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You Have Failed Me.../Literature: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}Examples of [[{{ROOTPAGENAME}}]] in [[{{SUBPAGENAME}}]] include:
* In PC Hodgell's ''[[Chronicles of the Kencyrath]]'', Rawneth has a particularly nasty example. She strips the names of some twenty underlings, making the affected underlings' souls to fade away, and causing everyone else under her to mostly (but not completely—they know they're missing something) forget them too. However, this causes a great deal of unrest among her followers, and some cases of civil disobedience.
* In ''Trickster's Queen'', we learn that Ulasim has prohibited his people undercover at the prison to get promoted beyond a certain level, because: "The Rittevons were notoriously fond of executing people in charge when things went wrong".
* Subverted in ''[[The Thrawn Trilogy]]'', part of the [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]], where tactical genius villain Grand Admiral Thrawn makes a point of [[Pragmatic Villainy|not indiscriminately killing subordinates]], and in fact quietly lampshades this when his [[Commander Contrarian]] expects him to act more like Vader. He instead has a [[Tractor Beam]] operator (who was also a [[Contest Winner Cameo]]!) killed for not following procedure from his training - and for trying to pin the blame on his superior - and later actually [[Career-Building Blunder|promotes]] a different [[Tractor Beam]] operator who quickly came up with a creative solution to a sudden problem that was "no less impressive for its failure" and for accepting the blame himself.
** Here's what the ''[[All There in the Manual|Thrawn Trilogy Sourcebook]]'' has to say.
{{quote|Thrawn used a small measure of fear, certainly: the Grand Admiral realized that fear of failure was a powerful motivating force in a military the size of the Empire. But Thrawn's ability to invoke a sense of ''pride'' in his troops was his most powerful asset. Palpatine inspired arrogance and callousness in his officers; Thrawn made his men proud to be Imperial soldiers. Thrawn's officers would have willingly died for the Grand Admiral. }}
** The [[Evil Overlord]] version (in which the [[Big Bad]] kills a random minion as a lesson) is subverted in the ''[[New Jedi Order]]'' series. Supreme Overlord Shimrra can be a really [[Bad Boss]], but he's clever enough to recognize when he's being played. Near the end, it looks as if he's about to execute High Prefect Jakan, who's been framed as a supporter of the heretics—then turns on the High Priestess who's framing him and ''is'' a heretic.
** This trope seems to be liked by villainous Imperials and former Imperials in general. In the ''[[X Wing Series]]'', Zsinj, spying on the consoles of his bridge crew, sees that one of them is playing flight simulators instead of paying attention while on duty. He has been warned about this, but he wants to be a pilot so ''much''. Zsinj has his second-in-command whisk the crewman off in the dead of night telling him it's a secret pilot test, put him through the standard set of pilot qualification simulations, praise or chastise him as necessary, and then kill him. Later on he puts a pair of scientists in a [[Shoot Your Mate]] Or I Kill You Both. The trope, and the fact that they're cruel about it rather than simply just shooting them, serves as [[Kick the Dog|a good reminder]] that while Zsinj and his [[The Dragon|Dragon]] are interesting, clever, and often funny characters, they are also the bad guys, and for good reason.
** When someone he's interrogating dies before giving up the information he needs, Kirtan Loor is summoned back to Imperial Center by Ysanne Isard, Empress in all but name. All along the way, even while [[The World Is Just Awesome|marveling at the view]], he's sweating and expecting her to kill him. She doesn't - not at that point in time - but she does make her displeasure at his poor thinking clear, and wants him to perform better.
*** The Queen of this trope is Ysanne Isard, whose murderous punishments for failure were known to go as far as Familicide. Isard's love affair with this trope is skewered in one of Allston's ''X-Wing'' novels, where another Imperial explains that anyone working for a [[Bad Boss|capricious psycho]] like Isard had nothing to look forward to except either death by the Rebels, or death by ''her''.
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** In book 7 he does at one point shoot everyone in sight when he is called after the Trio {{spoiler|breaks into the Lestranges' vault, stealing Hufflepuff's Cup}}. This is very much a [[Villainous Breakdown]] on his part; he now knows that {{spoiler|Potter knows his secret}}.
* ''[[Animorphs]]''' [[Big Bad]], Visser Three, was famous for this, to the point where promotion for a Yeerk was a very dicey proposition, since every ladder rung you climb brings you slightly closer to Esplin 9466's stolen tail blade and hairtrigger temper. He does this so reliably that Marco's able to bluff his way out of a situation where three flunkies were expected by saying, "I think Visser Three killed them for doing something wrong".
* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s ''[[Gaunt's Ghosts]]'' novel ''Traitor General'', Uexkull [[Off with His Head|executes a commander]] as "an incompetent weakling" for failing to search for Gaunt and his men, and disables the second for not answering promptly enough—and has the third-in-command [[Shoot Your Mate|shoot him]].
* In [[James Swallow]]'s ''[[Warhammer 40,000]] [[Blood Angels]]'' novel ''Deus Sanguinius'', at the end, Garand receives a message from {{spoiler|Abaddon}}. He sends for his death-shroud before going.
* Mocked in the [[Emberverse]]. Mike Havel pontificates for a while on how a "You fail, you die" policy is detrimental to subordinates' willingness to tell their superiors about their mistakes, thus effectively crippling said superior's ability to do his job.
* In ''[[Discworld|Thud!]]'', two trolls working for a mob boss threaten Vimes. When Vimes meets with their boss, he claims he hadn't told them to make threats, and indicates a box. The narration is quick to point out wouldn't fit an ''intact'' troll.
* In the [[Dale Brown]] novel ''Plan of Attack'', one Russian general fails to rein in trigger-happy underlings who cost them a SAM group. The [[Big Bad]] has someone sneak in while the general is napping and deliver a [[Boom! Headshot!]].
* Stephen King's ''[[The Stand]]'' has a real doozy in the demise of Randall Flagg's henchman, the hapless Bobby Terry. Bobby rather overdoes the orders that he's given to simply capture the Judge, one of the good guys, ending up by accidentally blowing the top half of his head off. On a lonely road, in the middle of nowhere, a panicking Bobby suddenly hears footsteps approaching him, faster and faster, from behind...and turns to see Flagg charging at him with a huge, manic grin..."HEY, BOBBY TERRY, YOU SCREEEEEEWED UPPPPPP!!!"...'There were worse things than death. There were teeth.'
* Robespierre gives Chauvelin this ultimatum in ''The Elusive Pimpernel'', one of the sequels to ''[[The Scarlet Pimpernel (novel)|The Scarlet Pimpernel]]'', where Chauvelin epically failed to capture the eponymous vigilante [[Superhero]].
* Recurring villain Overseer Biron in the [[Starfleet Corps of Engineers]] stories is quick to kill off subordinates who fail him. As an Elite Officer-caste Androssi, he is within his rights to kill a Worker at any time. Failure, even relatively minor, often results in instant vaporization and replacement - Workers are considered fully expendable. Ironically, Biron's own boss is rather forgiving on those occasions that Biron himself fails.
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