The Long Game (The Far Reaches, #4)

by Ann Leckie

a lot of humans who never will meet an actual person would be sad if a lot of us died, back on earth.

I make things better for everyone in the colony.” “Well, not everyone,” Nish said. “Not for the people who won’t do what you tell them. Not for the people who have a different idea of what’s good. And certainly not for the people who you decide have to work harder or go hungry or even die just to make things”—Nish waved a tentacle sarcastically—“better for everyone. But let’s not argue about those details.

As long as I will live—maybe forty years!—I will never see the outcome of this plan. Maybe it won’t happen exactly the way I want it to. But I can start it now, and the people who come after me can build more.