The Artemis Fowl Files - Eoin Colfer [9]
It was a simple plan. But extremely clever. If the commander found Holly, it would seem as though she were setting herself up for an ambush. Just not a very good one. The second he showed himself, Unix and Bobb could nail him with rifle fire.
There must be some way to warn the commander without endangering Trouble. Holly chewed it over. Use what nature provides. Nature was providing plenty, but unfortunately she couldn’t reach any of it. If she even tried, then Bobb and Unix would stun her with a low-level charge, without having to alter the basic structure of their plan. There was nothing much on her own person either. Unix had searched her from head to toe, even confiscating the digi-pen so she couldn’t try to use it as a weapon. The only thing they missed was the wafer-thin computer on her wrist, which was shorted out anyway.
Holly lowered her arm behind the rock, peeling back the Velcro patch that protected her computer from the elements. She flipped the tiny instrument over. It seemed as though hydrogel had seeped into the seal, shorting out the electrics. She slid off the battery panel, checking the circuit board inside. A tiny drop of gel was sitting on the board, straddling several switches, making connections where there shouldn’t be any. Holly plucked a blade of coarse grass, using it to scoop up the drop. In less than a minute the remaining film of gel had evaporated and the tiny computer hummed into action. Holly quickly blacked out the panel on her chest, so Bobb and Unix wouldn’t spot the flashing cursor.
So, now she had a computer. If she only had her helmet, she could send the commander an e-mail. As it was, all she could do was run some text across her chest.
CHAPTER 4: BROTHERS WITH ARMS
Tern Mór, Northern Peninsula
JULIUS Root was surprised to find that he was breathing hard. There was a time when he could have run all day without breaking a sweat, and now his heart was battering his ribcage after a mere two-mile jog. He had parked the shuttle on a foggy cliff top on the island’s northern peak. Of course, the fog was artificial, generated by a compressor bolted onto the shuttle’s exhaust. The shuttle’s projection shield was still in operation, the fog was merely a backup.
Root ran low, bent almost double. A hunter’s run. As he moved he felt the primal joy that only surface air could bring. The sea crashed on all sides; an everpresent behemoth, a reminder of Earth’s power. Commander Julius Root was never happier than when he was on the hunt aboveground. Strictly speaking, he could have delegated these initiations, but he wouldn’t give up these excursions until the first rookie beat him. It hadn’t happened yet.
Nearly two hours later the commander paused, taking a deep swallow from a canteen. This hunt would have been much easier with a pair of mechanical wings, but in the name of fair play he had left the wings on their rack in the shuttle. He would not have anyone claim that he had beaten them with superior equipment.
Root had searched all the obvious sites, and had yet to find Corporal Short. Holly had not been on the beach, or in the old quarry. Neither had she been perched in a treetop in the evergreen wood. Perhaps she was smarter than the average cadet. She would need to be. For a female to survive in Recon, she would have to rise above a lot of suspicion and prejudice. Not that the commander was tempted to cut her any slack. He would treat her with the same brash disdain that all his subordinates got. Until they earned something better.
Root continued his search, senses alert to any change in his surroundings that could indicate he himself was being tracked. The two hundred or so species of birds that nested on Tern Mór’s crags were unusually active. Gulls screeched at him from overhead, crows followed his movements, and Julius even spotted an eagle spying at him from the heavens. All this noise made it more