Quotes from Martha Wells

Amena and Ratthi kept suggesting that I should help it "adjust" whatever that is. I knew if I was in its position, I'd want to be left alone. And if it hadn't even sat down in a chair voluntarily yet, it probably wasn't ready to talk. (I know this sounds suspiciously like a rationale I had come up with to keep from doing something I didn't want to do anyway, but hey, I can't help that.)

Yes, I've had experience with investigating suspicious fatalities in controlled circumstances.

With a grimace that was probably supposed to be a sneer, he asked, "What do you want?

This message is for you," he told him. "The next time somebody wants to teach me a lesson, don't help.

I don't make threats, I'm just telling you what I'm going to do.

This is why I'm glad I'm not human. They come up with stuff like this. I said, "No. That's a human thing to do. Constructs aren't that stupid.

Pin-Lee had promised, "Don't worry, I'll preserve your right to wander off like an asshole anytime you like.")

can't do even the half-assed version of this stupid job if I have to talk to humans.

It would never stop being novel to be around a bunch of humans in a relatively confined space and be able to close a door between me and them and not have to care what they were doing.

I don't know what I want. I said that at some point, I think. But it isn't that, it's that I don't want anyone to tell me what I want, or to make decisions for me.

One of them started toward me. I said, "I assume you're about to try to install another combat override module and send me back to kill them." I opened my gun ports and expanded the weapons in my arms, then folded them back in. "I don't recommend that course of action.

I'd have to change, make myself do things I didn't want to do. Like talk to humans like I was one of them. I'd have to leave the armor behind.

Now that I knew where we were going, it was a lot easier to get there

It was obvious Station Security was out of its collective depth here. (At least it was obvious to me.)

It was going to be a long trip.

I hate being carted around like equipment, even though technically I am actually equipment.

being in control of the situation was really important because otherwise it was in control of me

I said, "I've reported to my contracted supervisor." (I know, I know, I could have said no, I didn't kill anybody. I could have said that even SecUnits under company protocol use minimum force necessary

The only way out of this was to kill them.

If I fail, everything terrible that happens next will be my fault. That's the perfect, fitting end to my life, don't you think?" "If you fail, I promise not to tell anybody," he said.

I made my voice firm and warm and gentle, and said, "Dr. Volescu, it's gonna be fine, okay? But you need to get up and come help me get her out of here." That

During all this, Volescu was huddled on the churned up rock, losing his shit, not that I was unsympathetic. I was far less vulnerable in this situation than he was and I wasn't exactly having a great time either.

What I did next was predicated on the assumption that she had told the DeltFall SecUnit to kill me. If I was wrong, we were screwed, and Mensah and I would both die, and the plan to save the rest of the group would fail and PreservationAux would be back to where it started, except minus their leader, their SecUnit, and their little hopper.

No, I didn't kill the dead human. If I had, I wouldn't dump the body in the station mall, for fuck's sake.)