- Melora: [to Bashir] Maybe independence isn't all it's cracked up to be; I kind of like how it feels to be dependent on someone for a change. And I'm glad you got me to unlock the doors to my quarters, so I could finally let someone into my life.
- [Quark is serving Fallit Kot selected delicacies]
- Quark: Here's the real treat: Jumbo Vulcan mollusk, sautéed in Rhombolian butter - a taste so exquisite, it's to die for! Er, or, or to live for, for that matter.
- [Quark gets a visit from an old business partner]
- Quark: Just passing through, are you? I'll bet you have business in the Gamma Quadrant. You always had a sharp eye for fresh territories.
- Fallit Kot: Oh, I'm not going to the Gamma Quadrant. My business is right here, with you.
- Quark: With me?
- Fallit Kot: That's right.
- [he leans in]
- Fallit Kot: I've come to kill you, Quark.
- Melora: I'm sorry if I seem overly sensitive. But I'm used to being shut out of the Melora problem. The truth is, there is no Melora problem - until people create one.
- Doctor Bashir: Melora, no one on this station is completely independent. In space, we all depend on one another, to some degree.
- Melora: I just want you all to know that you can depend on me.
- Doctor Bashir: You've proven that. Now, what do the rest of us have to do to convince you?
- Melora: Of what?
- Doctor Bashir: That you can depend on us.
- Quark: [of Fallit Kot] He threatened to kill me.
- [Odo answers with a broad smile]
- Quark: What?
- Odo: Nothing. Just a passing thought.
- Quark: Odo, he means it! Nothing I do seems to change his mind. You've got to do something.
- Odo: I'll do my job, Quark.
- Quark: Yeah...
- [leaves Odo's office]
- Odo: Unfortunately...
- [Dr. Bashir has given Melora a treatment enabling her to walk around without motor controls]
- Melora: I don't understand myself. How can I possibly have second thoughts? This would mean real independence. It's everything I ever wished for. But then I start to think about home, and how I will never be able to go back. Well, maybe just for a short visit, but... never *really* go back.
- Lieutenant Jadzia Dax: The Little Mermaid.
- Melora: Mermaid?
- Lieutenant Jadzia Dax: It's an Earth fable by Hans Christian Andersen. She trades her magical life under the sea for a pair of legs, to walk on land.
- Melora: Didn't she live happily ever after?
- [being an Elaysian, Melora has to use a wheelchair to get around the station]
- Lieutenant Jadzia Dax: Julian knows more of your capabilities than any of us.
- Melora: I don't need a medical opinion to tell me my own capabilities.
- Commander Sisko: Ensign.
- Melora: I simply object to being treated like someone who is ill.
- Commander Sisko: I don't see anybody doing that.
- Melora: Try sitting in the chair, Commander. No one can understand until they sit in the chair.
- Fallit Kot: I'm tired of your gifts, Quark. All I want is your miserable life.
- Quark: Wait! Everything's negotiable.
- Odo: We have something in common.
- Fallit Kot: We do?
- Odo: I don't like Quark either. But I can't let you kill him.
- Fallit Kot: Kill him? Did he tell you I was going to do that?
- Odo: I know of your history together.
- Fallit Kot: Let bygones be bygones, I always say.
- Odo: And I always say, you can tell a man's intentions by the way he walks.
- [Fallit Kot has kidnapped Quark and a couple of Starfleet officers in a runabout, threatening to kill everyone on board if they don't lose the pursuing vessel]
- Quark: Great! We escape, and he's got something special planned for me. We don't escape, and I just die, with everyone else. Am I missing a choice here, Fallit?
- [Melora and Bashir - a little clumsier - are floating in a low gravity environment]
- Doctor Bashir: [ecstatic] This is astonishing! I can't tell you how curios I was about this.
- Melora: Most people are. Sometimes they make me feel like a carnival attraction. So usually I prefer to keep everyone out.
- Doctor Bashir: Well, thank you - for letting me in.
- [Melora and Dax are discussing subspace relationships]
- Lieutenant Jadzia Dax: Love across light years - it's just so...
- Melora: It lacks intimacy.
- Lieutenant Jadzia Dax: You could say that.
- Melora: I finish my mission here, I move on to the next one...
- [sighs]
- Melora: What kind of future is that for a romance?
- Lieutenant Jadzia Dax: Look at the alternative.
- Melora: I guess.
- [first lines]
- Doctor Bashir: Medical log, stardate 47229.1. Chief O'Brian and I have been working overtime to prepare for the arrival of a new cartographer. Ensign Melora Pazlar is the first Elaysian to join Starfleet and, as such, requires special accomodations.
- Melora Pazlar: I dreamt about exploring the stars as a child. And I wasn't going to allow any *handicap*, not a chair, not a Cardassian station, to stop me from chasing that dream.