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Out of the Dark

1177 statements
231 feature instances
31 referencing feature instances

Out of the Dark	type	TVTItem
Out of the Dark	label	Out of the Dark
Out of the Dark	page	OutOfTheDark
Out of the Dark	comment	Expanded from a short story by David Weber that first appeared in George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois's anthology Warriors (2010), Out of the Dark, released the same year, is a series known for its unusual take on military science fiction.In the very near future, Earth has been targeted for colonization by a galactic empire known as the Hegemony. Deemed "lunatic local sentients" by a survey team that witnessed King Henry V and his troops slaughtering the French at Agincourt, humankind has essentially been written off as bloodthirsty, backwater barbarians that no one will particularly miss. It's The End of the World as We Know It. Technologically superior, carnivorous, canine-analog aliens have invaded Earth with the intention of killing most of us and enslaving the rest. Things don't go according to plan.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 Development Hell. The third installment, To Challenge Heaven was released on January 16th, 2024.
Out of the Dark	fetched	2024-02-23T00:31:58Z
Out of the Dark	parsed	2024-02-23T00:31:58Z
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Out of the Dark	processingComment	Dropped link to CoolPlane: Not a Feature - ITEM
Out of the Dark	processingComment	Dropped link to HoistByTheirOwnPetard: Not a Feature - UNKNOWN
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Out of the Dark	processingComment	Dropped link to IComeInPeace: Not a Feature - ITEM
Out of the Dark	processingComment	Dropped link to ObstructiveBureaucracy: Not a Feature - UNKNOWN
Out of the Dark	processingComment	Dropped link to Safehold: Not a Feature - ITEM
Out of the Dark	processingComment	Dropped link to SpaceMarines: Not a Feature - UNKNOWN
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Out of the Dark	isPartOf	DBTropes
Out of the Dark / int_1049848f	type	Aliens Speaking English
Out of the Dark / int_1049848f	comment	Aliens Speaking English: Most high ranking Shongairi personnel seem to be able to speak some Human languages such as English thanks to "belt translators", though they do have their own language.
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Out of the Dark / int_12c65d9b	type	Abnormal Ammo
Out of the Dark / int_12c65d9b	comment	Abnormal Ammo: Shongairi mortars use a wide range of ammunition types, which include two different High Explosive rounds, incendiary rounds, smoke rounds, and one that releases some kind of fast-acting neurotoxin.
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Out of the Dark / int_143939c1	type	Trailers Always Spoil
Out of the Dark / int_143939c1	comment	Trailers Always Spoil: The Publishers Weekly summary leaves no doubt as to the nature of the twist at the end of the novel.
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Out of the Dark / int_161fa3b8	type	Hidden Agenda Villain
Out of the Dark / int_161fa3b8	comment	Hidden Agenda Villain: Fleet Commander Thikair realizes that humanity's inventiveness could be used to bootstrap the Shongairi's reverse-engineering processes to give them a technological edge over the Hegemony, which sees them as a potential problem, but a useful proxy to deal with any ambitious junior members. By the end of the third book, the Shongairi, indeed, begin to benefit from human inventiveness, but not at all in the way Thikair intended.
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Out of the Dark / int_177a6464	type	Genre Shift
Out of the Dark / int_177a6464	comment	Genre Shift: The genre shift doesn't take place until near the end of Out of the Dark, resulting in a cry of Twist Ending or Deus ex Machina. The issue is that the novel's expansion of the short story is entirely before the twist, resulting in 90% being in the genre of hard sci-fi alien invasion. The last 10%, however, involves Dracula.
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Out of the Dark / int_19102429	type	Twist Ending
Out of the Dark / int_19102429	comment	Twist Ending: The last few pages of this novel shift this novel's genre signficantly away from Weber's usual Hard Sci-Fi by introducing vampires. YMMV, but few reviewers seem to appreciate it. The sequel partly untwists it by explaining that the "vampires" are actually robotic beings composed of nanobots.
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Out of the Dark / int_193adfd1	type	The Right of a Superior Species
Out of the Dark / int_193adfd1	comment	The Right of a Superior Species: The Shongairi usually do this successfully but get way more than they bargained for with humanity.
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Out of the Dark / int_19769f50	type	Defeat Means Friendship
Out of the Dark / int_19769f50	comment	Defeat Means Friendship: In the third novel, Dvorak intends to utterly curb-stomp the Shongairi Home Fleet and capture their orbital habitat in order to satisfy the requirements of Jukaris (the Shongairi honor code) and allow the Shongairi emperor to submit (the emperor privately laments not being able to do it without having to send thousands of his warriors to die first, but his people would never accept the submissions otherwise). After being going to the PUNS Relentless, the emperor is told that humanity doesn't need servants, they need allies, and that's why Dvorak stopped Vlad from wiping out the Shongairi.
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Out of the Dark / int_1994ba0b	type	Gone Horribly Right
Out of the Dark / int_1994ba0b	comment	Gone Horribly Right: Thikar planned the Shonghairi invasion to take place immediately after an extensive covert intelligence gathering campaign, followed by the simultaneous kinetic bombardment of every major military base and government center on record. The idea was to cripple humanity's ability to fight back in a massive opening salvo with minimal infrastructural damage outside of that, forcing them to surrender. However, as the targets included the major administrative organizations that might negotiate surrender, no one was left to tell their forces and civilians to stand down, leading to partisan actions, reprisal strikes, more partisan actions, and a protracted quagmire for the Shonghairi. There are some implications that parts of the Hegemony might have picked up from the scouting report that humans could be actually dangerous (and not just potentially dangerous if allowed to develop), and set the Shonghairi on Earth in the expectation that the Shonghairi might expend more resources than gained. They did, alright. To the point that the novel ends with the year noted as Year 1 of the Terran Empire. Furthermore, one of the reasons Fleet Commander Thikair chose to act the way he did was to try and harness humanity's rapid technological progression so the Shongairi Empire can gain an edge over the rest of the Hegemony. By the end of the third book, the Shongairi Empire begins to do exactly that...as equal partners with humanity in a growing interstellar alliance.
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Out of the Dark / int_19ab917f	type	Body Language
Out of the Dark / int_19ab917f	comment	Body Language: After arriving to the orbit of Sarth and studying the natives with their spy drones (modified from Shongairi drones to be even stealthier), the human emissaries study the natives' body language and learn that their nonverbal cues for "yes" and "no" are the exact opposite of those common on Earth (i.e. they shake their heads to indicate an affirmative and nod to indicate a negative). After first contact, Sarthians note that humans tend to often start nodding, only to then shake their heads, as if catching themselves.
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Out of the Dark / int_19e41d8f	type	And This Is for...
Out of the Dark / int_19e41d8f	comment	And This Is for...: When Mircea finally lets Buchevsky have his revenge by executing Thikair, he states that this is for his daughters, who were killed in the pre-invasion orbital strikes.
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Out of the Dark / int_1c398324	type	Death from Above
Out of the Dark / int_1c398324	comment	Death from Above: Humans have their aircraft while the Shongairi have Kinetic Weapons.
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Out of the Dark / int_1cc527d7	type	Asskicking Leads to Leadership
Out of the Dark / int_1cc527d7	comment	Asskicking Leads to Leadership: 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_1d47dc06	type	Alternative Calendar
Out of the Dark / int_1d47dc06	comment	Alternative Calendar: Various chapters provide the date in both the Gregorian and the galactic standard calendar. The epilogue of the first book introduces a third calendar, replacing the Hegemony's calendar with the notation "Year 1 of the Terran Empire".
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Out of the Dark / int_1dfd19f9	type	Papa Wolf
Out of the Dark / int_1dfd19f9	comment	Papa Wolf: Humanity's hat. The Shongairi's psychology is built around a pack structure, and thus they automatically submit to superior members of the pack. Most herbivore species' psychology is herd-oriented, causing them to submit out of automatic fear-response and a desire to deflect threats away from the herd as a whole. Humans, however, are family-oriented - and they respond to threats against members of their families with swift and seemingly-irrational violence.
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Out of the Dark / int_1e679bd0	type	The Quisling
Out of the Dark / int_1e679bd0	comment	The Quisling: Largely averted as a whole by humanity thanks to our collective outrage and the Shongairi's failure to understand human psychology and their "no carrot, all stick" approach. Then we get Governor Howell of North Carolina, who is actually a mole— something the Shongairi can't really conceive of until late in the book. Not only that, but he is instrumental in the sequel in trying to unify all the isolated pockets of survivors into a One World Order.
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Out of the Dark / int_1fc325dd	type	Do Not Adjust Your Set
Out of the Dark / int_1fc325dd	comment	Do Not Adjust Your Set: Fleet Commander Thikair hijacks Humanity's TV and Internet to demand Earth's surrender after the kinetic bombardment.
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Out of the Dark / int_24f4c82a	type	Semper Fi
Out of the Dark / int_24f4c82a	comment	Semper Fi: Master Sargent Stephen Buchevsky is a US Marine and was an instructor when he wasn't stationed in the Middle East. Rob Wilson, David's brother in law, is a former Marine Corps instructor. When it comes time to form the Continental Union Armed Forces, Rob is livid that there won't be a marine corps. To his credit, he manages to convince the brass to rename the nascent Continental Union Armed Forces Expeditionary Forces to Space Marines, especially since he finds the acronym CUAFEF ridiculous and sounding like a cat coughing up a furball.
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Out of the Dark / int_25afd4a3	type	Good Guns, Bad Guns
Out of the Dark / int_25afd4a3	comment	Good Guns, Bad Guns: Averted. Old Soviet hardware is lovingly appreciated by the resistance in Romania.
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Out of the Dark / int_260926c3	type	Failure Is the Only Option
Out of the Dark / int_260926c3	comment	Failure Is the Only Option: Human militaries outmatch the Shongairi, but cannot defeat them thanks to the Kinetic weapons on the Shongairi's side. Both the Shongairi and Liatu navies face the same when they come up against the highly upgraded human space navy.
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Out of the Dark / int_269e82c1	type	Death of a Child
Out of the Dark / int_269e82c1	comment	Death of a Child: In one particular scene in Chapter XVIII (18).
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Out of the Dark / int_26f41623	type	Kill Sat
Out of the Dark / int_26f41623	comment	Kill Sat: The Shongairi use their kinetic weapons to try to pound Earth into submission.
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Out of the Dark / int_2854b56d	type	Uncertain Doom
Out of the Dark / int_2854b56d	comment	Uncertain Doom: Admiral Robinson, 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 but are often told there's been no word of him since.
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Out of the Dark / int_292d57cd	type	Crusading Widow
Out of the Dark / int_292d57cd	comment	Crusading Widow: Most of the main male characters lose their entire family in the invasion.
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Out of the Dark / int_2a94a479	type	Outside-Genre Foe
Out of the Dark / int_2a94a479	comment	Outside-Genre Foe: Both sides are this to each other for various reasons. The vampires throw this trope back in the alien's face. Subverted in the sequel, where it's revealed that the vampires were created using by aliens using technological means and aren't supernatural in the least.
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Out of the Dark / int_2af6bbeb	type	Break the Haughty
Out of the Dark / int_2af6bbeb	comment	Break the Haughty: The Shongairi slowly start to lose morale as they realize that the backwater spear swinging primitives are anything but.
