Bring the Storm!
Alaster Karo was just an Ordinary High-School Student until he challenged a member of the Storm Ravens Space Marine Chapter to a fight in the school gym. Little did he know that this was but the first step on a rip-roaring adventure full of chitinous horrors, daemonic plots, interplanetary intrigue and exploding waiters.
The Misfits
is a Warhammer 40,000 fanfic by davidnm2007, very much in the style of Sandy Mitchell's contributions to the franchise, where the Imperium of Man is less an impossibly hellish and oppressive dictatorship and more an unwieldy, incompetence and corruption-ridden modern bureaucracy on a galactic scale, where ordinary people live ordinary lives while a handful of heroes try their best to make sure it doesn't all come crashing down.
The story follows Alaster and his new best friends: religious and soft-spoken Patreus and loutish ex-ganger Nasty, on their journey to become Space Marines and beyond, as they become involved in the complicated politics of the Imperium and a dark conspiracy that could spell the end of the chapter they worked so hard to join...
Bring the tropes, brothers!:
- All Monks Know Kung-Fu: Patreus, despite his unassuming looks, is an excellent fighter thanks to the martial arts training he got at the monastery that raised him.
- All Planets Are Earthlike: A Discussed Trope. Even though we see several habitable planets, they're all noted to have major differences, some of which can be quite problematic. The Octalian system's lack of potassium and need for imports becomes a major component of the Big Bad's plan.
- Aristocrats Are Evil: Not so much evil as incompetent. Riothria Minoris' Planetary Governor Sarrack's cutting the defense budget to finance his extravagant lifestyle and other failings of his cronyism-riddled administration causes major problems when the Tyranids attack, up to and including half the planet rebelling against him.
- Bad Ass Bookworm: Phelonas spent 800 years building himself an entire daemon world just so he'd have a quiet place to read, before some Khorne Berserkers took it over and threw all his books out to make room for more trophy skulls. He's even a published author!
- Bad Ass Normal: Despite being an aging priest (albeit an ex-military one), Father Inyre manages to survive multiple encounters with Phelonas, despite the latter being a Chaos Marine with Psychic Powers.
- Leora, despite being an ordinary middle-aged woman, at one point takes down a Bloodletter. She did use Phelonas' daemon sword, but that in itself is pretty impressive in light of the fact that a) it was made to be used by a Chaos Space Marine and probably weighs about as much as she does and b) daemon weapons tend to kill anybody they don't have a pact with just as easily no matter which end of the weapon they're on.
- Alaster Karo before he gets geneseed, starting the story going toe-to-toe with a fully augmented Space Marine in armor, then proving his mettle against Originists, Dark Eldar, and Tyranids all before finally earning his geneseed. The rest of Section Karo, being Patreus and Nasty, also take near equal part in the latter three fights, and so also qualify.
- Black-and-Grey Morality: Karo and co., and the portrayed Storm Ravens in general, openly hold xenophobic beliefs, are disgusted by aliens and mutants just for being aliens and mutants, and end up doing quite the number of morally questionable things over the course of the story, despite having their own individual struggles and qualms about what they're doing. They are opposed by:
- The Tyranids, who just want to eat everything, and are never portrayed positively or sympathetically in any way. Their Hive Mind is shown as having a cold, ruthless, cunning and calculating intelligence (and occasional experimentative bent), but is nonetheless ultimately frequently outmaneuvered by the Space Marines in individual engagements. The 'nids are ultimately portrayed as a ruthless, implacable, terrifying and utterly inhuman force, and no quarter is ever asked or given.
- Briefly, the Dark Eldar, who are again framed more as an impersonal force for other factions to manipulate, summon Warp Beasts, and are given no sympathetic characterization or treatment.
- Phelonas, who despite all his frustrations, philosophical musings, and valid criticism of the Imperium, casually kills people who have Outlived Their Usefulness (or just to feed his Daemon Sword), and is perfectly willing to gleefully kill and condemn 4 billion people for no higher cause than his own further transcension.
