Artemis- Shooting Flare into Helmet

They plummeted earthward, locked together. A sparrow on an eagle’s back. Opal smashed her armored head through the door window’s Plexiglas, still shouting inside the helmet, spittle spraying the visor.

Issuing orders that Artemis could not hear and could not spare enough time to lip-read. He could see that her eyes glowed red with magic, and it was clear from her manic expression that any threads connecting her to rationality had been severed.

More shouting, muffled behind the visor. Artemis cast a sardonic gaze at the radio, which sat dead and dark in its cradle.

Opal caught the look and raised her visor, shouting over the wind, too impatient for the helmet PA.

“Give me the lemur and I will save you,” she said, her voice mesmerizing. “You have my . . .”

Artemis avoided her gaze and pulled the emergency flare gun from under the seat, sticking it in her face.

“You leave me no choice but to shoot you,” he said, voice cold and certain. This was not a threat, it was a statement of fact.

Opal knew the truth when she heard it, and for one second her resolve wavered. She pulled back, but not quickly enough to prevent Artemis from firing the flare into her helmet, then reaching up to flick down the visor.

Opal spun away from the Cessna, trailing black smoke, red sparks swarming around her head like angry wasps. Her wing smashed into the Cessna’s, and neither survived intact. Solar cell splinters flashed like stardust, and Opal’s tail feathers helicoptered slowly earthward. The airplane yawed to starboard, moaning like a wounded animal.

-The Time Paradox, Chapter 15