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Out of the Dark / int_2af7961	type	Faster-Than-Light Travel
Out of the Dark / int_2af7961	comment	Faster-Than-Light Travel: The Hegemony has phase drives that allow them to travel several times the speed of light. This requires the use of Sleeper Starships in order to get anywhere meaningful, since trips routinely take decades or even centuries. In the second novel, human scientists have managed to improve on the tech and increase the speed by 50%.
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Out of the Dark / int_2d768e2d	type	Succession Crisis
Out of the Dark / int_2d768e2d	comment	Succession Crisis: Since the President and the entire line of succession, in accordance with the 25th Amendment, has been wiped out, there's no clear candidate to take the post of President. North Carolina Governor Judson Howell takes the reigns as the largest and most organized part of the country. While a congressman manages to survive the Shongairi attack, he wisely chooses to step aside, as Howell represents a far larger constituency than the people who elected him. This is less of an issue in Canada and Brazil, as the two people who become Prime Minister and President, respectively, were in the line of succession, albeit very far down.
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Out of the Dark / int_2dddd99d	type	False Flag Operation
Out of the Dark / int_2dddd99d	comment	False Flag Operation: The aliens use Iran as a cover when hacking world military installations right before the invasion.
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Out of the Dark / int_2edc31c2	type	Lightspeed Leapfrog
Out of the Dark / int_2edc31c2	comment	Lightspeed Leapfrog: 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. Then Dave Dvorak contacts Vlad from his brand-new ship that has left Earth 6 years ago and has actually beaten them there by a month. And she's not alone — there's a fleet of nineteen ships, ranging from transport and supply ships to enormous superdreadnoughts. And then we find out that the fleet sent to Tairyon a few years after Dvorak's departure is even faster and more powerful (Dvorak knew that there was going to be another breakthrough in FTL tech, but he had to arrive before Vlad did).
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Out of the Dark / int_2f253c94	type	Glass Cannon
Out of the Dark / int_2f253c94	comment	Glass Cannon: Shongairi ground vehicles are very well armed, with lasers that punch through modern tank armor like paper and advanced and powerful mortars. However, their armor is only rated to fight crossbows and catapults, so human anti-armor weapons go through theirs like paper too. Subverted in that they are later revealed to have designs for better hardware, but it took them a while to get their production facilities up and running.
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Out of the Dark / int_2fe5444	type	Fantastic Ship Prefix
Out of the Dark / int_2fe5444	comment	Fantastic Ship Prefix: The Planetary Union Navy uses PUNS for its spaceships, which presumably stands for "Planetary Union Navy Ship".
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Out of the Dark / int_30cdefe1	type	Reluctant Ruler
Out of the Dark / int_30cdefe1	comment	Reluctant Ruler: Dave Dvorak becomes this after "Clan Dvorak" defeats Clan Qwern, thereby becoming the new ruling dynasty of the Qwer— Dvorakian Empire. This allows him to sign the agreement to join the alliance with Earth. While he could have refused rulership, the result would've been chaos caused by a lack of succession. When he meets Vlad in the third book, he has three Sarthian bodyguards following him at all times, wearing the tartan kilts of the Scottish Clan Gunn, of all things. After becoming pack lord to Haymar (and, by extension, the entire Shongair Empire), he keeps shutting down any suggestions by the Sarthians and Haymar that he needs to be an emperor in order for their people to accept his rule. The eventually find a compromise by forming a new supranational governing body with Dvorak as its official representative.
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Out of the Dark / int_32956961	type	Explosive Breeder
Out of the Dark / int_32956961	comment	Explosive Breeder: Humans, compared to most other races at this stage of development. The Shongairi are shocked to discover that Earth is home to 7 billion people, whereas the next closest example is only half a billion.
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Out of the Dark / int_34dd5f3	type	La RÃ©sistance
Out of the Dark / int_34dd5f3	comment	La RÃ©sistance: Partisans operate all around the world, and prove to be a major thorn in the Shongairi's side.
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Out of the Dark / int_353f2b06	type	"Die Hard" on an X
Out of the Dark / int_353f2b06	comment	"Die Hard" on an X: Up until the TwistEnding, it's basically Worldwar in the twenty-first century, with the political and technological issues adjusted accordingly.
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Out of the Dark / int_38449aae	type	Magnetic Weapons
Out of the Dark / int_38449aae	comment	In the second novel, the humans decide to go with railguns instead of energy weapons, since railguns pack a lot more of a punch and are very good at penetrating armor. For tanks they particularly prefer discarding sabot rounds for better penetration. As for handheld rail weapons, they pretty much pulverize any flesh they encounter and can easily go through three or four people.
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Out of the Dark / int_393a1e86	type	But What About the Astronauts?
Out of the Dark / int_393a1e86	comment	But What About the Astronauts?: The Shongairi eventually start knocking out Human satellites in orbit. Assuming this means the space stations such as the ISS are among them.
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Out of the Dark / int_39b8d3d6	type	Boring, but Practical
Out of the Dark / int_39b8d3d6	comment	Boring, but Practical: You don't need a military grade BFG to kill Shongairi troops, even hunting and recreational firearms work well against them. When Dave Dvorak gets a good look at the standard Shongairi rifle, he is somewhat confused as to why they aren't using their equivalent of an Eotech sight instead of iron sights. Dave then remembers that Humans have been killing each just fine for centuries with good old fashioned sights.
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Out of the Dark / int_3a90dc63	type	Aliens Are Bastards
Out of the Dark / int_3a90dc63	comment	Aliens Are Bastards: The Shongairi and the Hegemony are condescending about those they see as lesser species and have no compunctions about exploiting them or being complicit to genocide. In the third novel, though, we learn that the Shongairi aren't as bad as initially thought. In fact, Thikair's actions would never have been sanctioned back home, as they go strictly against their honor code (no slaughtering civilians, no attacking without announcing yourself, etc.).
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Out of the Dark / int_3ac2a3e3	type	Deadly Gas
Out of the Dark / int_3ac2a3e3	comment	Deadly Gas: Shongairi mortars are able to fire a round the releases a fast acting neurotoxin.
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Out of the Dark / int_3c5ae1a1	type	Schizo Tech
Out of the Dark / int_3c5ae1a1	comment	Schizo Tech: How Earth is viewed. Not only is it weird for us to still be using fossil fuel power and yet to be avoiding chemical & biological weapons, but we've done things with military technology no other race ever would have because they would've been unified by that point.
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Out of the Dark / int_3d59c9a0	type	Powered Armor
Out of the Dark / int_3d59c9a0	comment	Powered Armor: In the first part of the second book, powered armor is being developed under the name Project Heinlein. In the third novel, we see Heinleins being deployed alongside the heavier M4 Bangalores that can take a heavy anti-tank missile and shrug it off.
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Out of the Dark / int_3d699462	type	Curb-Stomp Battle
Out of the Dark / int_3d699462	comment	Both the Shongairi and Liatu navies face the same when they come up against the highly upgraded human space navy.
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Out of the Dark / int_3d897748	type	Do Not Go Gentle
Out of the Dark / int_3d897748	comment	Do Not Go Gentle: Around halfway through the novel, most Humans decide that if they can't beat their orbital firepower, then they will kill as many as they can on the ground.
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Out of the Dark / int_3f064a0d	type	Humans Are Morons
Out of the Dark / int_3f064a0d	comment	Humans Are Morons: The Shongairi are initially convinced of this, based on "idiotic tactics" from Agincourt, and a further convinced of it once they understand the current situation. For example, they believe that the refusal of First World powers to use nuclear or biological weapons against their enemies in the Middle East is idiotic (specifically citing the US's tolerance of Iran's actions) and the presence of a public information network like the Internet, allowing free, ready access to vast stores of information, is considered completely insane. The whole reason the aliens want to kill us is because they believe we're mindlessly violent and would lash out uncontrolled against other species. The Shongairi think we're stupid for not using weapons of mass destruction against the population of the Middle East to kill off the terrorists, regardless of the ecological damage and the countless innocents who would die horribly.
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Out of the Dark / int_3f0b2f50	type	Make It Look Like an Accident
Out of the Dark / int_3f0b2f50	comment	Make It Look Like an Accident: One of the Hegemony's more pragmatic founding races basically tells the Shongairi that they'll look the other way if humanity doesn't happen to make it through this. Later, when the Shongairi decide we're too dangerous to use as slaves, they plan to make the release of their bioweapon look like an accident to deflect political fallout.
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Out of the Dark / int_3fca462c	type	Deus ex Machina
Out of the Dark / int_3fca462c	comment	Deus ex Machina: Throughout the story, the Shongairi invaders consistently lose ground battles to humans but pulverize the entire area from orbit afterwards. Towards the end they learn enough human tactics to capture a rebel village without resorting to orbital bombardment and develop a bioweapon to destroy what's left of humanity (clearly unaware that we happen to be extremely well versed in biological warfare). But just as they're about to deploy the virus the leader of the village they captured to experiment on turns out to be freakin' Dracula and he and a handful of newly-spawned vampires single-handedly wipe out the entire invasion force. Hints that Dracula was present were scattered throughout the book, but were relatively subtle, and the reader is expecting a hard sci-fi war novel, and not fantasy elements to creep in and sucker punch them. Granted, the subsequent books revealed that there's a very good sci-fi explanation as to how these vampires work..
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Out of the Dark / int_40cc0c7e	type	Bittersweet Ending
Out of the Dark / int_40cc0c7e	comment	Bittersweet Ending: By the end of the first book, Humanity has all it needs to strike back at the Shongairi homeworlds and the Hegemony, and to rebuild Earth but at the cost of three billion human lives thanks to the pre-landing orbital strikes and an unknown amount lost during the fighting on Earth.
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Out of the Dark / int_44989f6f	type	"Could Have Avoided This!" Plot
Out of the Dark / int_44989f6f	comment	"Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: The humans point out that the entire war could have been avoided if the Shongairi hadn't announced their presence with orbital bombardment and instead simply showed up to offer humans "carrots" i.e. gifts of advanced technology. The Shongairi eventually realize it too, but far too late.
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Out of the Dark / int_44a893af	type	Humans Through Alien Eyes
Out of the Dark / int_44a893af	comment	Humans Through Alien Eyes: Generally, the alien perception of humanity is that we're insane or idiots.
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Out of the Dark / int_44fc28e8	type	Honor Before Reason
Out of the Dark / int_44fc28e8	comment	Honor Before Reason: 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 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; also by killing women and children rather than warriors). 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. The Shongairi emperor laments the necessity of sending his warriors to die in a hopeless battle against the humans instead of simply ordering them to stand down and surrender, but Jukaris is clear on what has to be done.
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Out of the Dark / int_4536fd29	type	Energy Weapon
Out of the Dark / int_4536fd29	comment	Energy Weapon: The Shongairi "tank's" main armament is a laser emitter rather than say a 120mm cannon. These are very powerful and can tear through our armor easily, but is weakened by Earth's atmosphere and can't go through depleted uranium-augmented Chobham armor, but it can go through Ferdinand armor.
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Out of the Dark / int_4604fd4d	type	Worthy Opponent
Out of the Dark / int_4604fd4d	comment	Worthy Opponent: Regiment Commander Harah, despite hating them with a passion, still admires Humanity's ingenuity and resistance. Of course, he would never dare say this aloud. You aren't exactly doing a good job if you have to count people killed by orbital bombardment and civilians murdered by soldiers in your kill count to feel better about how badly your ass is being kicked: weâ€™ve killed thousands of them for every Shongair weâ€™ve lost
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Out of the Dark / int_48078a7	type	Cool Versus Awesome
Out of the Dark / int_48078a7	comment	Cool Versus Awesome: At the end, the book is essentially about Wolf Man aliens with orbital bombardments vs. various modern armies and fucking Dracula!
