The Arctic Incident
From Artemis Fowl
Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident (now Artemis Fowl and the Arctic Incident) is the second book in the Artemis Fowl series written by Irish author Eoin Colfer.
[edit] Plot
[edit] Beginning
Two years before Artemis Fowl stole a substantial amount of gold from The People, his father, Artemis Fowl the First, went missing after the ship he was on, the Fowl Star, exploded and was sunk by the Russian Mafia.
Two members of the Russian Mafiya looked around for any remains of the Fowl Star and its contents when they found a survivor, Artemis Fowl the First, in terrible condition. His hands were undergoing frostbite, while a leg was snapped below the knee and his face was badly burnt. They identified him by looking at his wallet and grin to themselves before calling their boss.
Almost three years later, Artemis Fowl the Second is sitting in a counselor's office in Saint Bartleby's School for Young Gentlemen, his mother worrying about his mental health. While the counselor got farther than the last half dozen that have tried to counsel Artemis, having seen that Artemis respects no one enough to see them as an equal, he is interrupted by a phone call from Butler to Artemis, calling about news of the Fowl Star.
Meanwhile underground, Elf Captain Holly Short, after the Artemis Fowl incident, is sent to surveillance duty along with Sprite Chix Verbil, who spent part of the time trying to impress Holly.
((Will continue this at later date since no one else seems interested in helping make the plots for this site. --Juubi no Ryuu 23:55, 2 June 2009 (UTC)))
[edit] Secret Message
For an unknown reason, the publisher of the US edition of this book chose to remove this code.
For the UK and other countries, each page had a set of symbols along the bottom. Using the guide on "www.artemisfowl.co.uk", this can be translated. From scratch, the code, written in Centaurian, can be deciphered because in the book there is a translation on Foaly's computer screen for the following poem:
Fairy creatures, heed this warning, On Earth, the human era is dawning. So hide, fairy, lest you be found, And make a home beneath the ground. Eoin Colfer writes prior to this passage that it is an "illuminated Centaurian manuscript" from "The Scrolls of Capalla". The code is slightly easier to translate than Gnommish because many of the symbols look similar to their English counterparts. It can be read fluently once familiar, and is more like a recognizable font than a language.
The final message is as follows:
Congratulations Human. If you have cracked this code then you are more intelligent than most of your species. This is a message from the Fairy People. We are seeking out our allies among the Mud Men. Though most Humans are dullwitted creatures there are exceptions. You for example. The reason for your intelligence is that you have Fairy ancestors. Do you feel different from those around you? Are your ears a bit pointier than most? Is your tongue long enough to touch your nose? Do you dream of flying? Have you ever thought that you do not belong among the Mud Men? That is because you have Fairy blood in your veins. So young Mud Fairy I have a mission for you. As one of the People it is your duty to protect the Earth from those who would destroy it. You must become one of a new race of Mud men who love this planet as much as the Fairy Folk. There is one simple rule. Use only what you need and use it wisely. Do this and the Earth will survive. Go now and begin your quest. I shall repeat this message for those Humans whose Fairy intelligence is buried a bit deeper than yours. The same message is then repeated, up until "Do you feel different from those around you?"
In the republication of the book, the Centaurian code is changed to the Gnommish cypher used in the first book.
One of these Goblins is named Niall, after Eoin Colfer's brother. Through the book, this Goblin is mentioned several times, and each time it is spelt differently. First, the original Irish spelling, Niall, as Colfer's brother spells it, then Nyal, then Nyle.
There is also a rewrite that features a different message at the beginning it is as follows.
One of the strangest creatures on the earth (or more accurately below it) is the common stinkworm. Stinkworms can only survive below the earth's crust and so have never been seen by humans. The stinkworm can grow to a length of fifteen centimetres and a diameter of up to eight centimetres.
The bigger a stinkworm is the more meat there is on its soft boned skeleton and the more valuable it is to a merchant. Stinkworms are big business in the fairy world and have been for thousands of yeats. They are very versatile creatures and can be boiled, fried, baked or even eaten raw - though this sushi approach can be difficult to swallow as the stink associated with the worms does not disappear until they are cooked. The current favourite way to eat the stinkworm is in a dish similar to bolognese, substituting stinkworms for spaghetti. Deep fried on a skewer is popular among the younger generation.
What makes the stinkworm so delicious is its juices. When the worm is heated in a pan or oven it bastes itself in a delicious spicy juice which even the best chefs have failed to reproduce. This juice is in fact earwax from the hundreds of ears that cover each worm's body. Some more sensitive fairies cannot forget that they are eating earwax and do not enjoy eating stinkworms, but most are so entranced by the flavour that they are quite prepared to ignore where it comes from.
Goblins in particular love stinkworms and are constantly inventing new ways to consume them. The rarest and most prized stinkworm dish is a stir fried bowl of stinkworm ears. The ears are shaved from the worm's body, rolled in flour and then lightly fried. This dish takes hours to prepare and costs a fortune. Goblins believe that if you eat a bowl of worm ears then you absorb the worm's memories of the places they have visited. This is not an appealing thought when you consider that a stinkworm's favourite environment is fresh troll dung.FowlFan 14 17:43, 8 May 2009 (UTC)
