Pre Asskicking One Liner / Literature

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• In the final of Animorphs, Rachel faces the whole crew of an enemy ship by herself while in grizzly bear morph.
  Rachel: "Scared? You should be."
• Babylon 5 novel Out of the Darkness: Garibaldi got one in when surprising the Big Bad.^note Midnight on the Firing Line established Looney Tunes or Daffy Duck as Garibaldi's second favourite thing in the Universe
  What's up, Drakh?
• In the Codex Alera series by Jim Butcher, Aldrick ex Gladius, one of the recurring antagonists, is widely renowned as the second best swordsman in the known lands, only being passed up by one other. He often uses this fact to unnerve his opponents, and his skill ensures that it's hammered in quickly enough.
  Aldrick: The only man to best me with a blade was Araris Valerian... and you aren't Araris.
  • Subverted, however, in the first book. The person he's attacking isn't Araris...but he's very close by. Aldrick's brief Villainous Breakdown when Araris intervenes is a sight to behold.
  • Also in the fourth book, in response to an antagonist complaining about being made to chase all over the place for "two pathetic sneaks." the third protagonist present Gaius Sextus who was hidden out of sight of the antagonist says "Three." Cue Curbstomp Battle.
• Discworld has a number, some that only make sense in context - but are even more awesome for that.
  • Sam Vimes in Thud!: "Where's... my... cow? Is that my cow? It goes hruuugh IT! IS A HIPPOPOTAMUS! THAT! IS! NOT! MY! COW!"
  • Death tends to produce some rather good ones:
    • In Hogfather: And now there remains only one final question. Have you been naughty... or nice? Ho. Ho. Ho.
    • In Thief of Time: While it is true we have to ride out, it doesn't say anywhere against whom.
  • Mort gets a delicious one in Mort when having fully assumed the mantle of Death while retaining the darker aspects of humanity - the result being terrifying.
  On your knees, Alberto Malich
  • Subverted, also in Thud, by A.E. Pessimal of all people: "C'mon if you think you're hard enough!!!"
  • Kaos/Chaos a.k.a. Ronnie Soak in Thief of Time: "Some old man told me you live and learn. Well, I have lived, and now I've learned that the edge of a sword is infinitely long. I've also learned how to make damn good yoghurt, although this is not a skill I intend to employ today. Shall we go get' em, boys?"
  • Vimes to Sybil in Jingo: "Just going out to kick some arse, dear." Of course, the fight doesn't start immediately afterwards.
• The Dresden Files:
  • Harry starts early: in Grave Peril, when he realizes that his enemy has stacked everything against him and there's literally no way out, Harry gets mad.
    Harry Dresden: Fuego! Pyrofuego! Burn, you bat-faced greasy fucks! BURN!
  • In Summer Knight, Harry Dresden rushes into a battle against a faction of The Fair Folk, belting out, "I don't believe in fairies!"
  • In Death Masks Harry tells the former, willing host of a fallen angel that people like him always mistake compassion for weakness. Michael and Sanya won't hurt him because they're good men.
    "Unfortunately for you, I'm not." (beats the bejeezus out of him with a baseball bat)
  • In Welcome To The Jungle, when asked what his profession is, Harry replies he works in "accounts payable" because he "makes sure everyone gets what's coming to them." Later, when he's going off to confront the Big Bad we get this exchange:
    Will: But what if you need help? Where will you be??
    Harry: Balancing some books.
  • In Small Favor, Harry comes up with this after Michael is shot.
  ''Fuego''. ''Pyrofuego''. BURN.
  • Later, in Changes, when vampires are attacking his building and the people inside it, Harry comments internally on wizards being subtle and quick to anger.
    Harry: Fuck Subtle. *steps around the corner and starts roasting some vampires*
  • In Turn Coat we have Listens-To-Wind versus Shagnasty the Skinwalker.
    Shagnasty: You are not a holy man. You do not follow the Old Ways, or the Binding Ways. You have no power over me.
    Listens-To-Wind: Don't plan to bind or banish you, old ghost. Just gonna kick your ass up between your ears.
  • In Changes, from either God or an Archangel, via Murphy:
  False gods! Pretenders! Usurpers of truth! Destroyers of faith, of families, of lives, of children! For your crimes against the Mayans, against the peoples of the world, now will you answer! Your time has come! Face judgment Almighty!
