Terra.
The Everqueen is an AU Warhammer 40,000 fanfic, started by Ashynarr (first ten chapters), then continued by Skyborne. The main discussion is on SpaceBattles.com, with some also on Sufficient Velocity.com here, as well as copies on FanFiction.Net and Archive of Our Own. A Patreon channel offers a couple of chapters in advance for subscribers.
Tropes contained in Everqueen:
Tropes From Book 1
- Adaptational Heroism: From Isha's memories, it seems Gorkamorka, prior to splitting into Gork and Mork, was more of a Proud Warrior Race Guy than the
Chaotic Neutral Blood Knight he's presented as in Warhammer: Age of Sigmar. - Arch-Enemy: The Emperor, for all he considers all of Chaos his and humanity's mortal enemies, has a really personaly enmity with Vashtorr. This is because Vashtorr, unlike the Chaos Gods, was born directly from humanity's sins during the Dark Age of Technology, the same way Slaanesh was born from the Eldar's, something George believes is his fault for being negligent. The two battled each other many times during the Age of Strife, and the Emperor suspects him to be behind the Mechanicum declaring war on Terra.
- Batman Gambit: Malcador suggests to the Emperor that it might be easier to persuade Isha to help with the Great Crusade if he exposed the venture as him searching for his lost children — Isha being a Mother Goddess would be quite receptive to the argument, after all.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: Jenetia Krole, the first member of what would become the Silent Sisterhood, is so loyal to the Emperor for this reason: as a Blank, she's been rejected and hated by people her entire life; even her own parents abandoned her as a child. The Emperor was the first person she met who was unaffected by her Anti-Magic aura (even Isha is a little affected by it) and showed her kindness. Presumably, the other members of the Sisterhood were in similar situations.
- Berserk Button: Isha finds the strength to fight against the Daemonettes once she sees one using her daughter's appearance.
- Blown Across the Room: Happens to Slaanesh once Khaine shatters apart.
- Body Guard Betrayal: Justified; Helioasa's Endymion guards were genetically engineered to be unquestionably obedient to her, no matter what they wanted; when Isha gives them their free will back, they do exactly what they already wanted to do.
- Boring, but Practical: Isha tends to see constantly creating healing fruit to combat the enemy bioweapons as a rather boring and monotonous task, but it is the most efficient way.
- Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: After imprisoning the Void Dragon, the Emperor actually died from his wounds. The result was that he spent thousands of years with Resurrective Immortality, and didn't remember much of his previous lives until into the third millennium.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: The Emperor and Malcador both notice that while Isha has vastly accelerated their timetable to form the Imperium, and has given them a far more stable base to start from, in addition to all of the secrets she holds, such as how to make wraithbone and dreamstones, things the Emperor dearly wants to use for the Imperium... but the problem for them is, there's no way for them to get any of these benefits without keeping Isha alive and willingly cooperating with her.
- Clones Are People, Too: Isha absolutely refuses to clone Astartes, remembering too well the We Have Reserves attitudes of the War in Heaven.
- Composite Character: In Warhammer Fantasy, Hoeth was the Elven god of knowledge, wisdom, and learning. In this story, Hoeth is who Cegorach used to be; it's implied the War In Heaven drove Hoeth insane, causing him to reinvent himself as the Laughing God.
- Crapsaccharine World: Alaris, the capital of the Pan-Pacific Empire. It is a city pretending to be a Crystal Spires and Togas attempt to restore the glory of humanity's Golden Age, but in reality, it merely replicates some ancient architecture with no attempts at originality, and is built in an extremely colourless, cold fashion. And of course, there is the clear Urban Segregation along with its leadership serving Chaos towards the end.
- Crossing the Burnt Bridge: With the established attitude of the Aeldari toward humans, it is to be expected Isha's efforts to seek refuge with the Emperor are met with much skepticism.
- Dance Battler: Isha's combat style as she and the Emperor take on the Chaos Androids.
