In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war! And rare ships.
Warhammer 40,000 is a sprawling media franchise, a grimdark military sci-fantasy setting about epic conflict, every side being horrible, and people generally never getting the chance to act on their feelings. BUT for this exchange I'm requesting ships that require only a single novel's worth of investment each. The key thing you need to know: the central conflict in the narrative is between the Imperium of Mankind (bad, oppressive, treats human life as v cheap) and the forces of Chaos (bad, often mindlessly violent, treat human life as v cheap) with the individuals stuck in this setting doing their best despite systemic horror. So let's go:
Tzula Digriiz/Shira Hagen, from the novel Pandorax. In this novel, a dangerous backwater planet in Imperial hands is discovered to have a mcguffin on it that causes Chaos forces to invade and try to seize the damn thing. The story is pulpy and ridiculous, but goddamn look at these ladies: - Tzula Digriiz, ex-cat burglar, is a member of an Inquisitorial team (basically a religion-flavored special ops hit squad). When things go wrong for her team she has to join forces with the local military to try to protect the world and keep herself safe. - Shira Hagen, hotshot fighter pilot, comes to the planet chasing a monstrous demon jetplane (did I mention it was pulpy?) and gets stranded there. She meets up with the defenders and pitches in to help. The two of them are very different personality-wise and contrast with each other in excellent ways. They work together well. They ALMOST get a hug in a novel where displays of affection are pretty much nonexistent. And despite the grimdark setting, they both get solidly positive endings that leave the door wide open for more development between them. Content notes: lots of combat violence, character death, magical brainwashing/slavery, brief torture scenes (not involving these characters), plague/decay/zombie-type body horror (the enemy forces).
Ahzek Ahriman/Kydomor Forrix, from the novel Magnus the Red: Master of Prospero. These guys do appear in other books too, but this is the only one where they're together, and it's the earliest one for either of them, so later developments aren't necessary for the ship. So: this novel is set in the prequel era, when not everything was terrible yet (some things are still terrible; you can't build a galactic empire without oppressing people). Space marines from two different legions are trying to evacuate a planet where increasing seismic instability is threatening human settlements. Ahriman is from a legion of sorcerers; Forrix is from a legion of engineers. They have exactly the kind of personality differences you expect from that sentence. As First Captains of their legions, they're expected to work together and find a way for their joint efforts to succeed. Watching them try to find common ground and learn to help each other was one of my favorite parts of the book (and the "let me hold off all the bad guys while you do your fiddly specialist magic" scene was another one). Content notes: civil unrest, crowd violence, I haven't re-read recently but probably background slavery.
Barsabbas/Sargaul, from the novel Blood Gorgons. A pirate-flavored chapter of Chaos space marines move to protect a world they recruit from, leaving the chapter leadership unprepared for an attempted takeover. Why I'm feral about them: LITERALLY SOULBOUND. The Blood Gorgons chapter engage in weird magic surgery to trade body parts with a partner (just called a "bond") that leaves them able to feel each other's pain, sense each other's presence, and even access a little of each other's memory. The whole chapter is made up of bonded pairs, often with a mentor/protege vibe. Barsabbas is the younger of this pair, and starts out uncertain that he's good enough for his more-experienced bond, but he's the main character so he grows into his own as a warrior a lot -- as he makes his way across the landscape of an unfamiliar planet trying to find Sargaul, who appears to have been captured by hostile aliens. Space marines are often framed as not having real human emotions but we get, among other things, this line: "He felt no love for Sargaul, only a need to recover him, like a swordsman who was missing his swordarm." HELLO YES I don't care if you call that love or not, you crave him like a missing part of your own body. The novel does NOT give me the big romantic ending I want, which is why there needs to be fanwork. Content notes: Lots of battle violence, betrayal (not between ship), torture (some of it committed by Barsabbas), slavery including suggestions of sex slavery (no on-page rape), abuse of prisoners, parasite/disease body horror.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2024-04-18 07:07 pm (UTC)Warhammer 40,000 is a sprawling media franchise, a grimdark military sci-fantasy setting about epic conflict, every side being horrible, and people generally never getting the chance to act on their feelings. BUT for this exchange I'm requesting ships that require only a single novel's worth of investment each. The key thing you need to know: the central conflict in the narrative is between the Imperium of Mankind (bad, oppressive, treats human life as v cheap) and the forces of Chaos (bad, often mindlessly violent, treat human life as v cheap) with the individuals stuck in this setting doing their best despite systemic horror. So let's go:
Tzula Digriiz/Shira Hagen, from the novel Pandorax. In this novel, a dangerous backwater planet in Imperial hands is discovered to have a mcguffin on it that causes Chaos forces to invade and try to seize the damn thing. The story is pulpy and ridiculous, but goddamn look at these ladies:
- Tzula Digriiz, ex-cat burglar, is a member of an Inquisitorial team (basically a religion-flavored special ops hit squad). When things go wrong for her team she has to join forces with the local military to try to protect the world and keep herself safe.
