Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Barcelona was beautiful this time of year, mused Artemis absentmindedly. It really would be a shame if it were plunged into some alternate dimension.

He frowned into his tea. “Were plunged”. Passive voice. Annoying, but unavoidable, really, as he wasn’t sure as to whether or not there was a subject that he could use to reconfigure his sentence. He didn’t know exactly what force would be doing the plunging of this Spanish city into the unknown should his plan go massively awry, just that it was currently on the table as part of the events that might transpire within the next hour. He had mentally placed it next to a trip to the Casa Milà and a phone call home to his mother. He supposed that the latter two were subject to change depending on the former.

Tourists milled around the cobblestone street, and Artemis was shaken from his reverie. Oh, right, he remembered. The plan.

Turning towards Butler, he set his cup gently down upon the table. Butler glanced at him, and had Artemis not known the older man for the majority of his life, he would have thought Domovoi to be calm and collected as always. However, the slight furrow of Butler’s brow and the performatively casual glances out into the crowd implied otherwise. He was a broad man, taking up space both in size and in presence, but his emotional tells were unassuming. This didn’t hinder their friendship, rather, Artemis personally held the belief that less was more when it came to communicating on a personal level.

“Artemis,” Butler began carefully, a slight lilt in his voice. “Perhaps we should go over today's business before our friend arrives.”

Artemis grasped the handle of his cup, using it to gently shift its position on the table. “Right. What exactly is it that you wish to go over?”

The sun shone high in the sky, casting beautiful reds, purples, and blues as it pierced the stained glass of the cathedral across the road. The air stirred slightly, a warm breeze languidly drifting towards the odd pair seated off to the side by the outdoor patio for the café.

Butler sighed. “I don’t know. Everything, maybe.” He leaned backwards in his chair. “This doesn’t feel—” he paused, eyes narrowing slightly in thought.

“We can call today’s plans off,” Artemis said suddenly, breaking the silence. “If you truly believe that something is off today, I will trust your intuition.”

Butler studied Artemis for a moment, lips pursed. “I appreciate the sentiment, but I doubt you plan to cancel the project over a feeling.” 

Artemis laughed slightly, the noise coming out as more of an exhale than a chortle. “I’m not saying anything so grand,” he remarked. “I’m just clarifying that today is in no way the only chance that my project has of achieving fruition.”

They sat there wordlessly.

It had only been a few months since the incident.

Things were, understandably, awkward in the aftermath of one of Artemis’ many schemes resulting in Butler nearly dying. “Nearly dying” in and of itself was a generous description of the incident, as Artemis had a sneaking suspicion that Butler had spent the better portion of that night being legally braindead before Captain Short had arrived.

Even if the problematic elements of the endeavor had been cleaned up quite beautifully thanks to some supernatural intervention, Artemis still felt guilty. Unlike with Mother and Father, Artemis couldn’t point the People towards Butler and make the memories of his trespass disappear. Hence, Artemis was back at point one, searching blindly for where exactly the line in the sand lay for their adventures. It was almost worse that it didn't seem as though it were Artemis himself that Butler didn’t trust as much anymore, Artemis thought glumly, it was that Butler didn’t trust his judgement. It made Artemis feel unsure. Small. They were meant to be infallible together, the Butlers and the Fowls. Spiro had ruined things, Artemis settled, slightly petulantly.

The waiter sidled up to the table, taking opportunity of the silence. He faced Butler, holding his notepad close to his chest.

“I’m sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if you two are all set for the meal. I can quickly run your check, as I assume you have plenty on your plate for the day,” He offered, his teeth a brilliant white. Today was busy, and there needed to be a turnover soon. People were becoming cross with the sign outside that listed the waiting time as being 45 minutes. As Hugo milled around the restaurant, looking for customers that seemed to be near the end of their meal, the hostess would try to nonchalantly make eye contact. She was beginning to give Hugo looks that resembled a deer in the headlights, her eyes pleading for assistance in mitigating the crowd of overzealous tourists.

He widened his smile by a few more molars, reaching for his pen. “It will only take a moment. Feel free to, uh, just get my attention when you feel ready.”

Butler gave a small smile in return. “Thank you, but I think we might need a tad longer, sorry.” Butler watched the man’s face crumple.

“Alright. Enjoy your uh, meal,” Hugo’s eyes flickered to the very empty table at which Artemis and Butler sat. Butler guilty looked at their drinks, both of which were conspicuously empty. He nodded at Hugo, and the man shuffled off back into the fray of moving people.

“I trust that our friend is coming soon,” Butler said quietly. “I don’t see the benefit in calling things off now. I would like it, however,” he added, “if you’d be more specific on what exactly it is that will happen once they get here.”

Artemis straightened in his seat subconsciously. “They’ll be here within the next few minutes, or they won’t be coming here at all today.”

Butler nodded, waiting for Artemis to continue. Artemis was a fairly reserved person, but he was quite animated when it came to describing his schemes. He could already see Artemis rearranging the few things that they had on the table, creating makeshift diagrams and outlines.

Artemis grasped the sugar bowl, transferring a cube from it into his empty cup. The bottom of the sugar dissolved slightly, giving the mixture of water and tea leaves at the bottom of his cup a slight sheen. He paused momentarily, eyes flitting across the space in front of him before he landed on the perspiring glass of ice water. Artemis picked up his spoon and gently maneuvered an ice cube into the tea cup, making sure to leave a bit of space between the ice and the sugar. He was ready.

“‘That is supernatural, whatever it be, that is either not in the chain of natural cause and effect, or which acts on the chain of cause and effect, in nature, from without the chain.’ Horace Bushnell, 1858,” He quoted, keeping the volume of his voice low.

“The roots of the word ‘supernatural’ also bely this state of impacting the chain of cause and effect whilst existing in a state of being distinctly separate from this chain. I’ve been mulling over this theory over for a while, and although I originally was worried that I was approaching magic in a way that is humanity-centric, I now believe that I was right to classify it as being supernatural in the aforementioned sense,” Artemis continued, his gaze thoughtful.

Butler nodded encouragingly. Artemis proceeded with his train of thought, and Butler shot another server an apologetic glance.

“Biologically speaking, there’s not much that differentiates the People from aboveground lifeforms. They live longer, yes, but I don’t think that’s inherent to their biology. After all, the People aren’t comparable to humanity in the sense that they’re not a coherent, singular species. It would be more apt to describe them as an ecological community — they’re most definitely interdependent, but they’re a group of organisms that has distinct species sprinkled throughout the population. I don’t think their evolutionary history is that of one magical species undergoing speciation until you have groups like goblins and pixies existing in the same environment, rather, I think that they were separate species that evolutionarily converged through the introduction of magic into their habitat,” Artemis chattered on, twirling his teaspoon between his index and pointer finger.

Butler snorted slightly. “How very clinical,” he said, his voice taking on a slightly chiding tone.

Artemis hesitated for a moment, frowning. “I suppose,” he remarked slowly. Butler waved a hand, dismissing the matter.

“Sorry. Continue, please,” Butler exhaled.

Artemis studied the other man briefly. “Alright,” he shrugged.

“I ended up settling on the theory of evolutionary convergence because of how we react to magic,” Artemis explained. He paused to shift his demonstration teacup so that it was in front of him.

“When we were rescuing Father, I remember Captain Short healing me when we boarded the train,” he furrowed his brow at the memory.

“It felt… strange. She was in a state of shock, so her magic had no real intent behind it. It almost felt as though someone had transplanted a missing piece of the nervous system into my being. I could feel that the magic wanted direction, wanted some kind of command. I don’t think I actively told it to heal me, rather, it felt like choosing to move a limb. You just decide to do it, and the process that goes into having your brain communicate this desire into reality is so wholly indescribable that it is secondary to both the desire itself and the eventual realization of the desire.”