  • In Ghost Story, we get this line from Mortimer right before he obliterates the Corpsetaker's ghost:
    "But it seems to me, you half-wit, that you probably shouldn’t have left a freaking ectomancer a pit full of wraiths to play with."
  • In Skin Game, Butters has made what seems to be a futile Heroic Sacrifice, all hope seems lost, and Nicodemus sneers, "Nice try." Harry throws him the shard of Fidelacchius, which reforges itself into a lightsaber. The newly-minted Knight of the Cross lifts it and snarls,
  Nice try? Mister, where I come from, there is no try.
  • He also has a great moment of snark in the short story Day Off: some severely low-talent warlocks are angry at him for undoing their curse ("That was you? I thought it was just some bad luck, and I did the cleansing just to put her mind at ease."), and confront him, pull out wands and whatnot and telling him to defend himself. Harry says "Okay" and pulls out his .44 Magnum revolver.
  Bad Dude: Wh-what are you doing?
  Harry: I'm-a fixin' to defend myself.
• The Elenium's confrontation between King Wargun and Sparkhawk, when the King is pulling rank and Sparhawk doesn't feel like cooperating.
  King Wargun: I have a thousand picked men at my back!
  Sparhawk: How many are you prepared to lose?
• Galaxy of Fear: The Brain Spiders, Zak is aware that the B'Omarr monks are interested in enlightenment and the idea of transcending material concerns, so when he threatens one...
  "Don't move or I'll enlighten you in a whole new way."
  • It works.
• "Men of Tanith! Do you want to live forever?"
  • Based off an actual quote from the Battle of Belleau Wood during World War One by USMC Gunnery Sergeant Dan Daly.
    "Come on, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?"
    • An even earlier version attributes it to Frederick the Great, King of Prussia at the battle of Kolin.
      "Ihr Racker, wollt ihr ewig leben?"
  • This quote is echoed once again in Starship Troopers.
  • Also, in Necropolis, Kowle's "Where is your courage? Where is your strength? Where is your conviction?" with the questions punctuated by the execution of his own men.
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows:
  • "NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!"
  • Also: "You shouldn't have done that."^note Obviously not to be confused with Ben Drowned.
• In Vulkan Lives, psychopathic demigod warrior prince Konrad Curze thinks he has his heroic brother Vulkan dead to rights. Turns out, it's the other way around:
  Konrad: I know, Vulkan. Your beacon won't work. This chamber is teleport-shielded. Nothing goes in or out except through that gate behind you. Did you think you had broken me, brother? Did you believe you had tricked me into letting you escape? Hope is cruel, isn't it? Yours was false, Vulkan.
  Vulkan: You're right. I fashioned it as a teleporter, a means to escape even a prison such as this. I counted on you leading me here, on you needing to face me one last time. It seems I was fooled into thinking you hadn't planned for this. But you're forgetting one thing...
  Konrad: What's that, brother?
  Vulkan: It's also a hammer.
• In Illium, Zeus and the Greek pantheon stand ready to destroy the combined Greek and Trojan armies (long, spoilery story), and then all of humanity. He delivers the classic "Any last words" line in a godly fashion... to which Achilles responds "Surrender now, and we'll spare your goddess's lives so they can be our slaves and courtesans." Despite being a fairly stupid (but awesome) asshole in this story, that may be the best response to such a line, ever.
• In Ivory Shoals by John Brandon, this from Acey, former enslaved person who then joined the Union army and finds himself alone and with next to nothing after the Civil War ends: "I done had enough of havin nothin, then havin somethin and gettin it took. I done had enough of all that." (One thing he does still have is a sword...)
• The Last Battle: "This is my password. The light is dawning, the lie broken. Now guard thee, miscreant, for I am Tirian of Narnia.
• In Last Chance by Nicole Kornher-Stace, two half-starved, abused children are forced by scavenging slavers to excavate pre-Apocalypse tech from a mountain of rubble. Their owner screams threats when they don't come out fast enough. Once one has suited up in cyber armor with functioning weaponry they've found, she calls out sweetly, "Coming!"
• Éowyn's speech to the Witch-king in The Lord of the Rings. This is the second half.
  "But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Éowyn I am, Éomund's daughter, and you stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you if you touch him."
