User:Fairfieldfencer/Sonic Meets Artemis Fowl

Sonic Meets Artemis Fowl, or Artemis Fowl: The Future Chase, is a Sonic and Artemis Fowl fan-fic about Artemis Fowl in the Sonic universe. Copyright owned by SEGA, Sonic Team, Eoin Colfer, Puffin books, 4Kids Entertainment, Archie and Dic.

In the early years of the 21st century, teenage criminal mastermind Artemis Fowl is off another daring mission to find one of the greatest enemies of the Fairy people. With help from a close companion, this threat travels into the future where she uses her magic to be protected by newlyweds Princess Sally Acorn and Sonic the Hedgehog. With only three days to complete their mission, Artemis and his team of heroes are going to have to work fast to bring this criminal to justice and return with her back to the past. But what does she want that she can only find in the future? And why enlist the help of the heroic Mobians residing in New Mobotropolis? Read on to find the answers...

Author: Fair field fencer F F F

Prologue
Through the thousands of years the fairy people have lived and strived in the underground of the Earth, many events and individuals have threatend to wipe them out of existence. Among those who stand out among them all are Artemis Fowl, Irish millionaire and criminal mastermind, and Opal Koboi, a once genius pixie with an IQ over 300 capable of inventing many a spectacular creation.

Artemis was dropped as an enemy of the People, however, since his first interaction with them, and became a valuable ally for the seven decades after he first met Captain Holly Short of the LEPrecon unit. Opal Koboi, however, remained a constant threat to her fellow fairies all her life.

In her time, the pixie with the golden touch had founded her own company known as Koboi Laboratories and used her wealth to fund a goblin rebellion for the B'wa Kell, and had also managed to trap and kill the youngest commander in LEPrecon history and blamed Captain Holly Short for it. It was later revealed that five years before this she had captured rare animals by mesmerizing the leader of the Exstinctionists known as Damon Kronski to further her magical power by extracting their naturally magical fluids and injecting them into herself.

All these plans and schemes had been foiled by Artemis Fowl, and the many others she had employed have also been foiled by him with some exceptions. This particular tale tells the story of how she managed to travel far into the future after she escaped imprisonment with the help of a close friend of hers. One so close to her, in fact, that you'd think them one in the same...

Double Trouble
SPECIALLY CONSTRUCTED ISOLATION PRISON CUBE, MAXIMUM SECURITY PENITENTIARY, ATLANTIS, THE LOWER ELEMENTS

Opal was making yet another plea to shorten her sentence in her cell by writing a letter to a member of the council. She was very displeased with her last attempt when Wing Commander Vinyáya had said she would release her, but it turned out to be a wicked trick. She had added her name to her revenge list, which was just a bunch of names on a yellow piece of paper she took from the human world before her capture. There were several names on the list, with only one crossed out. That name was "Julius Root". The one person she had actually managed to get her vengeance on. But he would be far from the last if she had anything to say about it.

For the past three years she had been writing plea after plea to various members of the Fairy Council. During that time in between writing letters, she had been thinking. Forever thinking. Thinking about how she could escape. Thinking about new plans and schemes for when she was out. Thinking about new machines and technology that could regain her wealth. And most importantly, thinking about her enemies and how she would exact her revenge on them.

The members of the Fairy Council would be sure to go. Especially that Vinyáya. Then there was the technical genius, Foaly. Her school rival. She would have him dipped in the molten metal of his own creations. The dwarf called Mulch Diggums who had helped in toppling two of her plans for world conquest. She often fantasised of tying him up in Death Valley and watching his body fry in the sun due to dwarfs being extremely vulnerable to sunnlight and only having a burn time of a few minutes. Then there was that Holly Short with her pretty features that paled in comparison to Opal's own beauty. Oh how she loved the thought of her being thrown into a boiling pool of lava and watching her sink beneath the molten rock. And above all, that meddlesome Mud Boy, Artemis Fowl. He was the main factor in her plans failing. Opal could not even imagine a fate horrible enough to justify the human's interference in her grand plans.

Opal finished her letter and yawned. She was tired from being in this cell. The only contact from the outside world she had was when the prison guards informed her that it was time for her daily meals through an old fashioned intercom. Opal thought they must have spent so much money on the cell itself they only had enough left for the intercom instead of one of the more high-tech communicators. She went over to her rather uncomfortable bed. On the wall the bed was next to were drawings of sea horses painted in pink, strawberry-flavoured toothpaste. Then, a feminine voice came through the intercom on the cell's wall.