- The Originists, who can have sympathetic personal stories or at least traumas, believe in a factually incorrect Young-Universe creation theory centered around the God-Emperor, are manipulated into worse living conditions by their leadership to give them further grievances and keep them dependent, and consider Space Marines mutants and blindly oppose them just for being Space Marines. They're also being manipulated into their worse actions by Phelonas.
- Boss-Arena Idiocy: How Alaster wins his initial fight with a Space Marine. He knows part of the school gymnasium's floor is dangerously slippery, so he maneuvers the Marine into it in order to trip him up and stab him.
- Bug War: Much of the story revolves around the Tyranid invasion of the Riothria system. Sergeant Kodos also mentions fighting giant nematode worms at one point.
- Combat Pragmatist: Alaster repeatedly shows this as one of his core strengths, finding ways to exploit the environment (and/or the enemies' own weapons) to win otherwise stacked fights. Up to and including drowning an entire Tyranid army. By using Tyranid explosives to blow a dam. As they'd planned to do to Imperial forces earlier.
- More generally, Storm Ravens doctrine encourages this, believing honor comes through victory and that anything which increases the odds thereof is worth pursuing. They also get in on it in practice, rolling boulders onto Tyranids and the like.
- Kodos comes to dislike the Tyranid Hive Mind for also showing a propensity towards it.
- The narration and characters also discuss at some points how seeming traditions of "honor", such as the Space Wolves' fondness for melee weapons and combat, may actually have pragmatic, situational, or secular reasoning behind it.
- Corrupt Church: This being 40k, there are a few, most prominent being the Originists, who believe Space Marines are unacceptable mutants, despite the fact that the guy they worship as God was the one responsible for creating them in the first place. The monks who raised Patreus were also real pieces of work who spent all the church donations on Hookers and Blow.
- Dead Fic: Unfortunately, it hasn't updated since January 2012.
- Deadpan Snarker: Nasty and Kodos are the real stand outs, but many cast members have their moments.
- Dirty Coward: Cadet Sarok, who tries to cut and run when Snake Outpost is attacked by Tyranids, which only makes things worse for everyone involved.
- Drill Sergeant Nasty: Kodos is a pretty amusing example.
- Dystopia Is Hard: The author makes a decent effort at showing what the Imperium would be like if it were run by real people. The result is decidedly less Nineteen Eighty-Four and more The Thick of It.
- Explosive Decompression: A more realistic example. Nobody actually blows up, but it does cause ruptured blood vessels and a collapsed lung.
- Fantastic Caste System: Every citizen of Octalia is ranked based on how well they did on their qualifying exams for the Space Marines. Those who just barely missed the mark due to geneseed incompatibility (naturally, this includes all the women, who are presumably tested as a formality) or other factors get the best jobs, more votes in the civilian government's elections, etc. while those too weak to qualify, or who refused to take the tests are pariahs and each citizen is born with the rank of their parents and only have one chance to advance it when The Selection comes around. Alaster's initial motivation for challenging the Space Marine to a fight was to bump up his family's rank, never expecting he'd actually qualify.
- Fantasy Counterpart Culture: Octalia strongly resembles modern Britain, though the Originists brand of religious fundamentalism has more of an American flavor.
- First Blood: One way of becoming a Storm Raven is to duel one to this.
- Full-Name Ultimatum: Whenever anybody calls Nasty "Sandy Shepherd" you know they're serious.
- Good Shepherd: Father Inyre, an Originist parish priest, is a kind man who wants the best for his flock and only hates Space Marines because of the horrors he suffered fighting against the Traitor Legions during his time as a Guardsman. And then he finds out who's really running the show.
- Heroic Sacrifice/ Redemption Equals Death: Governor Sarrack atones for his corruption and incompetence by giving up his spot on the last shuttle off Minoris to three children before the planet is destroyed.
- Implausible Fencing Powers: Most Chaos warriors who want a daemon-possessed sword go with a Khornate daemon of war and bloodlust for extra damage. Phelonas knows these people are fools. Just think of how much more damage you can do with a Tzeenchian daemon of luck and probability manipulation making sure you always hit just the right spot.