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Out of the Dark / int_4921aad7	type	Expanded States of America
Out of the Dark / int_4921aad7	comment	Expanded States of America: In the second book, following the Divided States of America, the state government of North Carolina consolidates power in the surviving enclaves in the US under Governor Judson Howell. Since the entire presidential line of succession is gone, Howell is appointed the new president. The trope is zigzagged, though, as Howell's plan is to create a new supranational governing body, first over the Americas, and then across the entire world. Being American himself, he wants the new Continental Union of the Americas to be a federal government like the US, with individual countries retaining their autonomy where it doesn't interfere with the established CU constitution and the laws passed by the CU congress. The congress is to be bicameral, mirroring the US Congress, except senators will be appointed by the countries' legislatures instead of elected by the people (the way it was for the US originally). There will be an Electoral College to ensure that countries with the larger populations don't dominate presidential elections. While the US isn't going anywhere, it will now be a part of this supranational body, equal to any other. The first member nations are the US, Canada, and Brazil (the latter is necessary to convince the rest of the world that this isn't going to be dominated by English-speaking nations). In the second part of the book, set 15 years later, it's mentioned that the Continental Union only existed for 5 years until the first nations from other continents began to join, at which point it was reformed into the Planetary Union of Earth.
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Out of the Dark / int_49fb5ccb	type	Combat Pragmatist
Out of the Dark / int_49fb5ccb	comment	Combat Pragmatist: Eventually, the Shongairi, realizing that the humans have far too many personal firearms and experience in warfare than they do, start to use their control of Earth's orbitals to their advantage. Any time a Shongairi patrol is wiped out in a partisan ambush, the area is bombarded using a kinetic strike in Disproportionate Retribution to eliminate any survivors. Even with this tactic, the expedition's command staff later authorize kinetic bombardment fire missions to be called in by any of their field commanders.
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Out of the Dark / int_4de1a4f7	type	Improvised Weapon
Out of the Dark / int_4de1a4f7	comment	Improvised Weapon: From IEDs to homemade Claymore mines.
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Out of the Dark / int_4f23179	type	Hit-and-Run Tactics
Out of the Dark / int_4f23179	comment	Hit-and-Run Tactics: Human Tank battalions rely on such tactics due to having to get the hell out of Dodge before Shongairi Kinetic weapons get a lock on them.
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Out of the Dark / int_4fafed32	type	Higher-Tech Species
Out of the Dark / int_4fafed32	comment	Higher-Tech Species: The Shongairi technology is very carefully calibrated to be just advanced enough to avert a Curb-Stomp Battleâ€”and permit humanity to show what determined and gallant warriors we areâ€”while still ensuring the eventual outcome will not be in our favor, necessitating the Deus ex Machina in the Twist Ending. Also, due to a quirk of human psychology, we're the only species that has ever reached our current tech level without world peace and thus invented things like modern stealth fighters. The Shongairi are far higher tech, but are just kitted out for the wrong war and could dominate us if they weren't. They still hold the top of the gravity well and have better bioweapons and cyber-warfare tech.
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Out of the Dark / int_50b05d30	type	Disproportionate Retribution
Out of the Dark / int_50b05d30	comment	Disproportionate Retribution: The Shongairi retaliate for a group of tanks wiping out one of their ground convoys with an orbital kinetic strike that not only destroys the human tanks but also the nearby city. This eventually becomes standard practice as a reprisal against any ambushed patrol, and even near the end of the first novel, any Shongairi field officer can start requesting kinetic strike fire missions if they deem it necessary.
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Out of the Dark / int_50f66629	type	Crazy-Prepared
Out of the Dark / int_50f66629	comment	Crazy-Prepared: Of course, if there hadn't actually been an Alien Invasion, it just would have been... crazy. On the Hegemony side, all the tech has dozens of layers of redundancy, since it's designed to work for centuries without fail. This means that a countergrav generator could potentially be 80% smaller than what it is now, if they were willing to go down to the expected equipment lifetime of only 80 years or so.
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Out of the Dark / int_51589353	type	The Cartel
Out of the Dark / int_51589353	comment	The Cartel: With Mexico City a smoking crater and the federal government in shambles, the drug cartels have taken the opportunity to carve out their own little fiefdoms over what used to be Mexico. Since the US needs a strong ally in the south, they have been sending squads of vampires to take out the cartel leadership in order to re-establish the legitimate government of Mexico.
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Out of the Dark / int_548bd053	type	Guns Akimbo
Out of the Dark / int_548bd053	comment	Guns Akimbo: Rob Wilson does this out of desperation when Shongairi soldiers are closing in on him and an injured Dave. The concept is even deconstructed during the same scene.
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Out of the Dark / int_54cbd0cb	type	This Is Unforgivable!
Out of the Dark / int_54cbd0cb	comment	This Is Unforgivable!: Absolutely no one on Earth will even consider helping the Shongairi thanks to their repeated orbital bombardment and the billions of human deaths. The Shongairi discovering this (which is completely incomprehensible to their own pack-based instincts to not bear grudges over defeats and demonstrations of superiority) is what prompts them to decide they're better off exterminating humanity completely, having finally realised that a planet full of bereaved humans will drive themselves extinct in a war of eternal vengeance before sincerely submitting.
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Out of the Dark / int_556a4863	type	Virtue Is Weakness
Out of the Dark / int_556a4863	comment	Virtue Is Weakness: The stated opinion of the Liatu where other, non-Liatu, species are concerned. Any species, like humans for example, who actually care about the well-being and humane treatment of races besides their own must be of inferior intelligence.
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Out of the Dark / int_556a4e20	type	The Empire
Out of the Dark / int_556a4e20	comment	The Empire: The Shongairi Empire. Year one of the Terran (aka Human) Empire begins after the defeat of the Shongairi.
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Out of the Dark / int_5625538f	type	Stupidity-Inducing Attack
Out of the Dark / int_5625538f	comment	Stupidity-Inducing Attack: The Liatu used a genetic weapon to do this to the Tairyonians when they invaded their planet. It turned their entire speices from Iron Age city builders to the intelligence equivilant of Earth's Gorillas. For humans, this is treated as Mind Rape.
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Out of the Dark / int_562abd51	type	Let's Get Dangerous!
Out of the Dark / int_562abd51	comment	Let's Get Dangerous!: The poor Shongairi did not expect backwater omnivores to pack armor-piercing, antipersonnel ammo, IED expertise, or the F-22, the M1 Abrams, or the T-72. In the second novel, the Qwernian Empire on Sarth get a dose of this after they capture a number of human diplomats in order to hold them hostage and force humans to deal with them exclusively. Humans instead mount a full-scale assault on their capital city and easily storm their palace without a single human casualty.
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Out of the Dark / int_56b53152	type	Green Aesop
Out of the Dark / int_56b53152	comment	Green Aesop: A minor example. Apparently, the Shongairi value prime grazing lands as food for their food animals. So they do their best to avoid polluting the environment. When they saw that humanity was still heavily using fossil fuels despite developing nuclear power, they're shocked. It may have contributed to Thikair's decision to attempt genocide of humanity.
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Out of the Dark / int_57b80b45	type	Fantastic Racism
Out of the Dark / int_57b80b45	comment	Fantastic Racism: Within the Hegemony, between carnivores and herbivores/omnivores. The Shongairi have nothing but contempt for humanity as well, at least at first. The revelation of the vampires makes a lot of mankind...uncomfortable. The entire Hegemony, but the Liatu in particular as the only Founding Race that humanity has had knowing contact with, appear to view less technologically sapient species as lesser. Their "Improper Use of Planetary Resources" is the justification used for displacing, enslaving, genetically modifying and/or outright exterminating planetary natives who can't match their technology. In the case of the Tairyonians, who were stripped of their intelligence during the invasion, Howell literally equates the Liatu's views to those of the Nazis.
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Out of the Dark / int_5989e3b6	type	Enemy Mine
Out of the Dark / int_5989e3b6	comment	Enemy Mine: According to the blurb for the as-yet unreleased third novel, the humans are going to try turning the Shongairi into allies against the Founders, but first that requires crushing their planetary defenses in order to satisfy their honor code.
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Out of the Dark / int_5ac34441	type	Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp"
Out of the Dark / int_5ac34441	comment	Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Shongairi equivalent to rabbits are known as "garishes".
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Out of the Dark / int_5ad80bf8	type	It's All My Fault
Out of the Dark / int_5ad80bf8	comment	It's All My Fault: Stephen Buchevsky blames himself for the villagers he was protecting getting killed or captured. Mircea helps convince him that it isn't.
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Out of the Dark / int_5b0eaf89	type	Upgrade Artifact
Out of the Dark / int_5b0eaf89	comment	Upgrade Artifact: The Shongairi test direct "neural education" on humanity and finds us surprisingly better at receiving it than most of the Hegemony's species.
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Out of the Dark / int_5e7eb915	type	Clarke's Third Law
Out of the Dark / int_5e7eb915	comment	Clarke's Third Law: Brigade Commander Harshair briefly reminisces that the savages from their earlier colonization campaigns were convinced that the Shongairi troops were wizards who could see in pitch black darkness thanks to their night vision tech.
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Out of the Dark / int_5f476d97	type	Space Navy
Out of the Dark / int_5f476d97	comment	Space Navy: The Planetary Union Navy is exclusively space-based. If there's anything the invasion has demonstrated, it's that a wet navy is utterly useless to anyone holding the orbitals and can see any ship in the ocean plain as day, being able to drop rocks on them well outside their range. Thus there no longer needs to be a wet navy. On the other hand, in order to standardize uniforms and rank insignia, as well as to avoid confusion, all the military branches now use the same ranking systems, so no admirals in charge of fleets or captains commanding ships. This does end up changing, however, as the naval personnel demand to be allowed to continue the old "wet" navy traditions, including the ranks.
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Out of the Dark / int_5fcb9ad1	type	Time Skip
Out of the Dark / int_5fcb9ad1	comment	Time Skip: The first part of Into the Light takes place not long after the invasion is over. The second part jumps forward 15 years. There are additional jumps by months and years in the novel. In fact, the epilogue takes place about 40 years after the beginning of the novel.
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Out of the Dark / int_619985d7	type	Sacrificial Lion
Out of the Dark / int_619985d7	comment	Sacrificial Lion: Colonel Sanders. Lasts a good ways into the novel, and inflicts a brutal defeat on the Shongari that gets talked about for the rest of the novel, but is killed in the bombing that follows.
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Out of the Dark / int_6293c185	type	Sequel Hook
Out of the Dark / int_6293c185	comment	Sequel Hook: The end of the book makes it clear that since we have decades until the Hegemony realizes the Shongairi haven't responded back to them, Humanity plans on bringing the fight to them with captured Shongairi tech.
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Out of the Dark / int_6381b11	type	Game-Breaking Injury
Out of the Dark / int_6381b11	comment	Game-Breaking Injury: Dave Dvorak, after taking a round to the shoulder, is forced to sit on the sidelines and take care of intel.
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Out of the Dark / int_638b65bc	type	Armor Is Useless
Out of the Dark / int_638b65bc	comment	Armor Is Useless: Shongairi troop and vehicle armor is great against primitives with sticks and crossbows. Not so much against combat rifles, tanks, and rocket launchers.
