Our universe is home to planets beyond counting, which in turn are home to are even more governments and rulers. For these regimes, the only alternative to defeat and revolution is to rule forever. Good luck with that.
In the humanoid sector of the universe, lies the planet Rhysalan. It gained independence at the cost of much of its own blood. In need of funds and being outside current political jurisdiction, Rhysalan eventually starts harboring the politicians and personnel of governments who had been ousted as others' independence. They have a lot of money don’t you know? However, in the cosmopolitan planet of wealthy refugees lie plenty of schemes and machinations, with the corruption to facilitate them.
When the Morchardese Prince Arpad Vladislaus Jaegalleon gets vaporized by a disruptor one day, MCID Chief Warrant Officer Graven Tower and Detector Derin Hildreth arrive to investigate this murder. Each witness brings in more questions than answers and the bodies continue to pile up as the corruption gets uncovered.
Quantum Mortis – A Man Disrupted is a combination of science fiction and classic noir taking place on the edges of the human-controlled portion of known outer space. Initially created as one book by Theodore Beale – known primarily as Vox Day – and Steven Rzasa, it has since expanded to a mini-series and even spawned a larger spin-off series called "War Dogs" by G. D. Stark.
In 2021, Vox began adapting the story into a serialized weekly webcomic at his site, Arkhaven. The whole thing can be read for free here
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Quantum Mortis - A Man Disrupted contains examples of the following tropes:
- Aliens Speaking English: Along with a healthy dose of unchanged modern American English. Xenos in this story generally speak English and often have names deriving from European languages, particularly Italian. Delbert even tips off Tower by using code in English.
- Artificial Intelligence: Very advanced AI’s exist in universe, but they have a lot of diversity in thought and personality. Some are rather stupid, though most of them are reasonably intelligent. All of them have their own likes and dislikes and personality.
- Disintegrator Ray: A disruptor performs this, hence the name A Man Disrupted. They're not generally practical for combat or self defense though.
- Fictional Document: Chapters begin with a quote from a longer work, to expand on the back story.
- Eye Scream: Tower uses his combat knife to remove a robotic eye from Dunn Hardwig in battle.
- Fantastic Racism: Downplayed. The humans freely call disparate non-humans 'xenos' to their faces even in tense situations, but none seem to particularly mind. Most of the species have some sort of problem with other species and wars are common. However despite the multitude of species on Rhysalan, the tension is generally low.
- Green-Skinned Space Babe: Mara is one. Might be why Prince Arpad had an affair with her.
- Mission Control: Baby interacts with Tower through his augment, not to mention performs a large amount of the research.
- Noble Fugitive: Rhysalan is a sort of neutral planet that tends to harbor exiled governments.
- Noir: In outerspace. It begins with a murder, corruption is rampant with each witness bringing twists and turns. The fashion is frequently from the 50s too.
- Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions: Averted. Entire planets seem to be still be Christian and Baby is one as well, despite being an AI. Tower himself has little contempt despite being an atheist.
- Rubberforehead Aliens: Most of the xenos encountered in the story tend to be very humanoid and speak English, though some exceptions are noted to exist too. Some of them are even genetically compatible with one another. They also tend to wear clothes that humans would wear too.
- Shellshocked Veteran: Tower has horrible PTSD that is preventing him from moving on or forming meaningful relationships. His brutality in battle even scares Hildreth. Its generally well hidden though.
- The Spock: Averted. The Artificial Intelligence's in universe have plenty of emotions and don't always cooperate with one another. Baby even calls an older, less functional model 'retarded'.
- Wretched Hive: For white collar crime anyways. Over half of the police force is receiving some amount of bribes and virtually all of customs is. Tower rarely enforces the law, seeing as his informants help him crack down on far more serious criminals.
