History HeroicSacrifice / Literature

* The climax of ''Literature/OldKingdom''. To bind Orannis, Lirael goes in assuming that she will die, as symbolised by her ringing of the bell Astarael. [[spoiler:Then the Disreputable Dog bites off her hand to save her and sacrifices her own life instead.]]
* In ''Literature/OlliesOdyssey'', when the Tunnel of Love starts collapsing, Zozo uses his machine to hold it up while everyone else escapes. In the end, he's BuriedAlive when it all comes down on top of him, [[spoiler:and is reunited with the ballerina he loved upon his death]].
* Occurs in ''Literature/AnOutcastInAnotherWorld'' during [[spoiler:the defense of The Village, where numerous named characters die protecting civilians or each other.]] Those deaths have repercussions that last for the rest of the story.

** Mat [[spoiler: gives one eye]] to save [[spoiler: Moiraine]]. The effects of that decision almost certainly saved the entire world in the beginning of the last book.
* ''Literature/WhenYouReachMe'': Marcus chases after Sal to try to apologize. The Laughing Man [[spoiler Future!Marcus]] sacrifices himself to push Sal out of the way of a moving vehicle, saving his life.

* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'': Rincewind, [[DirtyCoward of]] [[HighHopesZeroTalent all]] [[TrueNeutral people]], [[spoiler: makes one in ''Literature/{{Sourcery}}'']].

* At the end of ''Literature/{{Allegiant}}'', Tris gives her life to stop the "reset" of Chicago by LaserGuidedAmnesia so that Caleb doesn't have to do it.

* Occurs in ''Literature/AnOutcastInAnotherWorld'' during [[spoiler:the defense of The Village, where numerous named characters die protecting civilians or each other.]] Those deaths have repercussions that last for the rest of the story.

* In Creator/RobertEHoward's Literature/ConanTheBarbarian novel ''Literature/TheHourOfTheDragon'', Tiberias dies for leading Valerius astray, because he had nothing to lose. Dying, he taunts Valerius that with all the injuries Valerius had done him, he didn't care about dying.
* Cazaril in ''Literature/TheCurseOfChalion'' by Creator/LoisMcMasterBujold. Three times. He still ends up alive.

* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'': Rincewind, [[DirtyCoward of]] [[HighHopesZeroTalent all]] [[TrueNeutral people]], [[spoiler: makes one in ''Sourcery'']].

* The ''Series/DoctorWho'' novel [[Recap/NewSeriesAdventuresEnginesofWar "Engines of War"]]:
** Cinder gets shot saving the Doctor from Karlax.
** The Castellan, who transmits the codes needed to escape Gallifrey to the Doctor, despite knowing he'll probably get executed for this. Karlax suspects he was responsible and tells Rassilon he'll find out who did this.

** ''Summer Knight'': The changeling Meryl is constantly tempted to give into her ogre side, sacrificing her humanity to gain a lot of power at the price of being subservient to Queen Mab. In the end, she does Choose to accept her fae side when doing so grants her the power to save her friend from a terrible fate. Meryl dies soon after making her choice but she takes down one of the strongest of the enemy's forces in the process.
** In ''Death Masks'', Shiro gives his own life up to replace Harry's in Nicodemus's plan. The suffering he went through before dying (and he was alive at the end, too) was described as being nothing short of profane, and to make things worse, he couldn't die of it until later, either.
** Lasciel's Shadow ultimately turns to the side of good in the last moments of ''White Night'', saving Harry's life by taking the psychic backlash of the spell she used to save him at the cost of her life.
** ''Changes'':

** ''Ghost Story'':
*** {{Defied}} with Molly Carpenter. When fighting the century old warlock and mind-magic master the Corpsetaker, Molly is fighting on the defensive in this battle in the minds. She considers nuking her own mind when it comes close to the end of the fight hoping the result will kill the Corpsetaker. Harry is able to suggest an alternative course which calls for help from an unlikely ally and saves Molly and many others.

* In Creator/GeneStrattonPorter's ''Literature/{{Freckles}}'', Freckles saves Angel from a falling tree at the cost of his own injuries.

* In ''Girlfriend In A Coma'' by Creator/DouglasCoupland, [[spoiler:Karen makes a sacrifice of sorts: she goes back into her coma at the end, so that her friends may have a second chance at life and the world will be restored to normal. Although Richard tries to stop her, she makes it clear that she's always known this will have to happen, and there is no way out.]]

* In ''[[Literature/TheHungerGames Catching Fire]]'' by Suzanne Collins, first Mags, then the unnamed Morphling addict from District 6 give up their lives to save Peeta, which confuses Katniss greatly.
** Katniss herself in the first book when she takes Prim's place at the reaping.