Butler quirked an eyebrow upward, ignoring the awkwardness of the motion. His run-in with Spiro had resulted in the hair follicles on his head being impacted for God knows what reason. His eyebrows had somewhat, the keyword being somewhat, grown back. He had looked in the mirror at his hotel bathroom that morning, experimentally trying a raise or lowering of his brow here and there. It was not a pretty sight.

Artemis thankfully picked up on the motion, verbally backpedaling. “I digress. What I’m trying to highlight with this memory is that I was able to control the magic that Holly gave me when she was out of sorts. Magic is theoretically what makes the People so different from us, yet if we’re able to use it, then there is no difference,” he exclaimed, punctuating his statement by jabbing his spoon in emphasis. 

Butler’s eyes widened. “That sounds… actually, I remember something from when Holly healed me,” he said thoughtfully, graciously ignoring the way Artemis winced slightly at the memory. “I may be physically older now, but she pumped so much magic into my system that I’ll live a good decade more than I would have before my injury.”

Artemis forced a smile. “Exactly. That example accounts for their increased longevity as well. Magic impacts our natural world, yet it is distinctly different from this world as well. After all, we never would have met Holly had she been born with an infinite supply of magic within her. She had to renew her magic.”

Butler gestured towards the cup sitting on the table. “What’s this got to do with our future visitor?”

Artemis glanced down at the cup, ignoring the way that the ice cube was melting. “Now, the Book implies that during the clash between the People and  humans, a group of the People simply decided to abscond from this dimension via warlock. Now, to my knowledge, warlocks do not need to complete the Ritual. This would in theory negate my aforementioned hypothesis, save for the fact that I do not think that they are generating magic from within themselves, only harnessing that which is naturally floating around them. Anyways, they created a pocket dimension and have been living there for the past millennia.”

“That sounds like quite a bit of work,” Butler pointed out.

“Not work, energy,” Artemis clarified, the excitement in his voice palpable. “Energy that is approaching entropy as the spell runs out of magic to fuel their world’s separation from ours.”

Artemis grinned, pushing the cup forward. “This is when the cup factors into my explanation.”

“Oh, good. I was getting worried about it.”

Artemis brushed off the good-natured teasing, pointing at the sugar cube. “That’s us. The way that we use magic naturally contributes to the process of entropy as well, as you can see by the slight dissolution of the sugar at the bottom of the cube, but the process is so slow and natural that you could live a thousand lives and still not witness the magical heat death of our world.”

Butler grimaced. “Morbid.”

Artemis then gestured to the ice cube, which was at this point quite pathetic in its advanced stage of melting. “That’s the world of the lost colony of the People. The way they’ve broken off from our world is decidedly not natural, and they're about to pay quite dearly for it. Their world needs magic to function, and it’s dying as a result. Their spell is weakening, I’m positive of that, but I’m not quite sure as to what the result will be. This cup models both potential outcomes, though,” he tapped his chin thoughtfully.

“Either we can interpret the melting ice as the process of them returning ash to ash, dust to dust. From magic they were born, and magic they will return. At some point, the spell will become untenable, and their world will violently convert itself into magic, returning to the Earthen source.”

“Or,” Butler prompted, dread creeping into his voice.

“Or,” Artemis leaned back into his seat, shrugging. “Their world will attempt to violently recombine with ours to heal itself, undoubtedly impacting our own balance of magic usage. To be quite frank, its collision with our world could trigger the magical heat death that I described in the first possibility within Earth itself.”

Butler stared at Artemis. “Does… does Foaly know about this?” he started, forcing himself to not look back down at the horrifying cup-of-death model.

Artemis hummed, pursing his lips. “Definitely. I know that he knows about this, in fact, he's probably known about the problem for longer than we've been acquainted with one another. It’s rather rude that he hasn’t thought to include us in the discussion, actually,” he decided with a frown. “After all, I think we’ve matured enough to move beyond unlikely allies to friendly colleagues.” 

“Sir, I am really quite sorry for the intrusion,” Butler and Artemis flinched, startled by the new voice.

It was Hugo again.

“I am going to have to ask you to collect your bill soon,” Hugo tried, attempting to sound cheery in spite of the lunch rush that was currently wrecking havoc upon the understaffed restaurant.

Butler opened his mouth to wheedle for a few more moments in front of the “meeting” spot when he found himself staring eye-to-eye with something.

He boggled.

Standing right in front of him was a bipedal creature with grey skin, wide eyes, and a reptilian build.

The thing stared back at him, nervous energy emanating from him in waves.

Butler stared at the thing.

Hugo stared at the thing.

Artemis leaned forward, hands clasped together on the table. “Hello,” he stated politely.

The creature suddenly reached out towards Artemis, clasping the teenager’s hands in his own in what appeared to be a clumsy approximation of a hand shake.

Butler had dealt with magic before.

He knew how to deal with situations that were wholly unlike anything he had been prepared for in his Blue Diamond training. He did not, however, know what to make of this. There was something so banal about this that it was all he could do to watch stupefied as the creature before him interacted with his charge. Madam Ko would have been rolling in her grave were she dead, as opposed to merely enjoying her retirement in Southern Italy.

The creature opened his mouth and what he was about to say was as good as anyone’s guess, as he blinked out of existence just as quickly as he had popped in only moments earlier.

The waiter coughed. Butler turned to him, about to weave a tale of unparalleled proportions until Artemis could phone Holly and —

Artemis.

Butler closed his eyes, rubbing the bridge of his nose and exhaling roughly.

If I open my eyes, he thought, he’s going to be sitting right in front of me. Yeah, he continued, grinding his teeth slightly. Artemis has merely decided to try out staying silent during very opportune moments. He’s really matured, you know, to be able to do that after years of doing quite the opposite.

Butler opened his eyes. Artemis was not sitting across from him. The only person near him in the little alcove by the café where their table lay was the waiter from earlier.

“Where did…”

“Oh, I came here alone,” Butler blurted out, trying to nonchalantly move Artemis’ tea cup towards his half of the table.

“Oh, okay,” the waiter nodded as if that made perfect sense. He looked enormously stressed.

Butler cleared his throat awkwardly. “Er, could I see a menu…?” He pressed, folding his hands on the table.

“Sure,” Hugo said numbly, making no motion to move.

Butler blinked as pointedly as he was able to. Hugo shuddered, snapping back to look at the bodyguard as though he were doused with water. He finally meandered off, and Butler was left alone.

Butler took a deep breath, rearranging his utensils so that they were in their proper places on the table.

He took another breath.

Goddamnit, he thought helplessly, letting his face fall into his hands. Goddamnit. 

Chapter Text

As much as she was loathe to admit it, the humans weren’t wrong about moral work — it wasn’t something that paid well. Foaly had recently pulled up the data comparing their old paycheck at LEP to their Section 8 pay, and the numbers were glaringly in favor of the LEP. Lower Elements Police might have been a finely tuned machine, but Section 8 was its underdog counterpart. Vinaya was many things, Holly mused as she sipped on her protein shake, but a bureaucrat was not one of them.

Finishing her breakfast, she set her mug on the employee sink, being careful not to touch the various glasses and beakers that Foaly had left to collect mold. Using the end of her index finger, she gently shifted one of the less toxic looking dishes to the side to make room for her own. She shuddered and wiped her hand on her button up.

