Rate what you Read, or the fight against Necromancy

[Roomsky]

Ahriman: Unchanged - John French

 

As with Sorcerer, much better than my first go-through, though I don't think it quite lives up to its predecessor. Everything comes together quite nicely in the end, and all the character arcs wrap up in a satisfying way. The prose, as always with French, is terse but enjoyable, and the cast remains strong. The big issues remain that 1: unlike the previous books, Ahriman's goal never seems tenable so the stakes are hard to buy into and 2: Ahriman is barely a character in this book. He's a sad boi, certainly, but his supporting cast are the real stars here, which is only an issue because the emotional payoff is still for Ahriman. He's stands ominously around and goes "do this" for the whole book, then gets stuck in a hurricane of purple prose, then gets some pathos about mostly failing. The gripping parts are about Magnus' fate, Knekku's efforts, Ctesias and Ignis' bromance, and Iobel's journey, but all those threads end quite suddenly, while only Ahriman gets to grieve. Bit of a fumble there. And of course, in Sorcerer it was never a given he would actually get the Athenaeum, there was never a chance he would succeed in Rubric 2: Electric Boogaloo. Still, strong book and strong ending, worth a read if you liked Sorcerer.

 

ANR: 7/10

To Taste

[Roomsky]

Pharos - Guy Haley

 

Oh, Haley. You're so good at expanding on existing characters, and so inept at making new ones. It was very hard to care about anything in this book on the re-read, because Mericus and his squad are boring and Oberdeii's squad is boring. Skraivok, Kellinkir and Kellendvar are the exceptions, but they don't get nearly the focus they need to keep any momentum going. It was frankly a struggle to care, this re-read, you don't really get anything new out of Haley on a second pass. I'm struggling to find things to say, honestly. Pharos is fine for one go just to get the plot, but there's not really anything beyond that.

 

Diehards Only

5/10

 

 

Angels of Caliban - Gav Thorpe

 

Slightly better, because the plot is actually interesting. Unfortunately, like Haley, there's not a lot to keep the reader invested if they know where everything is going. Redloss and Holguin are quite flat (and would remain so until Guymer's Dreadwing) and Thorpe's characterization, while less bland than Haley's often takes strange turns. Guilliman is reduced to an obstructive bureaucrat instead of his usual charismatic self, and Astelan, while extremely entertaining, can't go 2 pages without doing some olympic-level logical backflips. It's not a painful read, Thorpe's not afraid to take a break from the battlefield and I love intrigue even if it's complete nonsense, but like the book above it's not really worth it beyond that first read to get the plot across.

 

Diehards Only

6/10

 

 

Brøthers of the Snake - Dan Abnett

 

I admit I was mildly distracted listening to this, trying to figure out why on earth Xisor doesn't like it. This was great, and a fun way to get across marine culture, how they're different from baseline humanity, and what life is like for the Emperor's angels. I loved that Abnett gave more focus to xenos than Chaos, considering how the dark gods' forces tend to completely hijack his plots. I loved how the shorter vignettes kept the action sequences from being overlong, and were usually very snappy and didn't overstay their welcome. I love the frequent struggles of interacting with a populace and interacting with other marines, and the burden of command is always a favourite plot point. Everything even comes together by the end with the return to the jawbone plot device introduced in part 1. It's just a good marine book, and a great companion to Abnett's guard work.

 

Must Read

ANR: 9/10

[SkimaskMohawk]

Honestly between the curze novel and the new one with cawl, pharos is a pretty decent jumping off point now.

[Jareddm]

Pharos was helped a lot for me by having listened to/read both "Heart of Pharos" and "A Safe and Shadowed Place" to help flesh out a few more characters. It's still Haley's weakest book for me, but the side stories tick it up another point or two for me.

[Xisor]

I often think of Brothers of the Snake. The thing that routinely sticks out in my head is the damn dog vs the Dark Eldar.

 

I think it's the "story" quality to it - it reads - to my mind - more like a story than most 40k stories.

 

It's so specific, so evocative... But it evokes things all wrong to my mind, and so it's really jarring.

 

I'm not* convinced it's a bad book, so I'm equally happy** to set aside*** my opinion**** and accept***** that it Just Isn't To My Tastes.

 

I'm curious to re-read it, but then I'm also furiouse ven just thinking about it. Maybe I could turn it into a form of energy that could help society, rather than grump about it periodically online.

