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“I’m scared too,” Drummer said

“I know That was so shit that ca like it I’ve never seen speculation about anything like it” Avasarala picked up her own ood”

“We grow it here Real leaves”

“All the food chemists in the syste a decent tea leaf”

“How am I about to fuck up?”

“By trying to get back your losses,” Avasarala said “It’s not just you either You’re going to have advisors on all sides ant the sa Mass a force to reclaiht back to Laconia Through a massive effort and at tremendous cost, push our way back to the status quo ante”

“Sunk-cost fallacy?”

“Yes”

“So you don’t think—” Dru her She sedher throat “You don’t think we can get the slow zone back?”

“How the fuck would I know? But I do know you can’t get it back as your first step And I kno h, fast enough, strong enough now, it won’t have happened the way it already did But that’s not how it’s going to work And I kno consurief can be Grief makes people crazy It did me”

It was like the airwas news to her, but the sy A vast fear, wide and cruel, welled up in Dru back doith a click, and Avasarala nodded

“I was briefed about Duarte, back in the day,” the old wo back then I thought at the time it was because they’d just been surprise ass-fucked by one of their own, and it was shame That was true as far as it went, but after I retired, I made him a hobby of mine”

“A hobby?”

“I’ a hand Then a moment later, “I found his thesis”

The little book she held out was printed on thin paper with a pale-green cover It was rough against her fingertips The title was in a siy in Interplanetary Conflict, by Winston Duarte