AN:

Call me weird, but I always liked the idea of Holly and her friends painting some walls. Maybe because I was never allowed to do so, as my dad thought I´ll only make a mess. He was right however…

Anyway, let´s see how Arty and his friends handle the situation.
I do not own Artemis Fowl, but I do own my stupid ideas ^^
Have fun reading and remember to solve the riddle at the end. If you know the answer, send us a PM, so no one can cheat.

~Ichigo

That is not an emergency, Foaly

When Holly had been called by Foaly early in the morning, because the LEP needed her even on her day off, she was prepared for everything. It was pretty often her well deserved breaks were cut short because of an emergency; criminals do not care about your work-life balance, commander Root had told her once. Did LEPRecon need her to catch someone who went rough, perhaps an escaped prisoner or someone new in this type of "business"? No problem, she could capture them with both eyes closed. A troll running through the city maybe? Peace of cake! Or how about some teenage fairies, who thought it would be awesome to break some rules? That would not be the first time, and Holly had to admit she had been in a similar situation once in her life too. A car chase? Tracking down Mulch again? A fairy that went to the surface without the permission to do so?

Yes, she was prepared for everything, such was her life. Or so she thought.

What the young elf never expected was a brightly smiling centaur greeting her in the hallway with two buckets full of paint, several paint brushes and a set of completely white clothes. Holly froze. He had to be kidding her! This was definitely not an emergency!

"What the hell is going on Foaly, explain yourself! Now!" Said man chose to take two steps back, which was kind of difficult if you had four hoofed feet to coordinate, to create some space between himself and the angry woman. It was no secret whom she worked for, the old commander´s attitude had rubbed off on her. "I am waiting!", the elf commanded. "You see Holly, I know it is your day of and…"

"Yet you still called me early in the morning for that?" She pointed at the paint with a disgusted face. "I am an officer, not an interior designer!"

"I know", Foaly tried to fight off. "Just listen to me, please." The woman crossed her arms in front of her chest and raised an eyebrow. "Our budget was cut short once again, so we have to take matters into our own hands. I called everybody who was free today or has some time left, so you are not the only one who has to do a little work. Besides, you´ll get paid for this as if it was any regular shift of yours."

"But still, you want me to paint some walls?"

"Basically yes." Holly let out a sigh. "You do realize I never handled a paint brush in my whole life? I´m more into Neutrinos or buzz batons." The centaur scratched his head. "Me neither, but it can´t be that hard, can it?" The female just shrugged, honestly, she had no idea. Though she´d be probably better at painting a wall than the centaur.

Holly grabbed her two buckets full of paint and followed Foaly down the corridor into the meeting room. Her eyes widened as she saw who would accompany her today. Not only colleagues of her where gathered there, but also Artemis Fowl and Juliet Butler. "You too?", she greeted them with disbelieve. Arty looked at her, as if somebody had thrown an encyclopedia on his foot, while the older girl started to giggle. "We were asked if we were free today. And as I believe Arty could use some "exercise", I talked him into helping too. I´m mainly here because I wanted to escape Fowl manor and my babysitting duties. Oh, and I wanted to see my best friend again." Holly smiled, then hugged the blond woman. "It´ll be awesome to spend some more time with you. And you too Arty." The boy flinched at the nickname, but didn´t say anything.

Behind them, someone threw the door open and shouted something about an idiotic pony and it´s stupid ideas. So commander Rood apparently had joined the painting-party. Next to him, as elegant as ever dressed in her black suit, stood wing commander Vinyáya, who did not seemed very pleased either. The young elf tilted her head. Why did those two lately always appear together?

After some more minutes of waiting, the room was filled with all kinds of confused and annoyed fairies. Holly could spot Trouble and Grub Kelp among them, as well as Chix Verbil and Caballine, Mulch and the little demon No.1. It seems as almost everyone was called here by Foaly. Well, the more they were, the faster they would finish and if they were lucky, there had some hours of their day off left. Hopefully.