* Eponine in ''Literature/LesMiserables'', kind of. She only gets shot to save him because she wanted to die first, she still wanted him to die though.
* Creator/IsaacAsimov's "Literature/LightVerse": Mrs Lardner's husband died in the BackStory, while rescuing a commercial spaceship from a solar flare.

* In ''[[Literature/ShamanOfTheUndead The Mirror Demon]]'', out of all creatures, [[spoiler:Bad Luck]] sacrifices itself to let Ida escape from Temper's world in the climax of the book. [[spoiler:Epilogue reveals he survived, for better or worse.]]
* [[spoiler:Kelsier]] near the end of the first ''Literature/MistbornTheOriginalTrilogy'' novel and [[spoiler:Elend and Vin]] at the end of the series. Each of these also doubles as a SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome. Also, [[spoiler:Lightsong]] in ''Literature/{{Warbreaker}}'' and [[spoiler:Hrathen]] in ''Literature/{{Elantris}}''. Sanderson likes this trope a lot.
** [[spoiler: Lightsong is particularly impressive because he actually pulls this off ''twice''.]]

* The climax of Creator/GarthNix's ''Literature/OldKingdom''. To bind Orannis, Lirael goes in assuming that she will die, as symbolised by her ringing of the bell Astarael. [[spoiler:Then the Disreputable Dog bites off her hand to save her and sacrifices her own life instead.]]
* In ''Literature/OlliesOdyssey'', when the Tunnel Of Love starts collapsing, Zozo uses his machine to hold it up while everyone else escapes. In the end, he's BuriedAlive when it all comes down on top of him, [[spoiler:and is reunited with the ballerina he loved upon his death]].
* [[spoiler: Willium]] allows [[spoiler: Raze to turn him into a werewolf]] in the ''{{Pactbreaker}}'' in exchange for the [[MacGuffin MacGuffin]] he needs to [[spoiler: cure his daughter of her [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampirism.]] ]]
** Made especially tragic, as he was raised to believe that [[spoiler: allowing oneself to become a supernatural creature is a [[FateWorseThanDeath Fate Worse Than Death]], and, knowing this, Raze specifically forbids him from killing himself while making their deal.]]

* A couple in the Literature/RedDwarf book series:
** [[spoiler: Rimmer]] of all people gets ''two'' of them at the end of ''Last Human''. The first is rescuing his crewmates [[spoiler: and his son]] from [[spoiler:Lister's other self]], who shoots out [[spoiler:his light bee]]. The second is using [[spoiler: the Oblivion virus]] to destroy The Rage.
** [[spoiler: Ace]] in ''Backwards'', saving Lister from the Agonoid Pizzak'Rapp by jettisoning them both into space.
* [[spoiler: Ezri Delmastro, Jean Tannen's]] love interest, gets one in ''[[Literature/GentlemanBastard Red Seas Under Red Skies]]'' in a naval battle, when TheMole triggers a fire bomb. [[spoiler: Jean]] is about to go and grab it when [[spoiler:Ezri]] [[MoreExpendableThanYou punches him to the deck]], [[MoreHeroThanThou grabs the extremely hot bomb]] [[spoiler:herself]], and throws it onto the opposing vessel before it explodes, burning [[spoiler:herself]] alive in the process.
* Diane Duane, again. In Book 2 of her Trekverse ''Rihannsu'' series (''The Romulan Way'') Federation Ensign Luks rams his warp courier into a Romulan Warbird to allow the rebel Romulan cruiser ''Bloodwing'' to escape ch'Rihan orbit. In the backstory from the book, a Romulan who was secretly working with the Federation allows himself to be captured and executed; this has the effect of strengthening Terise LoBrutto/Arrhae t'Llhweiir's cover (a Federation agent pretending to be a Romulan).
* In ''[[Literature/MichaelVey Rise of the Elgen]]'', Hatch releases a horde of rats to eat the heroes alive. While they manage to climb to water pipes above the swarm, they all know it's just a matter of time before one of them falls off or the rats pile high enough to reach them. [[ShockAndAwe Zeus]] uses his powers to set off the sprinklers, despite his potentially lethal weakness to water. He escapes alive, but only thanks to Jack [[NoOneGetsLeftBehind managing to pull off a last-minute rescue mission]].
* Creator/DavidWeber's ''Literature/{{Safehold}}'':

* In the FinalBattle of ''Literature/SongOfTheLioness'' by Creator/TamoraPierce, [[spoiler:Liam Ironarm for all his shang-dragon-ness realizes that he can't catch eight arrows at once and takes them to save Jonathan's life. Later the Shang Wildcat delivers a letter to Alanna, written by Liam before the last battle, which confirms that his death had been foretold.]]

