Translation State

by Ann Leckie

I assumed—if I thought about it at all—that I was just better than those victims. That there had been something fundamentally consumable about them.

Humans didn’t do much of anything without having tea at some point in the process,

The funny thing about having a name is that you begin to think of yourself as a solid thing that continues to exist, instead of just a stream of experiences.

“You have only small and seemingly pointless choices available to you. But if there is anything I have been trying to teach you, it is that small actions can have larger consequences. If one has only small choices available, one must be patient, and canny.”

“Sphene had a really bad thing happen, and then it hid by itself for three thousand years.” “That’s quite a sulk,” said Enae, to the mech. “I don’t do things by half measures,” said Sphene.