around in these things, but I'm not." She turned to Artemis. "Artemis, where's your closet?"
He looked slightly bemused. "Bedroom, down the west hall, fourth door on your right."
"Got it," replied the elf, before tossing a sarcastic salute to Mulch. "Have fun, Diggums. Call me when the painful stomach heaves start - OW."
Holly, usually a rather graceful stepper, had somehow managed to walk straight into the wall rather than the door. Artemis raised an eyebrow at this.
She caught his look and rubbed her bruised nose bitterly. No sparks came forth to heal the injury. "It's not me, it's these stupid legs. I can't seem to control them. I was aiming for that door… it just wasn't there when I got there."
Foaly looked kind of guilty. "Oh. Um, it looks like your spatial awareness might be a little affected. We had that in the trial runs, too. Coupled with the sudden growth, you're like a kid in über-puberty; all those inches and no idea of the dimensions."
"And her magic?" Asked Artemis, the lack of sparks having not missed his notice.
Holly gaped at the two of them. "My magic, too?"
"Just temporarily," soothed Foaly. "We had that with a few test trials, but it should return soon."
Artemis glanced at Holly's horrified expression before turning back to the centaur. "How soon, exactly?"
Foaly's flippant shrug made Holly's blood run cold. Artemis frowned. "Alright, we'll simply have to account for this fact in our immediate plans."
Holly was far less accepting. "So I've lost my lunch, probably everything I've eaten for the past two days, my magic… my balance? What next, Foaly? Am I going to experience terrible human-esque cravings to pillage and pollute as much as I can?"
Artemis glanced at her with a brief smirk. "Should I be welcoming you to the dark side?"
Holly glared daggers at him. "Don't make me hit you, Mud Boy." This was a fine time for Artemis to develop a sense of humor.
***
Chapter Four
So, a question: are these long chapters getting unreadable? Instead of 3 scenes a chapter, would it be more palatable at 2 or even 1?