|
f85e7bc
|
The boys spoke in loud, angry voices about tyranny and freedom. The girls watched the boys strut. The ancient, animal story, the same whether it was on a spinning rock surrounded by hard vacuum or the stamp-sized chimpanzee preserves on Earth. Even in the Belt, youth brought invulnerability, immortality, the unshakable conviction that for you, things would be different.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
0a691dd
|
Her disagreement was primarily with the level of glee over the destruction of the wicked that sometimes crept into the teachings.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
daddcc2
|
In a fight like this, unless you're willing to lose everything to win, you lose it all by losing.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
026a219
|
The velocities and forces involved in anything at orbital altitudes were enough to kill a human with just the rounding error. At their speeds, the friction from air too thin to breathe would set them on fire.
|
|
friction
orbit
rounding-error
velocity
speed
physics
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
fb6f86c
|
My life has become a single, ongoing revelation that I haven't been cynical enough.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
8f42dd4
|
The idea that animal suffering is less important than human suffering is a religious one. It assumes a special creation, and that we--you and I--are different in kind than other animals. We are morally separate from rats or horses or chimps, not based on any particular physical difference between us, but just because we claim that we're sacred by our nature and have dominion over them. It's a story we tell that lets us do what we do. Consid..
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
59e262e
|
And for a moment, he was tempted. In that hesitation between drawing breath and speaking, part of him wondered what would happen if he shed the patterns of history and spoke about himself as a man, about the Joe Miller who he'd known briefly, about the responsibility they all shared to tear down the images they held of one another and find
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
f9c1f06
|
And for a moment, he was tempted. In that hesitation between drawing breath and speaking, part of him wondered what would happen if he shed the patterns of history and spoke about himself as a man, about the Joe Miller who he'd known briefly, about the responsibility they all shared to tear down the images they held of one another and find the genuine, flawed, conflicted people they actually were. It
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
25e6e56
|
Welcome to Tycho Station," said the Butcher of Anderson Station. "Call me Fred."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
d0acfb1
|
The problem with you is that you are wasteful." "I'm not a fucking coward," Fred said through his rapidly swelling lip. "Of course you are. You're smart, you're healthy. Maybe a few hundred people out of forty billion have your combination of talent and training. And you're trying to waste that very valuable resource."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
8fb46b4
|
His lieutenant chuckled. "Here, kiddies," the lieutenant said. "We blew the shit out of your station, have some free MREs and UN Marine sticker books." Fred didn't laugh."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
a68c5a5
|
This is your house...If they don't respect you here, they won't respect you anywhere.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
4405e6b
|
Her system chirped, a polite little pop like someone snapping bamboo.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
3a711fb
|
The system made the little woody tock that meant she had her privacy again.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
0ac58f9
|
Time took her strength but it gave her power in exchange. It was a fair trade. She
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
26585d9
|
Taking the things that other people thought they deserved to keep was dangerous work.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
4beaf15
|
It was funny, he thought, how the ruins of the past shaped everything that came after.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
52f1b88
|
Naomi coughed. It was wet, painful sound, but the medical bay didn't seem concerned. The machine had a shitty bedside manner.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
3c0b324
|
I'm really wishing Titan were still on that list of options." "That's waiting for yesterday, sweetheart."
|
|
wishing-and-waiting
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
6f3cc51
|
Girl's at her own father's funeral, meets this really cute guy. They talk, hit it off, but he leaves before she can get his number. Girl doesn't know how to track the guy down. So a week later, she kills her mom.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
2bcb547
|
If life transcends death, then I will seek for you there. If not, then there too,
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
9cec346
|
Chapter Two: Filip
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
4fa635e
|
Holden rose, nodded to Fred, and left. Naomi walked at his side. "Wow, that was close," she said under her breath. Once they'd left the office, Holden said, "I think Fred was half a second from ordering Miller to shoot me." "Miller's on our side. Haven't you figured that out yet?"
