Just Out of Jupiter's Reach (The Far Reaches, #5)

by Nnedi Okorafor

when you have to earn it, it’s actually not at all like winning the lottery.

So they saw the money, but at the same time, it was hard for them to see me as important.

outlined in the bioluminescent blue of a deep-sea creature.

Interesting how we tend to associate strength with something hard like diamond, tungsten, stone. Never with something that is flesh, something that yields.

But my Miri, whom I’d named Chi (because it was the personification of my fate, my guardian spirit), made me understand that I would never be alone again.

They were powerful, even sentient creatures, and they were our freedom . . . in a way. Each one imprinted on only one human being, if Kármán could find that one.

“Chi is all about the bioluminescence,” I said.

And my time alone had been a journey of breaking and then healing . . . all alone.