Whoa. Can you believe it? Still not dead.

You know what pulling an eighty ton boulder through an ocean of frozen honey while Khan whips your back with his superhuman strength and an iron chain while a tornado comes your way feels like? Neither do I. But I needed something to compare writing this chapter to. In the end, satisfactory, I suppose, though not running exactly along the lines of the tone on the other chapters.

I hope the chapters will come faster from here on, but, of course, I can't guarantee. School's a bitch.

Do not own.

"Ah, Artemis," Foaly greeted as the group entered his lab. "You'll forgive our 'CSI's, won't you? They haven't yet grown accustomed to our favorite little human."

Artemis forced a smile. "Quite all right. It's to be expected. Now, what do you have for us?"

Foaly smirked a horsey smirk. "Something that brings us ever closer to catching this nuisance." He prepared himself for a speech. "Because there was so little of the bodies left to collect from, we have virtually no trace evidence that helps us. We do, however, no know the identities of all three victims. Vice Keavel is our shuttleport victim. He was granted a surface visa to complete the Ritual and was just making his way up. And the other two, Gase and Anya Po, were on their way back from the theater down the road. Keavel wasn't married and the Po's had no children, so I don't have to break the news to any family members."

Holly spoke with a tight lip of annoyance. "Glad to know you were spared that obstacle."

Foaly avoided her iron gaze, ashamed of his comment. "Ah…Sorry." His ego faded out of his speech as he continued. "But, as I was saying, none of the bodies offered us anything of interest. Except one." The centaur picked a small bag off of a table and presented it to the group, an expectant look pasted on his face.

Inside the little bag was a small white item, slightly yellowish with a tiny black hole at one end. A tooth.

There was silence for a few moments, and Foaly's face started to twitch in its expression.

"What do you want, a quarter?" Holly asked sarcastically.

"Wait," said Artemis, stepping forward. "Is it one of the victims'?"

"Nope," Foaly said smugly.

Artemis frowned. "But that's much too small to have belonged to the animal."

"In it's transformed state," Foaly said matter-of-factly. "This tooth fell out by the bodies after our unlucky infected fairy was back in his normal form. The size and shape of the tooth can help us eliminate some species possibilities, which I've already done. This tooth doesn't belong to a dwarf, it's much too small. It isn't a gnome's tooth either. When gnome teeth grow in, they have a layer of plaque already there. This tooth is clean. And it's not a goblin's or demon's; you'd be able to tell. So that leaves pixies, elves, and sprites."

And adolescent humans, Artemis added mentally. But after running his tongue along his teeth, he discovered that they were all accounted for. Perhaps another side effect of the disease, he though, not ready to take out previous possibilities.

"I'm not particularly keen on leafing through the entire phonebook to find this thing, but sooner or later, we may have to," Foaly was saying. "Unless we get it on camera again. Which at this point, doesn't seem likely." A look of concern suddenly crossed his face. "Holly, are you all right?"

Artemis looked toward his elfin friend. Holly's eyelids fluttered on her half-closed eyes, and she swayed slightly, her face a sickly gray. Tiny beads of sweat collected on her hairline. Artemis grew alarmed.

"Holly?" Artemis rushed toward her to catch her just as she was about to collapse. He supported her weight up while her eyes slowly opened and she held a hand to her forehead. Artemis escorted her to a chair.

Holly shook her head, taking a few deep breaths. "Mm. I'm fine," she whispered hoarsely. "Just…This whole… I just hate it." She met Artemis's worried eyes with a sad smile. "Fairies aren't used to death. We don't react well to it. Even the ones that have to live around it."

Artemis wiped some of the sweat off her forehead, chuckling softly, while guilt battered his heart unrelentingly. "I can understand. Even to us barbaric humans, death is often a revolting concept."

They looked at each other a moment in silence, until Foaly cleared his throat.

"Holly, I think you should get home and get some sleep. You too, Artemis."

"Oh, he always looks like that," Holly joked meekly, smiling.

Artemis smiled back, wishing for all the world that he could make right what was so very, very wrong in her life.

I must turn myself in before it's too late…

…but what if I'm wrong?

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"Should I tell her, Butler?" Artemis murmured. He sat against the wall as Butler got his bed ready in Holly's garage. His "mattress" was the equivalent of six large futon cushions that Holly provided from the corners of his attic. His calves sit sat on the floor when he lay down. His blanket was a giant cloth tapestry from an old museum. Butler beat the dust from the cushions, looking up at Artemis with sympathy sprinkled in his eyes.

"I can't bear to see her so…hurt. And knowing… I might be the one hurting her… It makes me feel unbearably guilty to cause her so much pain." Artemis stared down at the floor, looking ages older than he was, years weighing on his brow.

Butler arranged the cushions in a wide rectangle for sleeping, taking a few minutes to answer, but also to help Artemis find his own answer. When he was through, he sat cross legged on his bed and faced the young man.

"I think we both know that guilt isn't the only emotion feeding your indecision." Artemis met his bodyguard's slightly twinkling eye, about to deny, but then looked back down with a defeated sigh as Butler continued. "But… I think that both telling her and not telling her have their unsettling outcomes. You can't avoid that. No matter how much of a genius you are."

