Don't tell me about worth," Nita said. "My father commands fleets." "The wealthy measure everything with the weight of their money." Tool leaned close. "Sadna once risked herself and the rest of her crew to help me escape from an oil fire... Your father commands fleets. And thousands of half-men, I am sure. But would he risk himself to save a single one?

Nothing so mystical. Human beings hunger for killing, that is all. It only takes a few politicians to stoke division, or a few demagogues encouraging hatred to set your kind upon one another. And then before you know it, you have a whole nation biting on its own tail, going round and round until there is nothing left but the snapping of teeth.

Sex and hypocrisy. They go together like coffee and cream.

Blood is not destiny.

Nature has become something new. It is ours now, truly. And if our creation devours us, how poetic will that be?

The problem with surviving was that you ended up with the ghosts of everyone you’d ever left behind riding on your shoulders.

Politics is ugly. Never doubt what small men will do for great power.