 

I do fondly remember the beach and swimming scenes though. Even the most diabolical stories have some redeeming features, and the depiction of Ithika is certainly one of them in Bots - even given my ardent view on the book!

 

---

 

In other news, I also Did Not Enjoy Shroud of Night (3/10, must read if you usually disagree with my opinions!) but not at all in the same way as Brothers of the Snake!

 

---

 

* I am 100% convinced it is the worst book ever written, but I'm also aware that the intensity of my feeling on that might be leading me... far from objectivity. :) The righteous indignation is real though!

** furious and resentful

*** etch in stone

**** incontrovertible fact

***** defy until the end of time

[DarkChaplain]

I'm feeling both inspired and warned away from trying Brothers of the Snake. The recent audio release made it somewhat appealing, since I've never read it (and somehow, it's a novel I never picked up in print either, despite having seen it countless times at ridiculous prices on Amazon and co over the years). I can only assume that my reluctance in recent years had something to do with the micro-short Abnett wrote as a tie-in for the 15th anniversary series BL did. I reviewed the entire lot, and I seem to remember that being among my least favorites of the bunch. Kill Hill or somesuch?

[Lord_Caerolion]

I often think of Brothers of the Snake. The thing that routinely sticks out in my head is the damn dog vs the Dark Eldar.

 

I think it's the "story" quality to it - it reads - to my mind - more like a story than most 40k stories.

 

It's so specific, so evocative... But it evokes things all wrong to my mind, and so it's really jarring.

 

I'm not* convinced it's a bad book, so I'm equally happy** to set aside*** my opinion**** and accept***** that it Just Isn't To My Tastes.

 

I'm curious to re-read it, but then I'm also furiouse ven just thinking about it. Maybe I could turn it into a form of energy that could help society, rather than grump about it periodically online.

 

I do fondly remember the beach and swimming scenes though. Even the most diabolical stories have some redeeming features, and the depiction of Ithika is certainly one of them in Bots - even given my ardent view on the book!

 

---

 

In other news, I also Did Not Enjoy Shroud of Night (3/10, must read if you usually disagree with my opinions!) but not at all in the same way as Brothers of the Snake!

 

---

 

* I am 100% convinced it is the worst book ever written, but I'm also aware that the intensity of my feeling on that might be leading me... far from objectivity. The righteous indignation is real though!

** furious and resentful

*** etch in stone

**** incontrovertible fact

***** defy until the end of time

 

Isn't Brothers of the Snake the book with the "and then the Tactical squad killed hundreds of Kabalites all by themselves"?

[Xisor]

 

 

I often think of Brothers of the Snake. The thing that routinely sticks out in my head is the damn dog vs the Dark Eldar.

 

I think it's the "story" quality to it - it reads - to my mind - more like a story than most 40k stories.

 

It's so specific, so evocative... But it evokes things all wrong to my mind, and so it's really jarring.

 

I'm not* convinced it's a bad book, so I'm equally happy** to set aside*** my opinion**** and accept***** that it Just Isn't To My Tastes.

 

I'm curious to re-read it, but then I'm also furiouse ven just thinking about it. Maybe I could turn it into a form of energy that could help society, rather than grump about it periodically online.

 

I do fondly remember the beach and swimming scenes though. Even the most diabolical stories have some redeeming features, and the depiction of Ithika is certainly one of them in Bots - even given my ardent view on the book!

 

---

 

In other news, I also Did Not Enjoy Shroud of Night (3/10, must read if you usually disagree with my opinions!) but not at all in the same way as Brothers of the Snake!

 

---

 

* I am 100% convinced it is the worst book ever written, but I'm also aware that the intensity of my feeling on that might be leading me... far from objectivity. The righteous indignation is real though!

** furious and resentful

*** etch in stone

**** incontrovertible fact

***** defy until the end of time

Isn't Brothers of the Snake the book with the "and then the Tactical squad killed hundreds of Kabalites all by themselves"?

I don't care to remember. :p

 

---

 

But that's certainly a grumble I recall. It's a stilted view of things, and so ostensibly all the stuff that happens can sort of work fine if you squint and suspend disbelief happily.

 

But somehow for most of 40k I don't even consciously feel that's an effort, I vaguely recall BotS was alarmingly difficult for me - which is perhaps a stylistic choice on Abnett's part, but it *really* didn't work for me.

