:To be led by a coward - Octavia E. Butler

I didn't want to scare you. We don't want to scare anyone."
"No? Well, sometimes it's a good thing to scare people. Sometimes fear is all that will keep them from doing stupid things.

I want to write about what's going to happen if we keep doing what we've been doing, if we keep recklessly endangering the environment, if we keep paying no attention to economic realities, if we keep paying no attention to educational needs, if we keep doing a lot of the things that are hurting us now. And that's what I wound up writing about. And everything else just kind of fell into it, fell into place.

What will they do when they have only the herbs" he asked her.
"Live or die as best they can," she said. "Everything truly alive dies sooner or later.