History NightmareFuel / TheLaundrySeries

* The actual Atrocity Archive is a prime example; in general, anything which originated with the Nazis, and which is encountered in this context.
* [[HumanSacrifice Club]] [[ImAHumanitarian Zero]]. [[PoweredByAForsakenChild Amsterdam]].
* The Erich Zahn violin is absolutely terrifying. We never get any concrete information, but the snippets from its appraisal make it pretty clear why the appraiser almost vomited when he saw it:
-->The treatments that modify the material in this way are applied while its donor is still alive, and in excruciating pain.\\
[...]\\
The upper block appears to be carved from the body and lesser cornu of os hyoideum; the greater cornu is avulsed in a manner usually indicative of death by strangulation...
** And if that wasn't bad enough, there's also Mo's nightmare early on in ''Codex'', where a robed figure plays lullaby's to a baby in the Howard household on the Erich Zahn violin.
-->'''Bob:''' Think it's jealous?
** It gets worse. In ''The Rhesus Chart'', [[spoiler:it turns out that it's a second-order vampire, wide awake and hungry, capable of partially controlling the actions of Agent CANDID, and it's now ''extremely pissed off'' at Agent HOWARD.]]
*** It gets ''WORSE''. It's a fragment of [[spoiler: an elder god, specifically the King in Yellow and using it to play certain pieces of music can summon the King fully from Lost Carcosa. And while Mo's might be neutralised, it wasn't the only one and some of them are unaccounted for.]]
* From The Apocrypha of The Golden Promise Ministries (and really, just the Golden Promise Ministries as a whole):
** "There's this stuff about binding converts... And stuff about making the unclean vine bear clean fruit whether it will or no."
** The 'Ward of Nightmares' in the GPM compound too; [[spoiler:not only are the women there permanently and completely paralysed, but they're forced to constantly produce children for the Ministry, unwittingly contributing to the end of the world.]]
* In general, while the Laundry series offers no shortage of things 'from the bottom of the Mandelbrot set', most of the real nightmare fuel originates with humans. Sure, the many-angled ones will cheerfully suck your soul out through your ears and turn your hollowed-out carcass into a shambling zombie that does the same to anyone it touches -- but that's just what they ''do''. It takes humanity to aspire to true evil.
* ''Equoid'' manages to make unicorns ''horrifying''. [[spoiler: Ia Shub-Niggurath ia!]]
* A bit of FridgeHorror: Remember the half-dozen color-coded GOD GAME codewords from ''The Apocalypse Codex''? The naming scheme implies that all color code words are just variations on one theme. So, the EndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt is called CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. Does that mean there are other predicted Apocalypses like CASE NIGHTMARE BLUE/RED/YELLOW on the way? How many kinds of screwed is humanity in this universe?
** The world may soon find out; according to WordOfGod, ''The Nightmare Stacks'' is about what happens when the Laundry gets blindsided by CASE NIGHTMARE RED...
* [[AC:Scorpion Stare]], in ''The Nightmare Stacks', has GoneHorriblyWrong. [[spoiler:Faced with a faerie invasion force heading to the heart of Leeds, and with the British Army reinforcements still on the way, the Laundry decides to activate the local [[AC:Maginot Blue Stars]] CCTV network to slow them down. The network is fitted with an image-recognition algorithm that should, in theory, zap many-angled invaders into ashes while minimising accidental human casualties. Only it proves utterly useless against the heavily-warded invading army, and what's worse, fails to account for several hundred costumed anime convention-goers accidentally trespassing the zone of exclusion...]]

* [[AC:Scorpion Stare]], in ''The Nightmare Stacks', has GoneHorriblyRight. [[spoiler:Faced with a faerie invasion force heading to the heart of Leeds, and with the British Army reinforcements still on the way, the Laundry decides to activate the local [[AC:Maginot Blue Stars]] CCTV network to slow them down. The network is fitted with an image-recognition algorithm that should, in theory, zap many-angled invaders into ashes while minimising accidental human casualties. Only, they fail to account for several hundred costumed anime convention-goers accidentally trespassing the zone of exclusion...]]

* SCORPION STARE, in ''The Nightmare Stacks', has GoneHorriblyRight.

* SCORPION STARE [[spoiler: is a look-to-kill multi-headed basilisk uploaded to the national CCTV network.]] In ''The Nightmare Stacks', it has GoneHorriblyRight.

* SCORPION STARE [[spoiler: is a look-to-kill multi-headed basilisk uploaded to the national CCTV network.]] In ''The Nightmare Stacks', it GoesHorriblyRight.

** The world may soon find out; according to WordOfGod, ''The Nightmare Stacks'' is about what happens when the Laundry gets blindsided by CASE NIGHTMARE RED...

The upper block appears to be carved from the body and lesser cornu of os hyoideum; the greater cornu is avulsed in a manner usually indicative of death by strangulation . . .

* A bit of FridgeHorror: Remember the half-dozen color-coded GOD GAME codewords from ''The Apocalypse Codex''? The naming scheme implies that all color code words are just variations on one theme. So, the EndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt is called CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. Does that mean there are other predicted Apocalypses like CASE NIGHTMARE BLUE/RED/YELLOW on the way? How many kinds of screwed is humanity in this universe?

* ''Equoid'' manages to make unicorns ''horrifying''. [[spoiler: Ia Shub-Niggurath ia!]]

* From The Apocrypha of The Golden Promise Ministries (And really, just the Golden Promise Ministries as a whole):

** The 'Ward of Nightmares' in the GPM compound too; [[spoiler:Not only are the women there permanently and completely paralysed, but they're forced to constantly produce children for the Ministry, unwittingly contributing to the end of the world.]]

* Club Zero. Amsterdam.

* In general, while the Laundry series offers no shortage of things 'from the bottom of the Mandelbrot set', most of the real nightmare fuel originates with humans. Sure, the many-angled ones will cheerfully suck your soul out through your ears and turn your hollowed-out carcass into a shambling zombie that does the same to anyone it touches -- but that's just what they ''do''. It takes humanity to aspire to true evil.

* In general, while the Laundry series offers no shortage of things 'from the bottom of the Mandelbrot set', most of the real nightmare fuel originates with humans. Sure, the many-angled ones will cheerfully suck your soul out through your ears and turn your hollowed-out carcass into a shambling zombie that does the same to anyone it touches -- but that's just what they 'do'. It takes humanity to aspire to true evil.

* The actual Atrocity Archive (especially the chair and tables) is a prime example. Oddly enough, much of this trope seems to be provided by humans in the Laundry novels.
** Dear God, the reconstructed Zuse Z-2! "[T]hey rebuilt it at Sobibor camp, using circuits soldered with gold extracted from the teeth of their victims."

** The 'Ward of Nightmares' in the GPM compound too; [[spoiler:Not only are the women there permanently and completely paralysed, but they're forced to constantly produce children for the Ministry, unwittingly contributing to the end of the world.]]

** "There's this stuff about binding converts... And stuff about making the unclean vine bear clean fruit whether it will or no."

** "There's this stuff about binding converts... And stuff about making the unclean vine bear clean fruit whether it will or no.

* From The Apocrypha of The Golden Promise Ministries:

* Club Zero. Amsterdam.