Defusing the Roadside Picnic: Relics of the Fallen (Nick Nethery, 2025)

And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters;
And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter.
-Revelation 8:10-11
   Secure. Contain. Protect. These are the bywords of the SCP Foundation, probably the best internet fiction project ever written. The premise of the project is that each little bit of flash fiction revolves around some kind of weird magical or technological item that has the potential for disaster, up to destruction of the world or even reality itself. Since there are hundreds of different authors, quality wildly varies from SCP to SCP, but the very best of the fiction pieces are top-flight bits of horror or sci-fi writing, some of them, like the Antimemetic Cycle, genuinely ground-breaking. In the novel Relics of the Fallen, Nick Nethery gives an EOD (bomb) technician’s perspective on the whole premise. These things aren’t opportunities, these things are dangerous old landmines to be disposed of safely and securely. That’s the mission of the novel’s organization, nicknamed “Wormwood”.
   Woe to the Earth, for at the sounding of each trumpet the judgement of the Lord falls upon mankind, scourging the wicked. In the first book of the Wormwood Archive, fallen relics spread bitterness, gall, and occasionally, gravitational singularity explosions. As names go, we are set up for a good story by the titles of both the series and the initial novel. Genre is tricky on this one, it’s under the sci-fi label broadly but the setting is present-day on the planet Earth, so you’ll also see “thriller” labels for this style of story. I saw the old Soviet-era sci-fi novel Roadside Picnic here more than anything else, which, hey, that thing is an underrated classic.
   There’s a second genre here that readers of contemporary sci-fi may recognize. After the somewhat aimless imperial experience of the Global War On Terror left thousands of veterans suffering from severe PTSD, counselors in the armed forces started suggesting “well why don’t you write fantasy or sci-fi stories about this?” This led to tens of thousands of stories started, and hundreds actually finished. I hope the exercise helps each sufferer psychologically, but the needs of therapy and the needs of narrative fiction are not the same. For every Hammer’s Slammers there are a dozen misses. This novel isn’t one of those misses, it is clearly written by a guy who suffered some shit in the Sandbox but fortunately he’s not letting that take priority over telling a story for everyone.
   Our basic plot here is explained in the blurb and what you’d expect given premise. Man on deployment finds alien(?) bit of weird tech. Alien weird tech turns into black hole and eats man’s squad. Man gets slapped with an NDA. Man retires and gets hired by a semi-private black bag organization to disarm other bits of alien weird tech. Rival black organization harries man’s organization. Final confrontation. Really, a tale as old as time, but it’s done well. If you’re the type who has yet to realize that spoilers don’t negatively impact reading enjoyment, punch out here and read the book. It’s free on Kindle Unlimited even, zero reason not to check it out. It’ll leave you wanting more but, and this is crucial, it does resolve satisfyingly so you’re not getting strung along waiting for the next book in the series. 

   The devil is in the details and in Relics there are a lot of very solid details. Operations, from the nasty oven of Iraq to the sweaty cockroach-infested smuggling tunnels of the Tex-Mex border, are realistic and gritty. The scenes of weird tech being researched and/or unwisely poked are fun. The action is good, from gunfights to infiltration to a final melee fight with relic-created giant zombies. Really, the differentiation from the standard techno-thrillers is in two key areas and both are worth comments.
   First of all, the protagonist is an extremely committed family man and a sincere faithful Christian, a realistic man you really do meet fairly often working with military, but vanishingly rare in fiction. The novel never preaches, nor does it deal with theology or spirituality, but the fact that the protagonist goes to church and prays at all is something I can count on one hand, despite that being extremely normal with operator types here in 2025’s US of A. The novel is also quite chaste but also very, very, horny. That’s also something unusual to find in action novels although, let me inform you dear reader, it is in fact very common for a husband to be very into his wife. Why this stuff is as rare as hen’s teeth is probably a speculative essay in and of itself, but as a Christian Wife Guy myself, I found it refreshing.   
   Second, the end was a little different that normal. The issue with having the Bomb Guy as your novel’s hero is that if your protagonist succeeds at the end of the day, by definition that means there’s no boom. In this case, Chekov waved his gun multiple times throughout the story at an online psych degree and the protagonist’s love of history, so the end was actually talking the (sentient) bomb out of exploding. This could have been lame instead ended with multiple battle hymns and heroic poems being exchanged and the bomb’s consciousness jumping into our hero’s Gerber combat knife. If you’re going to stint on the pyrotechnics budget, then ending by giving your main character a magic sentient weapon is a nice consolation.
   In the end, Relics of the Fallen was a nice exemplar for my foray into modern-day sci-fi, competently written by a fairly new author. I went onto a channel, Dirtbaggery Book Reviews, to discuss my thoughts on the book with a panel. The last section discussion along with an author interview happens tonight (9/22/2025), for anyone interested. Definitely check it out. I’ll be pestering the author to hurry up and write the next one in this series.