'Hello?' said the voice. It was strangely familiar to Opal. She could remember hearing it before, but could not attach a face to the voice.

'Hello?' said the voice again. 'Opal Koboi? Can you hear me?'

'Yes,' said Opal. 'Who are you?'

'That can wait. I have hacked into the mainframe here to contact you. I've got an ingenious plan to help you escape from here, and you won't have to do a thing in return.'

Opal almost laughed at this. 'I seriously doubt that. What do you want from me?'

'Nothing.'

'Do you honestly expect me to believe that? Nothing in the world is free.'

'This is. I will explain why when you escape. Here's the plan.'

Opal listened intently to the voice. Her plan was great, evil and sneaky, with just a touch of vengeance as well. Opal smiled when the voice finished telling her the plan. This girl was so evil, that they could have been related.

OPERATIONS' BOOTH, POLICE PLAZA, HAVEN, THE LOWER ELEMENTS

Haven's Police Plaza for the Lower Elements Police was currently on full alert. After Artemis Fowl and Captain Holly Short had returned from their trip eight years into the past three months earlier, they had brought with them the past version of Opal Koboi, the LEP's most wanted fairy.

Among those who were working hard on this catastrophe, none were working harder than Foaly, the LEP's technical consultant who was the main reason the humans had not discovered the existence of fairies. Despite all his genius and efforts, Foaly felt at a loss. Opal had managed to steal his own inventions installed in Holly Short's standard issue LEPrecon suit, and was using it to avoid detection from the centaur and every other officer under the world.

Foaly packed up his gear, stowed away his tinfoil hat that hid his brain waves from prying human intelligence agencies, headed out of the Operations' booth of Police Plaza and made his way to his personally made Hover Car.

Previously, fairies had travelled around in cars powered by Magnastrips on the roads of Haven, but Foaly, as usual, had come up with an even more efficient way of getting around that used less energy. Using magnets built into the bottom of the new Hover Cars, Foaly was able to make a magnetic field that made the cars float in the air by propelling them from the metal lying underneath the roads of Haven with a nuclear engine that moved it forward and allowed it to be turned. The magnets were extremely sensitive since the metal was underneath the roads, and many a fairy jock with one of the newer models with retractable roofs had been thrown out of his car due to stray coins being left on the road.

Foaly walked out of Police Plaza to the parking lot where he had left his fine invention, only to find the hood of it opened with missing engine parts. Someone had somehow managed to bypass the finger print activated start button for the car and had opened up the hood and stole some of the more essential engine parts. No doubt to sell them on the black market for a fine price.

Foaly stowed his shocked surprise and sighed at the sight of his beloved invention and walked over to get a closer look. Burn marks surrounded a melted hole where the finger print scanner had once been. The only answer Foaly's intellectual brain could think of was that goblins had somehow burned through the finger print scanner, and then hot-wired the car to open the hood. But that was impossible. Goblins barely had enough brain power to light a Glow Cube. Hot-wiring a Hover Car was way beyond their intellectual capacity.

He looked around to see if any of the goblins might still be around, but he instead saw a free taxi hovering nearby.

'Taxi! Taxi!' Foaly yelled out.

The cab pulled out to the side-walk and Foaly got in. He hated having to take taxis, or any car that had not been personally designed for a centaur. There wasn't any room for him to sit down, so he could only lean against the seats with both seat-belts strapped around him to keep his large horse body secure. One time he had to share a taxi with a dwarf who was coming home from a busy day in the tunnels and had forgot to release the air he swallowed while eating through all the clay in the mines. The taxi had flown over a coin on the road, and Foaly had bumped into the dwarf's stomach. It had taken Foaly a month to get the smell out of his lab coat, and the taxi driver several months before he could get another customer.

Foaly fastened the two seatbelts around his front and hindquarters, tried to get in the most comfortable position possible for him and then told the driver where he wanted to go.

'I swear things are getting worse around here,' said Foaly, making conversation with the taxi driver. Although her face was hidden, Foaly could tell the driver was a girl by the long hair sticking out of the back of her baseball cap and feminine hands on the wheel.

'Goblins have even worked up the nerve to steal car parts not two miles from Police Plaza,' continued Foaly. 'And they're getting smarter, if you can believe that.'