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Out of the Dark / int_67f26dcc	type	Planet of Hats
Out of the Dark / int_67f26dcc	comment	Planet of Hats: Earth is a planet of Determinators who happen to be Mama Bears and Papa Wolves. Notably, this is the conclusion reached by Base Commander Shairez because there is no other truly common thread she can discern, due to the violent diversity of human culture. The entire trope is discussed and deconstructed in-universe, though not by name, at the end of the first half of the third book by a delegation of humans, Shongairi, and Sarthians. The Hegemony tends to boil down species' psychologies based on specific stereotypes pertaining to their biological origins, namely herbivorous, omnivorous, and carnivorous categories, but the humans and their allies realize that a species should be best understood based on how similar and how different they are to others, as neatly filing them away into boxes means that anything outside of that box gets disregarded.
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Out of the Dark / int_6860368a	type	Mook Horror Show
Out of the Dark / int_6860368a	comment	Mook Horror Show: The book is full of POVs of Shongairi soldiers freaking out as their comrades are slaughtered by human weaponry and vampires.
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Out of the Dark / int_69cce3dc	type	Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!
Out of the Dark / int_69cce3dc	comment	Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: 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. 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...
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Out of the Dark / int_6a2d1b1a	type	Rebel Leader
Out of the Dark / int_6a2d1b1a	comment	Rebel Leader: Mircea Basarab leads a human resistance group in Romania.
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Out of the Dark / int_6b4b3eba	type	Lady Land
Out of the Dark / int_6b4b3eba	comment	Lady Land: The Liatu are a matriarchy with women holding nearly all positions of power. There may be an occasional man as a high-ranking advisor, but women are still at the top. The only exception is the military that consists entirely of men, but even they obey their female leaders without question.
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Out of the Dark / int_6b510ace	type	Hopeless War
Out of the Dark / int_6b510ace	comment	Hopeless War: 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 hopeless for humanity, until the Twist Ending.
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Out of the Dark / int_6bda9a30	type	Meaningful Name
Out of the Dark / int_6bda9a30	comment	Meaningful Name: Mircea Basarab. See Genius Bonus on the YMMV page.
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Out of the Dark / int_6e429667	type	Fantastic Slurs
Out of the Dark / int_6e429667	comment	Fantastic Slurs: The Shongairi use "weed-eater" as an epithet for the herbivorous members of the Hegemony Humanity calls the Shongairi "puppies." The Liatu call the Tairyonians, the native sapient species of a planet they invaded, "Nuisance Animals".
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Out of the Dark / int_6ea3206	type	Numbered Homeworld
Out of the Dark / int_6ea3206	comment	Numbered Homeworld: The Hegemony designated Earth "KU-197-20".
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Out of the Dark / int_7071bfe9	type	Humans Advance Swiftly
Out of the Dark / int_7071bfe9	comment	Humans Advance Swiftly: We've advanced three times faster than the fastest known race (which advanced twice as fast as the next best), and no one can figure out why such a warlike species hasn't blown itself up yet. The Shongairi actually intended to take advantage of this, putting humans to work in their R&D labs as well as using them as shock troops. Then we hijack the Shongairi's neural educators, and the end of the novel implies we're getting prepped to eventually return the favor. 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 Post-Scarcity Economy, limitless energy, and perfect health that allows them 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 5 times 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). The third book reveals that humanity isn't the first rapidly-advancing species the Hegemony has suppressed. The Tairyonians were also omnivores (but with a strong carnivorous streak), and their rate of development, while not nearly as fast as that of humans, was seen as scary to the Hegemony, so the Liatu released a bioweapon that reduced their intelligence to "somewhere between a Labrador retriever and a four-year-old" and then sat back and watched most of them die out. The survivors live a primitive existence as Liatu subjects. Humans intend to kick the Liatu out and repair the genetic damage to the Tairyonians, while uplifting them technologically and culturally in order to recruit them as allies.
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Out of the Dark / int_72856b70	type	Godzilla Threshold
Out of the Dark / int_72856b70	comment	Godzilla Threshold: Thikar eventually concedes the use of genocidal bioweapons as the only option against a planet full of humans who refuse to submit, and are rapidly depleting the invader's reserves.
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Out of the Dark / int_7317b97d	type	Awakening the Sleeping Giant
Out of the Dark / int_7317b97d	comment	Awakening the Sleeping Giant: 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_7374ab13	type	Once More, with Clarity
Out of the Dark / int_7374ab13	comment	Once More, with Clarity: The start of the second half of the third book begins with the Liatu military garrison of the colony world of Tairyon driving away the "nuisance animals", the local semi-sentient pest of their planet, in a fairly surgical operation, showing more concern for their own ground troops than the creatures they are herding with sirens, flashbangs, and gunfire. The Liatu characters joke amongst each other and approach the operation with a routine detachment. The next chapter reveals that a human expedition has been watching the feed from near the planet, and they note the "nuisance animals", the native Tairyonians, resemble gorillas or early hominids, and several of the events from the previous chapter play out, but this time emphasizing the Tairyonians' perspective and the abject terror they are experiencing from being driven in a stampede.
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Out of the Dark / int_75c952bf	type	Our Presidents Are Different
Out of the Dark / int_75c952bf	comment	Our Presidents Are Different: Of the President Minority variety as POTUS is female in this story.
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Out of the Dark / int_76933235	type	Depopulation Bomb
Out of the Dark / int_76933235	comment	Depopulation Bomb: The Shongairi open up with a bombardment that kills about half of the world's population, and note that starvation and disease will kill many of the survivors. When resistance continues that severely threatens their ability to maintain control, they plan to instead just wash the whole thing by releasing a bioweapon and wiping out all the survivors. The Liatu used their own bioweapon on the Tairyonians that did this indirectly, reducing their intelligence to "somewhere between a golden retriever and a four-year-old" and letting their burgeoning Iron Age civilization collapse as a result. With the natives no longer able to sustain their numbers without their original intellect, the Liatu moved in on the planet once the dust settled. By the time humans arrive around Tairyon, the Tairyonians number only a few million, tend to live in the more arid areas of their planet that the Liatu prefer avoiding, and the Liatu of the planet have a term for them in their language that translates as "nuisance animals".
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Out of the Dark / int_79974fb8	type	Rock Beats Laser
Out of the Dark / int_79974fb8	comment	Rock Beats Laser: As it turns out, the depleted uranium-augmented Chobham armor on M1A2 Abrams tanks literally beats Shongairi vehicle mounted lasers.
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Out of the Dark / int_7a265daa	type	Eagleland
Out of the Dark / int_7a265daa	comment	Eagleland: Type 1. America is awesome, and the aliens recognize the US as one of their biggest threats.
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Out of the Dark / int_7b7f90d5	type	Pronoun Trouble
Out of the Dark / int_7b7f90d5	comment	Pronoun Trouble: After encountering the Sarthians and learning that they have three sexes, Dave Dvorak wonders for a short while about what pronoun to use for the neutro gender. But then the sophisticated translation software they're using comes up with a solution to use the Old English pronoun "ou" and its derivations: ous (his/her), oum (him/her), ouself (himself/herself). The narrator starts using these even before the Sarthians are contacted for the first time, which is likely to confuse the readers before the explanation is given.
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Out of the Dark / int_7c7589af	type	Earth-Shattering Kaboom
Out of the Dark / int_7c7589af	comment	Earth-Shattering Kaboom: Thikair eventually just decides to blast Earth to asteroids. Later, Vlad threatens to do this to the Shongairi worlds in turn using dreadnought weapons.
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Out of the Dark / int_7d89315b	type	"The Reason You Suck" Speech
Out of the Dark / int_7d89315b	comment	"The Reason You Suck" Speech: Dracula delivers one of these to Thikair at the end, noting that, among other things, the Shongairi were going to sentence humanity to extinction for daring to defend themselves and fight back against an invader.
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Out of the Dark / int_7e6c0522	type	Off with His Head!
Out of the Dark / int_7e6c0522	comment	Off with His Head!: Decapitation is the only way to kill a Vampire. That being said, good luck managing that if you're not a vampire yourself.
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Out of the Dark / int_82108e3d	type	Attack Its Weak Point
Out of the Dark / int_82108e3d	comment	Attack Its Weak Point: The Shongairi hover tanks have no belly armor, leaving it defenseless against anti-tank mines and IEDs.
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Out of the Dark / int_8344209e	type	BFG
Out of the Dark / int_8344209e	comment	You don't need a military grade BFG to kill Shongairi troops, even hunting and recreational firearms work well against them.
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Out of the Dark / int_85b5dc7	type	Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight
Out of the Dark / int_85b5dc7	comment	Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: The Shongairi come off as insufficiently advanced because their entire war doctrine revolves around conquering pre-industrial races. Guess what happens when troops trained and equipped to curb-stomp natives with pointy sticks comes up against modern military hardware?
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Out of the Dark / int_86b21114	type	Badass Boast
Out of the Dark / int_86b21114	comment	Badass Boast: Lieutenant Colonel Alastair Sanders gives one to his troops in Chapter XV (15). Sharon Dvorak in Chapter XXX (30) explains to her husband Dave that she will die defending the kids before any of the "floppy eared bastards" come anywhere close to them.
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Out of the Dark / int_86d4f985	type	Doing In the Wizard
Out of the Dark / int_86d4f985	comment	Doing In the Wizard: Vampires turn out to be more like 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 electromagnetic radiation. The scientists studying them state that this is way beyond what the Shongairi have and may also be beyond what the Hegemony has.
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Out of the Dark / int_89f50aaa	type	Restraining Bolt
Out of the Dark / int_89f50aaa	comment	Restraining Bolt: Much of Hegemony technology has built-in restrictions to keep it working within acceptable parameters. This also includes their self-learning software (what humans would call primitive AI), which is kept in check by dozens of subroutines.
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Out of the Dark / int_8aa0f76	type	Deconstructed Trope
Out of the Dark / int_8aa0f76	comment	Deconstructed Trope: The story deconstructs Humans Are Warriors and Humans Advance Swiftly. The Hegemony witnessed the English slaughtering the French at Agincourt and see how fast human tech is progressing compared to "civilized" races and are scared to hell. So they tell their enforcer race that everyone will turn a blind eye if an accident were to happen to us... Weber also goes out of his way to briefly deconstruct Guns Akimbo and shoulder flesh wounds. Mama Bear and Papa Wolf also get deconstructed when Buchevsky argues that winter will bring the need to defend against good people with starving children.
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Out of the Dark / int_8b1a664	type	Kill All Humans
Out of the Dark / int_8b1a664	comment	Kill All Humans: The Shongairi plan to kill most humans and enslave the rest turns into this thanks to one asskicking after another.
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Out of the Dark / int_8b93a168	type	Macross Missile Massacre
Out of the Dark / int_8b93a168	comment	Macross Missile Massacre: In the third novel, each Relentless-class superdreadnought has 2700 missile launchers and can bring two-thirds of them on any firing arc. If every one of those missiles has a MjÃ¶lnir bomb-pumped laser warhead, that can potentially mean over 27,000 lasers delivered at point-blank range on a target. And Dave brought four of these superdreadnoughts to the Shong System. During the battle over Shongaru, the opening salvo of the human superdreadnoughts and heavy cruisers consists of 8100 missiles (although only a third of them are actual ship-killers, the rest being penetration aids, decoy generators, and jammers). By the time the first missiles engage their targets, 6 more salvos have been launched. It's stated that a superdreadnought is capable of putting 21 salvos into space before running out of missiles.