“You know,” she called out, poking her head through the door that connected the “kitchen” to the hall. “I think you should be more worried about getting bumped off by the fact that you’re washing lab glassware in the same place as our leftover containers”

“Fine,” she heard Foaly’s muffled response from inside one of the many rooms in their office building. “You can tell Vinaya that she needs to get a working autoclave, then.”

Holly snorted under her breath. “No thanks,” she said, following the sound of his frantic tapping away at his keyboard.

Poking her head into his room, she rapped her right hand’s knuckles against the door frame. She tried to not look at the war zone of beakers and circuitboards that lay scattered over his desks amongst paperwork. She moved her gaze towards Foaly, who was staring, lips pursed and the tips of his ears twitching, at the soft blue glow of his monitor. Holly moved some of the debris from the desk nearest to the door and lifted herself onto it. She crossed her legs and picked up a random sheet of paper, pretending to be immersed in it.

“PAC versus support vector machines in driving AI: The pros and cons,” Holly read out, scratching the space of her neck below her left ear casually. “This is my favorite piece of light reading,” she grinned, moving to hold it father away from Foaly when he clicked his tongue in annoyance and reached for it.

“I can’t tell if you’re more or less annoying when you don’t have the rest of the LEP jock posse to cause trouble with — reference to our beloved friend Captain Kelp completely unintentional,” Foaly sighed, and Holly laughed as she handed over the paper.

“We had to pass the same written exam to get in the door for the hiring process,” she reminded him, letting one of her legs fall off the side of the table and swing idly. “It’s not my fault I can do a push-up and you can’t.”

Snorting, Foaly filed the essay away with care by pushing it into another pile of wrinkled papers. He rolled his eyes. “Touché.”

He went back to tapping away at his keyboard, and Holly allowed her gaze to wander around his office. All things considered, it wasn’t very nice looking. Foaly had probably created the mess to cover as much of the space as possible. That hadn’t helped.

After the mystique surrounding Section 8 had faded, Holly found that her job was not altogether that different from life at LEP. Before LEP had undergone renovations at their headquarters, the building had been older. Holly liked that. When Root had signed off on the expansion plan with Koboi Tech a while back, Holly had initially been thrilled. Of course, her current feelings on the matter were probably influenced by her recent history with Opal, but she had disliked the new layout even before the Koboi heir had made her bloodthirsty business strategies a bit more literal.

The new building was just too… clean. It felt sterile, like a hospital. Holly shuddered. The People were meant to be children of the Earth. It was no wonder the competition for aboveground missions had become un-bleeping-tenable these past few years — she sometimes thought she’d lose it completely if she had to spend one more day under LEDs instead of moonlight.

However, there’s only so much natural world that was fit for use in the core. She would admit, albeit begrudgingly, that it cost less to 3D print the skeleton of buildings and slot the pieces together with construction warlocks than it did to mine for sturdy pieces of igneous rock in the magma deposits.

Section 8 was all that remained of the administrative buildings of one of those very such mining sites — the entrance through the cave system still had some decommissioned equipment from a few centuries ago, and Vinaya had told Holly that she had a betting pool going on with Mulch on how long it would be before Foaly tried to cannibalize the machines for working parts. Holly had given the highest estimate, letting Foaly know immediately after so that they could split the winnings. Still, she doubted he’d be able to hold out for the month they had until they were in the clear, unless she managed to convince him to go to Haven’s electronic junkyard and scavenge the parts he needed from there. He claimed that was undignified, but he’d have to come to terms with the fact that they lacked the bells and whistles of their old jobs soon, she reasoned.

She continued to noncommittally watch Foaly type away with vigor. “Found anything?” she tried after a moment, as Foaly had seemed to be completely engrossed in his work.

Holly picked up another document that was hanging precariously off the side of the table. This one appeared to be a printed-out copy of an email chain with Artemis. She put the paper back down. He or Foaly were most likely being unbearable in that exchange, and it wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities that both of them were being awful at the same time, either. Academia was apparently one of those kinds of shared interests that made all parties involved quite hostile to one another. It was strange. After all, you didn’t see her and Butler getting territorial about who was the better shot. Obviously, Holly was the clear winner in that regards, and they both were at peace with that.

“Define ‘anything’,” Foaly all but grunted back, not looking up from his work.

“Fine. Have you found something that’s making you paranoid and antisocial, or did you not get enough beauty sleep last night?”

Foaly looked up. “I think you’ll find my coat has had quite the healthy sheen lately,” he shot back a tad defensively. “I think you’ll find I look quite fetching even during my all-nighters.”

Holly snorted. “If Caballine weren’t dating you, I worry that you’d slowly morph into a gremlin.”

He gave her a dirty look. “And I guess I have to worry about that happening to you now that Lilli and Trouble are no longer our coworkers?”

“Shut up,” Holly’s ears reddened.

Foaly all but cooed, completely delighted to no longer be the subject of their teasing. “It’s hilarious you’re related to Cupid, it really is,” he chuckled, finally rising to face her from the ottoman desk chair by which his computer lay. “You’re quite shite at romance.”

She crossed her arms. “A guy meets his first real girlfriend and gets cocky now, hm?” she griped.

He smirked. “Sensitive. And per your earlier question, my something concerning is actually a someone—“

“Artemis,” she offered bluntly.

Foaly sighed. “Yeah, it’s Artemis.”

“It always is,” Holly grinned. “I appreciate his consistency.”

Foaly shrugged and reached for various papers. “I sure as hell don’t,” he sighed, bringing his reading glasses to rest on the bridge of his nose as he tried to decide between two documents. “It’s actually quite annoying.”

Once he found what he needed, he crowed victoriously.

“Alright, here we go,” he began, shuffling the papers slightly. “All the work we’ve been doing here for the past few months? You know, that? Worthless. Completely negated.”

Holly blinked. “What?”

Sighing, Foaly handed her a stack of documents. She raised an eyebrow, and he gestured in annoyance for her to look. Fine. She glanced down, her eyes ghosting over the set of papers in her hands.

One was a travel log, she assumed. Holly squinted, concentrating. The second paper seemed to be something within the realm of theoretical physics. She shuffled that one to the bottom of the pile. Not today, Foaly, not today.

The final paper was completely incomprehensible. It was covered in a mishmash of English and Gnomish words and numbers, and there didn’t seem to be any guiding theme behind the text before her. She quirked a brow upwards, glancing at Foaly for further explanation. He offered none. Fine, then. If he wanted to be difficult…

“You’re right, Artemis does seem to be going on a disturbingly frequent amount of vacations. We should talk to him about that, though, because losing track of him after he goes backpacking in Europe and gets mugged would be unfortunate —“

“Take this seriously, Holly!” Foaly complained. It would've been more accurate to describe his actions as veering into whining territory, but Holly was feeling generous with her internal monologue today. The protein shake really did make a difference in her mood.

She held up her palms placatingly. “Fine, fine. I’m sorry that I don’t think Artemis researching the multiverse theory and taking a few sabbaticals here and there means that he’s cracked the code on finding the 8th family. He probably saw some of your work for Section 8 when he was rummaging through your hard drive and got curious.”

She snapped her fingers suddenly. “Oh, wait, that actually sounds reasonable, so clearly I’m on the wrong path.” Foaly looked dour at that statement.

Sighing, Holly shoved her hands into the pockets of her slacks. “Face it, Foaly, in a weird way he — well, I wouldn’t say that he looks up to you,” she amended before Foaly could interrupt. “But he certainly admires your intelligence in his own way. Just send him an email and compare notes so that we can all stop digging around in each other’s digital trash. He’s already contributed enough to global warming as it is with all the jet fuel this travel log says that he’s wasted.”

