The Butcher of Anderson Station Quotes

“Every now and then a green dot shifted to yellow. A soldier down, their armored suits detecting the injuries or death that rendered them combat ineffective. Combat ineffective. Such a nice euphemism for one of his kids bleeding out.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“The problem with you is that you are wasteful.” “I’m not a fucking coward,” Fred said through his rapidly swelling lip. “Of course you are. You’re smart, you’re healthy. Maybe a few hundred people out of forty billion have your combination of talent and training. And you’re trying to waste that very valuable resource.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“Fred’s vacuum-rated armor protected him from the smell of viscera, but it reported it to him as a slight increase in atmospheric methane levels. The stench of death reduced to a data point.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“So I think to myself,” the bartender said, reaching back toward the glassware by the mirror, “you’re here for something. The Butcher of Anderson Station in a Belter bar.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“You’ve been spending a lot of time in Belter bars, Colonel. Someone might think you were looking for something.” “Dawes?” “Fred?” “I’ve been through better interrogation training than you’ll ever see. You want to build rapport? Go for it. Talk for a while, take my shackles off, start telling me that you can save me if I just tell you what I know. And then I’ll rip your eyes out and skull-fuck you. You understand?” “I do,” Dawes said, not missing a beat. “So tell me, Fred. What happened to you on Anderson Station?”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“Fred launched himself at Dawes, pushing out with numbed legs, and Dawes scuttled back. Fred landed on the deck hard. The world grayed out for a second, and he tasted blood. He struggled forward, trying to get at Dawes’s feet with his teeth if that was the best he could manage.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“His lieutenant chuckled. “Here, kiddies,” the lieutenant said. “We blew the shit out of your station, have some free MREs and UN Marine sticker books.” Fred didn’t laugh.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“Even if they do take a walk outside or swallow a gun, there's always this part before. Taking risks. Hoping the universe will do it for them. Make it easy.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“Combat ineffective. Such a nice euphemism for one of his kids bleeding out on a piece-of-shit station at the ass end of the Belt.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“When I was about fifteen, I killed my sister,” Dawes said. “I didn’t mean to. We were on this rock about a week from Eros Station. We were going out of the ship to get some survey probes that got stuck in the slurry. I was supposed to check her suit seals, but I was in a mood. I was fifteen, you know? So I did a half-assed job of it. We went outside, and everything seemed fine until she twisted sideways to pull up a rock spur. I heard it on the comm link, and it just sounded like a pop. We had the old Ukrainian-style suits. Solid as stone unless something broke, and then it all failed at once.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“Even if they do take a walk outside or swallow a gun, there’s always this part before. Taking risks. Hoping the universe will do it for them. Make it easy.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“I still killed him.”
“You didn’t pull the trigger.”
“I killed him because he wanted her to have enough air to breathe,” Fred said. “I killed her daddy while he was trying to surrender, and they gave me a medal for doing it. So there you go. That’s what happened on Anderson Station. What are you going to do about it?”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“When I was growing up, my dad used to beat the crap out of me if I spat someplace other than the reclamation duct because we needed the water. We don’t waste things out here, Colonel. We can’t afford to. You understand that, though. Don’t you?”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“I’ve been through better interrogation training than you’ll ever see. You want to build rapport? Go for it. Talk for a while, take my shackles off, start telling me that you can save me if I just tell you what I know. And then I’ll rip your eyes out and skull-fuck you. You understand?”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station

“The plant had been pale and thin but twice as tall as the ones out in the side yard, deformed by reaching for the sunlight.”
― James S.A. Corey, The Butcher of Anderson Station