Artemis- Detonating Kraken

Artemis stood wearily and reached into his pocket. “Your armor should save you,” he said, his voice calm. “It will be terrifying, but the LEP will dig you out.”

Opal scoffed. “More tactics. Bluff and double bluff. Not this time, Artemis.”

“Don’t make me do this, Opal,” Artemis pleaded. “Just sit down and wait for the LEP. No one needs to get hurt.”

“Oh, I think someone needs to get hurt,” said Opal.

Artemis took his modified laser pointer from his pocket, activating the narrow beam and aiming it at the base of the Little Sister.

“What are you going to do with that thing? It would take a hundred years to saw through this rock.”

“I’m not trying to saw through it,” said Artemis, keeping the beam steady. “And it’s not a rock.”

Opal raised her hands, sparks laced like barbed wire around her fingers. No more talk.

Artemis’s laser beam cut deep into the base of the Little Sister, until it pierced the outer shell and reached the vast pocket of methane beneath.

The Little Sister was not a rock. It was the seventh kraken, attracted by the magical resonance of Hybras. Artemis had been studying it for years. Not even Foaly knew it was there.

The explosion was huge, shooting a column of fire fifty feet into the air. The outer shell collapsed under Opal, engulfing her in a blizzard of shrapnel.

Artemis heard the dull twang of her LEP armor flexing to take the shock. Foaly’s armor should save her.

He threw himself flat on the sea stack, suffering the rain of rock, weed, and even fish on his back and legs. Luck will save me now. Only luck.

And luck did save him. The plateau was hammered with several sizeable missiles, but none struck Artemis. He was hailed with smaller objects and would have a hundred bruises and cuts to add to his list of injuries, but not a single bone was broken.

When the world felt as though it had stopped vibrating, Artemis crawled to the lip of the sea stack and gazed down at the bubbling sea
below. A pyramid of rubble steamed gently in the waves where the kraken had been. The great beast would be moving away silently now, to find another magical hotspot. Of Opal there was no sign. The LEP will find her.

-The Time Paradox, Chapter 154