Denny Flowers’ Necromunda short story The Last Voyage of Elissa Harrow does what it says on the tin…and a bit more. SPOILERS abound in both the story and (to a lesser extent) this review for those who haven’t read at least Low Lives (YOU’VE BEEN WARNED!), as this picks up after the novella’s denouement to find Elissa horribly injured, possibly delusional, attempting to cross the sump on a makeshift raft. Land, and safety, seem a long way off, there are dangers beneath the surface of the toxic lake, and Elissa knows she can never really go home…but something drives her to keep moving forward.
Best read after The Hand of Harrow and Low Lives to get the full context and weight to proceedings, this is at once an entertaining, characterful story in its own right and an unexpected continuation of Elissa’s arc. She emerged as a strong character in Low Lives, easily able to compete for page time with Caleb and Iktomi, and here Flowers explores the consequences of failure and her sheer determination to survive, digging deeper still into her character and backstory even as she grimly tackles the dangers of the sump. This demonstrates once again just how good a handle Flowers has on the tone of Necromunda, as despite being very much a character-driven story it could only be taking place in the underhive. There are mysteries beneath the surface of this story, and it appears we might not have seen the last of the Harrows.