 

Hugely exposed the "you call that music/art, it's just noise/paint splashes" part of me, at any rate! :D

 

---

 

I'm also reading for the first time "City of the Damned", in which I'm tickled and horrified to see a lot of the indications that Guymer knew about the End Times long before we did!

 

I wonder how much of The Gathering Storm & Dark Imperium was foreshadowed?

 

Not that much, I imagine - as even through The Wrath of Magnus there were only tiny notes that seemed to imply Magnus was up to something more devious than precisely what he achieved with the Planet of the Sorcerors.

 

Valedor led into the Ynnari neatly, if only the Ynnari had followed it properly. Threw away a lot of good stuff from Valedor, they did.

[StrangerOrders]

Praetorian of Dorn by John French.

 

Rarely see this book discussed and I remembered it being good so I decided to give it a reread.

 

I was wrong as it turns out, it is not good but fraking fantastic! The prose are smoother to me than French's usual work and the worldbuilding in this book exceptional. The Sol system feels massive and lived in in a way that makes it feel like nowhere else could be humanities cradle, the book really takes the cliff notes you see in alot of other works and builds the system up until it is one of the leading protagonists in the book. I could frankly read an entire book about the weird metal mystery moon just hanging out being weird between terra and venus.

 

That is a compliment by the way because, despite having a very big cast, the characters really pop for me in this book. I think it might be controversial to say this but the Imperial Fists seem better off when they are away from the attention hog otherwise known as Sigismund, a chance to really see how brilliant and multi-dimensional the Fists are when it isnt all about anger and stoicism. This book treats the Fists as true guardians, clever and adaptive in a way that is so much more than what you would typically give the legion (its not just about a literal wall) and purposefully using their seemingly straightforward nature as a weapon against their opponents. Archaemus in particular is a delight, as it gives us a doubtful old veteran who can still lay a verbal smackdown when people take him for a simpleton. Dorn is used sparingly but it is a great book for showing the depth he has and in part why his own discipline hurts him so much, the book shows that he had some shocking common ground with his brothers but was too stubborn and poor a communicator for his own good.

 

The book also has my favorite take on the Alpha Legion. Their books tend to have a very bad habit of essentially thinking that omniscience and hand-waving is clever writing, harsh but it does get grating that we never know why or how the Legion does things, only that they are inscrutable and somehow always win. Praetorian makes them the villains but does so while giving them a hefty amount of screentime as you see their plans slowly come together, with all of the care attention of decades culminating in single, brilliant moments. The book also takes the bold move of actually letting the Alpha Legion be people, a particularly striking moment has one confessing to his 'brother' that he both hates and envies other Legions for being allowed to be proud and have genuine kinship something that Astartes are made to crave. Their crux in this book, the big motivating factor, is that the Alpha Legion wants it both ways and this is ultimately their weakness. It isnt enough to be nearly-omniscient and clever, they WANT recognition even if it is in the form of hatred and backhanded respect, they have been starved of it for too long and no amount of inscrutability is enough for them stay quiet in the corner. I don't want to touch on Alpharius because he is allowed to be more than a meme here so I do not want to spoil his being allowed a real personality.

 

In short, this is a far better Solar War and my personal favourite book from French now. I am also now considering buying Alpha Legion for 30k.

 

Must Read

8.5/10

[b1soul]

PoD was solid, but I felt Legion was still more enjoyable (and a more human portrayal of the legion).

[Roomsky]

Ruinstorm - David Annandale

 

Whoops, looks like I owe Annandale an apology. I fear my initial, harsh reaction to this book was, at least in part, my own succumbing to that thing I always get annoyed at: judging a work for what I wanted it to be rather than what it was. I was annoyed we weren't getting Pythos with Primarchs, rather what was apparently Annandale's more modern style of lots and lots of shooting. But going into it again, knowing the beats and how much of the book would be devoted to what, I really enjoyed it. It may be the strongest entry into Imperium Secundus, which surprises me as much as you, dear reader.

