SPOILERS--Quotes from Shadow of Victory

“Ma’am,” Lecter said feelingly, “the thought of Manticoran and Havenite warships operating together against a sovereign star nation full of genetic slavers and other bottom feeders on the other side of the League should send just about all the messages you’d like to everyone concerned.”

“If I hadn’t, Shannon Foraker would have,” the Havenite said after a handful of seconds. “I couldn’t let her do that. It wasn’t her responsibility; it was mine. And don’t mistake me, Commodore Terekhov. I didn’t do it because I’m such a noble, heroic fellow. For that matter, I didn’t do it simply because it was the right thing to do. I did it because I was ashamed.” His strong, confident voice wavered at last, turned husky, and he shook his head sharply. “I was ashamed of my star nation, ashamed of my superiors, ashamed of what was about to happen—what I knew had already happened on the way to Cerberus—to an honorable, innocent woman, and ashamed of the way the Navy—my Navy—had been turned into Cordelia Ransom’s executioners. We were better than that. We had to be. And so, just that once, I was.”

Hutch wrote:One more, about Mr. Harahap...

“Well, it turns out that ‘Mwenge’ is a word in a very ancient language, one called Swahili,” Kotarski said now. “And what it translates as is ‘Firebrand.’ I haven’t run down ‘Dupong’ yet, and I don’t intend to, since I’d just as soon not draw any attention to him if someone’s monitoring my data searches, but I’m willing to bet it means the same thing—or something very like it—in yet another ancient language.”

“You mean—?” Szponder said, his own eyes lighting with amusement.

“Exactly. He’s literally told Pokriefke and Mazur and all those aparatczycy over at KWSS that he’s here to burn their house of cards down around their ears, and they’re too damn stupid to realize it!” He shook his head with another chuckle. “How can I not like someone with that sense of humor?”