Artemis didn't respond for a moment. Butler took great pity on the boy's battling conscience. "I think I'll watch guard outside tonight, just in case you are right."

Artemis smiled sadly. "No, old friend, that's all right. You need your sleep too."

Butler waved the comment off. "Not as much as you need yours. You'll rest easier, I'm sure."

"I don't think I'll sleep at all," the boy murmured. "But thank you."

"It's all right. Is Holly already in bed?"

"Yes, but I don't imagine she's sleeping either. Every day seems to be a battle for her ever since this monster has been running around."

There was a pause.

"If it's any consolation, Artemis, I don't think it's you."

But I do… "I know. Thank you."

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Even if he had tried, Artemis wouldn't have slept. His thoughts ran in guilty cycles, plaguing his mind with never-ending grief. Tell her? Don't tell her? Can't cause her more pain… But have to make sure nothing else happens in the event that I'm correct…And if I'm not? How else can I explain…

Artemis tossed and turned on the bed, trying to halt the circle of thoughts, for what seemed like hours. Because it was. Finally, he grew exasperated and threw the blankets off of his body, making his way to Holly's kitchen to suffer at the table.

But when he got there, someone already sat at the table, backlit by the tiny glow of the clock on the stove.

"Holly?"

Holly looked up. Artemis couldn't see her eyes but imagined they were bloodshot from lack of sleep. "Artemis?" she murmured, obviously too enveloped in thought to have noticed his entrance into the kitchen. "Shouldn't you be sleeping?"

Artemis pulled a chair back from the table and sat down by his friend. "I could say the same for you." He was close enough now that he could just make out her exhausted features. Her face creased in places that made her fatigue obvious.

"I-I don't want to sleep, I—" She stopped abruptly and sighed, rubbing her forehead. "Sleep's not coming so easily these days."

Artemis nodded sympathetically. He reached out with thin fingers to smooth ruffled hair away from her face. "I know," he murmured, his tone soft. "Mine either. But we'll find the animal. I promise."

Holly closed her eyes, leaning her head tiredly into Artemis's palm. "Let's not talk about that, please." Her tone had a desperate tinge to it.

"I'm sorry," he said gently.

"It's okay, I just …"

"…hate it all," Artemis finished for her.

"Yeah," Holly sighed. "I need it all to go away, you know. Just give up fighting day in, day out, for something that's beyond my ability to help. I'm not strong enough to battle all the time. Not strong enough to keep up a fight that shouldn't be mine."

"You're the strongest person I know, Holly. Elf or human," Artemis whispered.

Holly laughed once, softly. "Thanks, Arty."

Neither had realized that Artemis still held her cheek in his hand and that she had placed her hand over his. But as silence settled over them, it became almost painfully obvious. Holly opened her tired mismatched eyes to meet his.

"Artemis?" she whispered.

He didn't reply. Instead, he started to pull her face to his, and their lips met in a soft kiss in the darkness. Their eyes closed blissfully, and for a moment, they both forgot how to breathe. But they didn't need air. They needed each other to live. The other's lips were oxygen, the feel of each other's skin was all the food they needed, and the passionate heat their bodies produced as natural to them as any kind of life. The only life they currently knew how to live.

The burning of their lungs for air pulled them away from each other, and they parted, their fast breaths breaking into the silence. Hearts drummed rapidly in both rounded and pointed ears, and they pressed their foreheads together as they tried to collect the shaken pieces of their emotional facades.

"Artemis…" Holly murmured. "I don't think…" He gently silenced her with his lips, not willing to give up his piece of euphoria just yet. And she gave in, too, kissing him back with equal passion as before. But her conscious cruelly intruded. She halted their kiss.

"Artemis, this isn't good."

He pulled away, panting slightly. If he thought his hormones were bad before, puberty came back with a vengeance to haunt him. Control, it seemed, was still far beyond his grasp.

"Artemis, you're still only a boy. I mean, -- I can't—" Holly stuttered.

"It didn't seem to stop you before," Artemis reminded her.

Holly let out a few exasperated breaths as she tried to speak again. "That was… different, and you know it. We were both different. Artemis." He looked up at her tiredly. He understood. It didn't mean he had to accept it, but he understood.

Holly touched her fingertips gently to his cheek. "Arty, you know I love you. But… I can't… I can't love you, Arty. I can't explain—" She gave up her efforts to speak and got up from the table to return to her bedroom to get no sleep and battle her own thoughts.

Artemis sat at the table for a few minutes more, or perhaps it was an hour. He didn't know. He didn't think during the whole time. He wouldn't allow himself to. He just wanted to preserve what he could remember of her touch, of their few shared kisses. He knew she was right. This night just added to the thoughts that would be circling around his mind in the morning. He was still just barely a boy. And the difference left something to be desired. She hadn't said anything Artemis hadn't already known in the first place.

Why did he have to be so damn smart?

Short, yeah, yeah, but the next one will be longer. And we shall discover... SOMETHING.

*thinks* Yeah.

I'm gonna go get the chain, Khan...