Foaly sighed, massaging the worry lines that were forming at his brow. He was too young to be this stressed — clocking in at two centuries and a half, Foaly felt each and every second of his age. He should probably invest in some eye cream soon, he thought gloomily. His eyebags were beginning to develop smaller, carry-on versions of their parent bags.

“Fine,” he threw up his hands. “I’ll send him an email.”

Holly nodded, pleased. “Good,” she said approvingly. “He’ll like—“

Artemis blinked. “Why would I want Foaly to send me an email?”

“Oh, you’re such a shit — see,” Foaly swore, wildly gesticulating at Artemis while glaring at Holly. “That’s what you get when you try to be nice to him!”

Holly stared at Artemis. She looked at Foaly, waiting for his brain to catch up to speed with the situation. She didn’t have to wait long.

“I — why are you in my office?” Foaly realized suddenly, his tone deadpan as his eyes narrowed.

Artemis took in a shaky breath, looking around the room. Holly could see that he was covered in what appeared to be soot and slime.

“Because I am very, very lucky,” he offered, leaning his weight against the desk on which Holly was perched. Foaly looked equal parts vindicated and horrified. If she wasn’t going to have to eventually deal with whatever mess Artemis had gotten himself into, Holly thought, she would've found this whole situation quite funny.

She recrossed her legs on the table and grabbed one of the papers that Foaly had handed her earlier. “You are lucky, I would agree. Dimension hopping without Butler just seems like you’re tempting fate, though.” She handed Artemis the article on theoretical physics that Foaly had offered up as proof of Artemis meddling with things that he shouldn’t. Points to Foaly, she internally sighed.

Artemis laughed, but it came out nervous and pitchy. “I didn’t have time to bring him with me, unfortunately.”

Holly’s ears perked up and she frowned. “Wait, is he—“

“Fine, he’s fine,” Artemis clarified quickly.

Holly relaxed. “Good.”

Foaly seemed to shake himself, his face turning to one of confusion. “But why…,” he began, voice trailing off

Artemis held up his right arm, and the cufflinks on his shirt glinted in a way that indicated they were expensive. “It was the silver,” he said almost reverently, and Holly found herself unable to tear her gaze away from the precious metal. “That’s what you were missing in your notes. It was silver.”

Chapter Text

It wasn’t wise to travel Inter-dimensionally if one had had a hearty lunch prior to embarking. He’d only officially been a warlock (Nº1 felt that his years spent getting picked on by the older demons didn’t constitute as very warlock-y) for an hour, and it was shaping up to be rather unpleasant. Even worse, he’d lost the human that he’d brought with him into the aether. His first potential friend, and Nº1 had lost him. No wonder he’d been supernaturally booted off Hybras. He was a mess.

Sighing, Nº1 crossed his grey arms. Things had started off so well, too, he reasoned as he stared out into the void.

It stared back, judgmentally.

… Maybe things hadn’t gotten off on the best foot.

When he’d first stepped off the edge of Hybras’ mountain and into the infinite expanse of space and time, Nº1 hadn’t felt scared. He’d been a bit upset, sure, but that had more to do with the fact that no one was giving him the time of day. They never did, but he was feeling more sensitive than usual today. He was demon enough to admit that.

Honestly, the black landscape streaked by sparkling lines of light had seemed exciting in comparison to plunging into the basin of lava that had laid below him seconds earlier. The transition from his planet to wherever he was now had happened painlessly, too, which was a bonus. However, once he had blinked out of existence on Hybras, he found he wasn’t sure about anything regarding the passage of time. He could have been drifting about for half an hour or half a century, it was all the same to him. The feeling wasn’t altogether pleasant, but it wasn’t unpleasant, either. It was like going to sleep and not dreaming; it just was something that happened, and that’s that.

He’d resurfaced into existence when the chatter around him started to crystalize into voices instead of white noise. Nº1 was surprised when he realized that the sounds around him were people speaking; adult demons had a certain raspiness about their voices, and the people he heard chattering on had a softness in how they spoke with which he was unfamiliar. Back home, even imps like him who hadn't yet warped made their voices harsh and gravelly. It was quite strange, but Nº1 decided it sounded pleasant. These people sounded like he’d always imagined the proper lords and ladies of Lady Heatherington Smythe’s Hedgerow to sound like.

Nº1 had been so engrossed in his thoughts about the novel that he almost didn’t notice the very strange world he had been dumped out into. The star in the sky was farther away here, and it was much younger, too. The flora surrounding the stone-covered ground was verdant and (hopefully) non-hostile. The air was smoky, but with sweet tones.

He was over the moon.

It was right out of the pages of his favorite book. Maybe he had died falling off that cliff, and he was reborn into his next life. He could immediately tell he was much better suited to this world. It looked like it had room for people like him.

Glancing around, he saw that he stood before three strangers. Two of the strangers seemed to be adults, and there was a boy seated next to the older man. The older man had ghosts of lines starting to appear on his face, and the first thing Nº1 thought about him was that he was strong. There was a silent kind of power that emanated from this man, and even General Abbott would have hesitated before confronting him. His eyes followed Nº1, unblinking. A slightly younger man stood beside his table, and this man was lankier. He seemed to be about to faint.

Then there was the third stranger.

The other individual did not appear to be related to the man by whom he was seated, although their postures indicated they were close. The boy was pale, almost sickly looking, and his eyes were piercing and ice-blue. He couldn’t have been any older than Nº1, yet they were about the same height. Nº1 might have actually been a centimeter or two taller. However, despite this person’s slight build, he matched the broad-shouldered man by whom he sat in intensity.

Nº1 hoped a bit nervously that they took kindly to new people around these parts.

He didn’t have to wait long to find out, as the boy held out his hand. Nº1 studied the outstretched appendage appraisingly. Why was he…

Oh.

OH.

These were humans.

The person in front of him was a human.

Nº1 forced himself to breathe. Be cool, Nº1, be cool, he repeated internally. You’ve read Lady Heatherington at least ten times. You’ve got this.

“Hello,” the boy said, tone even and his hand still outstretched. Nº1’s nerves heightened. Oh right, his role in this greeting was to respond in kind.

Mustering up all his courage, Nº1 had quickly grabbed onto the other boy’s hand with both of his, desperate not to make a faux-pas so early on in his arrival to Earth. He winced internally. He’d fumbled it. Damn.

Needless to say, the rest was history. Nº1 was floating through space again, and the human boy he had met was nowhere to be found.

“I’ll do better next time,” he decided aloud to no one in particular.

The stars around him winked in response.

Chapter Text

It was a long walk back to the hotel. The sun hung high in the sky, and the fact he was walking against foot traffic was the only thing that kept Butler off autopilot.

It had been less than an hour since the “meeting”, and Butler would’ve been cursing the fact that he hadn’t forced Artemis to call the whole affair off were he not preoccupied with simply getting from point a to point b. Poring over the what-ifs would do nothing for him right now. The priority was getting to the com-system to call Holly and explain that Artemis had gotten them into hot water. Again.

Butler could feel a headache coming on.

It was only when he had made it safely to the stairwell that lead to the set of rooms they were staying in that he felt a weight leave his shoulders. The other residents were out making the most of the day, and the only sound Butler could hear was the slight creak the wood of the stairs gave as he made his way up them. The stillness didn’t feel oppressive — it felt natural in the same way the stillness of half-empty airports did. The loss of the presence of people, the very thing that made transient spaces transient, left a very palpable hole in places like these.

Shaking his head, Butler frowned, putting a hand up against the cool, rough wallpaper on the side of the stairwell. He let the feeling ground him, and his hand left the wall slowly as he moved to continue to their rooms. The stickers on the copper keys were labelled with their room numbers in smudged cursive handwriting. 321 and 322. Letting the other keys fall to one side of the ring, Butler held on to the key to his room. He remembered that woman running the desk downstairs had told him to jiggle the key in the lock before turning it, and he hoped that didn’t indicate that the locks throughout the hotel were copies of one another.