 

Each primarch here has an arc, something that, startlingly, does not go without saying in this series. More than that, we get the intriguing temptation of each on their way to Davin, mirroring Horus' own journey. The book makes it clear that each would have fallen had they not been cogent of Chaos, and it's a wonderful thematic mirror to the series' early entries. Themes too are something this book has that several in series only really pretend at. The ideas of destiny and weakness are addressed distinctly for each primarch, and I have to give Annandale credit for (whether intentionally or not) obfuscating the Chaos plot in so much violence. Like the primarchs themselves, the reader may not notice the ways each are being manipulated until it's nearly too late. There's plenty more good here too: the ludicrous scale of the Chaos constructs remains unnerving, Sanguinius gets his most sympathetic role since Imperium Secundus began, and fighting Madail is a nice chance for catharsis against a pantheon that tends to be untouchable (Madail, too, is a far more threatening daemon than Ka'Bandha ever managed).

 

There are of course still a ton of issues with this book. It jumps into the plot so quickly that you have no time to get attached to the protagonists unless you've been binging Imperium Secundus (which I'll remind people was not published back to back). This is especially baffling because the book is under 400 pages long, there was easily enough time for some interesting establishing scenes on Macragge. The legions outside of their primarchs also go largely ignored, and Annandales ability to write themes through bolter porn is a double edged sword when there are perhaps one too many set pieces in the book. Some of my positives are also dampened when you consider the series around this book. Sanguinius here is written perfectly well, but not well enough to make you forget how little he's been doing for most of the series. Curze, used quite effectively as a foil to Sanguinius, may be rendered annoying due to just how often he's been harassing these people. 

 

A flawed gem, I'd say. A lot of strong stuff and some genuinely cool bits of writing even on a re-read. It certainly suffers from all the usual Annandale-isms, but at least this time it all has a point.

 

To Tase

ANR: 6.5/10

 

 

Lord of the Night - Simon Spurrier

 

The definitive Night Lords book. Black Library's best attempts to turn Curze into a Saturday Morning Cartoon baddie don't put a scratch on this thing either. The prose is witty, the plot is intriguing even after so long and so many years of similar twists, and the characterization is spot-on. Sahaal's journey tells you everything you need to know about the 8th both pre and post heresy, and he's an entertaining protagonist to boot. Mita Ashyn's journey tells you everything you need to know about the horrors of Imperial life, even in so privileged a position as Inquisitorial Interrogator, and as with Sahaal, manages to be a great character in her own right. The atmosphere is on point and the cast is the kind of quirky absurdity all the best 40k stories possess, from the manic Kaustus to the complete troll Pahvulti. If I had to make any complaints, it's that perhaps the book's plot tended to meander in the middle, and you sometimes get the impression Spurrier is engineering small crises for nothing more than keeping the page count up. All the same, it's a shame we never got a sequel, though it ends in a satisfying enough place. Maybe with this Marvel deal we'll get more Spurrier in future.

 

Must Read

ANR: 9/10

[Lord_Caerolion]

My only issue with Lord of the Night is that it created a similar issue to the original Dark Angels novel (a Fallen saying that Lion was the traitor? How could it be wrong!), in that a lot of people, admittedly including myself, bought into Sahaal's "rose-tinted preysight" of the Legions history, too willing to dismiss the truth being told by Acerbus as "well he's just a daemon prince, of course he's lying".

As good as it is, I think the Night Lord series by AD-B gives a far fuller showing of the Night Lords Legion, although that does get 3-4 times the page count to do so.

[Roomsky]

My only issue with Lord of the Night is that it created a similar issue to the original Dark Angels novel (a Fallen saying that Lion was the traitor? How could it be wrong!), in that a lot of people, admittedly including myself, bought into Sahaal's "rose-tinted preysight" of the Legions history, too willing to dismiss the truth being told by Acerbus as "well he's just a daemon prince, of course he's lying".

As good as it is, I think the Night Lord series by AD-B gives a far fuller showing of the Night Lords Legion, although that does get 3-4 times the page count to do so.

 

I can certainly see an argument for the trilogy as a whole being the superior work, but as an individual book I'd say LotN outstrips all of them (and don't get me wrong, I love the Night Lords trilogy too.) I'd imagine Spurrier probably had to do a lot more leg work for his entry as well, so I can't help but give props for basically inventing their presence in BL. 

[b1soul]

I too am of the view that the trilogy as a whole tops LotN, but LotN tops any individual entry in the trilogy

[Biscuittzz]

PoD was solid but I felt the plot armour, as with any AL book, was still a bit too thick. Having the most important communications array located outside the most impenetrable fortress in the galaxy for.......reasons? The rest of the book is solid but I had the annoyance in my head that if that outlandish plot device wasn't to happen then everything else after doesn't either.

