Patrick Stewart credited as playing...
Captain Jean-Luc Picard
- Capt. Picard: Return that moon to its orbit.
- Q: I have no powers! Q the ordinary.
- Capt. Picard: Q the liar! Q the misanthrope!
- Q: Q the miserable, Q the desperate! What must I do to convince you people?
- Lieutenant Worf: Die.
- Q: Oh, very clever, Worf. Eat any good books lately?
- Q: I've been entirely preoccupied by a most frightening experience of my own. A couple of hours ago, I realized that my body was no longer functioning properly. I felt weak, I could no longer stand. The life was oozing out of me, I lost consciousness.
- Capt. Picard: You fell asleep.
- Lt. Cmdr. Data: Captain, the aliens have disappeared. And so has the shuttle.
- Commander William T. Riker: Scan the sector.
- Lt. Cmdr. Data: I have, sir.
- Capt. Picard: Well... I suppose that is the end of Q.
- [with a flash, Q appears on the bridge with a trumpet, accompanied by a mariachi band]
- Q: AU CONTRAIRE, MON CAPITAINE! HE'S BACK!
- [the band starts playing, accompanied by Q with gusto]
- Q: I'm no longer a member of the Continuum. My superiors have decided to punish me!
- Capt. Picard: And punish us as well, it would seem.
- Capt. Picard: Shuttle occupant, identify yourself.
- Q: [appears onscreen] Don't try to talk me out of it, Jean-Luc.
- Capt. Picard: Q, return to the ship immediately.
- Q: I just can't get used to following orders.
- Lieutenant Worf: Captain, the plasma cloud is moving toward the shuttle.
- Q: It's easier this way. They won't bother you after I'm gone.
- Commander William T. Riker: Engineering, prepare to extend shields.
- Q: Please. Don't fall back on your tired cliché of charging to the rescue just in the nick of time. I don't want to be rescued. My life as a human being has been a dismal failure. Perhaps my death will have a little dignity.
- Capt. Picard: Q, there is no dignity in this suicide.
- Q: [thinks] Yes, I suppose you're right. Death of a coward, then. So be it. But as a human, I would have died of boredom.
- Q: You're right, of course. I'm extraordinarily selfish. But it has served me so well in the past.
- Capt. Picard: It will not serve you here.
- Q: Don't be so hard on me, Jean-Luc. You've been a mortal all your life, you know all about dying. I've never given it a second thought... or a first one, for that matter. I could have been killed. If it hadn't been for Data and that one brief delay he created, I would have been gone. No more me. And no one would have missed me, would they?
- [sighs]
- Q: Data may have sacrificed himself for me. Why?
- Capt. Picard: That is his special nature. He learned the lessons of humanity well.
- Q: When I ask myself if I would have done the same for him, and I am forced to answer, "No," I feel... I feel ashamed.
- Capt. Picard: Q, I am not your father confessor. You will receive no absolution from me. You have brought nothing but pain and suffering to this crew. And I am still not entirely convinced that all this isn't your latest attempt at a puerile joke.
- Q: It is a joke. A joke on me, the joke of the universe. The king who would be man. As I learn more and more what it is to be human, I am more and more convinced that I would never make a good one. I don't have what it takes. Without my powers, I'm frightened of everything. I'm a coward, and I'm miserable. And I can't go on this way.
- Capt. Picard: Fine. You want to be treated as human?
- Q: Absolutely.
- Capt. Picard: All right. Mr. Worf - throw him in the brig!
- Lieutenant Worf: Delighted, Captain.
- [last lines]
- Capt. Picard: Perhaps there's a... residue of humanity in Q after all.
- [raises his hand]
- Capt. Picard: Ensign, en...
- [with a flash, a cigar appears in his hand, with a miniature of Q's head floating in the smoke]
- Q: Don't bet on it, Picard.
- [the Calamarain close in on Q's shuttlecraft]
- Capt. Picard: This goes against my better judgment... Transporter room 3, lock on to shuttle 1, beam it back into its bay.
- Transporter Chief: [over comm] Aye, Captain.
- Capt. Picard: [to Riker] It's a perfectly good shuttlecraft.
- [Picard releases Q from the brig]
- Capt. Picard: If you are human, which I seriously doubt, you will have to work hard to earn our trust.
- Q: I'm not worried about that, Jean-Luc. You only dislike me. There are others in the cosmos who truly despise me.
- Q: You have a moon in a deteriorating orbit. I've known moons through the universe - big ones, small ones. I'm an expert. I could help you with this one, if you let me out of here.
- Capt. Picard: Q, there are millions of lives at risk. If you have the power...
- Q: I don't have any powers! But I have the knowledge, locked up in this puny brain. You cannot afford to not take that advantage, can you?
- Q: I know human beings. They're all sopping over with compassion and forgiveness. They can't wait to absolve... almost any offense. It's an inherent weakness of the breed.
- Capt. Picard: On the contrary, it is a strength.
- Q: You call it what you will. But I think you'll protect me, even though I've tormented you now and again.
- Commander William T. Riker: Fighting off all the species which you've insulted would be a full-time mission. That's not the one I signed up for.
- Capt. Picard: [to the newly mortal Q who's been attacked by an alien race called the Calamarain] You must have so many enemies. Surely you knew that if once you became mortal... some of them might look you up.