History Literature / OutOftheDark

* HonorBeforeReason: The Shongairi follow a strict honor code called "Jukaris" that has been compared to bushido. After studying it extensively, Dave comes to the conclusion that [[spoiler:Thikair acted of his own volition, and his actions would likely be seen by most Shongairi as dishonorable (by attacking without announcing himself or allowing humans the chance to fight back). That is why he rushes the newly-built fleet to the Shong System in order to beat Vlad there and stop him from laying waste to the Shongairi homeworld. His goal is instead to force the Shongairi to submit to Earth (as is normal for a Shongairi "beta" to submit to a stronger "alpha") and become their allies in the coming war against the Hegemony]].

* HonorBeforeReason: The Shongairi follow a strict honor code called "Jukaris" that has been compared to bushido. After studying it extensively, Dave comes to the conclusion that [[spoiler:Thikair acted of his own volition, and his actions would likely be seen by most Shongairi as dishonorable. That is why he rushes the newly-built fleet to the Shong System in order to beat Vlad there and stop him from laying waste to the Shongairi homeworld. His goal is instead to force the Shongairi to submit to Earth (as is normal for a Shongairi "beta" to submit to a stronger "alpha") and become their allies in the coming war against the Hegemony]].

* LightspeedLeapfrog: [[spoiler:Vlad and the vampires]] spend all of the second novel flying to the Shongairi homeworld at roughly 6 times the speed of light, taking them about 40 years. Just as they're preparing to repay the Shongairi for their attack on Earth, they detect a massive spindle-shaped vessel gaining on them at an unbelievable acceleration. [[spoiler:Then Dave Dvorak contacts Vlad from his brand-new ship that has left Earth no more than 10 years ago.]]

'''If you don't want to spoil the ending, don't scroll down to the Index list at the bottom of this page, or even glance at the review page.''' The sequel, called ''Into the Light'' (coauthored by Chris Kennedy), was released on January 12th, 2021, after more than a decade in DevelopmentHell. The third novel, ''To Challenge Heaven'' is scheduled for release on January 16th, 2024.

* TwistEnding: The last few pages of this novel shift this novel's genre signficantly away from Weber's usual Hard Sci-Fi [[spoiler:by introducing vampires]]. YMMV, but few reviewers seem to appreciate it.

** In the second book, [[spoiler:this is Vlad's intention for all the Shongairi in the galaxy. It takes Stephen decades to convince him to spare some of them. And that's just on their homeworld. Their colonies will be wiped out completely. Vlad's amended plan is to obliterate all their space assets, including off-world colonies in the system, and to bomb them back into the stone age, making sure to destroy any and all industry and about 2/3 of the population]].

'''If you don't want to spoil the ending, don't scroll down to the Index list at the bottom of this page, or even glance at the review page.''' The sequel, called ''Into the Light'', was released on January 12th, 2021, after more than a decade in DevelopmentHell.

* ExplainExplainOhCrap: The Earth delegation to Sarth wants an opinion on a discussion between one of their own diplomatic attaches and Myrcal, the Qwernian Foreign Minister, from a native Sarthian. [[spoiler:It is there that they discover that the Qwernian word for "councilor", which the humans have been using as a title for their junior diplomatic attaches, also means "deputy". Myrcal has been under the assumption that Arthur McCabe, a junior member of the delegation, is their Ambassador's immediate subordinate, due to this mistranslation. And the members of the Earth delegation begin to wonder what else Myrcal has incorrectly assumed about the humans, and how that might be shaping Qwernian foreign policy...]]

* AwakeningTheSleepingGiant: When the alien invaders are about to make the human race extinct, someone on Earth finally decides to come out of his self-imposed exile and show them what real monsters can do.

** Lieutenant Colonel Alastair Sanders gives one to his troops in ''Chapter XV'' (6).

* BeautyIsNeverTarnished: Averted. By the begining of ''Chapter XXVII'' (29), Thikair notes that Ground Base Commander Shairez appears to have "aged" thanks to the ongoing conflict with the Humans.
* BenevolentAlienInvasion: Discussed. Both the hostile Shongairi and the humans fighting them both realize that a benevolent invasion would have been a lot more effective than the regular Alien Invasion that triggered the violent, stubborn human resistance that is turning the aliens' occupation into a bloody slog.

* DeathOfAChild: In one [[MoralEventHorizon particular scene]] in ''Chapter XVIII (19)''.

* HopelessWar: Though mankind fights tenaciously and wins small victories, it ultimately has no way of defending itself from an enemy that controls the orbitals. It's a hopeless for man, until the TwistEnding.

