- Rommie: Beka, it's a state dinner. That means formal. Pick something.
- Beka Valentine: What if they start shooting? How am I supposed to run in a dress?
- Rommie: Good heavens, what kind of dinner parties have you been to?
- Seamus Harper: That's their Hail To The Chief? It's sounds more like a tuna with a toothache.
- Rommie: It works better underwater. Protocol. Remember, the Castalian dignitaries have musical cues for everything. Music for entering a room, for leaving a room, for proposing a toast. And while they're on this ship, we have to respect their traditions. The Castalian Republic is progressive, peaceful, and stable. If they sign the Commonwealth Charter, they provide us with instant credibility.
- Beka Valentine: And we provide them with the services of the toughest warship in the known universe.
- Rommie: Flatter me all you want. You still have to wear the dress.
- Chancellor Chandos: Fine, then we can broadcast as soon as you have checked our records and the apology is made.
- Captain Dylan Hunt: Apology?
- President Sebastian Lee: I need a formal apology from Tyr Anasazi. Protocol, you know. So tiresome.
- Captain Dylan Hunt: Think more than a few moves ahead, Tyr, and remember the long game. Re-establish the Commonwealth, and we re-establish open inquiry, accountability, and justice.
- Tyr Anasazi: Justice. For Nietzscheans?
- Captain Dylan Hunt: For everyone. Or there's no point.
- Seamus Harper: Uh, Dylan, you're not gonna believe this!
- Beka Valentine: Oh, no. You're not gonna confess again, are you?
- Seamus Harper: I'll resent that tomorrow, but for now, excuse me. Check this out.
- [last lines]
- Rev Bem: Are you familiar with Aeschylus?
- Captain Dylan Hunt: Ancient Earth, right? Greek tragedy?
- Rev Bem: Very good. I was thinking specifically of the Orestean Trilogy. The house of Atreus was cursed by the gods, condemned to murder one another throughout history.
- Captain Dylan Hunt: Orestes' mother killed his father. He was forced to kill her in revenge.
- Rev Bem: Forced to kill, much as Andromeda was forced to kill. Do you remember how the curse was finally ended?
- Captain Dylan Hunt: Apollo invented the jury trial. The jury found Orestes innocent.
- Rev Bem: Indeed. The cycle was broken when public justice replaced private vengeance, just as you are trying to do. Hmm?
- Captain Dylan Hunt: There's only one problem with your analogy, Rev. Apollo was a god. I'm just a man.
- Rev Bem: Mmm...
- Tyr Anasazi: For a man determined to cook history's greatest omelette, you're awfully squeamish about cracking your eggs.
- Tyr Anasazi: So, be just a bit more careful who you're shaking hands with, Captain Hunt. Your fingers might come away bloody.
- [first lines]
- Seamus Harper: I'll say this for the old Commonwealth. When it comes to, uh, formal dinnerware, you guys rule.
- Colonel Yao: Assassinating Sebastian Lee doesn't make sense. So what if the Nietzschean chose an eccentric way... to shoot the president. Assassins have been known to be eccentric.
- Seamus Harper: Not Tyr. Uh, overbearing, self-righteous, vain, vicious, brutal, *way* too serious, and a little big, yeah. But eccentric? No.
- Tyr Anasazi: That's your reconstruction of the crime?
- Captain Dylan Hunt: As of now.
- Tyr Anasazi: I think that's the most pathetic and ill-planned excuse for an assassination I've ever seen. And I speak as one who has had some... slight experience in these matters.
- Captain Dylan Hunt: Well, that was, uh, inflammatory.
- Colonel Yao: There are 20 billion very angry people in the Castalian Republic. If Chandos hadn't assured them of his firm intentions, they'd come up here and tear your ship apart with their bare hands.
- Captain Dylan Hunt: [sarcastically] Something else to look forward to.