The technological advisor of the LEP raised his voice: "Okay everyone, now that finally all of us have managed to come, I might as well introduce you to our today´s schedule." Most of the people gathered inside the room shot him a death glare. Especially commander Root and wing commander Vinyáya were not thrilled to listen to the pony. "We have up to twelve rooms that need to be fixed, the meeting room needs some new colors too and I thing we definitely need to change the wallpaper in the hallway. If we all work hard, it will only take us about six or seven hours." Again, almost everybody was not amused.

"And by we", Artemis started, "You mean everybody except you?" The centaur looked at him, nervously stomping his hooves on the ground. "Well…"

"And you do know, that I am probably the last person that should hold a paint brush in his hand."

"Arty is right", Holly jumped in, "He might set himself on fire or something."

"How am I supposed to lit myself up with a bucket of paint?" The elf shrugged in response. "I don´t know, you're a Fowl, I´m positive you´ll find a way to do so."

"Thank you, Holly." His voice dripped with sarcasm. "You're welcome", the all too happy reply came.

"We should probably split up then", commander Vinyáya stated. "Work will be more efficient if we form smaller groups to make progress in different rooms at the same time."

"Then who has to work with whom?"

"That´s simple Foaly. We make an all-girls group and the boys separate into three equally strong sections."

"Why an all-girls one?" Holly asked. She had planned to work together with Arty, just to laugh at him being overstrained the whole time with something as simple as paint.

"Because", the older woman started, "I do not wish to spent hours together in a small crowded pace with certain persons." She shot Chix a glare, who disappeared behind Trouble. Now that Holly thought of it, this would probably be a good idea. Less broken bones and wrecked nerves.

"As I see, the girls are ready, so…"

"Would you mind Foaly? I´ll take over from now on. Grab everything you need and follow me ladies, we´ll take the first room right at the end of the hall."

Root glanced at the centaur. "And this is exactly why I have trouble handling woman. " Said one blinked. "Vinyáya is probably one of the hardest to understand anyway."Julius nodded. "Bossy female elf."

A couple of carried buckets and new white outfits later, Holly, Caballine, Juliet and Raine stood in the middle of a messy office, that had yet to be repainted. "We should probably push everything into the middle and cover it with some plastic tarpaulin, clearing the room should take longer and we only need the walls anyway."

"You´re right Caballine, let´s start with that", Juliet replied. She already had experiences in renovating, as she had to fix up everything the twins messed up, including walls that were not made for explosive experiments. "Whose office is this anyway, I´ve never seen that much chaos on a single desk."

"That must be the shared room of the corporals, commander", Holly answered, glad that Vinyáya had not seen her mess on an especially busy day. It was nothing compared to this one.

"Enough babbling, let´s start", Juliet cheered.

Together they pushed everything out of their way, covered the floor and desks and opened the paint buckets. "Ughh, why does paint have to smell that bad?" Caballine covered her nose. "Ever worked with Mulch in a room longer than thirty minutes?" She shook her head. "No Holly, I haven't" The girl let out a sigh. "Just be thankful."

"So", Vinyáya started. "Does anyone actually know how to paint?" Juliet raised her hands. "Watch me and learn!"

"Please remind me why I have to work with you!"

"It´s not like I asked to be paired up with you either!" Artemis and Trouble stared at each other, little lightings jumping out of their eyes. "Great, just great", the commander mumbled. The only one of their "party" not sulking was Chix Verbil, who currently flew though the air with his brush, letting paint drip almost everywhere. "Watch out what you are doing!", Trouble growled. Artemis eyed his horrible white shirt, which already had some splatters on it. "I miss my suit."

"Great, just great", the commander mumbled again.

"Why are you flying anyway?", Captain Kelp asked the spirit, jumping out of the way as another drop of paint made fell to the ground. "I was just thinking about my lovely Holly. She must be very lonely without me." The room fell silent. "What?"