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Out of the Dark / int_8bbcd5ce	type	Code of Honour
Out of the Dark / int_8bbcd5ce	comment	The third book further expands upon the Shongairi's attitudes, revealing that they possess a Code of Honour called Jukaris based on their pack mentality. A conflict with this honor code actually caused the botched invasion of Earth, due to Thikair realizing that, if he openly challenged Earth as the precepts of Jukaris required, humanity would manage to actually beat him on the planet's surface, and he might have to surrender to THEM. As a result, he initiated the orbital bombardment of Earth in a gamble to try and force them to submit without a challenge, and hope no one would ever realize he didn't.
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Out of the Dark / int_8d0c9743	type	Intelligent Gerbil
Out of the Dark / int_8d0c9743	comment	Intelligent Gerbil: The two alien species described in the first novel resemble dogs and cattle.
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Out of the Dark / int_91e894b4	type	Apocalypse How
Out of the Dark / int_91e894b4	comment	Apocalypse How: The Shongairi start off with a plan to only go up to a Class 2 and enslave the survivors but switch to a Class 3a when the invasion's forces are getting chewed up on the ground. The second novel expands on the aftermath, with isolated pockets of survivors all across the world desperately trying to survive, with the winter coming and little food, shelter, or medicine available, while warlords and criminals use the opportunity to establish their own fiefdoms. The largest stable governments are North Carolina, Saskatchewan, and one of the Brazilian states.
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Out of the Dark / int_92ac1ba0	type	Alternative Number System
Out of the Dark / int_92ac1ba0	comment	Alternative Number System: The Shongairi appear to count in base-twelve.
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Out of the Dark / int_957e5fc2	type	Villainous Breakdown
Out of the Dark / int_957e5fc2	comment	Villainous Breakdown: Brigade Commander Harshair undergoes one while his entire platoon gets decimated by American M1A2 Abrams in the Afghan desert. Thikair as the novel progresses, especially when humans begin destroying his ground bases. He eventually just decides to Rage Quit regarding the entire invasion and blow up Earth from orbit. Vlad disagrees, and the subsequent scene on the bridge of the alien dreadnought ends with Thikair breaking down into a sobbing wreck.
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Out of the Dark / int_95cc926d	type	Post-Scarcity Economy
Out of the Dark / int_95cc926d	comment	Post-Scarcity Economy: Thanks to assemblers (3D printers that work on a molecular level) and unlimited energy, all Hegemony races are this, especially since space travel makes it easy to obtain resources from asteroids and uninhabited planets. Humanity is starting to become this in the second novel 15 years after the invasion, with the assemblers left behind by the Shongairi being wholly owned by the Planetary Union government. The assemblers back the global currency, the Planetary Union dollar. Any PU citizen can get their basic needs satisfied for free, although luxuries still require money, which means people have to work.
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Out of the Dark / int_96475bb6	type	Awesome Personnel Carrier
Out of the Dark / int_96475bb6	comment	Awesome Personnel Carrier: M3A3 Bradleys assist the Abrams tanks in Afghanistan in taking down Shongairi armored columns.
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Out of the Dark / int_97f53f5b	type	Superweapon Surprise
Out of the Dark / int_97f53f5b	comment	Superweapon Surprise: Humanity has barely left their gravity well, and are facing a species that has FTL capability. Humanity has superior ground weaponry, but there's no way mankind can win, and both sides know it. But no one expected Dracula!
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Out of the Dark / int_982b6570	type	Friendly Neighborhood Vampire
Out of the Dark / int_982b6570	comment	Friendly Neighborhood Vampire: Vlad is trying to be one of these, but the Shongairi are pushing him. He deliberately makes Stephen a vampire in order to be one of these and his Morality Pet.
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Out of the Dark / int_984ef9ef	type	"Not So Different" Remark
Out of the Dark / int_984ef9ef	comment	"Not So Different" Remark: Mircea to Stephen in Chapter XXVIII (28).
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Out of the Dark / int_99db72ee	type	Immune to Bullets
Out of the Dark / int_99db72ee	comment	Immune to Bullets: Shoot the vampires as much as you like, it won't do anything.
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Out of the Dark / int_9aaf8eca	type	Crippling Overspecialization
Out of the Dark / int_9aaf8eca	comment	Crippling Overspecialization: The Shongairi are prepared for two kinds of combat — kicking the crap out of primitives & space warfare. They are shocked to realize that humanity is far, far more advanced at warfare inside a gravity well; their tech could have done everything we did better, but they just never needed to.
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Out of the Dark / int_9b06e314	type	Greater-Scope Villain
Out of the Dark / int_9b06e314	comment	Greater-Scope Villain: The four Hegemony founder species appear to be this to the Shongairi.
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Out of the Dark / int_9dfd7154	type	Fridge Logic
Out of the Dark / int_9dfd7154	comment	Fridge Logic: The aliens think humanity deserves to be mass-murdered and enslaved or just outright exterminated because humans fight each other (even if the fighting was tiny compared to the species size) and the only reason we have militaries to resist theirs is due to our in-fighting. So...what does that say about the aliens since they have militaries, too?
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Out of the Dark / int_9e1e14ea	type	Ambition Is Evil
Out of the Dark / int_9e1e14ea	comment	Ambition Is Evil: The Shongari hope to harvest Earth's scientists and resourses to give them the power to move against the rest of the Hegemony. Averted with Colonel Sanders, who desperately wants to get promoted to general, but only to put a stop to the jokes about his name.
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Out of the Dark / int_9e6221b0	type	E.T. Gave Us Wi-Fi
Out of the Dark / int_9e6221b0	comment	E.T. Gave Us Wi-Fi: Discussed. When the Shongairi arrive at modern day Earth, they are confused as to how we have advanced so fast, they speculate that perhaps that one of their recon drones crashed and gave the Humans a head start on the technological game.
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Out of the Dark / int_9e8bf084	type	Recursive Translation
Out of the Dark / int_9e8bf084	comment	Recursive Translation: 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, 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_9ebff4b2	type	Devolution Device
Out of the Dark / int_9ebff4b2	comment	Devolution Device: After discovering the presence of an Iron Age civilization on Tairyon that advanced far too rapidly for Hegemony's tastes (but nowhere near as fast as humans), the Liatu, one of the founder species, deployed a bioweapon that reduced the intelligence of the Tairyonians to barely above animal level, and the vast majority of them died out, unable to support a population that size through hunting and gathering with primitive tools. The Liatu then moved in and settled the planet, treating the natives as "nuisance animals" (which is their actual name for them).
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Out of the Dark / int_9f63d4f1	type	Our Vampires Are Different
Out of the Dark / int_9f63d4f1	comment	Our Vampires Are Different: Instant intangibility/gaseous form, invulnerability to conventional weapons, undetectable to thermal or night vision, no need to breathe, and no vulnerability to holy items. Although the second book reveals that they're actually robotic beings composed of nanobots. Presumably, when a person is exposed to nanobots by drinking a vampire's "blood", they start to quickly replace their organs and cells with more of themselves until there's nothing of the original biology left. Furthermore, the supposed weakness to the sun is due to their systems being overloaded by light on the ultraviolet spectrum, which they appear to be able to process like photosynthesize in plants, but Dracula found out that he could develop a gradual resistance over years to this weakness, and spends the first book walking in broad daylight like a normal human.
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Out of the Dark / int_a0543350	type	Earth Is a Battlefield
Out of the Dark / int_a0543350	comment	Earth Is a Battlefield: Earth first has every single military base struck with a kinetic projectile, followed by every single political capital of every nation. And that's just the opening salvo that is the PRELUDE to the invasion.
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Out of the Dark / int_a0f6ab07	type	Nicknaming the Enemy
Out of the Dark / int_a0f6ab07	comment	Nicknaming the Enemy: English-speakers tend to call the Shongairi "puppies" due to their canine-like appearance.
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Out of the Dark / int_a1d4e0a8	type	Genocide Backfire
Out of the Dark / int_a1d4e0a8	comment	Neural education gives humanity what it needs to commandeer Shongairi capital and construction ships and begin the Genocide Backfire.
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Out of the Dark / int_a2b38d3b	type	Eye Scream
Out of the Dark / int_a2b38d3b	comment	Eye Scream: Squad Commander Gunshail is killed by a .308 Winchester round to the left eye.
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Out of the Dark / int_a2cb509b	type	Tested on Humans
Out of the Dark / int_a2cb509b	comment	Tested on Humans: The Shongairi attempt to capture humans several times to prepare a bioweapon.
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Out of the Dark / int_a74d419a	type	Unfinished, Untested, Used Anyway
Out of the Dark / int_a74d419a	comment	Unfinished, Untested, Used Anyway: When assaulting the Shongairi ships in orbit, Vlad and the other vampires hang on to the outer hull, as they don't need to breathe. However, Vlad didn't know if they'd survive being outside the ionosphere, with the sun's electromagnetic radiation (which feeds vampires) possibly overwhelming them. But it was the only way to stop Thikair from unleashing the bio-weapon.
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Out of the Dark / int_a7caa5b5	type	First Contact
Out of the Dark / int_a7caa5b5	comment	First Contact: Humanity's first contact with alien life is the Shongairi launching kinetic energy weapons and wiping out half of the world's population, including most major cities, military bases, and naval vessels. Only later do the Shongairi announce themselves to the survivors and demand surrender. A more proper first contact happens in the second book, when the PUNS Outlook reaches Sarth orbiting 61 Cygni A (roughly 11.4 light years from Earth). After a period of covert observation, Dave Dvorak sends out a radio broadcast across the planet announcing humanity's arrival and offering to meet all the world leaders (or their representatives) at a UN-like building the Sarthians call the Nonagon.
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Out of the Dark / int_a8adc5a0	type	Like a Son to Me
Out of the Dark / int_a8adc5a0	comment	Like a Son to Me: Pieter Ushaklov comes to view Zinaida, the girl he saved from Shongairi mortar fire, as his daughter.
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Out of the Dark / int_ab173426	type	Ruthless Modern Pirates
Out of the Dark / int_ab173426	comment	Ruthless Modern Pirates: In the second book, the breakaway Conch Republic raids coastlines for any ship or boat that dares to sail. They capture the vessels and either keep them or sell them to warlords in exchange for food and supplies. The re-established US government puts a stop to that.
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Out of the Dark / int_abb930ed	type	Sleeper Starship
Out of the Dark / int_abb930ed	comment	Sleeper Starship: Despite the existence of hyperdrives, interstellar travel routinely takes from several decades to centuries (just being several times faster than light isn't much of a speed in galactic terms), requiring cryogenic suspension for the crew.
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Out of the Dark / int_abf9209f	type	WolfMen
Out of the Dark / int_abf9209f	comment	Wolf Men: The Shongairi strongly resemble bipedal canines, to the point where several people refer to them with the Fantastic Slur "puppies".