'Things can only get better and improve,' said the taxi driver. 'Look around. Who would have thought eight years ago that Haven would have such wonderful mechanisms and gadgets that there are today?'

'Oh, they are wonderful. I designed most of them. Pure genius. The Council should really be giving me a better budget for-' Foaly stopped mid-sentence after realising something. 'Eight years? Pretty odd number. People usually say ten or five. But you said eight. Something important happen eight years ago for you?'

'You never miss a trick, do you, Foaly?' said the taxi driver, and turned around to show her face. The face of the past Opal Koboi.

'Opal!?' exlaimed Foaly. 'What are you doing driving a cab? Insane-genius-bent-on-world-domination not paying the bills?'

Opal let out a shrill laugh like a harpie at the joke. 'You always did have a sharp wit about you, Foaly.'

While Opal was talking, Foaly was trying to open the door, but it was locked and the windows couldn't be wound down.

'Like my little taxi, Foaly? I modified it just for you,' said Opal in a dreamy little girl voice.

'Well if that's true, then you could have at least put in more comfortable seats,' said Foaly, irratably.

'Oh, but they are comforatble. Why, you could sleep like a baby on them,' said Opal, and pressed a button on a hidden control panel. A window came up from behind her seat, cutting off all access to the passenger section. Hidden gas pipes were then activated and a special knockout gas that, while non-lethal, would leave Foaly in a coma-like state for several months was emitted.

'Nighty night,' said Opal. Once the centaur had been knocked out cold, Opal dragged him from the taxi and dumped him on a side-walk, which was no small effort as the centaur weighed over twice her own weight.

'Phase One complete. Now on to Phase Two,' said Opal with a devious smile on her face as she drove off.

Back To The Past, Off To The Future
Foaly had been found not too long after by a couple of passing gnomes and was immediately sent to hospital.

The warlocks there determined that he had somehow gone into a deep coma and would be back round again in the next few months. But a few months was too late.

Someone had managed to penetrate Haven's virtual defences and was running havoc on all things electronic. Mobile phones began ringing at all times and when you answered them you were greeted by some rather unpleasant noises that were usually issued by dwarfs. ATM machines kept spitting out Monopoly money instead of genuine currency. And the less said about Haven's plumbing system the better. But if you really want to know, let's just say geysers have been spotted in people's water closets at rather inconvenient times. One unfortunate elf had been answering Mother Nature's call while reading the paper and shot straight through the roof when Old Faithful suddenly erupted from his bathroom's waterworks.

It was only time before more of the essential systems were hit, like the ones making sure that the Mud Men could not detect Haven and come down to exploit its resources.

The Fairy Council were desperately seeking a way to restore order in their city and bring calm back to the People. They had always depended on Foaly during times of technical crisis, and the centaur constantly boasted that he was the only one that kept Haven running, and they hadn't realised just how much truth there was to that until now.

Reasoning that desperate times called for desperate measures, the Council voted to make a deal with the only other person under the world who could help them, Opal Koboi. In exchange for restoring the city to normal, they would lift 200 years off her sentence.

Many of the Council members objected to this, but they quickly realised that they had no other option. So Opal would be led from her prison to Haven's Operations' Booth to fix the mess by a team of the highest ranking LEP officers there were. One of which had all too many encounters with Opal Koboi in the past...

MAXIMUM SECURITY PENITENTIARY, ATLANTIS

Captain Holly Short walked alongside the new members of LEPretreival One while Wing Commander Vinyáya led the group towards Opal's specially constructed isolation prison cube.

Many of the previous members of LEPretrieval One had been promoted to cushy desk jobs in the three years Holly had been away in Limbo, but there were one or two faces she recognised. Obviously, these fairies believed that they were not ready for desk jobs just yet, or possibly they loved the excitement of dangerous missions when above ground too much. Holly knew about being in that postion.

Three years ago she was up for the rank of major, the career turnaround of the century as she had previously been the only fairy in recon history to have two simaltaneous Internal Affairs investigations. For a while Holly intended on refusing the position, but her late superior Commander Julius Root, who had opted for her promotion, told her the same words his commander had told him, that this position as a major was not for her, but it was for the People. Holly then changed her mind about it and intended to accept the poisition, but then Opal Koboi escaped from the Argon Clinic and had the commander killed, and framed Holly for his murder and she quit once a new commander had been appointed to try and do good without the acorn lapels on her chest.

