Lyra hadn't heard that saying before and- ramped up as she was- it sent a shudder through her. "Oh fuck, that we are. Definitely that we are." It was some solid horror-movie shivers, that idea that the whole universe stretched out forever and there was nothing else out there. She liked this aspect of the shivers, because she had no personal weird fucked up connection with aliens, so freaking herself out about it was safe and delicious.
"That's self-involvement again!" she said, jabbing her finger down on the table in an unconscious mirroring of his earlier point. "Thinking that we're the only planet with life? How up-ourselves are we?!"