In his line of work, paranoia and natural intuition seemed to bleed into one another — Juliet would’ve made fun of him for this suspicion had she been standing next to him as he unlocked the door, and the thought of his younger sister was enough to make Butler smile slightly. She was no fool, but she loved people a bit too much to be good at a job that required facing each situation with the worst in mind.

The door swung open as he pushed inwards, and he surveyed the dim room. The dark green of the curtains made the light filtering in a rich moss color as it splayed over the bed and desk in the corner. Letting his eyes wander over the expanse of the space, his hand moved towards the reading lamp on the dresser at the front of the room. He flicked the switch on, and his eyes squinted slightly as the fluorescent bulb illuminated his room.

The com-link that Holly had given him earlier that year was concealed in a small jump drive. He had only used it once without Artemis; Juliet’s 20th birthday had been a few months ago, and he remembered that Holly had promised Juliet a copy of some Haven MMA show before the Fowls and Butlers were mindwiped. Juliet ended up loving the program, and the glee she had been lit up with for hours following unwrapping the disc had been more than worth the awkwardness of explaining to Holly that he and Artemis had already let Juliet back into the loop about the People. Holly hadn’t minded — it was difficult to remain frustrated when it came to Juliet. Butler credited the fact that Artemis at least tried to make jokes now and then with growing up around his sister. To be frank, Butler sighed, typing his password into the computer and shoving the USB into a port, he wished she were with them in Barcelona. She would have been able to tell Artemis that this plan was an absolute “hot mess”.

His computer blinked to life, the screen displaying a loading bar. Finally, the home screen popped up, and Butler tried to make out where the com-link was listed on the desktop. Holly told him that Foaly wanted the design to be stylish, yet unassuming. Butler wished that Foaly went for a bold and brash look, as it took him damn near five minutes to find where the icon of the communication program was hiding each time he had to make a call.
This time the icon was a flickering cursor that was populating the space by the trash on his dock — the only thing that gave it away was the fact that he remembered the icon appearing in a similar location last time. He clicked it, pursing his lips and drumming the fingers on his free hand slightly against his thigh. It was loading.

After what seemed like ages, a white window popped up and filled the screen. Its layout reminded Butler of popular video-chat programs, only with a slight feeling of being off. Foaly might have optimized the app for him, but there was something about the program that was different from any human-designed tech Butler had come across. He paused, scanning the screen for the number Holly had used last call. He clicked on his history, then clicked on the button for video.

A tinny ringing began playing from his computer’s speakers almost immediately. He didn’t have to listen long, though, as Holly picked up the call on the second cycle.

Butler let himself relax slightly.

“Hello, Butler,” Holly grinned from the other side of the call, the audio coming out shakily.

“Holly,” Butler started, his eyes flickering towards Foaly, who was sitting in the background in a dour mood. “Something happened.”

“So this isn’t a social call?” Foaly cut in, moving his chair closer so that he’d be more in view of the camera. There were papers all over the table in front of their computer, and Foaly jostled a few as he shifted his position in the frame.

“Er, no,” Butler shook his head, turning his gaze back to Holly. “It’s about Artemis.”

“Why is he interested in the 8th family’s dimension?” Foaly’s voice crackled over the communication link, and Butler could hear the displeasure in his voice.

In the video window, Holly rolled her eyes. “Foaly, that’s not the point of this call,”

Foaly moved back into view of the call, holding his hands up placatingly. “Sorry,”

Butler cleared his throat, and the elf and centaur on the other end of line looked back at him. Holly nudged her companion, and Foaly’s eyes widened suddenly as he remembered the reason for Butler’s call.

“He’s fine, by the way,” Foaly explained, grinning in a way that suggested he was quite proud of the way he read the situation. “Popped back into our dimension about half an hour ago.”

Holly nodded, looking back at Foaly. “That probably would’ve been good to open with,” she admitted, shifting her weight onto her arm as she leaned back. “Artemis is currently in the med-bay with our top psychologist and doctor.”

Butler frowned. “Your singular doctor and psyche?”

Foaly leaned in front of Holly so that he could better make eye contact with the other man. “Well, we only need one. Professor Diggums is quite well regarded in the medical community.”

Blinking, Butler stared at the screen.

Foaly did a good job of maintaining his composure for all of ten seconds. “I’m absolutely kidding. Mulch has no credentials, medical or otherwise,” he laughed, slapping the desk.

Finally processing what had just been said, Butler looked at the two incredulously. “Excuse me— he’s back? What?” he frowned, shaking his head in disbelief.

Holly shrugged. “It was the silver cufflinks. Silver is one of the least magically conducive materials out there — he was thrown out of the time stream before he could get too far away, thankfully. Why he ended up getting spat out into Haven is anyone’s guess, though,” Holly finished, and Foaly nodded in agreement.

“— I do not want to help you reach into vending machines and steal, Mulch, for the last time!”

Just outside the office Foaly and Holly were sitting in, Butler could hear the sound of Artemis becoming increasingly exasperated with Diggums. Butler shifted in his seat slightly, opening his mouth to ask Holly to let him get a visual confirmation that Artemis was back and (relatively) unharmed, when he heard the door to the room swing open.

Foaly crossed his arms, letting out a fake sigh of annoyance. “Please don’t disrespect our medical staff, Artemis. They work far too hard as it is.”

Butler could almost hear the frown on Artemis’ face deepening. “Mulch doesn’t even have magic. If you’re going to pretend to give him a job around your department, at least give him one that makes sense. Head of espionage, perhaps.”

The meandering footsteps that echoed slightly across the call’s audio indicated that Mulch had made his way towards the commotion inside the office.

“I’m very sensitive about the fact I can’t do magic,” Butler heard Mulch’s voice become louder as he got closer. “It’s really hindered my promising career as a medical warlock.”

“Mulch, Foaly, you’re dragging out our medical-staff joke out beyond its shelf life. We really need to move on to business now,” Holly said pointedly, looking off-screen to where Mulch was presumably standing.

“Fine, fine — I can tell when I’m not wanted. Arty, tell Jules I said hi, okay?” Mulch’s voice echoed over the com-link, and Butler didn’t have time to respond before he heard Mulch wander back off into the hall of their office.

The dull clack of men’s formal shoes approached the computer, and Butler saw Artemis peak into view.

“Artemis,” Butler sighed, slumping in his chair. “What happened?”

“Just now? Frankly, I worry for us all if this office represents the Earth’s best chance,” Artemis side-eyed the door through which Mulch had just exited.

“What? No — no.”

“Oh,” Artemis straightened, moving to sit between Foaly and Holly. “You mean about the demon, Nº1, of course,”

“He… has a name,” Butler began slowly, trying to remain composed. “Actually,” he said, turning to look at Holly. “This seems like a conversation we could have aboveground. Could you get Artemis on the next shuttle to Barcelona?”

Holly nodded, clapping Artemis on the shoulder. “Not that I don’t enjoy our talks outside of life-or-death situations, but I agree that it’s best to get you back topside.”

Artemis inclined his head slightly. “I’m not exactly the People’s favorite person, true. I won’t outstay my welcome, if,” he shot Foaly a glance. "You get me up to date with Section 8’s understanding of the Hybras crisis.”

Grinning, Holly leveled her gaze towards Foaly. “Sure. Foaly, if you could email him your findings, I’ll cover verbal debriefing.”

Foaly merely grunted.

