- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Your... arrogant pretense at being the moral guardians of the universe strikes me as being hollow, Q. I see no evidence that you're guided by a superior moral code or any code whatsoever. You may be nearly omnipotent, and I don't deny that your... parlor tricks are very impressive. But morality, I don't see it. I don't acknowledge it, Q! I would put human morality against the Q's any day. And perhaps that's the reason that we fascinate you so - because our puny behavior shows you a glimmer of the one thing that evades your omnipotence: a moral center. And if so, I can think of no crueler irony than that you should destroy this young woman, whose only crime is that she's too human.
- Q: Jean-Luc... Sometimes I think the only reason I come here is to listen to these wonderful speeches of yours.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: You've made yourself judge and jury - and if necessary, executioner. By what right have you appointed yourself to this position?
- Q: Superior morality.
- Q: She was being impetuous. She'll just have to start behaving like a Q.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: If I'm not mistaken, she just did.
- [after Amanda has smashed Q against a wall]
- Q: Very impressive the way you contained that explosion. What else have you done?
- Amanda Rogers: I-I don't understand.
- Q: Telekinesis, teleportation? Spontaneous combustion of someone you don't like?
- [shoots a meaningful glance at Picard]
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander, have you been able to determine the cause of the warp breach?
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: No, sir. Everything was normal, and then suddenly it's like the laws of physics went right out the window.
- [characteristic flash of Q appearing]
- Q: And why shouldn't they? They're so inconvenient.
- Q: What is it about these squirming little infants that you find so appealing?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: I'm sure that's beyond your comprehension, Q.
- Q: I desperately hope so.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: [on Amanda's parents] The circumstance of their death's quite odd. A tornado somehow escaped the weather modification net and touched down in only one spot - Amanda's home.
- Q: Well - you can never predict the weather.
- Amanda Rogers: If suddenly you could make anything happen - what would it be?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: Well, I would... probably want to heal people - people who are hopelessly ill.
- Amanda Rogers: Hm... Would you bring your husband back?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: [sighs] Amanda, I don't know. And I don't think that I could make... a decision like that until I was actually faced with it.
- Amanda Rogers: I *am* faced with it.
- [Amanda has seduced Riker and made him love her, yet without the result she had hoped for]
- Amanda Rogers: You're right - none of this is real. I thought it would be romantic. But it's empty.
- [last lines]
- Amanda Rogers: I hope I can come back and... see you.
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: You're a Q. You can do anything you want!
- Q: [of Riker] You're attracted to him!
- Amanda Rogers: I am not.
- Q: I think you are. How repulsive! How do you stand that hair all over his face?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: [Picard, Riker, Crusher, LaForge and Troi have assembled in the Observation Lounge to discuss Amanda Rogers, a new intern aboard the Enterprise, who mysteriously contained a warp core breach by sheer force of will alone] She's a little shaken up, but she's gonna be fine.
- Commander William T. Riker: You said she was adopted. Could she be an alien?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: She's human. There's nothing more unusual about her. Not that my instruments can detect.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Commander, have you been able to determine the cause of the warp breach?
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: No, Sir. Everything was normal and then suddenly it's like the laws of physics went right out the window.
- Q: [Q materialises in one of the empty chairs wearing his usual Starfleet uniform] And why shouldn't they? They're so inconvenient.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: [a collective air of dismay suddenly descends on the room] Q!
- Q: Mon Capitan.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Are you responsible for this incident in Engineering?
- Q: [surprisingly upfront about it] Of course. I needed to find out if what I suspected about the girl were true.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: That being?
- Q: That she's a Q.
- Counselor Deanna Troi: Amanda's a Q?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: How is that possible? Her, her parents... her biological parents were human.
- Q: Well, not exactly. They had assumed human form in order to visit Earth, I suppose for... for amusement. But in vulgar human fashion they proceeded to conceive a child...
- [he winks at Beverly who looks thoroughly insulted]
- Q: ... and then like mawkish humans they became attached to it. What is it about these squirming little infants that you find so appealing?
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: I'm sure that's beyond your comprehension, Q.
- Q: I desperately hope so.
- Counselor Deanna Troi: What happened to Amanda's parents?
- Q: They died in an accident.
- [that gets Picard's attention but keeps it to himself for now]
- Q: None of us knew whether she had inherited the capacities of the Q but recently they've begun to emerge and er... as an expert in humanity... I was sent to investigate.
- Commander William T. Riker: You... an expert in humanity?
- Q: Not a very challenging field of study, I grant you.
- Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Are you saying that you created a core breach just to test this girl?
- Q: Uh huh.