Then when she and Artemis Fowl had saved the demons on Hybras and Trouble Kelp was made commander during her three year leave, she rejoined the LEP. Then she went and broke a few major rules by going back in time to save Angeline Fowl from what appeared to be Spelltropy, but it turned out it was an Opal Koboi from eight years ago mimicking Spelltropy, who had used the fluids of magical and endangered animals to increase her powers. When Opal had learned of the time portal Artemis and Holly had used, she followed them back to the present and escaped arrest and being returned to her own time by the LEP.

Holly was then punished for this by receiving LEPtraffic duty for two weeks. It was supposed to be three months, but with another Opal on the loose, the LEP needed every available officer to help on the manhunt for her.

She couldn't believe the Council was actually willing to shorten her sentence, though, truth be told, it was logical. But just because it was logical didn't mean she thought it the best of choices.

The maximum security penitentiary was roughly as high-tech and security prone as Section 8 Headquarters had been on Holly's first visit. Foaly had personally constructed this wing and had updated it since the past Opal's escape.

As they walked along, security cameras and devices took pictures of all members of the group and their identities were confirmed at least fifty times before they made it to the end of the hall.

Wing Commander Vinyáya pressed her hand against a plate of liquid metal that Holly recognised as flux metal: Metal saturated with nano-sensors. The nano-sensors would read through everything from Wing Commander Vinyáya's handprint to DNA. It was so high-tech, that even is someone cut off the hand of someone who had access to Opal's cell and used it, the flux metal would detect a lack of pulse and fail to allow that person entry.

Opal's prison cube had been made by Foaly and Altantis's top mechanics, technicians and engineers. The cube was air-tight as it was surrounded by 600,000 gallons of water, which was roughly the same amount used in Olyimpc swimming pools. The cell had been given an air supply through a large air tank directly opposite the cube's airtight access tunnel. Pipes attached to the cell had been deemed too risky as pixies were nimble creatures and could possibly squeeze through large enough pipes, and they weren't taking any chances with Opal, so the idea of air pipes had been dropped altogether.

Wing Commander Vinyáya placed her hand on another flux metal scanner attached to a titanium door that seperated the cube from the access tunnel made entirely of glass and steel.

Opal sat there writing out another letter and was surrounded by seahorse figurines fashioned from chewed cardboard. Two of them appeared to be broken as one lost a tail and the other had been decapitated.

'Ah, Wing Commander, finally seen the truth of my words?' said Opal in a sweet, innocent little girl fashion.

'Stuff it, Koboi!' snapped Vinyáya.

'Oh, my dear Wing Commander. Are you still upset because I took away your precious Commander Root?'

Vinyáya kept her cool, but Holly noticed that her fists were kept clenched very tightly after this.

'Just... Get up and come with me,' said Vinyáya. 'I'm sure the exercise will do you some good.'

'What do you mean by that?' said Opal, looking genuinely concerned.

'Well, look at you. Your skin's not as smooth as it used to be and your lips look pretty dry. And, oh, I think I might actually see a few wrinkles coming up. The centuries are catching up with you, Opal dear.'

This had Opal rushing over to the glass that surrounded them to check her reflection and see if this was true. Holly swallowed a smile at the sight. Good old Vinyáya. Always hit them right where it hurt.

They walked out of the holding facility where they took an armoured car to the nearest shuttleport and took an LEP shuttle that would take them straight to Haven.

It was a really agonising trip. Opal kept on talking all the way through it about her marvelous inventions and how the efforts of Holly and Artemis Fowl were so feeble that only luck could have allowed them to succeed.

'How they infiltrated Koboi Labs was all because of that stupid dwarf!' Opal ranted. 'I always knew that those two dwarfs were not to be trusted, but dwarf help is hard to get. As for the Zito Probe, that was all the fault of those accursed Brill brothers. Such bumbling idiots. As for Fowl, he is no genius, he is but a mere Mud Boy who spends too much time with these computers and is nowhere near as brilliant as me. I have thought over everything in my plans hundreds of times, and none of the mistakes that caused them to fail were my fault! It was all because of some idiot who does not appreciate my genius, or my beauty!'

It occurred to Holly then that Opal must have been thinking about all these during her three years in prison. This pixie was losing her mind to obsession.

Once they arrived in Haven City, they took another armoured car to Police Plaza where the Operations' booth that controlled all the city's defences and networks.

