Even though it went against all his smuggler's instincts, Doodah kept his speed down on the driveway. His teeth knocked together as he drove over the uneven granite flagstones. A digital read-out informed him that he was utilizing one hundredth of one per cent of the engine's new power. Doodah remembered just in time to mute the Mongocharger.
The last thing he needed right now was the computer's electronic voice complaining about his driving skills.
There were two guards in front of the main doors. They barely glanced down as Doodah swept past.
'Howdy, Sheriff,' said one, grinning.
'Chocolate,' squeaked Doodah. From the little he knew about Beau, it seemed the appropriate thing to say.
He tapped the accelerator to bump him over the lintel, then drove slowly across a streaked marble floor. The tyres spun for grip on the sleek stone, which was a bit worrying — it could cost crucial seconds in the event that he had to make a quick getaway. But at least the corridor was wide enough for a U-turn if one became necessary.
Doodah motored down the hallway, past rows of towering potted palms and several bright abstract works of art until he came to the corridor's end. There was a camera mounted over an archway, pointed directly at the front hall. A cable snaked out from the box and into a conduit which ran down to the base of the wall.
Doodah pulled up by the conduit, hopping from the car. So far his luck was holding. Nobody had challenged him. This human security was lame. In any fairy building he would have been laser-scanned a dozen times by now. The pixie yanked a section of conduit away, revealing the cable beneath. It took him mere seconds to twist the length of loaded fibre optics round the video cable. Job done. Smiling, Doodah climbed back into his stolen car. This had been a sweet deal. Amnesty for five minutes' work. Time to go home and enjoy a life of freedom, until he broke the rules again.
'Beau Paradizo, you little brat. Come over here, right now!'
Doodah froze momentarily, then checked his mirror. There was a girl behind him, glaring his way, hands on hips. This, he guessed, would be
Minerva. If memory served, he was supposed to keep far away from Minerva.
'Beau. It's time for your antibiotic. Do you want to have that chest infection forever?'
Doodah started the car, rolling it towards the arch and out of this Mud Girl's sight line. Once round the corner, he could floor the accelerator.
'Don't you dare drive away from me, Bobo.'
Bobo? No wonder I'm driving away, thought Doodah. Who would drive towards someone calling them Bobo?
'Eh… chocolate?' said the pixie hopefully.
It was the wrong thing to do. This girl knew her brother's voice when she heard it, and that wasn't it.
'Bobo? Is there something wrong with your voice?'
Doodah swore under his breath.
'Ches' inflec-chun?' he said.
But Minerva wasn't buying it. She took a walkie-talkie from her pocket and took rapid strides towards the car.
'Pierre, can you come in here, please? Bring Andre and Louis.' And then to Doodah, 'Just stay there, Bobo. I have a nice bar of chocolate for you.'
Sure, thought Doodah. Chocolate and a concrete cell.
He considered his options for a second and came to a conclusion. The conclusion was: I would rather escape quickly, than get captured and tortured to death.
I am out of here, thought Doodah, and floored the accelerator, sending several hundred horsepower shuddering down the fragile driveshaft. He had maybe a minute before the car fell apart, but by then he could be far away from this Mud Girl and her transparent promises of chocolate.
The car took off so fast that it left an image of itself where it had been.
Minerva stopped dead. 'What?'
There was a corner coming up quickly. Doodah pulled the wheel in as far as he could, but the vehicle's turning circle was too wide.
'Gotta bounce it,' said Doodah through gritted teeth.
He leaned hard left, eased up on the accelerator and hit the wall side-on. At the moment of impact he shifted his weight and stepped on the gas. The car lost a door, but shot out of the corner like a stone from a sling.
Beautiful, thought Doodah as soon as his head stopped ringing.
He had maybe seconds now before the girl could see him again, and who knew how many guards stood between him and freedom.
He was in a long straight corridor, opening on to a sitting room. Doodah could see a wall-mounted television and the top rim of a red velvet sofa. There must be steps down into the room. Not good. This car only had one more impact left in it.
'Where is Bobo?' shouted the girl. 'What have you done with him?'
No point in subtlety now. Time to see what this buggy could do. Doodah jammed his foot on the accelerator, then made a beeline for a window behind the velvet sofa. He patted the dash.
'You can do it, you little junk box. One jump. Your chance to be a thoroughbred.'
The car didn't answer back. They never did. Though occasionally in times of extreme stress and oxygen deprivation, Doodah imagined they shared his cavalier attitude.