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Out of the Dark / int_ac09dc0f	type	Alas, Poor Villain
Out of the Dark / int_ac09dc0f	comment	Alas, Poor Villain: Ground Base Commander Shairez. She may be responsible for kidnapping humans to develop a plague to wipe us all out, but through most of the book she's shown as an intelligent, curious, hard working, and capable aide who is one of the more likable enemies and often serves to draw out the Admiral's softer side. In the end, she's tortured for info for several hours by someone who knows a thing or two about torture. It's possible to feel some pity for Thikair in the middle of his Villainous Breakdown at the very end when, after already being worn down and speculating he'd be made to commit suicide, he's left facing a Cruel and Unusual Death he's confronted with the fact that 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_ac711709	type	Easily Thwarted Alien Invasion
Out of the Dark / int_ac711709	comment	Easily Thwarted Alien Invasion: Subverted. The Shongairi war technology is drastically inferior to Human tech. The real problem is their orbital firepower.
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Out of the Dark / int_ad1db87c	type	Oh, Crap!
Out of the Dark / int_ad1db87c	comment	Oh, Crap!: Thikair has one when Ground Base Commander Shairez informs him that Humans have no submission mentality. Dave Dvorak has one when he realizes that a Shongairi patrol will encounter him and his small resistance group during a supply run.
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Out of the Dark / int_ae69516f	type	Artificial Gravity
Out of the Dark / int_ae69516f	comment	Artificial Gravity: Inverted. While the Hegemony races possess countergrav generators that allow their vehicles to hover, their starships still use rotating sections to generate pseudogravity. When human engineers get their hands on Shongairi countergrav generator specs, they are surprised to discover governors that prevent the generators from being used to generate positive gravity either by accident or intentionally.
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Out of the Dark / int_b1bf5c9b	type	Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain
Out of the Dark / int_b1bf5c9b	comment	Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain: Zigzagged with vampires. While shooting one in the head has no effect (they often demonstrate their invulnerability by shooting themselves in the head), it is possible to kill a vampire, but only Vlad and Ushakov know how. Ushakov kills Cecilia, who's gone off the deep end and started killing indiscriminately, by decapitating her with some kind of special kukri he got from Vlad's mansion. After a moment, her head and body crumble to dust (actually nanobots).
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Out of the Dark / int_b4ac1655	type	Molotov Cocktail
Out of the Dark / int_b4ac1655	comment	Molotov Cocktail: Molotovs become standard for resistance fighters, and are easily able to land inside alien vehicles through the infantry firing ports.
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Out of the Dark / int_b53077b3	type	Take That!
Out of the Dark / int_b53077b3	comment	Take That!: The author does not have a high opinion of the F-35 Lightning II as shown during a scene where an F-22 Raptor pilot is criticizing it... while shooting down alien dropships.
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Out of the Dark / int_b6c94487	type	Invaded States of America
Out of the Dark / int_b6c94487	comment	Invaded States of America: Shongairi forces eventually land in America and they get all sorts of hell from the US Military and Partisan fighters.
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Out of the Dark / int_b9d11ad6	type	Self-Insert Fic
Out of the Dark / int_b9d11ad6	comment	Self-Insert Fic: So what, a main character is named David; it's a common name. And his wife's name is Sharon... and they live in South Carolina... and their dogs are named Nimue and Merlin? Oh, come on, Weber!
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Out of the Dark / int_ba0ff694	type	You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!
Out of the Dark / int_ba0ff694	comment	You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Abu Bakr el-Hiri's reaction to the thought of using a suicide truck bomb.
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Out of the Dark / int_bd4264a3	type	Slasher Smile
Out of the Dark / int_bd4264a3	comment	Slasher Smile: When Dracula and other vampires board the Shongairi ships, Thikair is terrified of his smile.
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Out of the Dark / int_bd8b2b0b	type	To Serve Man
Out of the Dark / int_bd8b2b0b	comment	To Serve Man: Played with. The Shongairi are carnivores and consider not eating their fallen foes as almost disrespectful to them. This does not endear them to humanity or to any other race, for that matter.
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Out of the Dark / int_bdcf86f3	type	Disaster Scavengers
Out of the Dark / int_bdcf86f3	comment	Disaster Scavengers: Alluded to and prepared against, but not actually seen. Humanity holds together pretty well rather than turning on each other for the most part. There are some mentions made of characters being attacked by other, desperate scavengers, and a couple of groups of National Guardsmen attempt to become local warlords and meet suitably bad ends. Then again, the plot doesn't last until winter, when people will get desperate, though what may happen then is discussed.
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Out of the Dark / int_bf698238	type	When All You Have Is a Hammerâ€¦
Out of the Dark / int_bf698238	comment	When All You Have Is a Hammerâ€¦: The Shongairi's trump card is their orbital firepower, which they use in lieu of effective ground forces. Whenever someone resists on the ground, the Shongairi orbital forces bomb them, or the nearest town within three or four miles. They don't seem to get that this is just making things worse. This is reinforced by Shongairi pack-based psychology, which tells them that the best way to force compliance is by bombing targets to demonstrate superiority, but those insane humans just keep on fighting. [[spoiler:Actually invoked in the third novel while explaining what happened on Earth during the first book to the Shongairi emperor. He is told the expression itself and finds it quite useful, filing it away for later].]
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Out of the Dark / int_bffc7851	type	Humanity on Trial
Out of the Dark / int_bffc7851	comment	Humanity on Trial: Offstage, but it does happen, and we're given the death penalty.
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Out of the Dark / int_c0f87dda	type	Humans Are Warriors
Out of the Dark / int_c0f87dda	comment	Humans Are Warriors: This novel has strong, pervasive themes of "HUMANITY, FUCK YEAH!"
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Out of the Dark / int_c1d58ab0	type	Drop Ship
Out of the Dark / int_c1d58ab0	comment	Drop Ship: The first ones sent to Earth were destroyed by USAF F-22 Raptors and a French antiaircraft battery took out three more. They're stated to be the size of missile cruisers but are utterly lacking in anything that would protect them in case of an attack. Even their radar is incapable of picking up human stealth fighters or detecting a missile lock. Apparently, they have antigravity drives, but tend to use the boring old aerodynamic wings, as antigravity is too power-hungry.
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Out of the Dark / int_c253090a	type	Big Blackout
Out of the Dark / int_c253090a	comment	Big Blackout: Averted — for a while. Despite the elimination of major cities, power and internet stay up for a good while before the Shongairi specifically take them out.
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Out of the Dark / int_c2fc1ae	type	Neck Snap
Out of the Dark / int_c2fc1ae	comment	Neck Snap: How Ground Base Commander Shairez is put out of her misery.
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Out of the Dark / int_c3c18143	type	Hope Spot
Out of the Dark / int_c3c18143	comment	Hope Spot: Senior Squad Commander Laifayr has when when Dave's .50 Cal Barret rifle stops firing since it is out of ammo.
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Out of the Dark / int_c3df91ff	type	Wooden Stake
Out of the Dark / int_c3df91ff	comment	Wooden Stake: An SAS soldier-turned-mercenary, who has started working for a Mexican drug cartel, breaks off a chair leg and tries to use it to stab one of the vampires who have just slaughtered his elite unit. He misses and stabs her in the gut. She points out that it should be the heart and demonstrated on herself. She drops to the ground, with the other two vampires gasping. A second later, they all burst into laughter, as the stabbed one gets up. They explain that none of the "traditional" methods of killing vampires work, right before one of them rips out his heart.
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Out of the Dark / int_c5d18c5a	type	Humanity Is Insane
Out of the Dark / int_c5d18c5a	comment	Humanity Is Insane: Humanity is the only race that doesn't have the instinct to surrender permanently when beaten by a superior force, since we're far more individual and family oriented than the pack and herd oriented aliens. Guerrilla warfare, passive resistance, and sabotage are utterly foreign to our would-be conquerors because a Shongairi confronted with an obvious superior will automatically submit; the notion of resisting against the "pack leader" in anything other than an obvious show of force intended to seize control of the pack is considered vile and dishonorable. They will soon learn that humanity isn't likely to accept their surrender when we exterminate them right back. The Hegemony will then learn that we hold those who ordered our extermination as even more guilty than those who attempted to carry it out.
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Out of the Dark / int_c5f0119c	type	Insane Troll Logic
Out of the Dark / int_c5f0119c	comment	Insane Troll Logic: How Foreign Minister Myrcal of the Qwernian Empire acts in the last third of Into The Light. Ou is so fixated on victory over the Republic of Dianto that ou regularly makes rookie diplomatic blunders just to gain a perceived advantage. Some select actions include using choice passages from the Earth Ambassador's speech proclaiming that no Sarthian nation will get preferential treatment to suggest the Earth delegation is making a secret deal with Dianto, exposing several key intelligence assets for minimal returns, and plotting to hold human diplomats hostage to force the Earth delegation to submit to their demands based on rather flimsy evidence even ous immediate subordinates are questioning. Unfortunately, ou also manages to maneuver ouself into beoming the second-in-command of the Qwernian Empire, and serves as the primary antagonist of the latter part of the book.
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Out of the Dark / int_c75df49a	type	Shout-Out
Out of the Dark / int_c75df49a	comment	Shout-Out: David's dogs are named Nimue and Merlin. Also, the second novel's epilogue features a spindle-shaped ship. And the space combat in the third novel might as well have taken place in the Honorverse.
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Out of the Dark / int_cb060751	type	War Refugees
Out of the Dark / int_cb060751	comment	War Refugees: There are many of them in Romania, and the Shongairi aren't afraid to target them either.
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Out of the Dark / int_cbdd9a55	type	We ARE Struggling Together
Out of the Dark / int_cbdd9a55	comment	We ARE Struggling Together: Averted, but it is mentioned that survivors will do what they must to keep themselves and their families from starving.
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Out of the Dark / int_ccab244d	type	Kinetic Weapons Are Just Better
Out of the Dark / int_ccab244d	comment	Kinetic Weapons Are Just Better: Dropping a Meteor of Doom is a cheap way to soften up a future colony. Plus, the Shongairi have effective energy weapons on their heavy assault vehicles, but mostly rely on mediocre conventional firearms. Human firearms and artillery become the stuff of nightmares for them. In the second novel, the humans decide to go with railguns instead of energy weapons, since railguns pack a lot more of a punch and are very good at penetrating armor. For tanks they particularly prefer discarding sabot rounds for better penetration. As for handheld rail weapons, they pretty much pulverize any flesh they encounter and can easily go through three or four people.
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Out of the Dark / int_cd809603	type	Tank Goodness
Out of the Dark / int_cd809603	comment	Tank Goodness: M1A2 Abrams and Romanian T-72 tanks do just fine against the invaders. Shongairi tanks (called GEVs) have powerful lasers for armaments and can easily punch through our armor.
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Out of the Dark / int_cdaa029f	type	Nuclear Weapons Taboo
Out of the Dark / int_cdaa029f	comment	Nuclear Weapons Taboo: Enforced thanks to the Shongairi keeping a close eye on our missile silos and nuclear subs. The Shongairi keeping an eye on our nuclear capability means nothing as if they had the power to get rid of it, they would have done so ASAP and if you shoot everything at once, it doesn't matter if they manage to destroy the silos and subs (which they aren't necessarily capable of doing anyway). This doesn't stop the radical factions in India and Pakistan from taking the opportunity to settle old scores by nuking one another after their population centers are wiped out by the Shongairi. In the aftermath, the angry Shongairi proceed to launch another salvo of rocks at the Indian subcontinent, further devastating it.
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Out of the Dark / int_cdfe12c3	type	Nothing Is Scarier
Out of the Dark / int_cdfe12c3	comment	Nothing Is Scarier: The Shongairi, when the vampires attack, find the silence more disturbing than facing the destruction humans can cause in direct combat.