[Fire Golem]

I do think it’s hard to say there’s much plot armour for the Alpha Legion in the book with how it ends and all. 

[Fedor]

Or the scene where Dorn basically deconstructs the Alpha Legion to their face and more or less goes " LOL i see through everything and you aren't even doing it as well as i would...if i could be bothered to try, which i can't because it's all vestigial showboating".....before proceeding to ruin the AL scheme in the book and hack their Primarch to death while not even speaking a word as Alpharius tries to monologue.

 

I didn't like that scene where Dorn trashes their methods, it was too tidy a takedown for me, but thought French mostly balanced things out ok in terms of how one conflict could realistically go to one side over the other ( as Thorpe did too when the AL stole the samples in DeliveranceLost and won there) but if you are inclined to find bias in the the book, i'd say it could be far more easily read as an outright validation of the Fists way over the AL methods.

 

It's a book that also seems to whip a lot of Imperial Fists fans into a frenzy if you even suggest that archamus intervention in that final fight may have been partly been to introduce some ambiguity to the outcome.

 

Incidentally the main plot beat that i found quite hard to take in one of his books was the last part of the Terra fleet, Phalanx and Luna being bypassed, driven off and taken apart almost entirely by chaos ritual shenanigans and worse, a kamikaze attack that worked nowhere near as well as the one in Know No Fear.

Edited October 26, 2019 by Fedor

[StrangerOrders]

I do think it’s hard to say there’s much plot armour for the Alpha Legion in the book with how it ends and all. 

Yet I still AL fans go into a bloodrage even several years later when you suggest that the outcome, confirmed by both Omegon and by French himself, actually happened.

 

That is sort of what I dislike about the Alpha Legion, they just have too much of an element of "I am always right and very clever and am super-special" even by Legion standards. Idk, that is why I never liked them much before PoD.

 

I find them painful in Legion because their entire arc is them doing things inexplicably without Abnett ever even trying to make it plausible, and in the end it is just silly. I mean, the literal Architect of Fate or Eldrad aren't so painful omniscient and coated in plot armour.

 

As I said earlier, I enjoy them in PoD because they are allowed to not be infallible. It is really weird how they do not ever behave like actual Astartes, seem to always be portrayed as able to positively murder every other Legion and have next to no consequence.

 

Unremembered Empire is the most egregious example of this. How they managed to even know who Thiel is? The guy had no distinctions at the time, was left on Calth during the height of the chaos and literally the only people that know how much Guilliman liked him are Guilliman and Gage (who was a lost in the Warp at the time). Yet the Alpha Legion totally knew this censored sergeant was clearly the one identity that they could use to bypass all the red tape.

 

Or how they knew to infiltrate the Gal Vorbak, a literally insignificant chapter at the time, get possessed and then defect without their Daemons or the rest of the Gal Vorbak Daemons giving a damn or Lorgar noticing that two of the super-small company he was observing like a hawk were gone. To say nothing of Erebus.

 

Folks criticize Praetorian, but the Alpha Legion is allowed to actually seem like a feasible organization. You see how they go about building their networks and how they go off of pretty sound scenarios with some redundancy, achieving fantastic results based off things that are possible to do. And they make a mistake, precisely because they are very used to setting things up their way and are not used to someone else putting together the puzzle. That Dorn is allowed to have more intellect than a brick when it comes to planning a defense also seems unpopular (despite this intellect pretty much evaporating come Solar War).

 

Idk, I think it is a preference thing. I find the AL to be a fantastic concept, but I think they draw people that are outraged by the idea of being anything but the omniscient 'I win' faction. PoD convinced me to put in to collect them, but I really cannot stand how alot of writers treat them. 

 

Funnily enough, I do not usually like Fists either precisely because alot of books dont treat them as being very bright about defense (counter-intelligence, civilian behaviours, etc).

[Morovir]

 

Or how they knew to infiltrate the Gal Vorbak, a literally insignificant chapter at the time, get possessed and then defect without their Daemons or the rest of the Gal Vorbak Daemons giving a damn or Lorgar noticing that two of the super-small company he was observing like a hawk were gone. To say nothing of Erebus.

 

 

When did this happen?

[StrangerOrders]

 

 

Or how they knew to infiltrate the Gal Vorbak, a literally insignificant chapter at the time, get possessed and then defect without their Daemons or the rest of the Gal Vorbak Daemons giving a damn or Lorgar noticing that two of the super-small company he was observing like a hawk were gone. To say nothing of Erebus.

