A/N: Hello everyone, this would be my first fanfic, so comment lots but don't flame too much, my ego is a very delicate item P. OK I dont see a way Colfer will write a romance into his books, but that aside I like writing romance and I have a feeling that that failing may well enter this fic, so apologies if you don't agree with it. Please read and review anyway as I make excuses for my vainly romantic nature.

Disclaimer: The characters belong entirely to Eoin Colfer, I have simply stolen them. I write in honour of his genius …. You kidding? My writing is more of an insult. Nah, I write because the characters are so good and I can't wait for the next book.

Anyway… long enough I think.

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An Apartement, Haven City, The Lower Elements

Miss Holly Short lay in bed staring at the ceiling. There definitely were perks to being your own manager and working hours was one of the biggies. Holly Short never really had liked mornings. It must be about 11 now and no screaming Root to point out that she had effectively missed an entire shift in the previous week because of her tardiness and disrespect for LEP procedure. No Root at all. Holly's half smile twisted as she struggled to fight the heaving emotions inside her. He had been dead for nearly a year now and she still hadn't really got over it. Of course being accused of murder didn't really help clear the air.

It had been Opal Koboi who had murdered the commander and threatened to destroy all of fairy life. Opal Koboi had duped them all and set out on her revenge framing Holly, attempted to assassinate the humans who had helped in her previous defeat, and then leading the MudPeople straight to Haven in a large mass of molten iron. Opal Koboi was now rotting in maximum security, Howler's Peak - Foaly had arranged Holly a private visit. Normally goblin prisons weren't the top of the list for pixie criminals, but no one was going to take any more chances with Koboi. Not that she could actually do anything now, the HGH she had inserted into her body truly had turned her into a human and a 5 foot 9 creature was fairly easy to spot, considering the average height was only a meter. Being stripped of magic and money (although it had taken Foaly several months to find all her accounts), she was now virtually powerless and instantly recognisable as Public Enemy No.1.

The LEP had lost too much to take risks with this pixie, which was probably just as well, seeing as the only beings ever to face Opal and win were either dead or working in Short and Diggums Private Investigators. There was no way anyone would give Foaly another chance to brag, the paranoid equine was quite egocentric enough as it was, another victory over Koboi and his head would, almost literally, be the death of him. And that aside, some of the more observent fairies were harboring disguised doubts over the exact location of his loyalties. Well one observant fairy, but then again, Trouble Kelp wasn't really too sure of Commander Sool himself.

11.10 What time had the centaur arranged to meet her for lunch? If she got up now she could be certain of her punctuality. But since when had Holly ever been punctual? Anyway, if she was too early Foaly might begin to think she actually enjoyed the work he brought her, and then where would she be. Holly turned over, thinking through the latest case. A pettie disagreement between some elves and sprites had quickly escalated into 2 attacks and abduction, and for a variety of reasons those involved had no wish to include the Lower Elements Police in the fun. Holly laughed. Since Sool had become commander she and Mulch had had almost twice as many contracts as the LEP had cases and she got paid. She had also helped Foaly out on many occasions, but that was just a service to a friend. And anyway how else could she pay for the equipment and information he supplied her with?

Now why would the owners of a prosperous elfin holiday company start a fight with a new, untested electronics company, exchange insults and then proceed to kidnap the daughter of the manager. It didn't make sense. Well she could ask Foaly about it over lunch.

A series of shrill "beeps" sounded across her room. Irritably Holly sat up, disentangled herself from her sheets and stumbled across the room to her computer. Who would want to talk to her now? Well actually several people now, considering the time.

"Unknown Caller – Audio and Video feed."

Holly accepted the call and turned to drag a chair over.

"Good evening Holly. I hope I find you tolerably well."

Holly swung around to see the screen barely managing to conceal her astonishment. The vampire like features of none other than Artemis Fowl faced her in the screen. The last member of Short and Diggums had finally managed to achieve the impossible.

"What…. How… you have some explaining to do Fowl!"

Holly spluttered - in a remarkably similar way to Commander Root but she wasn't to know that. Sool had ordered Foaly to monitor all Fowl's communications and was checking the results personally. It was only the fairy communicator which had allowed the to talk but that only worked one way. She had warned Artemis of this, and now he had successfully (it seemed) managed to bypass all Foaly's surveillance equipment. The centaur would not be happy with this

"Artemis… you know that Foaly is monitoring all you're communications. If you're caught… well my reputation is out. Sool will stop at nothing."

"Holly, calm down and let me explain. I had inserted the communicator into one of my computers, believe me it took some time to work out the rewiring for a wireless device, but I managed it. I then used a school account and sent Foaly a virus. No not like that."

Artemis had obviously seen Holly's expression; hardly surprising seeing as he also had video feed.

"I sent several random e-mails mentioning the People, Foaly, you said, had been ordered to pick up on these. They were harmless enough, but once intercepted they allowed me to send a follow up virus, which blocks all communications from me to any Lower Elements device. Perfect really. Your number is plastered over almost every news site under the Earth, did you know that?"

"So you are saying" continued Holly, trying to understand, "that you have hacked into Foaly's system with spam to random e-mail addresses and using LEP safety precautions against humans to do so." Holly almost laughed. "And yes I was aware of it."

"I'm glad you approve. The amusing thing is that, I have hidden the virus in the computer data base of previously found viruses. The only place that wont be scanned hourly for any form of bug."

Now Artemis' smug smile was becoming unbearable, being a genius didn't always make you friends as Foaly knew well. Of course when you did make friends you tended to keep them – geniuses couldn't afford to be fickle.

"Ok, Mudboy, I get the picture… very clever, some day I shall tell Foaly just to see his face. Well what did you want?"

"When you tell Foaly, please video it and send the footage to me. And I still have a name, even if I do annoy you."

Artemis grinned as Holly fumed silently, she was actually more like the commander than she realised, but no one would tell her that, his memory hurt her too much.

"Anyway" he continued, "I have a slight problem, some fool has decided to e-mail me with a proposition for a hostage payment of £1000000 in gold."

"I presume you do not actually have the hostage?" Holly could never forget the success he had with her kidnap and ransom.

"No I do not! I thought you trusted me… The thing is, the message is written in Gnomish."

Holly's retort died on her lips.

"I think Foaly is going to have to find out about your virus sooner than expected, we need help. Mail me a copy of the demand, an exact one, I'll take it with me today when I see him for lunch. This is serious."

"I know it's serious. Why do you think I asked you? I must go now, this is taking a large amount of power, and I'd rather not have to explain to Father why there are abnormal power surges in the middle of the night originating from my computer. Goodbye"

"Goodbye Artemis"

The connection went dead. Holly sighed and rubber her temples. 11.45 she really should get going. A cool shower and a fresh set of moisturiser on her ears, they were peeling so much at the moment, most likely due to stress, would wake her up and put her on the ball so to speak. She stood up and saw the mirror.

"D'Arvit, is that how bad I look." She thought, then wondered why she actually cared.

15 minutes later she had picked up the ransom offer, and was jogging into the city centre to meet with a certain genius centaur. This wasn't going to be easy. But then, nothing fun ever was.