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Out of the Dark / int_ce323098	type	Self-Mutilation Demonstration
Out of the Dark / int_ce323098	comment	Self-Mutilation Demonstration: In the sequel, the vampires demonstrate their nature by either allowing themselves to be shot or shooting themselves in the head.
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Out of the Dark / int_ce68d46b	type	Next Sunday A.D.
Out of the Dark / int_ce68d46b	comment	Next Sunday A.D.: We are never given an actual year, but we do get some subtle hints such as America having a female president.
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Out of the Dark / int_cea5c551	type	MeteorOfDoom
Out of the Dark / int_cea5c551	comment	Dropping a Meteor of Doom is a cheap way to soften up a future colony. Plus, the Shongairi have effective energy weapons on their heavy assault vehicles, but mostly rely on mediocre conventional firearms. Human firearms and artillery become the stuff of nightmares for them.
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Out of the Dark / int_ceec4df5	type	Roaring Rampage of Revenge
Out of the Dark / int_ceec4df5	comment	Roaring Rampage of Revenge: The war against the Shongairi becomes this as soon as it is confirmed that we can fight back and that they have landed on Earth. Platoon Commander Rayzhar goes on one when his two little brothers were killed in an ambush. He does not discriminate against military and civilian targets. It's clear at the end of the book that, with the help of captured Shongairi tech, Humanity will exact its revenge on the Hegemony and the Shongairi home worlds.
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Out of the Dark / int_cf92fea8	type	Cassandra Truth
Out of the Dark / int_cf92fea8	comment	Cassandra Truth: After driving away the Shongairi, the government of North Carolina sends out a broadcast telling the rest of humanity of what happened, including how it was accomplished. No one believes the latter part, of course. After all, who's going to believe something as ridiculous as vampires?
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Out of the Dark / int_cfa546f4	type	Mother Russia Makes You Strong
Out of the Dark / int_cfa546f4	comment	Mother Russia Makes You Strong: Also Mother Afghanistan, Mother Ukraine, Mother Romania, and even Mother North Carolina... Weber really makes an effort to show that he views Earth as a World of Badass.
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Out of the Dark / int_d40e1a9f	type	Break Out the Museum Piece
Out of the Dark / int_d40e1a9f	comment	Break Out the Museum Piece: Weapons stockpiles in Romania contained surplus Soviet weapons dating from as far back as World War II and are used by the resistance forces in the region.
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Out of the Dark / int_d41832cc	type	Written by the Winners
Out of the Dark / int_d41832cc	comment	Written by the Winners: In the second book, Vlad explains that while some of what he's done before his transformation would indeed be called cruel by modern standards, it was actually no different than what many of his enemies were doing. It's just that most of the stuff about him was written by the Ottomans, who wanted to portray Vlad as a bloodthirsty murderer.
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Out of the Dark / int_d429d0f6	type	Canada, Eh?
Out of the Dark / int_d429d0f6	comment	Canada, Eh?: In the second book, Canada is revealed to be one of the nations to suffer least in the Western Hemisphere, alongside the US and Brazil. With Saskatchewan surviving relatively unscathed, it becomes the new seat of government. Canada is the first to accept President Howell's offer of forming the Continental Union.
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Out of the Dark / int_d52d28b6	type	Hypocrite
Out of the Dark / int_d52d28b6	comment	Hypocrites: The Hegemony, who consider themselves peaceful enlightened folk and regret allowing the aggressive Shongairi into the fold as required by their laws, decide to sweep humanity under the rug (by literally throwing us to the wolves) rather than having to let us join someday. The Shongairi repeatedly lampshade this in contempt.
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Out of the Dark / int_d5661a8c	type	The Dreaded Dreadnought
Out of the Dark / int_d5661a8c	comment	The Dreaded Dreadnought: Shongairi dreadnoughts are powerful warships, capable of bombarding the surface of a planet with projectiles. They're also armed with missiles and lasers, although the latter are mainly used for close-range engagements and to shoot down missiles. Human-designed dreadnoughts in the second novel are significantly larger and more powerful.
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Out of the Dark / int_d71d51fd	type	The End of the World as We Know It
Out of the Dark / int_d71d51fd	comment	The End of the World as We Know It: Humanity is so screwed. Until Dracula decides it's the Shongairi's turn.
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Out of the Dark / int_d8ec79d5	type	Benevolent Alien Invasion
Out of the Dark / int_d8ec79d5	comment	Benevolent Alien Invasion: 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_d9cf40fa	type	Screw This, I'm Outta Here
Out of the Dark / int_d9cf40fa	comment	Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Thikar decides to scrap the invasion and destroy Earth from orbit.
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Out of the Dark / int_da15842d	type	Brain/Computer Interface
Out of the Dark / int_da15842d	comment	Brain/Computer Interface: In the second book, one of the scientists is obsessed with adapting the Shongairi neural educators into this. He sees multiple benefits to being able to control equipment with but a thought. His bosses eventually transfer to him to other projects, although he tries one last experiment and ends up frying his brain. Which is fine, since he also accidentally uploaded himself into his computer.
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Out of the Dark / int_da19c62a	type	Leave No Survivors
Out of the Dark / int_da19c62a	comment	Leave No Survivors: When Shongairi soldiers attempt to surrender, Stephen Buchevsky again sees the children they have killed, he is reminded of his own killed daughters and has them all executed. Eventually, the Shongairi just decide to kill all humans from orbit. Dracula ain't going to allow it. In the second book, 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. Based on the ending to the second novel and the blurb to the third novel, Dvorak intends to instead turn the Shogairi into allies against the Founders of the Hegemony, although this will still necessitate the obliteration of their planetary defenses to satisfy Shongairi honor code.
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Out of the Dark / int_dba1f5b5	type	Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny
Out of the Dark / int_dba1f5b5	comment	Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny: The book is basically vampires versus aliens. Plus that's just the first part of the trilogy!
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Out of the Dark / int_dca70c44	type	Reasonable Authority Figure
Out of the Dark / int_dca70c44	comment	Reasonable Authority Figure: Haymar-zik-Shayma, Shathyra and absolute ruler of the Shongair Empire, is actually quite reasonable. When he learns of what Thikair has done to humans, he's horrified by such a blatant violation of Jukaris (their honor code). He also reaslizes that humans are now much more advanced than the Shongairi, and their home fleet can't possibly stand up to the human task force in the system. And yet he knows he can't officially submit to David Dvorak without first sending his warriors into battle as demanded by Jukaris. He laments the necessity of so many having to die when the outcome is already certain.
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Out of the Dark / int_dca97045	type	Just Following Orders
Out of the Dark / int_dca97045	comment	Just Following Orders: 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_de56f2bf	type	Would Be Rude to Say "Genocide"
Out of the Dark / int_de56f2bf	comment	Would Be Rude to Say "Genocide": The Galactic Hegemony, being composed of peace-loving enlightened herbivores, absolutely abhors violence. Which is why, if they encounter any upstart species that could potentially upset their delicate balance, they decide to take care of them, whether by granting a more violent junior member the opportunity to expand into that space and crush their potential threat, or by engineering a de-evolutionary virus to collapse their civilization and cause their population to be adjusted to something much more manageable.
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Out of the Dark / int_de999021	type	Rage Quit
Out of the Dark / int_de999021	comment	Thikair as the novel progresses, especially when humans begin destroying his ground bases. He eventually just decides to Rage Quit regarding the entire invasion and blow up Earth from orbit. Vlad disagrees, and the subsequent scene on the bridge of the alien dreadnought ends with Thikair breaking down into a sobbing wreck.
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Out of the Dark / int_e0d133d0	type	Insufficiently Advanced Alien
Out of the Dark / int_e0d133d0	comment	Insufficiently Advanced Alien: Orbital bombardment is just about the only thing the Shongairi have going for them (though to be fair, Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies is pretty effective). Their ground forces don't have any experience going up against anything more advanced than crossbows, and it really shows in their tactics and equipment. They do eventually start uparmoring their equipment and adjusting their tactics, and their actual heavy and support weapons are quite effective; the humans note that the puppies' mortars in particular are very deadly and have a wide variety of ammunition types.
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Out of the Dark / int_e0ecb7b3	type	Space Station
Out of the Dark / int_e0ecb7b3	comment	Space Station: The space platform Bastion is built not long after the founding of the Planetary Union in order to house the seat of PU government, as doing it anywhere on Earth's surface would result in accusations of favoritism to a particular member state. The platform is home to the PU Congress, the Terra House (the residency of the president), the Citadel (the PU's version of the Pentagon), and the people who make it all work, so it's grown to a decent-sized city and is constantly in the process of being expanded. There are three massive space stations in orbit over Shongaru. Two of them are defensive battlestations, and the third is a civilian habitat. All use spinning to achieve pseudogravity. The battlestations are destroyed during the space battle, while the habitat is stormed by Space Marines in order to satisfy the honor requirements for the Shongairi to submit to humans.
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Out of the Dark / int_e13156e1	type	Mama Bear
Out of the Dark / int_e13156e1	comment	Mama Bear and Papa Wolf also get deconstructed when Buchevsky argues that winter will bring the need to defend against good people with starving children.
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Out of the Dark / int_e154ff08	type	Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique
Out of the Dark / int_e154ff08	comment	Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: Happens off camera to some captured Shongairi Mooks and Ground Base Commander Shairez.
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Out of the Dark / int_e1836adf	type	Bizarre Alien Sexes
Out of the Dark / int_e1836adf	comment	Bizarre Alien Sexes: Sarthians have three sexes: male female, and neutro. Male and female impregnate the neutro with their gametes, which merge to form a zygote in the neutro's body. Unlike the largely male-dominated human societies, the child-bearing neutros tend to be higher on the social and political hierarchy of Sarth, probably since they tend to act as peacekeepers between the more aggressive and emotional males and females. Many national leaders are neutros. There is almost no sexual dimorphism between males and females, except for their plumage coloring and patterns, while neutros tend to be a little smaller and also have a unique plumage pattern. Sarthian families also consist of three partners.
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Out of the Dark / int_e34541d	type	One World Order
Out of the Dark / int_e34541d	comment	One World Order: The Shongairi are confused that humanity managed to get to our current level of advancement without becoming this. It's starting to shape up in the sequel, as the governor of North Carolina seeks to unite all the human survivors under a single federal government modeled after the US (bicameral legislature, state-appointed senators, electoral college, etc.) in order to rebuild Earth and prepare for round 2 against the Hegemony in a few decades' time. By year 15 after the invasion, the Planetary Union of Earth consists of most of the nations, including the US, Canada, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Spain, both Italies (it split into Padania and Sicily), Portugal, Romania, India, and South Africa. Switzerland is on the fence, trying to lobby for "associated status", although President Howell makes it clear that it's either in or out, no middle ground. Pakistan has become a hotbed of radical Islam and steadfastly refuses to join, as the Planetary Union constitution includes clauses for fundamental human rights, which the Pakistani leaders are vehemently against. Averted with the Sarthians, who are at about the 1930s-1940s level of technology. They still have plenty of nation-states, but the two dominant ones are the Republic of Dianto and the Qwernian Empire. The others tend to be members of one of the two blocs. The humans compare them to Athens and Sparta of Ancient Greece. The Dianteans are a lot more like the humans in terms of their politics and values. They revere the rule of law. They are an island nation with a powerful navy. The Qwernians, meanwhile, have a strong warrior tradition and scoff at laws, preferring custom and tradition over the written word. They have a powerful army and control lots of natural resources, but their navy is lacking. The humans are adamant that they wish for the Sarthians to establish some kind of supranational governing body in order to help distribute the human technology equally.