Artemis smiled, his eyes crinkling slightly in amusement. “I’ll see you in a few hours, old friend,” Artemis said, a tad apologetically.

Butler tried to smile back. “Alright.”

The com-link cut out, the screen of his computer dimming.

Across the city of Barcelona, a young girl pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her nose. This would be the place, she thought, looking absentmindedly at her notes. She was going to find magic.

Chapter Text

"Norma really is an essential of the medium if you've even the least bit of interest in opera. BBC recently put out a review of this production, and although —"

Butler leaned over to where Artemis was sitting, keeping his voice low. "Does the group on the balcony over there look familiar?"

"Hm?"

Artemis turned away from the empty corner of their box where a very well shielded Captain Short was hovering. Craning his neck, he looked to where Butler was pointing.

The balcony across the way was packed. There didn't seem to be an empty seat in the house, and the restless energy of the crowd made it all too easy for Artemis to let his gaze be diverted away from the pair that Butler had pointed out. Focusing, his eyes landed upon the duo in the balcony with whom Butler was concerned.

It was a young girl, probably a year or two younger than himself, and an adult man just nearing his thirties. The girl's corkscrew curls that had been meticulously pinned back seemed familiar enough, and Artemis remembered that one of the young women in the café had been of the same stature.

The man, though. Artemis furrowed his brow in thought, tilting his head slightly.

The man accompanying the girl from before looked forgettable. He fit the profile of many men who had too much money and too little of a sense of how they should spend it. He sat slouched, but not so much as to be hunched over. He wore a nondescript suit, neither too extravagant nor too casual. His hair was cut in one of the faux-sensible styles that could be achieved just as easily at home, to be frank. He was average. Very nouveau-riche, Artemis added privately.

However, Artemis mused, contrary to popular belief, boring and uninteresting were not necessarily mutually inclusive. Artemis knew many boring people who were of great interest to him; some of Father's mob contacts had been some of the worst conversationalists with whom he had ever met. He did not know, however, many interesting people who partnered up with people who were uninteresting.

The girl from the café was interesting — her existence on the periphery of the Hybras affair aside, she carried herself with an energy that made the people seated around her give her space despite her age and diminutive stature.

As such, the man sitting next to her — regardless of if he was her guardian, family friend, teacher, or what have you — came off as trying a bit too hard. He was her buffer; perhaps they'd hoped that when people looked at them, they'd see an extraordinarily boring man before they'd see her. It had the opposite effect, ironically enough.

"I recognize her," Artemis finally said, breaking the silence and turning back to face Butler. "I can't say outright if she was accompanied by the same man when we were in Spain, though,"

A voice next to Artemis sighed. "I don't love the implications of why the same human is showing up at Hybras rifts."

"Fair," Artemis hummed, "but the real question is whether or not her presence is troublesome enough to divert our attention from our interdimensional friend."

Holly snorted. "Personal experience points towards human curiosity and magic being a recipe for disaster. How long do we have until the curtain goes up?"

Turning his wrist, Artemis displayed the face of his watch. "15 minutes. We've plenty of time."

"Right. Try not to cause a scene while I'm gone,"

Before Artemis could shoot back a response, he felt the air shift, indicating Holly had already sped off towards the nearby balcony.

"Do you think she'll find anything?" Butler kept his voice low, watching the duo seated across the opera house.

Tearing his eyes away from the girl and her compatriot, Artemis watched the rippling curtain below.

"Hm. Maybe, maybe not."

—

It was times like these that made Holly grateful that she had stuck with Foaly throughout the years. If someone had asked her even ten years ago if there would be hover-tech that was suited for indoor reconnaissance, she'd have laughed in their face. But Foaly had done it. Not even a stone's throw away from the sea of faces below her, and no one was the wiser.

The lights in the opera house were a rich yellow, and she could just barely make out her own silhouette amongst the flickering shadows. The blonde girl that Butler had pointed out earlier was leaning on the rail of the balcony, drumming her fingers impatiently. Next to her sat a man of considerable height, watching the curtain flutter below them. Neither spoke.

The sides of Holly's mouth quirked upwards slightly, her dimples deepening subconsciously. She threw a glance over to where Artemis and Butler were. Neither of her human friends showed any signs of awareness that she was looking at them. Both of them, however, were unwittingly mirroring the two opera attendees she was investigating — she'd be hard pressed to decide who seemed the most unapproachable. Butler's arms were crossed, and Artemis was hardly any better — she wouldn't say he was scowling, per se, but Artemis inevitably wound up making the 'neutral face of displeasure' whenever he was focused intently upon something he couldn't quite figure out.

She powered down her hover-tech slightly, decreasing her altitude. Now only a few meters from the girl and man situated on the balcony, she brought her helmet's camera up.

Easy.

Holly took a quick look at the image before deciding that its quality was fine. Foaly would be able to use it, and it wasn't as if the lighting in here was going to improve if she waited. Sparing the two below her one last glance, she allowed her gear to lift her high above the balcony.

—

Minerva Paradizo.

The text on the screen of her helmet appeared mere moments after Holly uploaded the photo to Foaly's cloud databank. Eyes still scanning for anything of importance, Holly alighted onto the ledge of the opera box. Her hover-tech protested slightly, its fans humming softly in protest, and she could tell from the sudden alertness in Butler's gaze that he had heard her.

"I'm back," she called out softly, unshielding, and his shoulders relaxed.

"Who is she?" Butler asked, keeping his voice low.

"Minerva Paradizo"

Butler looked at Artemis, who shook his head.

"We don't know her," Butler sighed, pursing his lips.

Holly snorted. "Funny, because her file implies that you all should run in similar circles. The information our program pulled up is full of news stories about her taking home awards at some child savant competition."

Artemis leaned closer in his chair, his expression a tad smug. "I actually prefer to compete at the adult level when it comes to those types of events."

"The point, Artemis," Holly looked at him pointedly, "is that I'd rather none of us, particularly myself, end up locked in some basement at the whim of some pre-teen megalomaniac."

Butler, at least, had the grace to look guilty, but Artemis crossed his arms challengingly.

"As far as she knows, the demon is the only magical visitor the Bellini Opera House is hosting tonight," Artemis insisted. "We already know where and when he's going to appear — I don't know when I'll be able to get the calculations ready to guess the next opening of the rift. We need to catch up to the demon tonight, Holly."

The box fell silent.

"You're positive that he's going to be at stage right," Holly finally said, trying to study Artemis' face for any hint of guile.

"Yes."

"Okay. Okay, I'll try to intercept him," she conceded. Artemis blinked owlishly, the whites of his eyes glowing dimly in the low light before he smiled.

"But, Artemis?" Holly flickered out of view slightly, her shield starting to power up. "Leave your comm link on."

—

The backstage of the opera house felt old. The parts of the building that faced the audience looked old in that they had been meticulous upkept to preserve the century-old architecture, but it didn't feel genuine. The hallway that Holly was carefully hovering in smelled damp and musty — it didn't need stained marble or imported wood, it just was old.

Her hover-tech barely disturbed the dust filtering through the air as she crept down the way. Artemis had said that the demon would be near the part of the backstage where the original stairway to the underground would have been, but that the exact place the rift would open was as good as anyone's guess. Holly was fine with having to make her own call with where to station herself. Ideally, she'd get lucky and the demon would be hidden from the bustle of the technical crew near the curtain, but she felt confident enough that she could shoot out and pull him away from prying eyes before anyone noticed him; the humans here were busy enough that she'd have a few seconds of grace time before his presence was noticed.

Her comm beeped. Holly flinched slightly, startled. Reaching towards her helmet, she pressed one of the protruding buttons on the side, and the interior of her visor flickered green. One new message. She sighed. She pressed the button on her helmet again.

