- Centurion Bochra: You're lying!
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: I never lie when I've got sand in my shoes, Commodore.
- [Worf has refused to serve as donor for a seriously injured Romulan]
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: Lieutenant, I understand your feelings about the Romulans, but this is not the time or the place...
- Lieutenant Worf: If you had seen them kill your parents, you would understand, Doctor. It is always the time and place for those feelings!
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: *This* Romulan didn't murder your parents. And you are the only one who can save his life.
- Lieutenant Worf: Then he will die.
- Lieutenant Worf: I am asked to give up the very lifeblood of my mother and my father to those who murdered them!
- Commander William T. Riker: So you blame all Romulans for that?
- Lieutenant Worf: Yes!
- Commander William T. Riker: Forever? What if someday, the Federation made peace with the Romulans?
- Lieutenant Worf: Impossible.
- Commander William T. Riker: That's what your people said a few years ago, about Humans. Think how many died on both sides in that war. Would you and I be here now like this, if we hadn't been able to let go of the anger and the blame? Where does it end, Worf? If that Romulan dies... does his family carry the bitterness on another generation?
- [La Forge has told Bochra that he was born blind]
- Centurion Bochra: And your parents let you live?
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: What kind of question is that? Of course they let me live!
- Centurion Bochra: No wonder your race is weak. You waste time and resources on defective children.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Lieutenant - sometimes, the moral obligations of command are less than clear. I have to weigh the good of the many against the needs of the individual, and try to balance them as realistically as possible. God knows, I don't always succeed.
- Lieutenant Worf: I have not had cause to complain, Captain.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Oh. Lieutenant, you wouldn't complain even if you had cause.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander Tomalak - it would appear, our away team has located a second man from your "one-man ship".
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander, how is it that we were not informed of the presence of the second Romulan on Galondon Core?
- Commander Tomalak: A simple misunderstanding, Captain Picard. I was obviously misinformed as to the size of the craft. I assure you, I intended no deception.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Of course not.
- Commander Tomalak: You doubt my good faith?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Let's just say my faith would be reinforced by a gesture from you - such as powering down your disruptors.
- [Tomalak turns and nods to someone offscreen]
- Lieutenant Worf: Disruptors powering down.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Thank you. Commander, we will return your officer, and escort your ship to the Neutral Zone.
- Commander Tomalak: That is acceptable.
- Commander Tomalak: Territories! You would measure territories against a man's life?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander, I am singularly impressed by your concern for *a* life. Do not risk any more lives by leaving the Neutral Zone!
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander, both our ships are ready to fight. We have two extremely powerful and destructive arsenals at our command. Our next actions will have serious repercussions. We have good reason to mistrust one another; but we have even better reason to set those differences aside. Now, of course, the question is... who will take the initiative? Who will make the first gesture of trust? - The answer is, I will. I must lower our shields to beam those men up from the planet's surface. Once the shields are down, you will, of course, have the opportunity to fire on us. If you do, you will destroy not only the Enterprise and its crew, but the ceasefire that the Romulans and the Federation now enjoy.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: [to Worf] Lieutenant... lower the shields.
- [O'Brien is trying to get a lock on La Forge, who has gone missing on a stormy planet]
- Chief Miles O'Brien: The electrical storm's creating thousands of ghosts.
- Commander William T. Riker: Well, beam some of those ghosts back; one of them may be Geordi!
- Lieutenant Worf: [on how to deal with the injured Romulan] My Starfleet training tells me one thing. But everything I am tells me another.
- [the crew are debating the recent intrusion of a Romulan ship in Federation space]
- Commander William T. Riker: It obviously wasn't pilot's error. I think it demands a response from us.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: But we must measure our response carefully, or history may remember Galorndon Core along with... Pearl Harbor, and Station Salem One, as the stage for a bloody preamble to war.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: If the point has not yet been made clearly Commander, let me make it again: Romulan warbirds do not enter Federation space unless they are prepared to do battle.
- Commander Tomalak: But on a mission of mercy?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: A mission - to recover one of your officers, who has been caught on a Federation planet, for reasons as yet unknown.
- Commander Tomalak: I have already explained...
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: And I have rejected your explanation!
- [last lines]
- Commander William T. Riker: Close call.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Too close, Number One. Brinkmanship is a dangerous game.
- Commander Tomalak: You have one chance to escape destruction, Picard. Return my officer at once!
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander, you have entered Federation space despite my warning!
- Commander Tomalak: You forced this situation! I will not leave without him.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: He's dead.
- Commander Tomalak: Then he... is but the first to fall, Picard.
- Centurion Bochra: I no more wish to die than you do.
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Bochra - there are times when it's necessary to die for one's ideals. Do you believe this is one of those times?
- [after a long pause, Bochra lowers the phaser]
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Come on. Let's go find that beacon.
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: [Bochra has jerry-rigged a tricorder with Geordi's VISOR to detect the neutrino beacon and they can be rescued] Let er' rip.
- [first lines]
- Commander Riker: Placing beam-out marker. Return transport: 14 minutes 40 seconds. Is your view any better, Geordi?
- Lieutenant Commander La Forge: Not too bad, Commander. A lot of charged-particle precipitation, but I can compensate.
- Lieutenant Worf: Communicators are dysfunctional.
- Commander Riker: Tricorders?
- Lieutenant Worf: Readings only within five metres.
- Commander Riker: Good thing we didn't bring Data. We'd be unscrambling his circuits for a week.