Waking Gods (Themis Files, #2)

by Sylvain Neuvel

Rose Franklin was twenty-eight when she was put in charge of the research team studying the hand. She died at thirty. A year later, they found me. I was twenty-seven.

I may believe in God, but I’m at war with Him. I’m a scientist, I try to answer questions, one at a time, so there’s a little less room for Him as the answer. I plant my flag, and inch by inch, I take away His kingdom. It’s odd, but none of this has ever occurred to me before. I never even saw a real contradiction between science and religion. I see it now, I see it clear as day. I’ve crossed that line we’re not supposed to cross. I died. And I’m still here. I cheated death. I took away God’s power. I killed God and I feel empty inside.

“The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land.”

Scientists are like children: They always want to know everything, they all ask too many questions, and they never follow orders to the letter.

They came up with a seven-step procedure, starting with remote surveillance. We would then secretly visit the alien world, and if we felt our weaponry and technology to be more advanced than the aliens, we would begin a series of brief landings during which we would gather samples of plant and animal life, perhaps abducting an alien or two in the process. After that, we would make our existence known to as many aliens as possible, and if we were satisfied with their reaction, we would make contact.

Believing you’re the only person with their head on straight is usually not a sign of good mental health.

You, my friend, are a very complex, awe-inspiring configuration of matter. What you’re made of isn’t really important. Everything in the universe is made of the same thing. You’re a configuration. Your essence, as you call it, is information. It doesn’t matter where the material comes from. Do you think it matters when it comes from?

While I am reasonably confident you are not “the chosen one,” you are without doubt one who has been chosen.

Parents feel a great deal of responsibility for the way their children turn out, but there is very little a parent can do that will remotely rival the influence a friend or lover can have.