Humanity is an assemblage of information-processing entities, and in that regard you have potential. - Alastair Reynolds

She was usually caught with her back to us, a distant figure standing on some cliff or high building with one hand on her hip and another shielding her eyes from the sun, lost in the rapture of scale and scenery, drunk on the very idea of being human, a monkey who had hit the big time.

It was astonishing how quickly friendship could turn to enmity, she thought, like a compass needle swinging from one pole to the other.
They’d been excellent friends. They’d make excellent enemies as well.

Civilisations beyond number had risen from obscurity, considering themselves masters of all creation, before fading back into the footnotes of history.