 

 

When did this happen?

 

Malevolence, it is in the first chapter which details different legions approaching sorcerers.

 

Essentially, AL stole everyones arcane knowledge. The somehow used pure science to beat the warp into submission and use it without risk... Ya.

 

And among those thefts is infiltrating the Gal Vorbak and figuring out how to mass-produce them. 

[byrd9999]

Chris Wraight - Scars

 

I look forward to reading Chris Wraight's work precisely because of books like this. He has a fluid prose style and doesn't hesitate to just tell a really good story. I hadn't read anything of the White Scars before this, but he did such a great job with them, giving them a point of view on the whole Imperium that is believably different from the other legions.

 

I'm reading the Heresy series in order, with as few spoilers as possible, so I was genuinely surprised and excited when Magnus showed up, and Wraight balances the different aspects that led to the downfall of Prospero. He did well to dovetail several previous plot strands into the narrative of this one, and I can see why the series is 54 books long if they are all of this standard (spoiler alert: i know they aren't). In the short space given to them in this story, Wraight writes the Thousand Sons well and I hope he gets to do more with them.

 

8/10

[b1soul]

@byrd9999

 

Did you read Brotherhood of the Storm before reading Scars? The former is arguably the best novella in the HH series IMO, especially when read in order with Scars and PoH

 

@Fedor

 

"It's a book that also seems to whip a lot of Imperial Fists fans into a frenzy if you even suggest that archamus intervention in that final fight may have been partly been to introduce some ambiguity to the outcome."

 

It was introduced deliberately to create ambiguity, but I have seen AL fans throw fits when faced with the suggestion that it was ambiguous, rather than a guaranteed case of Dorn definitely being screwed had Archamus not stepped in.

 

As for how Dorn deconstructs Alpharius' methods...it's classic Primarch trash talk, like how Jaghatai comes at Fulbright. In the same book, the AL's methods were giving the IF fits. If anything, the AL come across as more competent than the IF in the book.

[StrangerOrders]

@byrd9999

 

Did you read Brotherhood of the Storm before reading Scars? The former is arguably the best novella in the HH series IMO, especially when read in order with Scars and PoH

 

@Fedor

 

"It's a book that also seems to whip a lot of Imperial Fists fans into a frenzy if you even suggest that archamus intervention in that final fight may have been partly been to introduce some ambiguity to the outcome."

 

It was introduced deliberately to create ambiguity, but I have seen AL fans throw fits when faced with the suggestion that it was ambiguous, rather than a guaranteed case of Dorn definitely being screwed had Archamus not stepped in.

 

As for how Dorn deconstructs Alpharius' methods...it's classic Primarch trash talk, like how Jaghatai comes at Fulbright. In the same book, the AL's methods were giving the IF fits. If anything, the AL come across as more competent than the IF in the book.

The funny thing is that while it was superbly well done and explained, the AL did great all book long.

 

The entire reason the end goes haywire is because Alpharius took a gamble and I honestly think pride sort of made him act. Which is a flaw that literally every Primarch has. Even the humble Primarchs feel a need to remind everyone that they are being humble.

 

My favorite bit was when you see a detailed outline of how they used one smuggling ring to create a particular avenue of contacts across Sol over 70 years through a careful subversion of existing criminal elements. Or how the Headhunters were buried with a number of mission parameters, they had no idea which mission, war or enemies they would be fighting when woken. Heck, the Prime seems a bit offput by the variable that they ended up getting.

 

The IFs really only even caught on because the AL did not realize that the Emp hadn't wiped out the Selenites after all and that the one that had helped make them was still 'alive'.

 

Which is pretty fair for a blindspot, which is alot better than inexplicable knowledge (Thiel).

[Xisor]

Jesus :cussing spoiler tags christ, Fedor.

[Beren]

Keep in mind that Malevolence states that those two were the two survivors of the infiltration attempt into the Gal Vorbak, which implies that the other Gal Vorbak did notice, did give a damn and managed to kill all but two of them.

 

Edit: My mistake, only two survived their transformation, then only one of them escaped. The point still stands though. Hell, it even explicitly states they were detected and hunted by the Gal Vorbak, and that there is no way of knowing if the account is actually true or not.

Edited October 27, 2019 by Beren