- Did Not Think This Through: After the Emperor reveals to Isha that he is technically the Warp God of the Dead for the human race, he then noted that instead of crafting an afterlife for humanity in the Warp (potentially forming a cycle of reincarnation and Resurrective Immortality as seen with the pre-Fall Aeldari), the Emperor feared becoming akin to the Chaos Gods (in terms of essentially forever stealing human souls for his own use) and instead let human souls meld back into the Warp upon death, basically having them go through a peaceful Cessation of Existence. However, as he has since figured out, this heavily hampered the further growth of his psychic power and also prevented him from creating his own equivalent of daemons (from the souls of long-dead humans, as their potential strength as Warp spirits would be dependent on Older Is Better) to combat the forces of Chaos, severely hindering his efforts against the Ruinous Powers. The Emperor himself even admits to Isha that in hindsight, he made a pretty dumb decision.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Isha is doing her best to make the Emperor cut down on his pragmatism.
- Dressing as the Enemy: Not an enemy, but when Horus goes to see Isha, he wears a guard's uniform, obtained by convincing a servant.
- Drowning My Sorrows: One chapter shows an Eldar priest drunk out of his wits after the Fall of the Eldar. He starts to sober up and regain hope upon figuring out that not all of the Aeldari pantheon was devoured by Slaanesh.
- Earth That Used to Be Better: A large part of the fic as of early 2023 is Isha helping the Emperor to heal the war-ravaged Terra.
- Evil Makes You Ugly: Narthan Dume, the leader of the Pan-Pacific Empire, used to be very handsome, but when the Emperor meets him after he fell to Chaos, he resembles a zombie with Mad Scientist manners.
- Expecting Someone Taller: Horus has this impression when he meets Isha, given that she was the "scientist" responsible for "making the machine" that fixed Cthonia's atmosphere. Of course, Isha can appear as "someone taller", but the Emperor might not like it.
- Fake a Fight: Horus' gang stages one to give him the chance to slip away and go see Isha against the Emperor's orders.
- Fall-in Angel: During Isha's arrival on Terra, she materializes well above the surface.
- Family of Choice: That's how Horus views his gang, Ezekyle included.
- Fantastic Racism: The Emperor and Malcador have a lot of trouble believing that Isha genuinely wants to help people with no strings attached (granted, their main experiences with the Eldar before that were with the insanely corrupt Eldar Dominion). Isha herself defies this, for the most part.
- Floating Continent: Alaris, the capital of the Pan-Pacific Empire, is a floating Domed Hometown.
- Fossil Revival: Isha brings back a lot of extinct species, or at least ones no longer found on Terra. One chapter has her watching a white tiger family she grew from material and data provided by the Emperor.
- History Repeats:
- A recurring theme in the story is Isha noting how uncomfortable she is finding the growing parallels between her work with the Emperor and the work the Old Ones had the Aeldari perform during the War In Heaven.
- Isha also regularly grouses about how frustratingly petty the Emperor is and how much of a Control Freak nature he has, and how much it reminds her of the previous Teeth-Clenched Teamwork she had with Asuryan, the Top God of the Aeldari pantheon (and who was basically her ruler/boss).
- Garden Garment: How Isha is dressed when arriving on Terra.
- Gargle Blaster: Malcador is shown drinking wine meant for the genetically modified nobles of Albia. It would kill any ordinary person and leave said nobles incoherent with a single glass. For a properly augmented Golden Age soldier, even sans his psyker power, it's barely enough for a buzz.
- Gilligan Cut: As Isha starts teaching the Emperor to make Dreamstones of his own, he thinks "I can do this". Then there's a line break, and the next section starts with the words "He couldn't do this" (though as Isha points out, he's actually doing very well, considering it's only been an hour).
- Glamour Failure: Blanks, like Jenetia Krole, can see through the illusions and disguises gods and god-like beings can drape themselves in. For instance, she's never seen the Emperor as a golden titan, ancient sage, or any of the other remarkable descriptions people have for him; she just sees a regularly middle-aged man. Isha, likewise, despite appearing human, looks to her like a creature with bark for skin and leaves for hair; presumably closest to her true appearance.
- God Is Good: Isha is easily the most benevolent and moral deity in the Warhammer 40K universe, at the moment (not that it's very hard to be that, considering her only real competition is Khaine, Cegorach, Gork and Mork, the Chaos Gods, and - sorry, not the Emperor).