Minerva came round the corner. She was running hard, and screaming into a walkie-talkie. Doodah heard the words apprehend, necessary violence and interrogation. None of which boded well for him.
The toy car's wheels spun on a long rug, then caught. The rug was shunted backwards like a length of toffee from a roller. Minerva was bowled over, but kept talking as she went down.
'He's headed for the library. Take him down! Shoot if necessary.'
Doodah held on to the wheel grimly, keeping his line. He was going out of that window, closed or not. He entered the room at seventy miles per hour, flying off the top step. Not bad acceleration for a toy. There were two guards in the room, in the act of drawing their weapons. They wouldn't shoot though. It still appeared as though the car was being driven by a child.
Suckers, thought Doodah — then the first bullet crashed into the chassis.
OK, maybe they would shoot the car.
He flew in a gentle arc towards the window. Two more bullets took plastic chunks from the bodywork, but it was too late to stop the tiny vehicle. It clipped the lower frame, lost a fender and tumbled out through the open window.
Someone really should be filming this, thought Doodah, as he clenched his teeth for impact.
The crash shook him all the way from his toes to his skull. Stars danced before Doodah's eyes for a moment, then he was in control again, careering towards the septic tank.
Mulch was waiting, his wild halo of hair quivering with impatience.
'Where have you been? I'm running out of sunblock.'
Doodah did not waste time with an answer. Instead he extricated himself from the all but demolished car, prising off his Mongocharger and mirror.
Mulch pointed a stubby finger at him. 'I have a few more questions.'
A bullet fired from the open window ricocheted off" the septic tank, throwing up concrete splinters.
'But they can wait. Hop on.'
Mulch turned, presenting Doodah with his back, and more besides.
Doodah jumped on, grabbing thick hanks of Mulch's beard.
'Go!' he shouted. 'They're right behind me!'
Mulch unhinged his jaw and he went into the clay like a hairy torpedo.
But fast as he was, they wouldn't have made it. Armed guards were two paces away. They would have seen the gently snoring Beau and riddled the moving tunnel mound with bullets. They probably would have tossed in a few grenades for good measure. But they didn't, because at that precise moment all hell broke loose inside the chateau.
As soon as Doodah had twisted the loaded fibre optic round the video cable, hundreds of tiny spikes had punctured the rubber, making dozens of strong contacts with the wiring inside.
Seconds later in Section 8 HQ, information came flooding into Foaly's terminal. He had video, alarm systems, waffle boxes and communications all flashing up in separate windows on his screen.
Foaly cackled, cracking his knuckles like a concert pianist. He loved those old fibre optic twists. Not as fancy as the new organic bugs, but twice as reliable.
'OK,' he said into a reed mike on his desk. 'I'm in control. What kind of nightmares would you like to give the Paradizos?'
In the south of France, Captain Holly Short spoke into her helmet microphone. 'Whatever you have. Storm troopers, helicopters. Overload their communications, blow out their waffle boxes. Set off all the alarms. I want them to believe they are under attack.'
Foaly called up several phantom files on his computer. The phantoms were one of his own pet projects. He would lift patterns from human movies, soldiers, explosions whatever, and then use them universally in whatever scene he chose. In this case he sent a squad of French Army special forces, the Commandement des Operations Speciales, or COS, to the Paradizos' closed-circuit system. That would do nicely for starters.
Inside the chateau, the Paradizo chief of security, Juan Soto, had a little problem. His little problem was that a couple of loose shots were being popped off in the house. This can only be seen as a little problem in relation to the very big problem that Foaly was sending his way.
Soto was speaking into a radio.
'Yes, Miss Paradizo,' he said, keeping his voice calm. . 'I realize that your brother may be missing. I say may be because that may be him in the toy car. It sure looks like him to me. OK, OK, I take your point. It is unusual for toy cars to fly that far. It could be a malfunction.'
Soto resolved to have strong words with the two idiots who had actually fired on a toy car on Minerva's command. He did not care how smart she was, no child was giving orders like that on his watch.
Even though Miss Minerva was nowhere near the security centre and could not see his face, Chief Soto adopted a stern expression for the lecture he was about to give.
'Now, Miss Paradizo, you listen to me,' he began, then his expression changed completely as the security system went ballistic.
'Yes, Chief, I'm listening.'
The chief held on to his radio with one hand; with the other he flicked numerous switches on his security console, praying for malfunction.