* ItsAllMyFault: Stephan Buchevsky blames himself for the villagers he was protecting getting killed or captured. Mircea helps convince him that it isn't.

** Stephan Buchevsky and a small band of rebels pulls one so that the refugee village can evacuate.

* NotSoDifferentRemark: Mircea to Stephan in ''Chapter XXVIII (28)''.

** Platoon Commander Rayzhar goes on one when his two little brothers were killed in a ambush. He does not discriminate against military and civilian targets.

** Master Sargent Stephan Buchevsky is a US Marine and was an instructor when he wasn't stationed in the Middle East.

-->'''Stephan Buchevsky:''' If their kids start starving, then any parent worth a single solitary damn is going to do anything it takes to feed them. I understand that, and I’ll give any kid the last slice of bread I’ve got. But if any of those other enclaves out there decide to sell us out, or throw us to the wolves to save their own asses by pointing somebody who comes after what they’ve got in our direction—or if they’re stupid enough to try and use your agreement just to get close enough to us to hit us themselves—then I’m going to be really, really unhappy, you understand. And they won’t like me when I’m unhappy. Hell, I don’t like me when I’m unhappy!

* ThisIsUnforgivable: Absolutely no one on Earth will even consider helping the Shongairi thanks to their repeated orbital bombardment and the billions of human deaths.

* AsskickingEqualsAuthority: It's a bone-deep part of Shongairi psychology, and (at first) they view humanity's "never say die" mentality as consciously dishonorable; when they realize it's innate to our species, they decide we're clinically insane.

* CrusadingWidower: Most of the main male characters lose their entire family in the invasion.

** It's possible to feel ''some'' pity for Thikair in the middle of his VillainousBreakdown at the very end when, afterr already being worn down and speculating he'd be made to commit suicide, he's left facing a CruelAndUnusualDeath he's confronted with the fact that [[spoiler:His entire command is being wiped out, and that his entire clan, and entire ''species'' will likely follow soon]] as a direct result of his actions.

--->'''Sharon Dvorak:''' If those long-eared freaks ever get this close, my kids -- our kids -- are going to be [[AdultFear hiding inside that cave, scared out of their minds]]. Those kids are our lives, Dave. They're our future. Hell, they're our hearts and souls, and you damned well know it! And if anything happens to you, I'll see you in their faces, hear the echo of you in their voices. Nothing is going to take that away from me. Nothing on God’s green earth -- and I don't care how it got here! -- is getting past me to hurt those kids! Don't you worry about what I'm ready for, David Dvorak. Not when our kids are involved!

* [[invoked]] AccidentallyCorrectWriting: In the second novel, [[spoiler:Vlad explains that the one movie to get close to getting his origins is ''Film/DraculaUntold''. While he doesn't look nearly as attractive as Creator/LukeEvans, the real Vlad and his surviving men did happen upon some cave in the mountains, although they did not meet a monster there. They found a chamber filled with light. Then Vlad lost consciousness. When he woke up, he found nothing of his men but their empty clothes, while he himself was transformed.]]

** The second book expands on this and proposes several explanations for why that's the case. For one, the Hegemony is dominated by herbivore species, whose mindset was that technology should help protect them from predators instead of finding better ways to hunt prey. This means that after a certain point, there's really no need to advance at a breakneck pace. This mindset seems to propagate even to omnivores and carnivores in the Hegemony, since they're in the minority. Additionally, pretty much all races in the Hegemony have a PostScarcityEconomy, limitless energy, and [[WeWillHavePerfectHealthInTheFuture perfect health]] that allows the to live for centuries. All those factors result in them designing technology to last for a ''long'' time and viewing change in a negative light. As a consequence, they're not used to having to repair broken stuff as much as we are. And when things don't break, there's no need to innovate. Humans of the 21st century are used to the mentality of "next year's model will be better" and planned obsolescence. The Hegemony races have no such views. The galactic culture's advancement curve has plateaued around 150,000-100,000 years ago. In contrast, humanity's curve continues to rise. When engineers and scientists get their hands on some specs of Shongairi tech, they're shocked at how overengineered everything is (to the point of having a piece of equipment be 80% larger than it has to be due to all the redundancy). The engineers' immediate reaction is to scale back on the redundancy to something that is still acceptable by human standards (but would be unforgivably risky to the aliens) to miniaturize the components. And some applications of tech are either absent (any form of AI) or are deliberately suppressed (artificial gravity on ships).

* ObligatoryWarCrimeScene: Platoon Commander Rayzhar slaughters civilians out of revenge for the death of his brothers.