- I Shall Taunt You: The first version is part of how Alaster defeats Thaddeus in the opening fight, by taunting him into losing his cool, then luring him into an environmental hazard.
- Jerkass: Cadet Sarok, who seems to be channeling Draco Malfoy. Tobias, one of the heads of the Originist church, whose plans to bring down the Storm Ravens involve running guns to petty criminals and screwing over investors in the stock market. Also, any Ultramarines who appear.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Both Sergeant Kodos and Nasty. Naturally, they butt heads a lot.
- Lighter and Softer: Another Discussed Trope. Delta Octalis is noted as being a much nicer place to live than most of the Imperium, being a rare example of an urbanized Chapter homeworld. It'd still be pretty dystopian by most modern people's standards, though, with state-mandated religious services, draconian eugenics policies and most of the population working for slave wages. Phelonas is wont to comment on how sick the Imperium is that such a place is considered one of it crown jewels.
- Lower-Class Lout: Nasty was one before he became a Space Marine... and pretty much stays that way.
- Mama Bear: Dr. Leora's desire to avenge her dead son is so powerful she's able to stand up to Chaos Champions without flinching, plot the downfall of entire planets and even kill daemons.
- Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: Phelonas' most trusted confidante on Delta Octalis is Leora, a medicae at a local hospital with a grudge against the Storm Ravens because her son tried out but didn't survive the training.
- Motive Rant: Phelonas tends to do this with anybody who'll listen. Lampshaded by Leora.
- Required Secondary Powers: Phelonas uses some Tzeenchian warp magic to make himself an Intangible Man. Being a genetically altered, daemonically mutated Super-Soldier in Powered Armor, he's not too bothered by the fact that he can't breathe or even feel air pressure in this state. When he tries to take a normal person with him, however...
- Space Marine: Natch, the story is about how Alaster, Nasty and Patreus become, then serve as these. Plenty of others also feature, both Storm Ravens and other Chapters.
- Space Pirates: How Patreus became an orphan.
- Spanner in the Works: The Emperor being a strong adherent of the "works in mysterious ways" school of godhood, Alaster and friends have a habit of stumbling into Phelonas' plans and mucking them up without even realizing they've done it.
- The Spartan Way: Downplayed. From what we see of it, the Storm Ravens' recruiting methods are pretty sedate by Space Marine standards. Of course, running an obstacle course through a ship's halls 'til you drop is a pretty tall order when said ship is a floating battle-cathedral the size of a small city.
- Stealth in Space: Justified for the 'Nids, who use cryogenic gasses to freeze their spore ships so they can't be detected by infrared scanners. By the time they're close enough to their target's sun to thaw out, it's already too late. They also have little need for engines during interstellar voyages, since they use the psychically manipulated gravity well of their last target planet's sun to catapult themselves toward the next habitable system over.
- Surrounded by Idiots: Poor Phelonas just can't seem to escape this trope. As an avowed rationalist, he originally defected to Chaos because he couldn't abide the Emperor's authoritarianism, only to find himself surrounded by bloodthirsty maniacs who cared more about taking skulls for the skull throne than unveiling the mysteries of the Warp. And then he has to go and hatch a scheme that involves manipulating a bunch of people who are brainless fundies even by Imperium standards.
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Take That, Scrappy!: The Ultras get a good kicking here, as they tend to do in 40k fanworks. - 10-Minute Retirement: An involuntary version when Alastor, Nasty and Patreus are failed from their training and busted down to Chapter Serfs due to starting a brawl. Of course, then the Tyranids show up, and Sarok shows his true colors and his pals do nothing to stop him, leaving the Chapter even shorter on recruits...
- Those Two Guys: Fegust and Sandrer.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Nasty and Patreus. Nasty and anyone he likes, really.
- We ARE Struggling Together: The Minorans go and have a civil war right in the middle of a 'Nid invasion. Thanks to the rebels making a big show of worshiping Ultramarines Primarch Roboute Guilliman, they manage to drag them into it, too.
- Wicked Cultured: Aspiring Champion Phelonas.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Happens to Tobias when the Originists plans start to backfire.
"If they explode, do we still have to leave a tip?"