* In ''VideoGame/StarCraft: Speed of Darkness'', the remaining SpaceMarines willingly activate the psi-emitter to lure the Zerg to their bunker in order to buy precious time for the shuttles sent by the [[LaResistance Sons of Korhal]] to evacuate Mar Sara City (as shown in the game). None of the marines survive.

* ''Franchise/StarWarsLegends''
** In the novelization of ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'', the dragon lizard that Obi-Wan rode on Utapau, named Boga, somehow sensed the clone attack coming and twisted herself in midair to take the brunt of the blasts, saving Obi-Wan's life.

* In ''Literature/AncillaryJustice'', Breq jumps down a bridge to save Seivarden, who has fallen down there a moment ago and is clinging to a very fragile piece of glass. Breq is wearing very efficient armour and counts on possibly surviving, but the fall does break every bone in her body.

* In ''Literature/TheFarthestShore'', [[TheArchmage Ged]] uses all his power to close the hole in the world. He doesn't die, but he does permanently lose his magic (he describes it as pouring a cup of water on the ground), so the person he was is essentially dead.

* ''Literature/IHaveNoMouthAndIMustScream''. Ted kills the other four prisoners so they won't have to suffer anymore, and in return, suffers a FateWorseThanDeath for the rest of eternity.

** At the close of the War Arc, Arthur is forced to overexert Sylvia's Beast Will while fighting a losing battle against the Scythes Cadell and Nico on top of the rest of the Alacryan army in order to buy time for the Dicathians to escape. In the process, his body begins tearing itself apart, and Sylvie is forced to sacrifice herself to save him. In the aftermath, Arthur ends up in the Relictombs and realizes that Sylvie had given up her own physical form to preserve his own body, making him part Asura in the process. Notably, he also finds out Sylvie is still alive but inert, having been turned back into an egg while she recovers. As it turns out, after Sylvie sacrificed herself [[spoiler:her soul was displaced across time and space, allowing her to bear witness to Arthur's past life as King Grey in its entirety. When her biological father Agrona came to claim Grey's soul for his own use, Sylvie was able to wrest it away before he could bring it to his intended vessel and take it to the Leywin family to be reincarnated as Arthur]].
** Arthur's fellow Lance Aya Grephin is forced to make one during a losing battle against the Asura Taci, who had been sent to purge the Dicathian resistance at the behest of [[GodIsEvil Kezess]]. She drains her own mana core to create convincing enough illusions to fool him into thinking he killed the remaining Lances. Her gambit succeeds (especially once Arthur returns from Alacrya to deal with him), but at the cost of her life, and the remaining Lances while still alive are severely injured.
** At the end of Volume 10, [[spoiler:Aldir sacrifices himself to allow Arthur to bring back Sylvie. He does so as a form of TakingAThirdOption. On one hand, while he has turned against Kezess and is deeply remorseful for his role in the destruction of Elenoir, he knows that the Dicathians would never accept as an ally. On the other hand, he is tired of fighting and no longer wishes to take up arms against his own people, especially after Kezess forced him to kill his own disciples in a bid to discredit him. As such, he decides to go out on his own terms, giving up his own life to bring back another who could bring an end to the DivineConflict while allowing Arthur to claim a great victory in the eyes of both Dicathen and Epheotus due to having seemingly brought one who had greatly wronged both factions to justice]].

** King Finrod Felagund follows Beren on his suicidal quest for a Silmaril knowing it will kill him, and dies saving him from a werewolf.
** When Curufin fires an arrow at Luthien, Beren jumps in the way and gets hit instead.

* Every single Dzur in any of Brust's ''Literature/{{Dragaera}}'' books will insist to be the one making any heroic sacrifices required, despite the fact that none have actually become necessary. (No, [[spoiler:Zivra/Zerika jumping off Deathsgate Falls does not count as a heroic sacrifice]].)
* Sturm Brightblade, a KnightInShiningArmor indeed, even if he wasn't one officially through most of his life, performed one in the second ''Literature/{{Dragonlance}}'' novel, giving the other heroes a chance to activate the LostSuperweapon and giving the Knighthood an example to strive for, pulling them from their slide into corruption.

* In the BackStory of Creator/JohnCWright's ''[[Literature/TheGoldenOecumene The Golden Age]]'', Helion had sacrificed himself in a solar storm, especially to save [[PapaWolf his son]]. During the course of the novel, Phaethon believes that the whole civilization lies in danger, and opens his memories, knowing it will mean exile.