"Is he here yet?? -A," she read, mouthing the words slightly.

Her comm beeped again. "Apologies — only meant to send one '?'. - A"

Holly grinned. Opening the comm keyboard discreetly, she tapped out an 'n' and an 'o' with her index finger, the clicking of the keys muted by her the cushioning on the fingertips of her gloves.

She moved to send the text, but a chill wracked her body. Frowning, she closed the keyboard, eyes scanning her surroundings. A draft disturbed some of the dust on the floor, and the legs of the curtain on stage right seemed to dance with the breeze.

Holly blanched, a realization dawning on her with horror.

He was tangled in the curtains.

The ashy grey of the demon's skin was suddenly grotesquely obvious against the deep wine of the velour of the drapery — even ignoring his thrashing, it was a miracle no one had noticed him yet.

Her body moving into action before her mind could fully catch up, Holly darted between the openings in the crowd of technical crew staff bustling around. Her suit hummed with the whirring of the mechanical wings, and she frantically tried to move the curtain aside to reach the imp.

"I'm not trying to hurt — stop moving! It's dangerous to be out in the open, I need you to shield yourself," Holly hissed in Gnommish. The demon's eyes were wide, his pupils constricted, and Holly cursed herself. Unshielding slightly, she grasped the curtain and drew it close around the two of them.

"Can you use your magic? We cannot be visible right now," she repeated slowly and firmly, voice low.

"I don't — are those humans?" he blinked, his Gnommish accent unfamiliar to Holly's ears.

Holly winced, feeling almost claustrophobic. "Er, yes?"

"Oh."

God, Holly internally groaned, her hand steadied only by sheer habit as it moved to tap her comm. Why did Sool have to be such a piece of shit — LEP might have gone to hell in a handbasket, but at least they had more than one active field officer on a mission at a time. At least she'd get to interact with her old recon coworkers when Section 8's impressive four fairies strong workforce got subpoenaed for letting a damn demon loose in front of a crowd of humans.

"Call Foaly," she hissed into her helmet's mic, gritting her teeth at the whirring of the comm on her wrist as it processed the request. Around her, the curtain rippled. Fumbling, she pulled the drapes closer around her and the demon, trying to shush him. "Call. Foaly."

Finally, the comm light glowed with a dim, green light. "Thank Frond, look, the demon just popped through the rift, and he's experiencing too much shock to manage a passable shield — can you knock out the lights or— or, I don't know, get some director to send out an announcement that there's going to be a fifteen minute delay before the curtain goes up?"

"My Gnommish is fairly good, Holly, but not that good. I'm going to have to ask for a repeat of that, I'm afraid," the voice crackled over the audio link, and Holly's stomach dropped as she heard one of the only versions of the fae tongue spoken with the slight lilt of an Irish accent.

"Artemis?" she slipped back into English, hesitating. Her grip on the curtain tightened. "Where's — nevermind. I found the demon. I need you to delay curtain-up."

"I beg your pardon? Holly, I have only my phone with me. I don't exactly have an app that can hack the electrical grid of Sicily. Ask Foaly-"

"Foaly is completely unreachable on my suit tech right now!" she groaned, waving the demon's hands away from the curtain. Faintly, she heard the sound of voices murmuring on the other side of the line.

Artemis' voice came back through on the line, his tone all business. "How fast can your suit fly with the weight of another person?"

Holly snorted. "Fast enough. I didn't think that the flyboy route of action is the, uh, most discreet way to get our friend out of here, though."

The tinny sound of a sigh rattled through the comm speakers. "True. However, it seems like you're stuck between a rock and a hard place here. I will say the building is old, though, and that works in your favor. Ironically enough, the signal from your suit's communication systems is almost enough on its own to make the CCTV footage from the cameras near the stairwell choppy. I'll try to jam it further, so please don't get caught up in worrying about found footage being the downfall of the People."

Pursing her lips, Holly steeled her nerves. Once she let go of the curtain, she needed to shoot straight out towards the stairwell — the less time it took, the better, and hopefully any techie that saw her unshielded passenger would blame it on the stress of the job. She opened the curtain a crack, thanking the fates that the demon had seemed to gone stock still once the initial adrenaline rush of having jumped dimensions wore off. Reaching blindly behind herself, she grasped the young imp's scaly arm.

"We're going to go somewhere a bit less crowded, is that alright?" she asked kindly, keeping her voice to a whisper.

"Erm, yes?" he squeaked out, his posture making him look like he was folding in on himself.

"In a moment I'm going to move us towards where we're going, and I'm sorry in advance about the speed. It's only going to be for a moment, though, okay?" she gave his wrist a slight squeeze, trying not to feel awkward. She nearly slumped in relief when he nodded haltingly, his expression unsure.

"Great, great. Hey, Artemis? How's the signal situation shaping up?" She tried, putting her hover-tech into the first stages of powering up.

"Ready."

Holly didn't need to wait for more. Twisting her body to scoop the imp up into her arms, she kicked up off the ground to launch herself out from the curtains.

The drapes fluttered behind her as she shot out, and Holly's vision zeroed in on the door to the stairwell in front of her. Contorting as she narrowly avoided one of the various humans bustling around backstage, she forced herself to ignore the sensory overload that was creeping up on her, what with the suffocating sound of the murmurs of the audience and the shadows cast throughout the poor lighting.

Her hand reached outward towards the handleset-style doorknob, pulling it open clumsily as she tried not to drop the demon in her arms. Thankfully, it gave, opening outwards.

She all but shoved the demon through the crack in the door before she slipped into the room with the old, stairwell, slamming the door shut behind her.

She winced. Holly could all but picture the lengthy list of charges that'd get lobbed at her when the council dealt with the disaster of the Hybras mission. Sool would have a field day with this.

Looking at the awkward heap into which the demon had collapsed, Holly pinched the bridge of her nose and forced herself to breathe deeply. He looked back up at her, his cat-like eyes glowing eerily in the dark.

"Hullo," he said simply, tilting his head to the side curiously.

"Hi," Holly forced herself to grin, the motion not quite reaching her eyes. They stared at one another in silence for a moment, the sounds of the hall bleeding through the thick wood of the door behind Holly.

"So," the imp tried, scratching the side of his chin shyly. "My name is Nº1. What do you like to be called?"

Chapter Text

A Nobel prize in the physics category for research on matter-antimatter asymmetry in the cosmos, specifically in the context of neutrino/antineutrino relations, was no small feat. Neither, for the matter, was the admirable accomplishment of being on the team that created Jython, an implementation of the Python programming language designed to run on the Java platform. With a resume long enough to represent ten men and an education from Cornell University, Dr. Pearson was your hardware guy, your software guy — your ‘go-to guy’ in general.

All of this over the course of a few decades. He’d assumed he was only at the beginning of his journey, and he was thus sorely surprised to find that 2002 would mark the zenith of his career. How soon he realized both that he was a modern Daedalus and that Jon Spiro would be the Icarus that would send them both careening into the sea.

Pearson paused in his work to take a sip of his lukewarm coffee.

Or would it be more accurate to say, he wondered, that he was Icarus — which, of course, would thus make Spiro the sun that cast him down from the heavens.

Jon Spiro was the sun, he decided, he was Icarus, and that… boy was the ocean that had damned them both. Pearson readjusted his glasses as he tapped away at his laptop, slightly shaking his head in annoyance as he did so — he was no good with metaphors. It was no matter, though. He would clean up any odd phrases or clunky language when he finally finished his autobiography. He was an American, after all — getting the chance to self publish a twee memoir was his God-given right.