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
2df5ea5
|
I bet every captain you ever flew under thought you were a gigantic pain in the ass," Fred said finally. "I believe my record reflects that," Holden said, trying to hide his relief."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
843b5e9
|
Hello, James Holden. My name is Fred Johnson.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
39f3f8f
|
If you leave it again without a direct order, I'll have the XO beat you to death with a pipe wrench.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
a77de41
|
Reputation never has very much to do with reality," she said. "I could name half a dozen paragons of virtue that are horrible, small-souled, evil people."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
2949161
|
A flock of softball-sized spiderlike things crawled through the corridor, leaving a slick sheen of glowing slime behind them. It wasn't until he paused to knock one off the cart that he recognized them as severed hands, the trailing wrist bones charred black and remade.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
7b2674e
|
You can't stop here, Holden said. You have to stop running and get on the right road. Miller looked over his shoulder. The captain stood, real and not, where his inner Julie would have been. Well, that's interesting, Miller thought.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
ca62926
|
Well, someone tell McBride she doesn't need to shoot us now." "Hey," Alex said, his voice thoughtful. "If we made those nukes stop listening, that means we can't shut 'em down, right? Wonder where Fred's going to drop those." "Hell if I know," Amos said. "Just disarmed Earth, though. That's gotta be fucking embarrassing."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
0aa891d
|
One more chance to try being the person that the situation called for instead of just herself.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
c56e52f
|
No more leave," Holden said. "Holy shit. Right?" Alex said. "I take off for a few weeks, and everything turns into chaos." "It really, really does." Holden went to the coffee maker and Alex followed at his elbow. "I think this has to qualify for the worst vacation ever."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
6e62460
|
we'll be cocked, locked, and ready to rock.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
0a6e0cb
|
That moment of shaking had been a whole battle too abrupt for a human mind to follow. He wasn't sure if that was amazing or terrifying. Maybe there was room for both.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
7c8b5ab
|
We got a pilot yet?" she asked. "Alex Kamal is on the ready rotation today, so he's our man. I kind of wish Valka had been up. He's not the pilot Alex is, but he's quieter, and my head hurts." "I like Alex. He's ebullient," Naomi said. "I don't know what ebullient means, but if it means Alex, it makes me tired."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
3a36acf
|
Howdy, XO," he drawled. The old west affectation common to everyone from the Mariner Valley annoyed Holden. There hadn't been a cowboy on Earth in a hundred years, and Mars didn't have a blade of grass that wasn't under a dome, or a horse that wasn't in a zoo. Mariner Valley had been settled by East Indians, Chinese, and a small contingent of Texans. Apparently, the drawl was viral."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
5f2263f
|
Fred laughed. It was mirthless. "Let me get this straight," he said. "You'll give me all the kingdoms of the Earth if I just bow down and do one act of worship for you?" Dresden cocked his head. "I don't know the reference."
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
8ed6c49
|
Eighteen months before, there hadn't been sides. The inner planets had all been one big, happy, slightly dysfunctional family. Then Eros, and now the two superpowers were dividing up the solar system between them, and the one moon neither side was willing to give up was Ganymede, breadbasket of the Jovian system.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
ca3023e
|
Belters had been a structural underclass fighting to have people on the inner planets even notice when they were dying.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
914ce4f
|
Miller closed his terminal, frowning. "Philosophical. But if it's the price of doing business, what're we here for?" "Because I thought you... you people had this shit under control. Ever since we stopped paying the Loca, I've been able to turn a decent profit. Now it's all starting up again." "Hold on," Miller said. "You're telling me the Loca Greiga stopped charging protection?" "Sure. Not just here. Half of the guys I know in the Bough j..
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
6e73e6b
|
You've been spending a lot of time in Belter bars, Colonel. Someone might think you were looking for something." "Dawes?" "Fred?" "I've been through better interrogation training than you'll ever see. You want to build rapport? Go for it. Talk for a while, take my shackles off, start telling me that you can save me if I just tell you what I know. And then I'll rip your eyes out and skull-fuck you. You understand?" "I do," Dawes said, not mi..
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
8fea522
|
No, there doesn't. Every time someone starts talking about final anythings in politics, that means the atrocities are warming up. Humanity has done amazing things by just muddling through, arguing and complaining and fighting and negotiating. It's messy and undignified, but it's when we're at our best, because everyone gets to have a voice in it. Even if everyone else is trying to shout it down. Whenever there's just one voice that matters,..
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
2854076
|
The reactions of the talking heads of Earth security forces ran the gamut from calm, rational discussion of preemptive defense to foaming-at-the-mouth denunciations of Mars as a pack of baby-raping animals.
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |
|
a96b1ed
|
All empty. She plucked a magnetized pipe wrench of suitable size for skull cracking out of an EVA kit,
|
|
|
James S.A. Corey |