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Out of the Dark / int_e3585b3d	type	No Party Given
Out of the Dark / int_e3585b3d	comment	No Party Given: What party the Premier of Saskatchewan belongs to isn't specified, even though the Leader of the Opposition is identified as belonging to the New Democratic Party.
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Out of the Dark / int_e3a7d2e6	type	Karmic Jackpot
Out of the Dark / int_e3a7d2e6	comment	Karmic Jackpot: Governor Howell, the Governor of North Carolina who acted as The 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_e3b0cd87	type	Morality Pet
Out of the Dark / int_e3b0cd87	comment	Morality Pet: Stephen becomes this for Mircea.
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Out of the Dark / int_e543a655	type	Light Is Not Good
Out of the Dark / int_e543a655	comment	Light Is Not Good: The Galactic Hegemony presents itself as the bastion of galactic civilization, keeping everything orderly and peaceful amidst hostile darkness around them. They do this by forcing all members to stay in a technological stasis, punishing any members who stray away from their precepts with extinction or forced de-evolution, and using the junior members to jockey amongst one another in endless political games lasting millennia and deal with potential threats to the senior members, the Founders.
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Out of the Dark / int_e567510d	type	Determinator
Out of the Dark / int_e567510d	comment	Determinator: Mankind as a whole to the Shongairi; it turns out that while humans do possess a submission mechanism, it is subordinated to our instinct to protect family. It's also pointed out that "family", in this case, can include up to entire countries. Then Dracula extends it to humanity itself, at great cost to the invaders. And, implicitly, the Hegemony and its allies.
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Out of the Dark / int_e640b487	type	Infodump
Out of the Dark / int_e640b487	comment	Infodump: Several chapters are devoted solely to outline politics on Earth or within the Hegemony that led to the current situation. One chapter is mostly devoted to excessively detailing survivalist preparations, and there are some entirely irrelevant infodumps (e.g. the one regarding Iranian politics or several pages devoted to an F-22 pilot bashing the F-35 while in the middle of attacking alien landing ships).
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Out of the Dark / int_e663d3ef	type	Only a Flesh Wound
Out of the Dark / int_e663d3ef	comment	Only a Flesh Wound: The concept of shoulder flesh wounds commonly seen in media is deconstructed in Chapter XXXIII (33).
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Out of the Dark / int_e6a901a3	type	Meaningful Rename
Out of the Dark / int_e6a901a3	comment	Meaningful Rename: After capturing the Shongairi ships, Vlad renames the flagship Star of Empire to TÃ¢rgoviÈ™te, his former capital city.
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Out of the Dark / int_e70127	type	The Mole
Out of the Dark / int_e70127	comment	The Mole: Governor Howell appears to be working with the Shongairi to make everything go smoothly. The puppies never even suspect the truth that he is undermining them at every turn.
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Out of the Dark / int_e8763c7e	type	Aliens Never Invented the Wheel
Out of the Dark / int_e8763c7e	comment	Aliens Never Invented the Wheel: Most galactic civilizations tend to be unified under a single government long before they become space-capable, and tend to focus their military development on spacepower once they get to orbit. However, humans are still fractious even at the level of having an orbital satellite network, and though human technology is necessarily cruder than spacefaring alien tech, in areas of ground and atmospheric combat it is necessarily advanced. Other species simply never had the need for things like heavy armored vehicles or fighter aircraft when such things were easily dispatched with Orbital Bombardment.
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Out of the Dark / int_e8e56799	type	Blue-and-Orange Morality
Out of the Dark / int_e8e56799	comment	Blue-and-Orange Morality: For the Shongairi, refusing to submit to an obvious superior, especially after that superior has demonstrated unquestioned strength, is horrific. They also don't see why humans get pissed when Shongairi eat the corpses of those they killed, including children; to the Shongairi, eating the corpses is the only way to honor them and not let the soul go to waste. Humanity's refusal to back down and fight viciously out of a need to protect their families or to seek vengeance for the deaths of loved ones is utterly alien to the Shongairi. The third book further expands upon the Shongairi's attitudes, revealing that they possess a Code of Honour called Jukaris based on their pack mentality. A conflict with this honor code actually caused the botched invasion of Earth, due to Thikair realizing that, if he openly challenged Earth as the precepts of Jukaris required, humanity would manage to actually beat him on the planet's surface, and he might have to surrender to THEM. As a result, he initiated the orbital bombardment of Earth in a gamble to try and force them to submit without a challenge, and hope no one would ever realize he didn't. In the same book, we also get the Liatu, one of the founding members of the Hegemony, and their own sensibilities, where violence between members of the same species is abhorrent, but pretty much anything leading up to violence, such as "assassinating" a political enemy by stranding them in a desert, or forcibly devolving a native sapient species through a virus, is fair game. They also have a form of communism that, on paper, seems equitable and encourages economic growth while also allowing for everyone to benefit together, but just like human communism, some end up FAR more equal than others.
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Out of the Dark / int_e9f517e1	type	Artistic License â€“ Geography
Out of the Dark / int_e9f517e1	comment	Artistic License â€“ Geography: In the second book, people keep referring to Mexico as a South American country. Except one look at a map will place it firmly in North America. Why they simply didn't call it Latin American is anybody's guess.
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Out of the Dark / int_ea6fdefb	type	Casual Danger Dialog
Out of the Dark / int_ea6fdefb	comment	Casual Danger Dialog: An F-22 Raptor pilot takes time to criticize the F-35 while shooting down alien dropships.
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Out of the Dark / int_ebcf99b5	type	The Unmasqued World
Out of the Dark / int_ebcf99b5	comment	The Unmasqued World: Once the vampires come out in to the open, there's no real way to hide their existence. Though many people don't believe the announcements about vampires helping fight off the Shongairi invasion.
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Out of the Dark / int_ecb6abb7	type	Galactic Conqueror
Out of the Dark / int_ecb6abb7	comment	Galactic Conqueror: The Shongairi had already conquered two planets before arriving on Earth.
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Out of the Dark / int_edf8db61	type	Oh, My Gods!
Out of the Dark / int_edf8db61	comment	Oh, My Gods!: The Shongairi use names such as "Cainharn" and "Dainthar" in this fashion.
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Out of the Dark / int_f13a0451	type	Suicide Attack
Out of the Dark / int_f13a0451	comment	Suicide Attack: Major Dan Torino and Abu Bakr were going to use a suicide truck bomb to destroy a Shongairi base. Becomes unnecessary when the Shongairi evacuate the planet.
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Out of the Dark / int_f1d6144a	type	War Is Hell
Out of the Dark / int_f1d6144a	comment	War Is Hell: Something the Shongairi finally learn after treating it like a safari for so long.
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Out of the Dark / int_f1d7b320	type	Crazy Survivalist
Out of the Dark / int_f1d7b320	comment	Crazy Survivalist: It's all justified (Alien Invasion, remember), but the menfolk of the mountain cabin have clear plans to put lots of half-inch holes in anyone who might threaten their little commune.
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Out of the Dark / int_f2c08c1e	type	Accidentally-Correct Writing
Out of the Dark / int_f2c08c1e	comment	Accidentally-Correct Writing: In-Universe example. In the second novel, Vlad explains that the one movie to get close to getting his origins is Dracula Untold. While he doesn't look nearly as attractive as Luke Evans, 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.
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Out of the Dark / int_f2e4d683	type	Stealth in Space
Out of the Dark / int_f2e4d683	comment	Stealth in Space: As far as the Hegemony knows, there's no way to conceal a ship in space from detection. Dropping out of FTL anywhere close to a star system produces a characteristic energy splash that will definitely be picked up. In the third novel, we find out that humans have upgraded the FTL technology to function a little differently, which means that no energy splash happens when they drop out of phase space. Plus they're able to direct a ship's emissions in a specific direction (such as away from the plane of the ecliptic, where no one is likely to be scanning for them). While it's not perfect, and anyone actually looking will be able to spot occultations of stars and planets. But the Hegemony has become so complacent, they don't bother looking for threats beyond the bare minimum.
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Out of the Dark / int_f37bf401	type	Hover Tank
Out of the Dark / int_f37bf401	comment	Hover Tank: The Shongairi tanks are able to hover, but this just leaves its unarmored bottom side exposed. Their ground transports are still wheeled, though, as hover tech is expensive.
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Out of the Dark / int_f56aeb67	type	Alien Invasion
Out of the Dark / int_f56aeb67	comment	Alien Invasion: The whole plot of the first book. I mean, just look at the summary.
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Out of the Dark / int_f5eda11	type	Mix-and-Match Critters
Out of the Dark / int_f5eda11	comment	Mix-and-Match Critters: On a previous planet they colonized, the Shongairi's bases were attacked by "cat-apes".
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Out of the Dark / int_f6507695	type	Everything Is Online
Out of the Dark / int_f6507695	comment	Everything Is Online: We youtubed shooting down alien dropships! Fleet Commander Thikair broadcasted to all of Humanity online to announce the invasion. Also one of the primary advantages of humanity, allowing us to coordinate strikes and keep up morale.
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Out of the Dark / int_f7cee9b	type	Last Stand
Out of the Dark / int_f7cee9b	comment	Last Stand: All of Humanity is pulling this since they have no way to stop the Shongairi kinetic weapons. Stephen Buchevsky and a small band of rebels pulls one so that the refugee village can evacuate.
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Out of the Dark / int_f9c17447	type	The Remnant
Out of the Dark / int_f9c17447	comment	The Remnant: The remaining Human military units of the world are still fighting the Shongairi.
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Out of the Dark / int_fab3c1e1	type	Weakened by the Light
Out of the Dark / int_fab3c1e1	comment	Weakened by the Light: Zig-zagged. While vampires do indeed feel pain when exposed to sunlight, it's not because they're dying. It's because their changed bodies are fed by electromagnetic radiation, and sunlight overloads them. Older vampires have learned to control their intake and no longer suffer from it. That said, Vlad wasn't certain that the vampires, especially the new ones, would survive the unshielded trip into space with all the cosmic and solar radiation up there. He didn't tell the others because it wouldn't have a made a difference.
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Out of the Dark / int_fbd285b7	type	Comically Missing the Point
Out of the Dark / int_fbd285b7	comment	Comically Missing the Point: It only becomes funny during the Shongairi invasion, but the take-away from the original hegemony survey of Earth counts as this. The Barthoni team took away that humans are barbarians from watching a battle from the hundred years war when they should have learned that, even when faced with seemingly insurmountable odds, humans will try to find creative solutions to problems before giving up. From the way the invasion was conducted, that simply never occurred to anyone even though everyone had access to the same data.
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Out of the Dark / int_fd94c4ac	type	Theme Naming
Out of the Dark / int_fd94c4ac	comment	Theme Naming: Task Force One consists of 19 ships: four Relentless-class superdreadnoughts (all named Relentless in various languages), eight Sword-class heavy cruisers (no names given), three troop transports (all named after company commanders that fought at Harirud River), and four Foundry-class industrial ships (all named Foundry in various languages).
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Out of the Dark / int_fe614133	type	Beauty Is Never Tarnished
Out of the Dark / int_fe614133	comment	Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Averted. By the begining of Chapter XXVII (27), Thikair notes that Ground Base Commander Shairez appears to have "aged" thanks to the ongoing conflict with the Humans.
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