Chapter 1: The Beginning
Artemis once again surveyed the room, pleased with the unfolding of events. He had gathered all of his friends in the sitting room of Fowl Manor for his big unveiling, but he had told no one what it was. Holly Short and Juliet Butler were talking animatedly about the latest human and fairy trends. Artemis chuckled mentally; he had often thought that being around so many men would dampen Holly’s chance of “living a real girl’s life”, as Juliet would put it. His bodyguard and oldest friend, Butler, was absently cleaning his trademark Sig Sauer in the corner of the room. Mulch Diggums the dwarf was setting a very bad example, unhinging his jaw and throwing random foods in, while the demon N°1 egged him on. His twin brothers, Myles and Beckett, were drawing with crayons on the table. Myles was an exceptional artist; even at the age of five, he had faithfully rendered what appeared to be a crackling bonfire. Foaly the centaur was talking to himself, muttering incessantly about new wings and jotting things down on a clipboard. He had brought with him a human named Connor, who had apparently been digging a well in an old Haitian village when he’d stumbled on an LEP weapons cache. He somehow managed to prove to Vinyaya and Trouble Kelp he wasn’t a threat to fairy society, and that he wouldn’t speak a word of it to anyone who didn’t know. (Let me just say it right now: You know I had to add an OC to this story. The mandates of heaven state that any My Little Pony fanfiction that aspires to be great must have an OC character.)
Connor sat down next to Artemis with a sigh and stared up at the enormous LCD flat-screen television mounted on the wall. An admittedly attractive young woman was arguing with a policeman on BBC.
“Puberty’s a bitch, Artemis,” he said, taking a long draught of coffee from a mug. Artemis chuckled.
“That it is, my friend. That it is.” His gaze almost instinctively drifted to Holly, settling on her heterochromatic eyes. Eyes that matched his exactly. After a few seconds, he snapped out of his trance and returned to watching the drama, but Connor had noticed. He grinned and started to speak, but Artemis cut him off.
“If you tell anyone, I will make sure your entrails are hanging from a California redwood, so high up only the vultures could reach them.” His smile widened.
“All I wanted to know was whether you liked her or not, and I just got an answer.” He blocked a hasty swipe from Artemis, who sighed.
“I guess I did set myself up for that one.” Artemis got up and circled around to Foaly, who was now scribbling on his papers with incredible speed. “Foaly, I believe it’s time we start.” Foaly looked up from his notes.
“Alright, Artemis, but I’m warning you: nothing good will come out of this.”
“I know, but what’s the point if there wasn’t any risk?” Artemis retorted, settling his nerves. By now, the room was completely silent; even Myles and Beckett has stopped drawing to listen.
“I know you’re wondering why I gathered you here today.” Connor immediately facepalmed.
“Artemis, if you say any more cheesy crap, so help me God…” his free hand curled into a fist. Artemis grimaced.
“Alright, I get it,” he said quickly, waving down the teenager. “Anyway, Foaly and I have finally finished developing something that will put even N°1’s magic to shame.” The demon in question raised an eyebrow but didn’t respond. He nodded to Foaly, who pressed a button on a small fob watch. With a smooth grinding sound, an archway appeared in the room.
The curved steel was navy blue and shaped like an omega. Soft greenish light pulsated from inside it; a signature form of demon and fairy magic mixing.
“As you can see, Foaly and I have built a device that, when activated, will rip open the boundaries in the space time continuum and allow us to access other universes,” Artemis explained to the bewildered audience. Connor raised a hand.
“By that, do you mean parallel universes, or just shattering the boundaries into a random dimension?” he asked.
“I truthfully don’t know,” Artemis admitted. “But I do know that if we have four or more magical beings transported at once, we can have some semblance of control over the destination.”
“But there are only four magical creatures in the room,” Holly pointed out. “Me, Mulch, Foaly, and N. Foaly will need to stay behind to watch for our return, so who’s up?”
Artemis cursed himself silently. “Well,” he admitted sheepishly, “I may or may not have stolen just a little bit of magic in the time stream.”
“What?!” Holly shouted, knocking over the coffee table. “Artemis, you could’ve gotten yourself killed!”
“She’s right,” N said gravely. “As a human, your body isn’t used to magic, even after spending a few years with Holly and Foaly. The magic could have just as easily backfired and burned you to dust as it could have accepted you.”
