Featuring the legendary outlaw D’onne Ulanti – or ‘Mad’ Donna – Will McDermott’s Necromunda short story Underhive Apex is a chainsword-fuelled shot of frantic, explosive underhive action. On the hunt for a uniquely useful mutant known as Lumpy Nox, D’onne and her pet ogryn Dog have tracked their quarry to a Cawdor-owned manufactorum, only for an entire Goliath gang to arrive and steal him away from under their noses. Not to be denied, D’onne adjusts on the fly and happily throws herself into the fray despite being outnumbered, outmuscled and outgunned, confident that she’ll figure something out and walk away the victor.
With a plot that’s nice and simple and a limited cast, this is essentially just an excuse to show Mad Donna being Mad Donna – chaotic, gleefully hyper-violent, and content to eschew any form of planning in favour of reacting to changing circumstances with effortless quick thinking. There’s no real character development, no clever twists and turns, just a tremendously entertaining blast of carnage as D’onne chews her way through everything in her path with verve, demonstrating why she’s such a feared underhive predator. It’s not subtle, but it’s a lot of fun – perfect as either an introduction to one of Soulless Fury’s key characters or a welcome extra dose of Mad Donna craziness.
See also: my review of Soulless Fury and an interview with Will McDermott.