• In Bryan Young's Lost At The Con, the alcoholic gonzo journalist protagonist is trying to defend a young female cosplayer from handsy frat boys, and getting his ass kicked, when suddenly...
  Cybernetic!Abraham Lincoln: A house divided against itself cannot stand. [starts punching frat boys in the face]
• Memories of Ice, book three of Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen: After Quick Ben unleashes half of his Warrens (sources of magical power) to blast Korbal Broach through a wall, Bauchelain, partner of the aforementioned Korbal Broach, notes that Quick Ben's power is most impressive, but that, in retrospect, he ought to have saved at least half his warrens. Quick Ben just replies: "But Bauchelain, I did." He then blows Bauchelain through the wall, too.
• Rastignac's "It's between you and me now, Paris!" in Le Père Goriot.
• Percy Jackson and the Olympians series:
  • Jason Grace in The Lost Hero has one badass and laconic enough to be worthy of a Roman Praetor; "My turn."
  • "You. Me. To the finish."
  • "Welcome to Canada, idiot."
• In A Practical Guide to Evil, Ranger used to infiltrate the Dead King's stronghold specifically to fight his strongest guards.
  "I am the Ranger. I hunt those worth hunting. Rejoice, you qualify."
• From a scene in David Weber's Safehold book, Off Armageddon Reef, right before protagonist Merlin Athrawes attacks a Smug Snake's Mooks:
  Smug Snake: After all, what do you think the odds are of you managing to defeat fifteen of my best?
  Merlin: Better than average.
  • This was also used by Mick Dundee.
  "What are the odds of you getting out of here with that coat?"
  Knife through a mohawk
  "Better than average."
• Grettir in The Saga of Grettir the Strong:
  "Defend yourself if you want; you will never have better occasion for it than now."
• Come and have a go... If you think you're hard enough. From Tanith Low, before asskicking everyone ever.
• Solomon Kane, before his Knife Fight with the Fishhawk:
  "There be many fires, scum, some hotter than others - but save the fires of Hell - all fires - may be - quenched - by - blood!"
• Quite a few in other Star Wars novels.
  • Shadows of the Empire:
    Darth Vader: I will risk the Emperor's displeasure. However, you will not be there to see it, this time.
  • New Jedi Order:
    Ganner: None shall pass.
  • When Raynar confronts a squad of Mandolorian commandos storming the Jedi Temple....
    Raynar: I am Jedi Thul. I have not fought for real in many years. I should be a pushover. Come get me.
• Star Wars: Red Harvest: Ra'at begins his duel with The Dreaded Lussk by making a confident claim about his skills.
  Ra'at: What are you afraid of?
  Lussk: From you? Boredom, for a start.
  Ra'at: Then I'll be sure not to bore you.
• The Sten series book Fleet of the Damned provides this: "We are now attacking a Tahn battlefleet. There are at least two battleships with the fleet. We are going to kill them." Ironically, Sten didn't consider this an example, and in fact felt it would be a waste of time to give an "England Expects." He was commanding an obsolete heavy cruiser, and they did destroy one state-of-the-art battleship, and cripple the other beyond repair.
• From True Grit by Charles Portis (and both film versions), we have this exchange before the final showdown:
  Rooster: I mean to kill you in one minute, Ned, or see you hanged at Fort Smith at Judge Parker's convenience. Which'll it be?
  Ned: I call that bold talk for a one-eyed fat man!
  Rooster: Fill your hand, you son of a bitch!
• Watership Down. Bigwig's Determinator speech, "My Chief Rabbit has told me to defend this run, and until he says otherwise I shall stay here," scares the hraka out of the Efrafans, who mainly respect brute strength and have assumed up to this point that Bigwig was the Chief Rabbit of his warren. If he's not, there must be an even bigger badass Bunny around somewhere. Has emotional meaning as well, since Bigwig swore never to call Hazel the Chief Rabbit until the day he stops fighting.
• The Wheel of Time has:
  Mat Cauthon: Carai an Caldazar! Carai an Ellisande! Al Ellisande! (For the honor of the Red Eagle! For the Honor of the Rose of the Sun! The Rose of the Sun!)
  Mat Cauthon: Dovie'andi se tovya sagain. (It's time to toss the dice.)
  Mazrim Taim: Asha'man, Kill!
• "Fairest and fallen... greetings and defiance!"

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