“I personally don’t see the problem here,” Connor said. “The magic has already accepted him; he’s tried mesmerizing me a few times already. What’s in the past is in the past.”
“Thank you, Connor,” Artemis said. He gestured to the archway. “Now, anyone who wants to try it, follow.” Artemis stepped into the archway. Connor jumped up to follow, as did Butler. The fairy people followed suit. As Foaly prepared the archway for activation, Artemis saw Connor jump out of the gate out of the corner of his eye. He dashed over to the couch, quickly kissed Juliet on the mouth, and ran back. Juliet looked torn between anger and a dreamy smile, while Butler had the look in his eye that told people anyone in the vicinity would be in pain.
“He’s got guts,” Artemis muttered. “He may be an idiot, but he’s got guts.” He turned to a tap on his shoulder. Holly was looking at him, a smirk on her face.
“Damn right he does,” she said. “Oh, how do we control this thing, Artemis?”
“Just focus on civilization and sentient life for now.”
“Got it.” She looked away again, and Artemis turned his gaze onto Connor. In the light of the now shimmering arch, he looked ethereal. “You are a fool, you know that?”
“Oh, I know,” Connor said, dismissing it with the wave of a hand. “I’ve been dying to get that off my chest, though, and it’s good to see Butler actually show some emotion for once.” Artemis chuckled as Foaly pulled the final switch. He saluted Holly, Artemis and Butler.
“Stay safe, you three,” he said. He then leaned over and whispered something into Holly’s ear. She turned bright red.
“You twisted little donkey!” she said, swinging at him. Before her punch could connect, the room faded away, and Artemis blacked out.
Artemis the Manticore Slayer
Chapter 2: Artemis the Manticore Slayer
Artemis pulled himself from unconsciousness, his old habits of observation surfacing as he took in everything in a single glance. They had appeared in some sort of ominous forest. He looked around again and noticed Holly and Butler slowly awakening. N°1 was already up and about, weaving a temporary campsite out of thin air. Artemis grabbed a small cube from his pocket and pressed a button. The box immediately elongated to form a chest about three feet deep. He opened the box and pulled a bundle of logs out. He tossed them to N°1.
“Can you light those?” he asked, contemplating the evening light that streamed through the tree cover. N nodded and hurriedly made a campfire. Artemis waited for Holly and Butler to awaken.
“Ugh… where are we?” Holly asked. Artemis took a good look at her and gasped. She seemed… younger, as if the travel stripped away decades of seriousness and worry. Her auburn hair was longer, falling unrestrained to her waist, and her skin seemed slightly lighter and paler, as though it had not been subjected to more than a dozen high-intensity explosions.
“Holly, you might want to take a good look at yourself,” Artemis said timidly. Holly raised an eyebrow and unclipped her Neutrino, staring at herself in the reflective surface.
“Wow… I’m young,” she said in shock.
“In all fairness, you weren’t that old before,” Connor said sleepily, rubbing the back of his head as he approached. “Artemis, you might want to look at yourself too.”
Artemis grabbed a mirror from the chest next to him and gaped. He looked to be about three years older; seventeen, if memory served him correctly. His normally combed back hair was unkempt and brushed his eyes occasionally. A thin layer of stubble surrounding his jaw added to the rugged appearance. He noticed the signs of artificial aging in Butler and Connor, too. While Connor had gotten several years older, like him, Butler looked to be about thirty. The patch of discolored skin where the Kevlar had infused itself into his body was gone.
“Alright, now that that’s out of the way,” Connor said, “I suggest we split up and scout the area around us. Artemis, you and Holly go together, and I’ll stick with Mulch. Butler, You and N°1 should stay behind and protect the camp, in case there’s anything hostile in these woods.”
Artemis and Holly headed east, still contemplating their artificial aging. The woods had an eerie feel, with light barely splitting the canopy and a small breeze shifting the many shadows. Artemis fingered his pockets nervously as the silence pressed in around them. He was just about to break said silence when they heard a roar from their left.
“You know, normal people wouldn’t go near a roaring like that,” Holly quipped. Artemis smiled widely.
“But we aren’t normal people, Holly.” And with that, they traced the roaring sound. They followed the sound deeper and deeper into the forest, relying only on the fading light and Holly’s adept hearing to find their way. When the duo finally found a clearing, something stopped them. It was…
What was it?
