Who knows what we humans have that others might be willing to take in trade for a livable space on a world not our own. - Octavia E. Butler

So he had locked her in the closet. Some of his people, ignorant and fearful, could not quite believe her illness was not contagious. Badger locked her away from them for her own safety. She had seen for herself how eager they were to get her out of their sight.

They had clearly feared turn-of-the-century irrationality—religious overzealousness on one side, destructive hedonism on the other, with both heated by ideological intolerance and corporate greed.

There’s no narcotic like exhaustion.