- Shira Hagen, hotshot fighter pilot, comes to the planet chasing a monstrous demon jetplane (did I mention it was pulpy?) and gets stranded there. She meets up with the defenders and pitches in to help.
The two of them are very different personality-wise and contrast with each other in excellent ways. They work together well. They ALMOST get a hug in a novel where displays of affection are pretty much nonexistent. And despite the grimdark setting, they both get solidly positive endings that leave the door wide open for more development between them.
Content notes: lots of combat violence, character death, magical brainwashing/slavery, brief torture scenes (not involving these characters), plague/decay/zombie-type body horror (the enemy forces).
Ahzek Ahriman/Kydomor Forrix, from the novel Magnus the Red: Master of Prospero. These guys do appear in other books too, but this is the only one where they're together, and it's the earliest one for either of them, so later developments aren't necessary for the ship.
So: this novel is set in the prequel era, when not everything was terrible yet (some things are still terrible; you can't build a galactic empire without oppressing people). Space marines from two different legions are trying to evacuate a planet where increasing seismic instability is threatening human settlements. Ahriman is from a legion of sorcerers; Forrix is from a legion of engineers. They have exactly the kind of personality differences you expect from that sentence. As First Captains of their legions, they're expected to work together and find a way for their joint efforts to succeed. Watching them try to find common ground and learn to help each other was one of my favorite parts of the book (and the "let me hold off all the bad guys while you do your fiddly specialist magic" scene was another one).
Content notes: civil unrest, crowd violence, I haven't re-read recently but probably background slavery.
Barsabbas/Sargaul, from the novel Blood Gorgons. A pirate-flavored chapter of Chaos space marines move to protect a world they recruit from, leaving the chapter leadership unprepared for an attempted takeover.
Why I'm feral about them: LITERALLY SOULBOUND. The Blood Gorgons chapter engage in weird magic surgery to trade body parts with a partner (just called a "bond") that leaves them able to feel each other's pain, sense each other's presence, and even access a little of each other's memory. The whole chapter is made up of bonded pairs, often with a mentor/protege vibe.
Barsabbas is the younger of this pair, and starts out uncertain that he's good enough for his more-experienced bond, but he's the main character so he grows into his own as a warrior a lot -- as he makes his way across the landscape of an unfamiliar planet trying to find Sargaul, who appears to have been captured by hostile aliens. Space marines are often framed as not having real human emotions but we get, among other things, this line: "He felt no love for Sargaul, only a need to recover him, like a swordsman who was missing his swordarm." HELLO YES I don't care if you call that love or not, you crave him like a missing part of your own body. The novel does NOT give me the big romantic ending I want, which is why there needs to be fanwork.
Content notes: Lots of battle violence, betrayal (not between ship), torture (some of it committed by Barsabbas), slavery including suggestions of sex slavery (no on-page rape), abuse of prisoners, parasite/disease body horror.