Holly’s ears. The B’wa Kell was trading with the Mud People. Humans and goblins working together to reactivate outlawed weapons. And if the weapons were here, how long could it be before the Mud People followed?
Help arrived just after the nick of time. In thirty minutes there were so many halogen spotlights buzzing around E37 that it looked like a GolemWorld movie premiere.
Foaly was down on his knees examining the unconscious goblin by the escalator. The centaur was the main reason that humans hadn’t yet discovered the People’s underground lairs. A technical genius, who had pioneered every major development from flare prediction to mind-wiping technology, every discovery made him less respectful and more annoying. But rumour had it that he had a soft spot for a certain female Recon officer.
Actually, the only female Recon officer.
‘Good job, Holly,’ he said, rubbing the goblin’s reflective suit. ‘You just had a firefight with a kebab.’
‘That’s it, Foaly, draw attention away from the fact that the B’wa Kell foxed your sensors.’
Foaly tried on one of the helmets. ‘Not the B’wa Kell. No way. Too dumb. Goblins just don’t have the cranial capacity. These are human manufacture.’
Holly snorted. ‘And how do you know that? Recognize the stitching?’
‘Nope,’ replied Foaly, tossing the helmet to Holly.
Holly read the label. ‘Made in Germany.’
‘I’d guess that this is a fire suit. The material keeps the heat out as well as in. This is serious, Holly. We’re not talking a couple of designer shirts and a case of chocolate bars here. Some human is doing some serious smuggling with the B’wa Kell.’
Foaly stepped out of the way to allow the technical crew access to their prisoner. The techies would tag the unconscious goblin with a subcutaneous sleeper. The sleeper contained microcapsules of a sedative agent and a tiny detonator. Once tagged, a criminal could be knocked out by computer if the LEP realized he was involved in an illegal situation.
‘You know who’s probably behind this, don’t you?’ said Holly.
Foaly rolled his eyes. ‘Oh, let me guess. Captain Short’s arch-enemy, Master Artemis Fowl.’
‘Well, who else could it be?’
‘Take your pick. The People have been in contact with thousands of Mud Men over the years.’
‘Is that so?’ retorted Holly. ‘And how many that haven’t been mind-wiped?’
Foaly pretended to think about it, adjusting the foil hat jammed on his head to deflect any brain-probing signals that could be focused his way.
‘Three,’ he muttered eventually.
‘Pardon?’
‘Three, OK?’
‘Exactly. Fowl and his pet gorillas. Artemis is behind this. Mark my words.’
‘You’d just love that to be the case now, wouldn’t you? You’d finally have the chance to get your own back. You do remember what happened the last time the LEP went up against Artemis Fowl?’
‘I remember. But that was last time.’
Foaly smirked. ‘I would remind you that he’ll be thirteen now.’
Holly’s hand dropped to her buzz baton. ‘I don’t care how old he is. One zap with this and he’ll be sleeping like a baby.’
Foaly nodded towards the entrance. ‘I’d save my charges if I were you. You’re going to need them.’
Holly followed his gaze. Commander Julius Root was sweeping across the secured zone. The more he saw, the redder his face grew, hence the nickname, Beetroot.
‘Commander,’ began Holly. ‘You need to see this.’
Root’s gaze silenced her. ‘What were you thinking?’
‘Pardon me, sir?’
‘Don’t give me that. I was in Ops for the whole thing. I was watching the video feed from your helmet.’
‘Oh.’
‘Oh hardly covers it, Captain!’ Root’s buzz-cut grey hair was quivering with emotion. ‘This was supposed to be a surveillance mission. There were several back-up squads sitting on their well-trained behinds only waiting for you to call. But no, Captain Short decides to take on the B’wa Kell on her own.’
‘I had a man down, sir. There was no choice.’
‘What was Verbil doing^out there anyway?’
For the first time, Holly’s gaze dropped. ‘I sent him out to do a thermal, sir. Just following regulations.’
Root nodded. ‘I’ve talked to the paramedic warlock. Verbil will be OK, but his flying days are over. There’ll be a tribunal, of course.’
‘Yes, sir. Understood.’
‘A formality, I’m sure, but you know the Council.’
Holly knew the Council all too well. She would be the first LEP officer in history to be the subject of two simultaneous investigations.
‘So what’s this I hear about a Class A?’
All contraband was classed. Class A was code for dangerous human technology. Power sources, for instance.
‘This way, sir.’
Holly led them to the rear of the maintenance area, to the shuttle bay itself, where a restricted-access perspex dome had been erected. She pressed through the frosted flaps.
‘You see. This is serious.’
Root studied the evidence. In the shuttle’s cargo bay were crates of AAA batteries. Holly selected a pack.
‘Pencil batteries,’ she said. ‘A common human power source. Crude, inefficient and an environmental disaster. Twelve crates of them right here.
Who knows how many are in the tunnels already.’
Root was unimpressed. ‘Forgive me for not quaking in my boots. So a few goblins get to play human video games. So what?’
Foaly had spotted the goblin’s Softnose laser. ‘Oh no!’ he said, checking the weapon.
‘Exactly,’ agreed Holly.
The commander did not appreciate being left out of the conversation.
‘Oh no? I hope you’re being melodramatic.’
‘No, chief,’ replied the centaur, sombre for once. ‘This is deadly serious.
The B’wa Kell is using human batteries to power the old Softnose lasers.
They’d only get about six shots per battery. But you give every goblin a pocketful of power cells, and that’s a lot of shots.’
‘Softnose lasers? They were outlawed decades ago. Weren’t they all recycled?’
Foaly nodded. ‘Supposedly. My division supervised the meltdowns. Not that we considered it priority. They were originally powered by a single solar cell, with a life of less than a decade. Obviously somebody managed to sneak a few out of the recycling lock-up.’
‘Quite a few by the look of all these batteries. That’s the last thing I need, goblins with Softnoses.’
The theory behind the Softnose technique involved placing an inhibitor on the blaster, which allowed the laser to travel at slower speeds so that it actually penetrated the target. Initially developed for mining purposes, they were quickly adapted by some greedy weapons manufacturer.
The Softnoses were just as quickly outlawed, for the obvious reason that these weapons were designed to kill and not incapacitate. Now and then one found its way into the hands of a gang member. But this did not look like small-scale, black-market trading. This looked like somebody was planning something big.
‘You know what the worrying thing about this is?’ said Foaly.
‘No,’ said Root, with deceptive calmness. ‘Do tell me what the worrying thing is.’
Foaly turned the gun around. ‘The way this weapon has been adapted to take a human battery. Very clever. There’s no way a goblin figured this out on his own.’
‘But why adapt the Softnoses?’ asked the commander. ‘Why not just use the old solar cells?’