* Multiple ones turn up in the Creator/BenCounter written ''Literature/GreyKnights'' trilogy, but a special mention has to go to Medic Haggard, who in a last act of defiance against a powerful daemon possessing his ship sends it hurtling into the presence of the daemon's patron god. What follows is a YouHaveFailedMe of biblical proportions, with Haggard ''laughing'' as the daemon screamed in fear.

* ''Literature/TheHeartsWeSold'' features a couple.

* Bess in the poem "The Highwayman" by Alfred Noyes. She is taken prisoner by the British Army troops who want to capture her lover the highwayman. They tie her up and bind a loaded musket to her with the mouth of the barrel against her chest. When the highwayman arrives she pulls the musket's trigger, killing herself and warning the highwayman to flee.
* In the final book of the ''Literature/HisDarkMaterials'' trilogy, [[spoiler: Lord Asriel and Marisa Coulter willingly consign themselves to [[FateWorseThanDeath the Abyss]] by dragging down [[BigBad Metatron]] with them in order to save the world and give their daughter a chance to live]]
** But they had their own selfish reasons and little else to live for, too. Infinitely more heroic was the death of [[spoiler: Lee Scoresby]]. Seriously, that man died [[spoiler: holding off an enemy force by himself just to buy a girl he barely knew the time to continue her ungraspable quest to do not-even-she-knew-what]]. And then [[spoiler: gave his body as a final sacrifice to feed Iorek Byrnison, the sentient armor-wearing bear who had been his friend]]. If there's a more tearjerker set of scenes in YA lit, it's been hidden well away.
* A species-wide example in ''Literature/TheHistoryOfTheGalaxy'' books, as discovered by the archaeologists about a race of {{Precursors}} dubbed Delphons. They were FishPeople who lived 3 million years ago and had even managed to establish outposts [[AncientAstronauts as far as Earth]]. When they detected the [[HordeOfAlienLocusts Forerunner swarm]], moving from system to system, guided by starlight, [[PlanetEater consuming all matter]] in their path (except the stars themselves). None of the four races living in that area of space (Delphons, [[HumanAliens Harammins]], [[InsectoidAliens Insects]], and [[StarfishAliens Logrians]]) had developed a portable [[FasterThanLightTravel hyperdrive]], relying instead on a PortalNetwork that required portals to be first towed to the destination at sublight. Unlike the other three races, who chose to run and hide from the swarm, the Delphons decided to stay and fight, using the only way they knew how - StarKilling. The only weapons they had in their arsenal that could harm the animal-like clumps of proto-matter were their own stars. So, they waited for the swarm to approach each star in their system, and then used a device that caused the star to go nova. They kept doing this until the swarm was wiped out, but so were the Delphons, although they did that knowing that they were allowing other life-bearing worlds in the path of the swarm to survive (including our very own planet).

* Gandalf in ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' [[spoiler: [[YouShallNotPass delays the Balrog]], gets pulled into a nearly bottomless pit by its fiery whip, and then proceeds to fight it all the way up the Endless Stair, dying of his wounds and exhaustion after finally succeeding at the top of Celebdil. He is then [[BackFromTheDead brought back to life]] and becomes Gandalf the White.]]
** ''Literature/TheSilmarillion'' is full of these, being the darker of Tolkien's works. In no particular order, Finrod, Aredhel, the entire House of Hador, Glorfindel, Ecthelion, Beren and Lúthien all die doing something heroic (although the last two [[BackFromTheDead don't take]]).

* In the Stuart Slade-authored novel ''Literature/TheSalvationWar: Armageddon'', in [[http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?p=2886932#2886932 the last chapter before the epilogue]] [[spoiler:a number of (dead) Romans who were enslaved by the demons of Hell are rescued by U.S. Marines in 2008 -- but when the Marines' sergeant is about to walk into a tripwire for a rock trap, the dead Simplicus without thinking pushes him backward, inadvertently hits the tripwire himself, is crushed and dies a second time. Despite being dead to begin with,]] it's a HeroicSacrifice because nobody knows if humans get another extra life.
** Mildly subverts the trope in that the heroic sacrifice is ''not'' intentional, and in the original thread where this story was posted there was actually a discussion before the chapter about such.

*** Ganner Rhysode's SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome when he agrees to defend a gateway to the World Brain in order to give Jacen Solo time to put his plan into motion. Over a thousand warriors, each capable of killing a Jedi in a fair fight, versus one mediocre Jedi. The resulting carnage was so incredible, Ganner was made an impassable GOD in the Yuuzhan Vong pantheon after building a literal rampart of dead enemies before succumbing to a DeathOfAThousandCuts. His last act before death is to use the Force to ''collapse the building they're in'', killing all the remaining Vong in the process.