** That's a mistake a lot of real-world Americans ALSO make, sooo...

--->'''Sharon Dvorak:''' If those long-eared freaks ever get this close, my kids—our kids—are going to be [[AdultFear hiding inside that cave, scared out of their minds]], Those kids are our lives, Dave. They’re our future. Hell, they’re our hearts and souls, and you damned well know it! And if anything happens to you, I’ll see you in their faces, hear the echo of you in their voices. Nothing is going to take that away from me. Nothing on God’s green earth—and I don’t care how it got here!—is getting past me to hurt those kids! Don’t you worry about what I’m ready for, David Dvorak. Not when our kids are involved!

* RecuriveTranslation: A major plot point of the latter third of ''Into The Light''. The Earth delegation to Sarth uses the term "Councilor" for some of their minor civilian dignitaries, as it has a common equivalent amongst most Sarthian languages thanks to the democratic influence of Dianto[[spoiler:, except in Qwernian, where the same word can be translated as "deputy". This leads to the Qwernians completely misunderstanding the Earth delegation's command structure, and who is actually in charge, which causes them to make successive diplomatic blunders]].

* DoingInTheWizard: [[spoiler:Vampires turn out to be more like ''[[Series/StargateSG1 Stargate]]''[='s=] Replicators. Their bodies are composed of advanced nanobots that make them invulnerable to most things and allow them to "disassociate" into gas form that can levitate. It's also why they don't require any sustenance beyond elecromagnetic radiation. The scientists studying them state that this is way beyond what the Shongairi have and may also be beyond what the Hegemony has.]]

* LaserGuidedKarma: Meanwhile, Humanity has Governor Howell. [[spoiler:The Governor of North Carolina who acted as [[TheMole a mole]] to the Shongairi and had all National Guardsmen and law enforcement covertly assist the rebel forces in his state. Because of his actions, which saved many lives, he seems to be well on his way to becoming President of the USA and the nation's capitol will be moved to Raleigh.]]

--> Over the years, Rob Wilson had instructed more Marines and cops than he could count in the proper use of handguns, and he’d always made a point of depressing the pretensions of any would-be two-gun pistoleros who crossed his path. That kind of fancy shit looked good in movies, he’d told them cuttingly. Of course, in that case both the writers and the director were on the side of the hero as he [[RuleOfCool unerringly picked off individual targets with each hand while simultaneously hurling his body in a graceful, headfirst, slow-motion, midair roll of a leap through a solid hail of automatic fire.]] [[RealityEnsues In real life, the hurlee would almost certainly end up shredded and dead, he’d pointed out.]] And even if the idiot survived—miracles did occasionally happen, after all, and he’d been told God sometimes took pity on lunatics, drunks, and fools—all he’d really achieve was to totally waste the ammunition from both of the guns in question. Even standing still he’d waste most of his shots because the human brain had this odd little quirk: it found it quite difficult to focus on two separate sight pictures simultaneously.

* RealityEnsues: Though mankind fights tenaciously and wins small victories, it ultimately has no way of defending itself from an enemy that controls the orbitals. It's a HopelessWar for man, until the TwistEnding.
** On the Shongairi side we have Ground Base Commander Shairez, who is often portrayed as the more likable Shongairi, whose only concern is to just follow her orders and get the job done along with not seem to having a severe hatred for the Humans.
** Meanwhile, Humanity has Governor Howell. [[spoiler:The Governor of North Carolina who acted as [[TheMole a mole]] to the Shongairi and had all National Guardsmen and law enforcement covertly assist the rebel forces in his state. Because of his actions, which saved many lives, he seems to be well on his way to becoming President of the USA and the nation's capitol will be moved to Raleigh.]]

* NotSoDifferent: Mircea to Stephan in ''Chapter XXVIII (28)''.

* InfantImmortality: Averted in one [[MoralEventHorizon particular scene]] in ''Chapter XVIII (19)''.

* UncertainDoom: Admiral Hazard, who briefly takes command of the U.S. military after most of the cities and military bases are destroyed and organizes the first (quite effective) counterattack. He's targeted by the Shongairi immediately afterwards and multiple characters question/specualte whether he got away in time bu t are often told there's been no word of him since.

* RecuriveTranslation: A major plot point of the latter third of ''Into The Light''. The Earth delegation to Sarth uses the term "Councilor" for some of their minor civilian dignitaries, as it has a common equivalent amongst most Sarthian languages thanks to the democratic influence of Dianto[[spoiler:, except in Qwernian, where the same word can be translated as "deputy". This leads to the Qwernians completely misunderstanding the Earth delegation's command structure, and who is actually in charge, which causes them to make successive diplomatic blunders.]]