Foaly had made it so that if anyone but he tried to use the booth it would automatically shut down, but he had left back-doors for emergencies such as this by installing a secret password that he entrusted to only his wife Caballine and one of his most gifted and trustworthy techies.

Wing Commander Vinyáya typed in the password and then stood over in a corner to observe Opal, but then her communicator went off with a message and her features flashed those of annoyance and concern.

'I'm needed back at headquarters,' she whispered to Holly.

By headquarters Holly realised she must have meant Section 8, an elite and secret branch of the LEP that used to track the activity of demons, but since their return, Section 8 had mainly been helping them rehabilitate and was now involving themselves in serious actions involving demons such as gangs planning to head to the surface and hunt down Mud Men.

'Qwan's gone into a fit because he can't find or contact Qweffor,' continued Vinyáya. 'It's probably nothing, but better safe than sorry.'

'Understood. I'll take care of Opal,' said Holly and Vinyáya left to catch a taxi.

Opal's fingers were a blur were at the main computer as they moved over its keyboard searching for bugs and potential leads to the hacker and creating ways to keep him out. Opal went through all the data-files she could and searched through reams and reams of code that was reflected in her large chocolate brown eyes.

'Captain Short, I have used one of the centaur's data-programs to search for the Internet Protocal address of your hacker,' said Opal. 'It seems to be coming from Fowl Manor.'

'What?' said Holly and rushed over to the console.

'I'm not finished, dear Holly,' said Opal in a mock sweet little girl tone. 'The IP address is being routed through Fowl Manor to leave a hopeless false trail. Why, I know of kindergarteners who could have figured that out.'

'Just button it and find out who this is!' Holly snapped.

Opal followed her orders and kept on searching and after about five minutes, a wide smile came across her face.

'It appears you have a traitor in your midst. The IP address leads me back here to Police Plaza, and I think I can pin it down to an exact location.'

Too shocked for words, Holly let Opal continue her work without passing comment. The idea of an LEP officer hacking into Haven's security system seemed preposterous, but people could be turned, and it was possible that past Opal might even have the poor fairy under the influence of the mesmer.

'I've pin-pointed the location,' said Opal. 'It says it's right here in the Operations' booth. Oh why, Captain Short, I do belive it's- ME!'

Opal surprised Holly by snatching her Neutrino 3000 and aiming at her. Holly had expected Opal to have over a dozen neutrino charges blasted at her well before this, but then she saw what had happened.

Out of thin air wearing full LEP gear, minus a helmet, was the past version of Opal from eight years ago. She had blasted LEPretrieval One's Neutrinos with bursts of lightning and they had either melted in their hands or short-circuted from the attack.

Holly immediately realised what the past Opal had done. She must have used the LEP suit's built-in computer and its additional feature of shielding support so that no security device or person would even notice her. She had infiltrated Police Plaza using the LEP's own technology!

'Ah, you must be the famous Captain Short I've heard so much about,' said the past Opal. 'For the past five years you have been a thorn in my future-self's side, and now I think I shall let her have the vengeace she deserves, and let you be killed with your own weapon.'

Present Opal switched the setting on the Neutrino 3000 up to level 10, or Crispy Charcoal as the guys in LEPrecon called it.

Opal fired pulled the trigger, but no shot came out.

'What!? Why doesn't it fire!?' Opal yelled.

'It won't work for you, Opal,' said Holly, trying to buy more time to formulate a plan. 'That's one of Foaly's Neutrino 3000s. It uses the unique magic in every fairy to make sure only the designated holder, in this case me, can fire it.'

'Arrrggghhhh!' Opal screamed at the top of her lungs. 'My vengeance! Snatched from me again by that infernal centaur!'

Fowl To The Future
Butler had alerted his sensei Madame Ko to his predicament during his three-year-wait for Artemis's return using the excuse that the years were catching up with him. She had recommended a routine of diet and exercise she'd learned from an old Tibetan man that would make Butler feel as if he were thirty years younger. The Tibetan man was currently 97 and was living in Jamaica for the tropical fruit. Every day he would climb up banana trees for food and would knock down coconuts and crack them open with his head for drink. His body was as youthful as that of a 20-year-old, but he often suffered from terrible headaches due to the coconuts. And asprin was hard to come by in the tropical islands.

Butler had stuck to this routine for the past three years. He hadn't felt so alive since Holly Short had saved him from a troll's attack using her healing magic. Right now, he felt as if he could take on a dozen trolls. Not necessarily in medieval armour though. Perhaps if he just had a really big machine gun.

