Abaddon's Gate (Expanse, #3)

by James S.A. Corey

“Annie,” Tilly said. “If I wanted to suck vile fluids out of a flaccid and indifferent tube, I’d have stayed on Earth with my husband.”

“Oh,” Tilly said, her coffee bulb floating forgotten in the air in front of her. “We are so fucked.”

Holden was starting to feel like they were all monkeys playing with a microwave. Push a button, a light comes on inside, so it’s a light. Push a different button and stick your hand inside, it burns you, so it’s a weapon. Learn to open and close the door, it’s a place to hide things. Never grasping what it actually did, and maybe not even having the framework necessary to figure it out. No monkey ever reheated a frozen burrito.

He imagined himself landing on the station, and Miller saying, James Holden, you and only you in the universe have the correct chemical composition to make a perfect wormhole fuel! then stuffing him into a machine to be processed.

It was a lesson he’d never forgotten. That humans only have so much emotional energy. No matter how intense the situation, or how powerful the feelings, it was impossible to maintain a heightened emotional state forever. Eventually you’d just get tired and want it to end.

“Ma’am, we don’t ask ‘how high’ when James fucking Holden says jump,” the officer growled back.

Miller nodded, understanding the question. He frowned, sighed. “Miller kind of liked you. Thought you were a decent guy.” “That’s it?” “You need more?”