"It' is for objects, not people."
"Freedom isn't hard to lose - but it's a hard thing to win back once it's been lost."
"How do YOU know what God meant? Did he whisper into your ear? Did he put the knife in your heart? Did he put a gun in your hand?"
"Half-Lieutenant Marsh’k Kluss’ta was not a happy man. Naturally, that didn’t bother him as things were rarely otherwise. As the commanding sub-officer of the Black Sunrise, happiness was not a state of mind expected of him, though in reality – our reality – he was probably not such a bad person. The crew, though terrified of him even under normal circumstances, believed that he had the heart of a little child. (Let’s leave it at that, shall we?)"
"Start thinking for yourself, ask 'why?' and even venture to say 'why should I?' and pretty soon you will have half the world at your throat for being a 'trouble maker'."
"There's no point in arguing with an idiot - save for exposing their stupidity in their own words."
"As you may follow, they are an extremely hostile species (i.e. there is no word for ‘welcome’ in the Ruminarii language.) In four short centuries they had managed to lay waste to almost a thousand star systems, enslaving their populations and stripping them of all they wanted."
"Regardless of what language it is said in, "I love you" stays beautiful, and two hearts beating together make the same sound. It is the language of Love."
"The simple truth of the matter is that people who complain about a peaceful parade which lasts at best one hour in a particular place - ONCE in a whole year - do so out of hatred and intolerance. it isn't just the parade, it is seeing gay and trans people in public - and gay and trans people BEING gay and trans in public. And that is the root of the problem - they HATE gay and trans people."
"The moment you hand over YOUR responsibility to manage your own rights, morality, and freedoms - to the government, that is the moment democracy fails."
"It would seem that the right to equality and human rights is far more an exclusive thing than an inclusive thing."
"Corrigan crept up to the bar, cautiously moving around it. It looked like he was copying all the moves he’d seen in old cop movies and westerns, and doing it rather badly. He lowered the pistol. There was no one behind the bar. There was however, an open trapdoor. And that would mean the bounty hunter was - .“Don’t move!” Came Beck’s distant, slightly muffled, barked order. “My turn, I think!"
"Aside from all that, she was carrying about a million tons of titanium ore to the heavy industries on Gorda. All told, that would take care of their traveling arrangements for the next year or so, pretty much."
"Being the commander of a Ruminarii war vessel meant that he had risen to the rank by means of assassination and ruthlessness and was therefore implicitly distrusted by the Tidhii Mah’k’hai (Naval Command, that is The Queen Of Suth Herself.) He was expected to mete out, in generous portions, brutality to conquered subjects and to act swiftly and mercilessly in dealing with alien encounters. In short, he was expected to be a bad example."
"Cautiously, he moved further out, checking the roofs, doors, windows. Nothing. He walked out further, keeping against the wooden wall of a building, just in case. His heart was pounding in his ears. Strange, isn’t it? You could be in hundreds of fights, but everyone always seemed like the first time. A million different things could happen, go completely wrong. Then it might well be his last. Where is he? Which building?"