'There seems to be a full squad of COS converging on the chateau. My
God, there are some in the house. Helicopters, the rooftop cameras are picking up helicopters.' Transmissions suddenly squawked through the band monitor. 'And we have chatter. They're after you, Miss Paradizo, and your prisoner. My God, the alarms have all been tripped. Every sector. We're surrounded! We need to evacuate. I can see them in the treeline. They have a tank. How did they get a tank up here?'
Outside, Artemis and Butler watched the chaos Foaly had created. Alarm klaxons ripped through the Alpine air and security men sprinted to ordained spots.
Butler lobbed a few smoke grenades into the grounds to add to the effect.
'A tank,' said Artemis wryly into his fairy phone. 'You sent them a tank?'
'You've hacked into the audio feed?' said Foaly sharply. 'Just what else can that phone of yours do?'
'It can play solitaire and minesweeper,' replied Artemis innocently.
Foaly grunted doubtfully. 'We'll talk about this later, Mud Boy. For now, let's concentrate on the plan.'
'Excellent suggestion. Do you have any phantom guided missiles?'
The security chief nearly fainted. The radar had picked up two tracks spiralling from the belly of a helicopter.
'Man Dieu! Missiles. They're firing smart bombs at us. We must evacuate now.' 162
He flicked open a perspex panel, revealing an orange switch below.
With only a moment's hesitation, he pressed the orange switch. The various alarms were immediately cut off and replaced by a single continuous whine. The evac alarm.
The moment this was sounded, the guards changed course, heading for their assigned vehicles or principals, and the non-security residents of the chateau began gathering data or whatever was most precious to them.
On the eastern side of the house, a series of garage doors opened and six black BMW four-wheel drives sprang into the courtyard like cougars.
One had blacked-out windows.
Artemis studied the situation through binoculars.
'Watch the girl,' he said into the tiny phone in his palm. 'The girl is the key. I'm guessing hers is the vehicle with the tinted windows.'
The girl Minerva appeared through patio doors, speaking calmly into a walkie-talkie. Her father trailed beside her, dragging a protesting Beau
Paradizo by the hand. Billy Kong came last, bending slightly under the weight of a large golf bag.
'Here we go, Holly. Are you ready?'
'Artemis! I'm the field agent here,' came the irritated reply. 'Stay off my band unless you have something to contribute.'
'I was just thinking. .'
'I was just thinking that you should change your middle name to control freak.'
Artemis glanced across at Butler, who was lying beside him on the verge and couldn't help overhearing the entire exchange.
'Control freak? Can you believe that?' 'The nerve of some people,' replied the bodyguard, without taking his eyes off the chateau.
To their left, a small patch of earth began to vibrate. Mud, grass and insects were thrust upwards in a sudden gush, followed by two heads.
One dwarf and one pixie.
Doodah climbed over Mulch's shoulders, collapsing on the ground.
'You people are crazy,' he panted, plucking a beetle from his shirt pocket. 'I should be getting more than amnesty for this. I should be getting a pension.'
'Quiet, little man,' said Butler calmly. 'Phase two of the plan is about to start, and I wouldn't want to miss it because of you.'
Doodah blanched. 'Neither would I. Want you to miss it, that is. Because of me.'
Outside the chateau's garage, Billy Kong popped one of I the BMW's boots, hefting the golf bag inside. It was the car with the tinted windows.
Artemis opened his mouth to issue an order, then closed it again. Holly probably knew what to do.
She did. The driver's door clunked open a fraction, apparently all on its own, then closed again. Before Minerva or Billy Kong could do more than blink in surprise, the four-by-four started up and laid down a six-metre length of rubber skidding towards the main gate.
'Perfect,' said Artemis under his breath. 'Now, Miss Minerva Paradizo, would-be criminal mastermind, let us see exactly how smart you are. I know what I would do in this situation.'
Minerva Paradizo's reaction was a bit less dramatic than one might expect from a child who has just had her prize possession stolen. There were no tantrums or foot-stamping. Billy Kong also defied expectations.
He did not so much as draw a weapon. Instead he squatted on his hunkers, ran his fingers through Manga hair and lit a cigarette, which Minerva promptly plucked from his lips and squashed underfoot.
Meanwhile the four-by-four was getting away, barrelling towards the main gates. Perhaps Minerva was confident that the reinforced steel barrier would be sufficient to halt the BMW in its tracks. She was wrong.