"Your Holly?", Artemis asked in disbelieve. "Since when is there any connection between you and her?" Trouble pushed the teenager away, to stare at the spirit. "Since when does she belong to anybody?" With a sidelong glance he looked at Artemis. Said one´s eyes narrowed. "May I ask what you are trying to imply, Kelp?" The elf lifted his chin and tensed his shoulders. "It seems like some of us claim to know her better than others, and even think they can decide over her and her relationships." Artemis let his infamous vampire smile appear on his lips. "Is that so? It also seems like some of us are a bit to overprotective of her too. Maybe even possessive."

The elf grabbed his brush and covered it with paint, only to push it right at the human´s chest, leaving a big colorful stain on his once almost white shirt. "Someone of us sees the world only in two different shades, black and white. That needed to be fixed. Now let me tell you something, do not try anything on Holly, got that mudboy!" Artemis felt slightly childish as he copied the elf´s move, leaving an equally large stain on his clothing, but also satisfied. "Sorry Kelp", he said as the eyes of the elf widened. "My hand just slipped."

"Both of you, stop this nonsense. We are supposed to paint the walls, not each other!", the commander shouted annoyed. His face was bright read, fingers clenched into fists. "You", he pointed at the frightened spirit, "Keep your hands away from Holly, she is out of you league anyway. You", he now pointed at Fowl, "stay away from her too, she has enough to deal without you dragging her into another mess. And finally you Kelp, I thought you and Holly were only friends? We are all professionals here, so no dating, got that!"

"Yes sir", the elf mumbled. "And the rest of you?"

"Yes sir", Chix hastily said. "I´ve understood commander," Artemis added. "Good, now go back to your work and…"

Julius Root could not finish his sentence, as a shrill scream disturbed him. All men froze. This was Holly´s voice! Leaving everything behind, the four of them rushed out of the room, Trouble leading, the others close behind. As they threw open the door of the room the girls were currently in, they stopped abruptly. Apparently, there was no danger at all, no one threatening the females, nothing. In fact, Holly, Raine, Caballine and Juliet were giggling, holding onto their paint brushes and buckets. Everything was covered in paint. Everything.

The once white clothes were all decorated in handprints of different color. Some of those prints were even on not so decent places, though the girls did not seem to mind. Their faces were colored too, as well as the floor and each wall. It looked like a complete mess.

"Commander Vinyáya?", Trouble asked after overcoming his shock. "What happened?" He turned towards Holly, blushing at the handprints of her shirt. "Is everything ok?" Looking at each other and the chaos they had created, all of them busted out into a new wave of giggles and laughter.

"We", Caballine managed to say, "We had some training at aiming and self defense." As she tried to brush of some half dried paint of her back, she started to giggle again. "Just be glad you were not present a couple of minutes ago." The other girls nodded, trying to get rid of some paint at their faces.

Right at this moment, Foaly entered the room, viewing the mess, then the girls and the boys. "You do realize that the paint belongs at the walls?"

The next day, everyone belonging to the painting-party had to clean up the hallway too, as Foaly had tried to use it as an escape route. Color stains had to be removed and the carped had to be cleaned too. Though Holly thought it was still worth the centaurs shocked face.

Riddle:

Name a scene (+ the book) where it is clearly shown that Artemis and Trouble do not each other. A short summary of the scene would be nice too ;)

Stories so far

1st December: Inuyasha – Lord of the kitchen
2nd December: Artemis Fowl – The tale of the handsome commander
3rd December: Inuyasha – Miroku´s wish list
4th December: Iron Fey Series – Dream beaches
5th December: Kamisama Kiss – How to not freeze to death
6th December: Inuyasha – Surprise surprise
7th December: Kamisama Kiss – I´m going into town, Tomoe
8th December: Artemis Fowl – No one ever calls me to simply drink coffee
9th December: Tiger´s Curse – Tigers and Badminton
10th December: Inuyasha – Geography with Myoga
11th December: Iron Fey Series – Preperations
12th December: Iron Fey Series – The other way to fight
13th December: Kamisama Kiss –Meeting Tomoe
14th December: Artemis Fowl – This is not an emergency, Foaly
15th December: soon