Fugitive Telemetry Quotes

“Yeah, good luck with that. Trying to get humans not to touch dangerous things was a full-time job.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“It had been such a stupid question, I had forgotten not to have an expression.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“All I wanted to do was watch media and not exist. I said, You know I don’t like fun.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“There was a big huge deal about it, and Security was all “but what if it takes over the station’s systems and kills everybody” and Pin-Lee told them “if it wanted to do that it would have done it by now,” which in hindsight was probably not the best response.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Humans touch stuff all the time, I wish they wouldn’t.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Pin-Lee had promised, "Don't worry, I'll preserve your right to wander off like an asshole anytime you like." (I said, "It takes one to know one.")”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I know a “fuck off” when I hear one. So I fucked off.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I am going to have to stop scaring the shit out of myself.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“The full station threat assessment for murder was sitting at a baseline 7 percent. (To make it drop lower than that we’d have to be on an uninhabited planet.) (I’ve never been on a contract on an uninhabited planet because if I was on the planet on a contract then we’d be inhabiting it.)”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I just realized I don’t like the phrase “as far as I knew” because it implies how much you actually don’t know. I’m not going to stop using it, but. I don’t like it as much anymore.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Humans do the “make it a question so it doesn’t sound so bad” thing and it still sounds bad.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I guess the feed isn’t adequate for all forms of communication, particularly those that involve a lot of glaring.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Gurathin sighed and rubbed his face and looked off into the distance, like he regretted all his life choices that had led to him standing here right now.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Don’t look at me like that’s my fault. I’m just telling you shit I know.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I had archives of everything that had happened since I hacked my governor module, but I hadn’t had as much relevant experience in that time. But what I did have were thousands of hours of category mystery media, so I had a lot of theoretical knowledge that was possibly anywhere from 60 to 70 percent inaccurate shit.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I didn’t know what that meant, but it was a good job title and honestly it made me a little jealous.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Good luck. I understand why humans say that, but luck sucks.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“It tried to alert its onboard SecSystem, but as the old saying (which I just made up) goes, if you can ping the SecUnit, it’s way too late.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I guess if you were really determined, you could find a way to get yourself killed by exposing the power connectors under the panels and shielding and, I don’t know, licking them or something, but this dead human clearly hadn’t.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“They all stared. Still woozy, Target Four said, “It’s a slitting SecUnit, you pussers, how stupid are you?” Yeah, these Targets are going to be fun to chat with, I can tell already. I told him, “You’re the one who got yourself bodyslammed into station detention, so let’s talk about how dumb you are.” Target Four seemed shocked. “SecUnits aren’t supposed to talk back,” Target Five said weakly. Tell me about it. “Cargo ship crews aren’t supposed to take Port Authority supervisors as hostages, but here we all are.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Huh. I liked it better because it wasn’t a CombatUnit plan, or actually a plan that humans would come up with for CombatUnits. Sneaking the endangered humans off the ship to safety and then leaving the hostiles for someone else to deal with, that was a SecUnit plan, that was what we were really designed for, despite how the company and every other corporate used us. The point was to retrieve the clients alive and fuck everything else. Maybe I’d been waiting too long for GrayCris to show up and try to kill us all. I was thinking like a CombatUnit, or, for fuck’s sake, like a CombatBot.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I have a name, but it’s private. On their secure feed connection, Pin-Lee sent to Mensah, Oh, that’s going to go over well. When station residents are running into “Murderbot”— That’s one of the reasons why it’s private.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Sometimes you have to look into every possibility, even the dumb ones.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“I didn't need as much air as humans did, but I needed some, and it was really cold out there, in the colony ship's shadow. This meant that if the life-tender failed it would take me longer to die so I'd have longer to feel dumb about it than a human would.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“The point was to retrieve the clients alive and fuck everything else.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Target Four seemed shocked. “SecUnits aren’t supposed to talk back,” Target Five said weakly. Tell me about it. “Cargo ship crews aren’t supposed to take Port Authority supervisors as hostages, but here we all are.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Just a regular projectile, not an explosive one, so most of my back was still there. I just didn’t feel like walking around leaking in front of humans right now.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“so the plan had been to get into the hostile ship through its lock and then run around getting shot and murdering my way through whoever was aboard until I could get control. (I hadn’t used those exact words during the planning process with Indah and Aylen, but we all knew what we were talking about.)”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“Mensah’s really smart, she can sort-of bribe me and tell Indah to fuck off simultaneously.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry

“That plan was easier plus 100 percent less murdery. And I liked it better.”
― Martha Wells, Fugitive Telemetry