It had the head and torso of a male lion. Going further back, however, it had talons and a scorpion stinger. Two leathery wings sprouted from its back. Artemis’ eyes locked onto it appreciatively, and his mind began to record every tidbit of information on the creature.
“Artemis, what the hell is that thing?” Holly whispered as it locked onto them. Artemis searched his wide expanse of knowledge.
“It looks like a manticore,” he replied. “They were demons in Greek mythology that ate humans.”
“Let’s hope this thing isn’t human-hungry right now,” Holly said. Artemis grinned again and held up Holly’s Neutrino.
“We have this, don’t we?” he asked, dangling it in front of her. The manticore roared and charged them. Holly knocked Artemis out of the way and was slammed against a tree. Artemis held up the
Neutrino.
“Big mistake,” he said, pulling the trigger. A bolt of greenish light sank into the back of the monster’s head. It dropped to the ground, dead. Artemis helped Holly to her feet. A small bump was oozing blood from the back of her head. He frowned and concentrated, pressing his thumbs against the wound.
“Heal,” he murmured. Several small blue sparks raced around her head, fixing any damage that would have been caused to the brain and skull. Being shoved headfirst into a tree did not leave a person unharmed, after all.
“Nice shot,” she observed. Artemis shrugged.
“I’ve had Butler training me with a few human and fairy weapons. I nearly took his eye out the first time I shot a Neutrino.” Artemis chuckled before dropping to his knees to observe the dead beast.
“This thing is incredible,” he said, turning the head this way and that. “The bones and organs of all these animals all smoothly connect. The only question I have is what created it. Is this a natural creature in this dimension, or was it created by some genetic experimentation?”
“Well, we won’t get anywhere with your experimenting right now,” Holly said impatiently. “Come on, Artemis. We’ll drag the corpse back to camp once we’re done scouting this area.”
The two finished scouring the area for any life, and pulled the dead manticore all the way back to their camp. They didn’t notice the strange, four-legged creature that was hovering over them.
“I gotta tell Twilight about this,” Rainbow Dash said, racing back towards the direction of town.
Twilight Sparkle was having a good day. She had woken up to Spike’s fabulous cooking, finished several projects for the Canterlot Board of Scientific Experimentation, had an absolutely amazing picnic with her friends, and managed to do all of her daily maintenance jobs on the slowly degrading library. She thought back to the week before. Spike was a good housekeeper, but even he couldn’t keep up with the disastrous situations she often found herself in. It would take weeks to clean all of the cake off the ceiling and turn Gummy back into an alligator. She was about to settle down with a nice, long copy of Hoofster’s Dictionary when she instinctively glanced at the clock. Her eyes suddenly widened, and she quickly backpedaled from the room. A moment later, a rainbow-maned pegasus smashed through the ceiling and dug a hole into the floor. Twilight sighed and, with resignation and longing in her eyes, set the book down to help the pegasus.
“Hello, Rainbow,” she said sullenly. “You were right on time, as always. Were you practicing your Double Rainboom again?” the violet unicorn’s horn sparked with light, and a violet aura surrounded Rainbow Dash, lifting her into the air and setting her rather unceremoniously onto the floor.
“Twilight, you’ve gotta come quick!” she babbled, rising from the ground and buzzing the shelves. “There were these things, and a campfire, and some weird green thing, and-” Twilight frowned and shut Rainbow’s mouth with her magic.
“What are you going on about, Rainbow?” she asked. “Start from the beginning, and maybe we can make some sense of this.”
“Well,” Rainbow started, clearly impatient, “I was practicing the Double Rainboom over the Everfree Forest when I heard a manticore. I thought some poor animal was in danger, and since Fluttershy would Stare me down if I let a bunny get hurt, I went to check it out. I went down there, and there were these things. They looked like those animal that throw poop that Fluttershy sometimes takes care of.”
“You mean monkeys,” Twilight interjected.
“Yeah, those things. Anyway, one of them pulled out this silver thing and some green light came out of it. The light hit the manticore and killed it, and then they dragged it away.”
“But why would they do that?” Twilight thought aloud. “Everypony knows that manticore flesh is poisonous, and nopony ever eats meat anyway.”
