Chapter Text
Book Two: The Arctic Incident
Artemis and Orion Fowl: A Psychological Assessment
From “The Teenage Years”
By Prof. J. Argon, Brotherhood of Psychologists
Commissioned by the Lower Elements Police
By the age of thirteen, our first subject, Artemis Fowl, was displaying signs of an intellect greater than any human since Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Artemis had beaten European chess champion Evan Kashoggi in an online tournament, patented more than twenty-seven Inventions, and won the architectural competition to design Dublin’s new opera house. He had also written a computer program that diverted millions of dollars from Swiss accounts to his own, forged more than a dozen Impressionist paintings that now hang in various galleries worldwide, and cheated the Fairy People out of a substantial amount of gold.
Meanwhile, our second subject, Orion Fowl, at the same age possessed a similar but significantly underutilized skill set. She has dedicated hundreds of thousands of hours to a range of video games of all types but never competed professionally. She demonstrated great physical skill in the area of gymnastics, and possibly hand-to-hand combat, but has not engaged in the activity since her early childhood. She has shown great talent in engineering and strategic thinking, but mostly only uses them for her own amusement.
At this time, it is worth noting that contrary to popular belief, Artemis and Orion Fowl are, in fact, first cousins, not twins (though the two do share a birthday). And unlike Artemis, Orion appears to have no interest in vast wealth or power. With that in mind, the remaining question is, why? What drove Artemis to get involved in criminal enterprises?
The answer lies with his father. Artemis Fowl Senior was the head of a criminal empire that stretched from Dublin’s docklands to the backstreets of Tokyo, but he had had ambitions to establish himself as a legitimate businessman.
Artemis Fowl Senior had bought a cargo ship, stocked it with 250 thousand cans of cola, and set course for Murmansk in Northern Russia along with his younger brother Demitri and nephew Isaac. There, he had arranged a business deal that could prove profitable for decades to come.
Unfortunately, the Russian Mafiya decided they did not want an Irish tycoon cutting himself a slice of their market, and sank the Fowl Star in the Bay of Kola. Demitri Fowl was killed, along with his son. Artemis Fowl the First was declared missing, presumed dead.
Artemis Junior was now the head of an empire with limited funds, while Orion was parentless and moved from her home in the U.S. due to financial struggles. In order to restore the family fortune, Artemis embarked on a criminal career that would earn him over fifteen million pounds in two short years.
This vast fortune was mainly spent financing rescue expeditions to Russia. Artemis refused to believe that his father was dead, even though every passing day made it seem more likely.
Both of the Fowl children avoided other teenagers and resented being sent to school. Artemis preferring to spend his time plotting his next crime, and Orion her latest means of annoying him.
So, even though their involvement with the goblin uprising during this year was to be traumatic, terrifying, and dangerous, it was probably the best thing that could have happened to them. At least they spent some time outdoors, and got to meet some new people.
It’s a pity most of them were trying to kill them.