'Complete genius, wouldn't you say, old friend?'

'Indeed, Artemis. It looks like we can now add Dr. Emmett J. Brown to your long list of aliases.'

Artemis On The Hunt
Butler put on a trench coat that, surprisingly, hid a vast amount of his bulky frame and a cloth cap atop his head.

'How do I look?' he asked.

'Like a tall Del Boy,' said Holly, barely concealing her fit of giggles.

'Thanks.'

Butler was out searching in the city of Soleanna for the next several hours, leaving his comrades to sit in the ship and develop cramp. It was worst for Mulch, who got up and walked around every few minutes in fear that his lower half would get numb, and when you're a dwarf in the tunneling business, a numb bottom could prove fatal during mining "procedures".

Butler jumped on to a particularly large boat with dancing girls on to catch up, and startled many of them but they did not let screams out as to alert the authorities.

'Never a gondola around when you need one,' said Butler, matter-of-factly, and jumped off the opposite end of the boat and on to left side of the canal.

Crashing The Casino
'I am Mammoth Mogul, manager and owner of this establishment. Do tell to as to your own identity?'

'Henry Adrian S. Wahl. Or H. Adrian S. Wahl as I'm often credited.' Artemis had used this alias several times to deliver papers in various archaeological magazines. Most recently he had submitted a lecture on Egyptian hieroglyphics to The Trowel regarding their origins.

Shadow and Rouge followed the princess inside without a problem, but Omega was too big to get through the door.

'Oh, sorry, Omega. We made the entrances smaller so that Mobians could get in, but not any of Eggman's robots,' explained Sally.

'You really are taking every precaution,' noted Rouge. 'Making the doors small. You must have been thinking of everything that Eggman could dish out.'

'I have. But once we've finished here, a small door will be the last thing that amazes you. Come on, you two.'

'Hang on,' said Shadow in his usual grumpy demeanor. 'Omega, please give me your arm,' the hedgehog instructed, clutching Omega's arm by the thin part attaching the arm to Omega's shoulder. The arm was then released with a pneumatic hiss and Shadow caught it in his hand before it dropped to the floor.

'Omega's arms can be detached from his body,' Shadow explained, a touch unnecessarily. 'You can then carry the arms around as your own personal weapons. If you have the strength, of course. You just twist the spikes on the wrist to switch between weapons and to fire.'

An Opal For An Emerald
Butler then walked up to him and bumped into the Crocodile with his shoulder.

'Why don't you watch where you're going?' Butler yelled.

'Hey, you're the one that bumped into me, Gramps!' said Vector.

'You're the one that bumped into me, you over-grown handbag!'

'Watch it, buddy, or I'll put your head between my jaws and bite down. Hard!'

'Oh! Does the Croc' with the big mouth want a fight?' Butler was getting Vector so worked up that Foaly would have been proud had he been there to witness it.

'That's it! You're going down, pal!'

'OK. I always did want to Crocodile Wrestle,' said Butler and removed his trench coat, revealing a chest rivaling Mammoth Mogul's. 'Come on, scale-face. My sister's birthday's coming up, and I want to give her a pair of Crocodile-skin shoes as a present.'

Vector had had enough, and charged at Butler, as did the Eurasian so that they were soon locked in a battle of strength. Each trying to overpower the other. Soon there were Mobians, Overlanders and Humans of all kinds placing bets on the Crocodile and manservant for who would win. A couple of "Mes Braves" Battalion soldiers saw all the commotion and considered stopping it, but who was going to get in the way of an over two-metre tall Human and a near six-foot Crocodile who both had chests roughly the size of houses?

Omnipitent Opal
Dr. Eggman sat in his laboratory of his Eggdome with Opal, looking over the new robot just manufactured. Its skinny body was covered from top to bottom in white and black armour, and had a head shaped like a frisbee with a single optic eye. Its armaments consisted of a missile launcher on one arm and a machine gun on the other with a jet engine in its back for hovering. Eggman couldn't help but admire the handiwork and great craftsmanship of the design, and this was only one of four models.

'I must say, Miss Koboi, these new modifications to my Egg Gunner designs are brilliant. And you made the perfect models for my Egg Rollers idea in no time at all. You're an evil genius after my own heart. And I must also thank you for your contribution to my little side-project,' said Eggman.