- God of the Dead: The Emperor eventually confesses to Isha that the Shamen of humanity and the last of the Old Ones worked together to craft the Emperor via "god-forging" (similar to the process that the Old Ones uses to shape the Warp spirits worshipped by the ancient Aeldari into the Aeldari pantheon), and that his "divine domain" is that of the afterlife, explaining his immense psychic powers. However, unlike the Aeldari pantheon, who had created a cycle of reincarnation for the Aeldari, the Emperor's A God I Am Not views had him intentionally allow human souls to peacefully fade into the Warp upon death, which he has admitted to being a terrible idea in the present day.
- Green Thumb: The spot where Isha fell to Earth is covered in plants within seconds, and she regularly shows a great mastery of plantlife and other forms of life while in the Materium.
- Have You Seen My God?: At least three Craftworlds heard Isha's messages to them, and are deeply intent on finding her.
- If I Can't Have You…: Isha's first mission outside the Emperor's capital is a city whose ruler destroyed it with nuclear and chemical weapons rather than surrendering.
- Immortality Bisexuality: The Emperor casually mentions Enkidu as a former lover of his.
- Insistent Terminology: The Emperor is not a god, and neither is anyone else.
- Killed Mid-Sentence: Khaine is killed by Khorne and Slaanesh right as he boasts he is the true god of war.
- Magic Music: For both Isha and the Emperor, singing is an important part in making Dreamstones.
- My Greatest Failure: One reason Isha tries so hard to help the Thunder Warriors is because their flaws remind her of her inability to prevent the barbarization of the Krork into the Orks, and the resultant insanity of Gorkamorka.
- Nature Is Not Nice: Isha is the Eldar embodiment of this. Yes, she's a Mother Goddess who's much more empathic than the Emperor and enjoys surrounding herself with greenery and animals, but she's also a ruthless warrior, has no qualms eating bloody raw meat and doesn't bat an eyelash in front of predator beasts hunting and gruesomely devouring prey because it's part of the cycle of life.
- Never Gets Drunk: The Golden Age augmentations Malcador has make alcohol have no effect on him, even without his psyker abilities. He manages to get some Gargle Blaster used by genetically enhanced nobility from Albia who themselves suffered from this problem. They could barely withstand a single glass. Malcador gets a bit of buzz.
- Nice Girl: Well, as nice as someone can be in the Crapsack World that is 40k. Isha is patient and kind, willing to go out of her way to help not only the Eldar but also even those outside of her race with no strings attached. While understandably annoyed with the Emperor's ruthlessness, she does nothing to threaten their agreement and goes along to help him with his plans for the Imperium. Even with many people viewing her with caution, she takes it in stride and attempts to at least not go out of her way to be an aggressor. That being said, she's not without a spine and is capable of feeling anger as well as disagreeing with the Emperor on certain occasions.
- Offing the Offspring: The Emperor mentions he had to do this a number of times in ages past, and might have to do so again.
- Oh, Crap!: Isha angrily obliterates a Daemonette who dared wear her daughter's face... and realizes her outburst drew the attention of the Four.
- One-Winged Angel: During Isha's battle with the Chaos Androids, Slaanesh takes enough attention in the battle to empower the last one personally. Still not enough to defeat her, of course - him calling Isha mother does, however, prove to be a Berserk Button.
- Overshadowed by Awesome: Amar Astarte is the best biology specialist on Terra and the creator of the Space Marines. When it comes to Isha's work, however, she plain out calls it impossible.
- Painting the Medium: The scene of Isha healing broken Machine Spirits uses Zalgo for a Chaos corrupted one. A broken device has text mixed with binary code and All Caps.
- Perception Filter: The Emperor uses such a power both to protect his parked shuttle and to ensure his conversation with Horus isn’t disturbed by outsiders.
- Power Limiter: For a long time, Isha is only allowed to leave her rooms while wearing special enchanted manacles.
- The Power of Love: A required emotion when making Dreamstones is love, and the Emperor's main problem turns out to be him having forgotten how to feel and express it properly.