He was torn from his thoughts when his phone rang. Dr. Pearson let it ring through once, allowing himself a small chuckle at the first few notes of Toccata & Fugue in D Minor that played over his speaker. It’s really the small joys in life, he grinned, finally accepting the call.

“Hello, Bill,” he said, leaning back in his leather chair. “I assume you’re calling to apologize for earlier, of course? I do hope the fact that your little boss’ project would be lost without my aid doesn’t weight too heavily on you.”

Pearson waited for Kong to snap at him for ribbing him, but the line was silent. He cleared his throat nervously, straightening in his seat despite the fact he was alone in his office. “Billy?”

“You were wrong, Pearson.”

Although he’d usually gripe about not being referred to his proper title, Dr. Pearson found that he suddenly had much more pertinent matters to worry about.

“W- how was I wrong? What are you talking about, Kong?”

“Whatever calculations you were bragging about earlier were full of shit. The demon never showed up.”

Pearson blanched. “My calculations were —? Excuse me, demons? What the hell are you talking about?”

He heard the faint sound of voices speaking Italian in the background. Billy let out a beleaguered sigh, the sound of him shifting his weight in his nice polyester suit crinkling over the receiver.

“It never appeared on stage,” Billy clarified, patience short. “Paradizo wants to see your math as soon as we get back. She wants to know if she was comparing her own conclusions to junk back when you said her prediction looked good.”

Pearson hesitated, chewing on the inside of his lip.

“ Pearson .”

Fiddling with his a pen, Pearson forced himself to swallow. “Sure. Of course.”

The line went dead.

Practically throwing it down on the desk, Pearson chucked his cell phone away as if it had scalded him. He needed to work quickly. Inhaling shakily, he pulled open his work program on his desktop’s screen.

Glancing at the faxed documents Paradizo had sent him, his eyes flickered between the pages on his desk and the glowing computer. He’d never forged his work in such a short amount of time before.

First time for everything, I guess, he thought, almost in hysterics.

After a moment, he got to work. The kid’s predictions came from three places: frequency of social media posts with similar keywords, power outrages that messed with electronic memory, and proximity to historical sites. She’d see his bullshit a mile away if he populated his working prediction model with the same variables as hers — that was out of the question. New stuff, new stuff, he screwed his eyes shut, keeping the phrase on his mind almost like a mantra.

“Uh… let’s try… mapping output to…,” he tapped the desk with the pen as he tried to think. “Time of day?”

He cursed. “ Stupid .”

He didn’t have time to make an entirely new set of variables. Pearson would have to settle for making up one — he’d keep the variables of social media keywords and spikes in surges of data loss. He had no more than an hour to reverse engineer a working explanation for why he’d been so confident in backing Paradizo’s calculations about whatever this weird event was that she was tracking. If she so much as suspected that he’d simply been a yes-man on this, she’d be livid. And if she was livid, he shuddered, Kong would be a damn hurricane of a man.

Wracking his brain, he attempted to find a common thread behind the phenomena. Time of day was out of the question, he snorted. The data points he’d been given when he’d started the project pointed to the events occurring with increasing frequency. 

Pearson’s eyes snapped open.

The moon.

He remembered that from his dream. The moon was always there.

Fingers tapping on the keyboard unsteadily, he pulled up each of the days Minerva had listed as being significant.

The phase wasn’t the same, he frowned. But then again, he wasn’t really expecting it to be. That wouldn’t produce the same exponential results Paradizo had generated. He scrolled through the news section of Bing, his computer humming softly.

October 21st, 2002: Orionid meteor shower. November 19th, 2002: Full Moon and Penumbral lunar eclipse. December 21st, 2002: Ursid meteor shower and December solstice. January 29th, 2003: Mercury at dichotomy. February 16th, 2003: Full Moon. March 24th, 2003: Moon at Last Quarter. April 7th, 2003: Close approach and conjunction of the Moon and Saturn. April 28th, 2003: Alpha-Scorpiid meteor shower, conjunction and close approach of the Moon and Venus.

And today — May 7th, 2003. Transit of Mercury.

Just out of curiosity, he typed in the next date he knew. May 15th.

Sure enough, there was going to be both a Full Moon and a total lunar eclipse.

He grinned. He could make a mountain out a molehill.

“There ain’t no faith like bad faith,” he muttered under his breath, not bothering to keep the glee out of his voice. His once frenzied tapping on the keyboard now relaxed into an almost musical clacking, and he hummed along as he worked.

The idea that the cosmos were also impacting these strange events that Paradizo was tracking sounded grand enough to be his dummy variable. It was easy enough to find some cosmological event occurring on the days he already knew that the event would happen — and, more importantly, the idea of outer space fitting into this little theory Minerva had sounded nice. Sounding nice was what mattered the most here.

At the end of the day, so what if he’d fumbled a prediction — he wasn’t always right, he reasoned. The odds he played were still far better than anyone else’s.

Billy Kong would get to meet this… demon, or whatever, soon. Pearson was sure of it. His luck was changing, he smiled at the 8-ball on his desk. Things were looking up for him these days.

Many, many years ago, Dr. Pearson had been known as Abe Pearson, and Abe Pearson had been hated.

Pearson knew why, of course. He’d been annoying. A certified dickhead, really. A bonafide know-it-all in a small town. He seemed to know almost everything, but one of the only things he could never figure out was why no one else was as good at figuring out the world as he was.

In elementary school, he’d made his friend Elisa cry when he mocked her for not knowing what she should have studied for the math final. He’d gotten 100%, whereas she’d received a low C-.

“I looked at the study guide, same as you!” she’d sniffed at him angrily, storming off to throw out her red-marked test.

He’d genuinely been flummoxed. He hadn’t even looked at the study guide — he just knew what he had to study and then, well, he’d studied.

In middle school, he’d pissed off a group of his friends when he spoiled the ending of The Empire Strikes Back. It’d been a week or so before it was due to be released — he’d bragged that his uncle had taken him to the Hollywood premiere as an early 13th birthday present.

The only uncle he had worked construction over in the Bronx.

He’d been right about the ending, though. For the rest of the year, he holed himself up in the corner of the library to study alone.

( Dreams, dreams, dreams )

In his junior year of high school, he’d dreamed that his house burned down. The image of curling smoke and licking flames was burned into his memory, and he felt that he could picture how it would feel to gasp for breath, only to choke on the blistering smog.

He ended up not having to imagine what it would feel like, as he woke to the sound of his smoke detector blaring and his mother screaming at him and his brother to get out of the house.

As he stood upon his lawn in the dewy grass, watching his childhood home crumble and burn, his eyes had been wide open.

That had been both the end of Abe Pearson and the birth of Pearson, just Pearson.

Pearson was the best thief the world had ever known, mainly because it was impossible for his victims to realize that they were being stolen from.

Ronald Miller wasn’t scheduled to get the idea that would make Jython work for at least another few weeks when Pearson had brought the idea up in a meeting. Óscar Wanchope and Claudia Ferrer wouldn’t have formed the team to investigate neutrinos and antimatter until at least 2008.

Could you interrogate the contents of a dream as being the proof of plagiarism? Could you prove that things might’ve gone differently had he held his hand and let the future run its course?

Dr . Pearson didn’t think so.

After all, sometimes he got things wrong. He’d lost money when he bet on the 1999 Superbowl. He was surprised when Y2K didn’t result in even a teeny bit of chaos.

… And he’d also failed to predict that Artemis Fowl would completely trounce Jon Spiro last year.

Dr. Pearson was by no means a proud man. A few failures in the grand scheme of things meant nothing . His day was yet to come, he knew it.

Minerva Paradizo would be the first stepping stone on a path back to glory.