A spark of decency

[darvit]

The Irish countryside, the Hill of Tara. There’s a full moon overhead. Three figures stand just outside a realistic but holographic hedge, with a holographic cow chewing the virtual leaves. Disguising, for a fairy shuttle station. Two of the figures are the size of children, because one is a twelve-year-old child with pale skin, sleek black hair and icy blue eyes and the other is Holly, two hazel eyes looking back at him where most of the group would expect to see one hazel, one blue. The third is a giant of a man, over two metres tall.

“This blazer smells unusual,” the boy comments, sniffing his school uniform. “Not unpleasant, but unusual.”

“It’s completely clean,” Holly says, smiling. “Foaly had to put it through three cycles in the machine to purge—”

“To purge the Mud Man from it.”

“Exactly.”

“Foaly said, in light of the help you’ve given us, he’s pulling the surveillance on Fowl Manor.”

“That’s good to know.”

“Is it the right decision?”

Fowl seems to consider it, then nods. “Yes. The People are safe from me.”

“Good. Because a large section of the Council wanted you mind-wiped. And with a chunk of memory that big, your IQ could take a bit of a dip.”

The big man extends a hand. “Well, Captain. I don’t suppose I’ll see you again.”

Holly shakes it, as best as she can when her hand is so small compared to his. “If you do, it’ll be too late.” She looks back towards the fairy fort. “I had better go. It will be light soon. I don’t want to be caught unshielded on a spy satellite. The last thing I need is my photo all over the Internet, not when I’ve just been reinstated at Recon.”

The big man elbows the young Fowl gently, and his back straightens. “Oh, Holly… eh, Captain Short.”

Holly turns back to him, head tilted. “Yes, Mud B… yes, Artemis?”

Artemis looks Holly in the eye, and the way he does it, it’s like he’s rehearsed it in his head a thousand times. “I would like to... I mean... what I mean is...” Another elbow. “Thank you. I owe you everything. Because of you I have my parents. And the way you flew that craft was nothing short of spectacular. And on the train… well, I could never have done what you…” A third elbow. “Sorry. Well, you get the idea.”

Holly’s features take on a strange expression, somewhere between embarrassment and delight, but she recovers quickly, drawing her pistol. “Maybe I owe you something too, human.”

There’s a twitch from the bodyguard, but Holly just plucks a gold coin from her belt, flicks it fifty feet into the moonlit sky and with one fluid movement brings her weapon up and looses a single blast. The coin rises another fifty feet, then spun earthward.

Artemis somehow managed to snatch it from the air. The first cool moment of his young life. The previously solid disk now had a tiny hole in the centre.

“Nice shot,” he says.

Holly holds out her hand, revealing a still raw scar on her finger. “If it wasn’t for you, I would have missed altogether. No mech-digit can replicate that kind of accuracy. So, thank you too, I suppose.”

Artemis held out the coin.

“No,” says Holly. “You keep it, to remind you.”

“To remind me?”

Holly stares at him with a frank look. “To remind you that deep beneath the layers of deviousness, you have a spark of decency. Perhaps you could blow on that spark occasionally.”

Artemis’s fingers close around the coin. “Yes, perhaps.”

A small two-seater plane buzzes overhead. Artemis glances skyward, and when he looks back, Holly is gone. A slight heat haze hovered above the grass.

“Good-bye, Holly,” he says softly, and there the memory stalls.