History Literature / TheAtrocityArchive

* ApocalypseHow / Class X4: The climax is set on an [[AlternateHistory alternate world]] where [[spoiler: the [[{{Ghostapo}} top-secret Nazi necromancy project]] used the souls of those murdered in the Holocaust to summon an [[EldritchAbomination Infovore]], creature of a universe that succumbed to Entropic Heat Death aeons ago and use it as a weapon against the Allies, wiping out all life on Earth except for the Nazis. Unfortunately for them, the Nazis didn't realize that they weren't in control of the Infovore until it was much, ''much'' too late - and after it ate the Nazis as well, it began consuming all the energy of the rest of the universe, causing it to undergo Heat Death as well. Eventually it began sucking energy directly from the Space-Time Continuum, causing the universe to begin to collapse. Now it wants to escape to our universe]].
* AttackBackfire: Bob and the OCCULUS team following the threat through to a frozen world where [[StupidJetpackHitler the Nazis summoned a Great Old One to win WWII... and it didn't end well for them]]. The plan is to retrieve the hostage, then leave a nuke to blow the site, and the threat, sky high. [[spoiler: At least, until Bob realizes that the threat feeds off of energy and entropy, meaning blowing up a nuke would give it enough strength to force its way through to our world.]]

* BatmanGambit The Jotun Infovore is nasty and manipulative. It [[spoiler: targeted Mo to get the Laundry on its tail, then abducted her into its reality]], while dropping hints that [[spoiler: the Nazis]] were behind the whole thing. This forces the Laundry to pursue it in force with a nuclear weapon just to be on the safe side. [[spoiler: That's exactly what it wants: a burst of powerful, concentrated energy like a hydrogen bomb is what it needs to open a big enough gate to ''our'' reality so it can feed on all that delicious energy in our universe]].
* ContinuousDecompression: Justified. The sucking hole is a hole in ''reality'', working on sucking Earth's entire atmosphere through an interdimensional portal to [[spoiler: an alternate Earth where the atmosphere has frozen solid after the Jotunheimr sucked all the heat out of its home universe.]]

* EldritchAbomination: The infovore, [[spoiler: the only survivor of a reality where the Nazis actually managed to pull it off. Only thing is, once they unleashed "the frost giant" on the Allies, they quickly began to realize that the thing was draining the heat from... well, everything. Just sixty years later, that universe is nearing entropic heat death, and the infovore wants out...]]
* EldritchLocation: A portal to another universe is opened in which Heinrich Himmler and the Ahnenerbe SS managed to make a deal (via mass human sacrifices, natch) with EldritchAbomination s (the Ice Giants) to win WWII. Guess what happened next in that universe. While you can admire Hitler's portrait [[spoiler: chiseled onto the moon's surface by giant hands]], it just so happens that [[spoiler: alter-earth is now frozen to near absolute zero while the universe itself has redshifted into collapse mode and has just a few hours left to go]]. And something wants to get back through the portal to our side. This is bad!

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: The book has as its villains the remnants of an alternate universe's Third Reich. They [[{{Ghostapo}} managed to turn the Holocaust into a massive necromantic working]], attracting the attention of a [[EldritchAbomination Great Old One]] they got to fight on their side. Thing is, after it destroyed the Allies, it proceeded to drain ''everything'' from the universe, to the point that said universe is facing imminent heat death only 60 years later and the Great Old One itself is trying to escape ahead of the impending collapse of reality making this a double case when the Laundry agents realize what's happening and trap it in the dying reality.

* MinorCrimeRevealsMajorPlot: Extract a British national being kept inside America by the CIA's occult wing → [[spoiler: stop an EldritchAbomination from crossing over from a world where the Nazis won World War II]].

* SpaceIsCold: Stross [[ShownTheirWork did his research]]. Despite the ambient temperature on the [[spoiler:alternate Earth]] being roughly 40 Kelvin, the characters note that since there's no air they can't lose heat by convection, so heat exhaustion is a potential danger.

* TheStarsAreGoingOut: There's an AlternateUniverse where most of the stars are gone [[spoiler:because a monster has eaten all the heat from the universe and without the energy to make it expand, the universe has been collapsing in on itself. When the crew enters the universe, the collapse has sped up to be faster than the speed of light and somewhere in the quickly shrinking universe lurks an Ice Giant looking for a way out]]...
* StupidJetpackHitler: This is crossed with {{Ghostapo}} since "magic" is really just applied higher mathematics and physics. Part of the reason for the Holocaust was [[spoiler:to open a gateway to an alternate universe and bring an EldritchAbomination (an infovore) through to destroy their enemies. Part of the action of the story takes place in an AlternateTimeline where the Nazis succeeded, then [[GoneHorriblyRight were destroyed by their own creation]].]] After UsefulNotes/WorldWarII the major powers signed an occult arms-control treaty since none of the parties involved ever wanted to see mass murder used as a strategic weapon again.
* TapOnTheHead: Subverted. The protagonist is hit on the back of the head with a sap (a bag full of lead shot) knocking him out. He spends a couple of weeks recovering, and got a hairline skull fracture for his trouble.

* SpaceIsCold: Stross [[ShownTheirWork did his research]]. Despite the ambient temperature on the [[spoiler:alternate Earth]] being roughly 40 Kelvin, the characters note that since there's no air they can't lose heat by convection, so heat exhaustion is a potential danger.

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