“Twilight, weren’t you listening to me? These things aren’t ponies at all!” Rainbow Dash was hovering in the air, a fire of confidence in her eyes. “When I find them, they aren’t gonna know what hit them!”
“Rainbow, I’m sure that whatever these things are, they could quite frankly kick your flank.” Rainbow sputtered indignantly, but Twilight pressed on. “Listen to yourself, Rainbow. You had your tail handed to you by a manticore back when we first met, and that one was only a cub! Whatever these things are, they’re either incredibly adept at magic, or amazing technicians. I’ve never seen any technology that could shoot green light at things before. Ooh, I wonder if they can talk. It would be amazing to know what kind of magic their species has!” Twilight rolled off on a tangent, as she was well known to do when confronting anything related to science or magic.
Rainbow was too blind with rage to think rationally (well, about as rationally as she usually thinks). How dare these… things try to one-up her? She was Rainbow Dash, for crying out loud! She was the only pony in history other than the famous Firefly who had ever done a Sonic Rainboom, and an Element of Harmony. She could kick these creatures’ flanks to the curb! Another spark of determination danced in her heart. Without another word to Twilight, who was still in a state of deep thought, she raced out the door and flapped off in the direction of the Everfree forest.
Artemis had been working late into the night, using a pair of Foaly’s new night-specs. He examined the entirety of the manticore’s body, save the genitalia and tail. He was completely stumped by the creature. Three species of animal, all of completely different nature, and yet they all fit together almost seamlessly. The job was too perfect for a Frankenstein-esque innovation, but there were several flaws in the system that nature could not have produced normally. He had deduced from the size of the creature’s eyes and brain that it was sight oriented, unlike the traditional lion, which mapped its surroundings mainly with scent and sound. There was also an odd joining of the small and large intestine; the creature had to have been in pain its entire life from slowly degrading organs. All in all, Artemis concluded it was a somewhat successful attempt at genetic splicing and recombination. That only brought up more questions. Who had created the beast? Was it truly a sentient being? How did the creator develop such technology?
A sudden brainwave hit him with the force of a tidal wave. “Of course,” he murmured. N°1 gazed sleepily at him from his watch.
“Did you find something?” he asked, his voice slurred with exhaustion. Artemis felt a brief flash of guilt; N°1 had used an enormous amount of magic to power the Arch, and he was keeping watch for a good half of the night before Connor took over.
“Could you come here for a moment, N°1?” he asked after a moment. The demon complied, staggering over to Artemis and the corpse. “Do you mind doing a quick scan for residual magic on the body?”
“That should be easy enough,” N°1 replied. He slowly exhaled and entered a relaxed stance. Red wisps of magic curled around his hands and wrists, forming a corona of light. He passed his palms over the carcass in an almost meditative way, presumably checking for residual traces of magic. The demon’s closed eyes flickered, a sign Artemis took to be surprise.
“Artemis,” N°1 said slowly, “Never let me look at this thing again.”
“Excuse me?” Artemis was baffled by his finality.
“This… this thing is sick. It was born naturally, but… it’s horrible, Artemis. It’s like this poor creature was magically mauled.” He thought for a moment. “Have you ever seen that human movie, Insidious?”
“I’ve heard of it. I assume you’re referring to the red-faced demon?”
“Yeah. This creature is an abomination of nature. As far as I can tell, these things have been like this for hundreds of years. The magic isn’t nearly as potent as it would have been a long time ago, but its soul…” N°1 shivered, and the halo of scarlet light dissipated. “I’m never doing that again, Artemis. I don’t care if we’re friends. If you force me to look at that again I will do everything in my power to avoid it.”
“Don’t worry,” Artemis assured. “I won’t do anything like that. You should get some sleep. Connor’s watch is coming up soon, and quite frankly, you look terrible.”
N°1 chuckled. “Even worse than usual, huh?”
“Quite.” Artemis allowed the faintest of grins to peek through before he shooed the demon back to the camp. He placed a single hand on the grip of the pistol Butler had lent him earlier that year, while using the other to continue examining the body of the manticore.
“I will find all of your secrets,” he promised to the whole forest in a grave whisper. Unbeknownst to him, the earth beneath his feet heard the call, and the world’s destiny shifted just a tiny bit to ensure that swear would be kept.