* In ''Literature/SuperPowereds'', when a group of Super supremacists attacks Lander in book 3, some of the students elect to go topside in order to save the regular humans. [[spoiler: Alex and Sasha happen upon a [[SuperSpeed speedster]], whose power has been temporarily boosted UpToEleven by the supremacist leader, so even Sasha, a speedster herself, can't keep up with him, and Alex's MindOverMatter isn't strong enough to contain him. The evil speedster decides to kill Alex and rushes him. At the last moment, Sasha interposes herself to save her boyfriend. When Vince finds them, he sees Alex cradling Sasha's dead body with a fist-sized hole in her chest. This not only sends Vince over the edge (Sasha was his friend and ex-girlfriend) and nearly has him kill the other speedster in TranquilFury (after all, what can a speedster do against someone who can absorb any type of energy, including kinetic?), but also gives Alex the determination to succeed no matter what in order to honor Sasha's sacrifice, which allows him to be among those graduating at the end of year 4.]]

*** This actually makes it into the Disney canon, [[BroadStrokes albeit with some modifications]].

* In ''Literature/SuperPowereds'', when a group of Super supremacists attacks Lander in book 3, some of the students elect to go topside in order to save the regular humans. [[spoiler: Alex and Sasha happen upon a [[SuperSpeed speedster]], whose power has been temporarily boosted UpToEleven by the supremacist leader, so even Sasha, a speedster herself, can't keep up with him, and Alex's MindOverMatter isn't strong enough to contain him. The evil speedster decides to kill Alex and rushes him. At the last moment, Sasha interposes herself to save her boyfriend. When Vince finds them, he sees Alex cradling Sasha's dead body with a fist-sized hole in her chest. This not only sends Vince over the edge (Sasha was his friend and ex-girlfriend) and nearly has him kill the other speedster in ColdFury (after all, what can a speedster do against someone who can absorb any type of energy, including kinetic?), but also gives Alex the determination to succeed no matter what in order to honor Sasha's sacrifice, which allows him to be among those graduating at the end of year 4.]]

* In ''Literature/SuperPowereds'', when a group of Super supremacists attacks Lander in book 3, some of the students elect to go topside in order to save the regular humans. [[spoiler: Alex and Sasha happen upon a [[SuperSpeed speedster]], whose power has been temporarily boosted UpToEleven by the supremacist leader, so even Sasha, a speedster herself, can't keep up with him, and Alex's MindOverMatter isn't strong enough to contain him. The evil speedster decides to kill Alex and rushes him. At the last moment, Sasha interposes herself to save her boyfriend. When Vince finds them, he sees Alex cradling Sasha's dead body with a fist-sized hole in her chest. This not only sends Vince over the edge and nearly has him kill the other speedster in ColdFury (after all, what can a speedster do against someone who can absorb any type of energy, including kinetic?), but also gives Alex the determination to succeed no matter what in order to honor Sasha's sacrifice, which allows him to be among those graduating at the end of year 4.]]

** In #19, Cassie [[spoiler:[[HonorBeforeReason permanently morphs a caterpillar to prove a point]] to Aftran, so she'll release her host Karen]]. She gets better.

** At the end, Racehl agrees to go on a suicide mission to [[KillTheHostBody kill Tom]] and destroy the Blade ship from within. Turns into a SenselessSacrifice when it's revealed that Erek drained the Pool ship's weapons, not wanting Jake to use them to kill. As a result, Rachel is unable to render the ship completely inoperable, and it escapes.

* [[spoiler:Rachel]] in ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'', who agrees to go on a suicide mission to kill Tom and destroy the Blade ship from within.
** [[spoiler:Turns into a SenselessSacrifice when it's revealed that Erek drained the Pool ship's weapons, not wanting Jake to use them to kill. As a result, Rachel is unable to render the ship completely inoperable, and it escapes.]]

* In the ''[[Franchise/WarcraftExpandedUniverse Warcraft]]: Literature/TheWarOfTheAncients'' trilogy by Creator/RichardKnaak, [[spoiler:[[OurOrcsAreDifferent orc]] Broxigar]] makes a LastStand against the hordes of the [[spoiler:[[OurDemonsAreDifferent Burning Legion]]]] in order to give [[NatureHero Malfurion]] time to [[spoiler:close the portal. He]] even manages to wound [[spoiler:[[TheDevil Sargeras]]]] himself before dying.