'The new design is rather splendid, not to mention the SCR-GPs, or "Egg Rollers" as you call them. And Operation: Eggstermination seems rather promising also. But there's no chance of it working unless you get the other necessities,' said Opal while filing her nails.

'Don't you worry about them. My Egg Cruiser will soon be ready and I can collect the Destructicite crystals from Mobius's asteroid belt. With them, Operation: Eggstermination can't fail. The Eggman Empire will be all powerful again, and I shall rule it all from right here in Metropolis. I think I shall destroy one of the continents when that happens, build a new glorious vast city from the ashes and christen it Egg Capital as a gift for myself. Or better yet, ha ha ha, pave over the entire world and turn it into the Egg Planet. My own glorious world with an all-powerful army of robots serving my every whim with that Hedgehog behind bars, living for the sole purpose of giving me entertainment by being tortured or humiliated whenever world domination starts to get boring.'

Opal smiled an evil smile at the Doctor's view of the future. He may be deranged, but his ideas and future schemes were so deliciously good that she herself could have thought of them. And when she got back to her world and conquered it, she would make it seem that she did think of them.

Snively took that moment to walk in and deliver some news to his adoptive uncle.

'Sir, satellites show that something is heading towards Metropolis at high speed. It must be the Hedgehog and his friends, sir.'

'Now, now, incompetent lackey,' said Opal in a voice as if talking to a disobedient child. 'It is ma'am and sir now that I am here with your uncle.'

'Ooh... I'd like to give you such a whack you witch!' muttered Snively to himself as he walked away.

'What was that!?' said Opal, furious.

'I said "I think on my back, there's an itch",' said Snively and proceeded to try and scratch himself in a place he'd never been able to reach.

'Long time no see, rodent! What do you think of these brilliant new robots Miss Koboi designed?' Eggman asked. 'Their inner-workings are absolutely spectacular! Their armour is made of a newly discovered metal found by my grand empire known as Eggamantium, the strongest metal on Mobius. And let's not forget the best part about these babies; They have such great computing and battle situation protocols that they make your wife's NICOLE look like a pocket calculator. They're smart, smart enough to out-think you and your little band of renegades with the utmost precision, Sonic.'

Butler fired a few charges from his Neutrino 2000 on the nearest Egg Gunner, and it began to spark upon impact as the charge made its way through the robot's body and fried all its inner circutry.

Apparently, Butler thought, Eggamantium conducts neutrino charges. Perhaps my luck is changing. Then another Egg Gunner launched a rocket that was aimed for Butler's legs, but it hit the floor just as Butler moved out of the way and he was flung from his feet by the force of the explosion. Nope. Still bad as ever.

'Allow me to introduce myself. I am Artemis Fowl II, former criminal mastermind and a being who shall haunt your worst and darkest nightmares for years to come,' said Artemis, and went into a small bow while simaltaneously giving Eggman his best vampire-like smile.

Fowl And The Future Saviours
'Butler here is my bodyguard. The Butlers have been protecting the Fowl family for centuries. All members of his family are either bodyguards or assassins.'

'Well, almost all, Artemis,' corrected Butler. 'My sister Juliet is a wrestler and I also have a cousin in America who is an artist who draws comic books for a living. My, it's been a long time since I last saw old Steven,' muttered Butler under his breath before drawing out of his past memories and back to the present.

Murder Most Fowl
'How are we supposed to bring her back to the past, Artemis? I just don't see it.'

'Since when have you been one for giving up?'

'I've never been, but the odds haven't been like this before. We're going up against a power-mad dictator who controls most of the planet with legions of robots armed to the teeth. It's just impossible.'

'Holly, look at what we've got on our side. We've got a red Echidna with herculean strength, a cowboy cyborg rabbit, a floating head in a crystal ball, an alien Hedgehog hybrid, a voluptuous thieving bat, a two-tailed genius Fox, a royal Squirrel tactician, and a speedy blue Hedgehog who's had such an active love life that his theme song should be Mambo No. 5. With many more ridiculous exceptions. How can we possibly lose?'

Holly actually laughed at this. 'I like this new sense of humour of yours. It makes you seem more... normal.'

'Normal? I don't think that word has ever been associated with me before.'

'D'Arvit!' exclaimed Holly.

'Is there really any need for such language, Hol- D'Aaaaarviiiiit!' said Artemis, once he saw what Holly had seen.

Dialogue
'I HATE THAT HEDGEHOG!'

'AND I HATE THAT HUMAN!'