- Pragmatic Villainy: Well, the Emperor is no saint, but he's not exactly villainous (at least not in the traditional manner some of the other factions are *cough* Chaos *cough*). While he is understandably paranoid of Isha, he doesn't try to brute force her into working for the Imperium but instead willing to enter an agreement. He still calls the shots, but he does allow her some manner of leniency and takes some of her words into consideration. Even someone as ruthless as the Emperor knows that information gained from Isha would be less valuable if it was forced out of her compared to her willingly working with him.
- Properly Paranoid: Malcador is constantly suspicious of Isha's work, believing she has an agenda and might have modified the plants for a purpose not coinciding with the Emperor's. She modified them to whisper songs of hope to the Eldar, much like what she did in canon as a prisoner.
- Reality Warper: Both the Emperor and Isha are pretty potent ones, albeit restricted to their "divine domains" (Isha with nature and the Emperor with souls). Isha is actually noted to be probably the greater of the two as she has mastery over Aeldari bonesinging, which in-and-of-itself technically counts as this trope. Most notably, she's able to simply sing Aeldari Spirit Stones into existence.
- Resurrective Immortality: After his battle with the Void Dragon, the Emperor was reduced to near-normal human level of power except for being reborn after death. Some reincarnations did have a bit of his power, but none of them were even close to his definitely-not-godhood.
- Secret Test of Character: Before giving Isha more freedom, the Emperor deliberately tries to anger her as much as possible, so as to test her self-control.
- Shapeshifters Do It for a Change: There is a mention of the Emperor having been both a father and a mother in past ages.
- Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids!: Both the Emperor and Malcador have trouble understanding that Isha genuinely wants to help people who aren't her children, with no strings attached.
- The Sleepless: Isha, of course, doesn't need to sleep, but after her experiences, she is afraid to as well.
- Special Person, Normal Name: Although having held many names throughout the millennia, the one name the Emperor holds dear and recognizes as his own is George.
- Street Urchin: Horus is one on Cthonia, naturally, and leads a gang of such kids.
- Uncanny Valley: Isha, when not concealing herself behind a Glamour, is described as disturbingly, impossibly beautiful, looking more like a statue that moves than a real, living person.
- Unskilled, but Strong: That's what Malcador thinks of the Emperor when he sees Isha healing Chaos corruption and comparing it to his method of burning it away through brute force.
- Urban Segregation: Alaris is a Floating Continent capital (a Crapsaccharine World by itself) with the cities underneath it being the regular WretchedHives and suffering serfs of pre-Unification Terra.
- What Is This Feeling?: The Emperor has become so hardened and ruthless over the millennia that he is genuinely startled and initially unable to properly figure out that he's feeling sympathy and pity for the Aeldari goddess when he sees her basically go through a PTSD flashback related to Nurgle.
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Isha tries to alleviate all suffering, not just that of Eldar, but also of humans and even Machine Spirits. To say the Emperor and Malcador are both surprised by this — particularly since the vast majority of the Aeldari that they had encountered prior to her were all prime examples of Aliens Are Bastards — would be a massive understatement.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Isha's reaction once she sees what kind of Flawed Prototype the Thunder Warriors are. She actually snaps at the Emperor before catching herself.
- When You Coming Home, Dad?: With the Emperor busy being, well, the Emperor, his relationship with Horus has a concerningly high amount of this.
- Worthless Yellow Rocks: The Emperor's attempts to replicate Isha's Dreamstones produce marvelous, near-priceless jewels, which he notices would be enough to elevate a commoner family to the ranks of nobility in terms of sheer monetary cost. Without the soul-protecting aspect of the Dreamstones, however, they are trash as far as he cares.
- Wretched Hive: Chtonia is a heavily polluted ruin ruled by gangs. Furthermore, most of the remaining settlements on Terra — with the exception of those found in the Imperium's territory, thanks to Isha — are ruined Hive Cities, all of which are only slightly less awful than Cthonia on average.
Tropes From Book 2: Reclamation
- I Die Free: Bel'akor has one option to save himself from Isha, but it would require him to become a slave to the Chaos Gods. He chooses to let Isha kill him rather than become their puppet.
- Mugging the Monster: Kelbor-Hal, the Fabricator of Mars, attacks The Emperor, believing he's merely a barbarian warlord and common psyker.