- Counselor Deanna Troi: What would have happened if she couldn't stop it?
- Q: Then I would have known she wasn't a Q.
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: And now that you know - what do you intend to do?
- Q: Instruct her. If this child does not learn how to control her power she may accidentally destroy herself... or all of you... or perhaps your entire galaxy?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: I find it hard to believe that you're here to do us a favour.
- Q: You're quite right. I wouldn't. But there are those in the Continuum...
- [raises his eyes skyward]
- Q: ... who have an over exaggerated sense of responsibility. They think that we need to take precautions to keep the little dear from running amok.
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: And once you've taught her... then you'll go away?
- Q: And leave her here? Of course not. She'll come back to the Continuum where she belongs.
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: Wait a minute! You, you can't just come in here and take her away from everything she's ever known.
- Q: [laughs that off] I assure you I can.
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: She has plans for herself. She wants to have a career and a family.
- Q: I'm rescuing her from that miserable existence.
- Doctor Beverly Crusher: That miserable existence is all she's known for the last eighteen years. You have no right to take her away from it!
- Q: [bored with the direction this conversation has taken] Mon Capitan, I really think that we need to speak privately.
- [Q transports them both to Picard's Ready Room]
- Q: Well, there, that's better. Crusher gets more shrill with each passing year.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Very well, I will introduce you; but... we cannot argue like this in front of her. We must at least appear to be...
- Q: [putting an arm around Picard's shoulder] Pals?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Civil.
- Q: [on Amanda] None of us knew whether she had inherited the capacities of the Q, but recently they've begun to emerge, and, uh, as an expert in humanity, I was sent to investigate.
- Commander William T. Riker: You, an expert in humanity?
- Q: Not a very challenging field of study, I grant you.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Amanda, er... Allow me to introduce... er... Q... Er, he's, erm... he's an acquaintance of ours. We've, er, we've known him... for years...
- Amanda Rogers: Ever since I got here I've been fighting this. I've been denying the truth - denying what I am. I am Q.
- Q: [to Amanda, after she found Q hiding inside a barrel in an Enterprise cargo bay] Not bad. Not bad at all.
- [after Riker shows her to her quarters and she is alone, Amanda sees something amiss]
- Amanda Rogers: Oh no...
- [Scene shows the living room where a litter of cute Labrador retriever puppies are huddled on the floor]
- Amanda Rogers: [about her earlier statement of having a dozen dogs] No, no, no, I didn't mean it! Oh no!
- [Amanda walks over to the living room are and gets down on the floor; to the puppies]
- Amanda Rogers: You guys can't stay here!
- [a small group of puppies disappear magically]
- Amanda Rogers: [to another group of puppies] Come on, all of you.
- [the puppies disappear, until two remain. Amanda picks up one puppy, sweetly]
- Amanda Rogers: Hello.
- [kisses the puppy]
- Amanda Rogers: [Amanda picks up the other puppy]
- Amanda Rogers: Come here little one.
- [She kisses the two puppies affectionately; gently]
- Amanda Rogers: You two, come on. Come on.
- [Amanda sets the puppies down. The puppies vanish. Amanda sighs, relieved but slightly worried]
- Q: You have it within yourself the ability to refrain from using the power of the Q. If you can do that, you can stay here.
- Amanda Rogers: Then I'm staying here.
- Q: Think about this. This is not so easy. Your parents were given this choice and they were unable to resist the temptation of using their power.
- Commander William T. Riker: You're a very lovely young lady, but none of this is real.
- Amanda Rogers: My feelings are real.
- Commander William T. Riker: I know, but you can't make someone love you.
- Amanda Rogers: Can't I?
- Commander William T. Riker: Oh Amanda, you're so beautiful.
- [kisses her neck]
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: I have no reason to believe that Q is lying. He claims he has orders from the Continuum. If Amanda cannot prove that she is fully Q, then he must kill her.
- Q: Well, to put it simply, we're omnipotent. There's nothing, nothing we can't do.
- Amanda Rogers: And what do you do with this power?
- Q: Anything we want.
- Amanda Rogers: Do you use it to help others?
- Q: I think you've missed the point, my dear. Clearly, you've spent far too much time with humans.
- Amanda Rogers: I'd like to know what my parents looked like, my real parents.
- Q: How quaint. So, do it.
- Amanda Rogers: What do you mean?
- Q: Summon the image.
- [first lines]
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: [voiceover] Captain's log, stardate 46192.3. We have arrived at Starbase 112 and are loading relief supplies destined for Tagra 4, an ecologically devastated planet in the Argolis Cluster. We have also taken on a rather unusual passenger.