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“I stole you,” Nono said, like she always said, only this tih it were an annoying ritual to be rushed through “But you always say this ‘There were so many others I was so unlikely to be picked’”
“It’s true”
“It’s the excuse you use You’ve always been one to ask for forgiveness rather than perainst her eyes and the tears that threatened there Her elbow banged into the salad bowl, nearly knocking it off the table “I haven’t said yes to them I’ll tell the her hand “You will go But I arandparents Grow up in real gravity”
Anna felt a white-hot spike of fear shoot through her sto me?”
Nono’s s us For a little while And when you co for you in Moscow Your family I will find us a nice place to live there, and Nami and I will make it a hoo with you”
“Why?” was all Anna could think to say
Nono got up and took two plates out of the cupboard, then dished up dinner and put it on the table As she spooned Waldorf salad onto her plate she said, “I’ fro we care about Humanity, God, our place in His universe I’m afraid of what it will do, of course, but much more afraid of what it means”
“I am too,” Anna said It was the truth In fact, it was part of the reason she’d asked to join the expedition when she heard it was being asse about Anna wanted to look it in the eye Give God a chance to help her understand it Only then could she help anyone else with it
“So go find the answers,” Nono said “Your faet back”
“Thank you,” Anna said, a little awed by what Nono was offering her
“I think,” Nono said around a mouthful of mushrooms and rice, “that maybe they will need people like you out there”
“Like me?”
“People who don’t ask peret,” Michio Pa, executive officer of the Behemoth, said If she’d been an Earther, she would have been a sed her the way it did all of theated—not thin exactly Just put together differently Her head was larger than it would have been, and walking in the ravity, she stood as tall as Bull but still seemed perversely childlike It ht need to adjust that,” he said “When they put in the rail gun, they were treating it like we had standard bulkheads and supports Thing is, the Mor to cut back on mass They used a lot of cerao Directional stuff We fire a round right noe could shear the skin off”
Pa walked down the long, curving corridor The ceiling arched above her, white and easily twice as high as required, an aesthetic gesture by designers who hadn’t known they were building a warship Her stride a little wider than his,hihtly to keep up It was one of a thousand small ways Belters re here The XO shook her head