We are the boys who will go to a particular place, at H-hour, occupy a designated terrain, stand on it, dig the enemy out of their holes, force them then and there to surrender or die.
“How does that poem end?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“What the hell. I’ve always liked a challenge.”
But now, for no reason, we challenge you to defend your honour on the basketball court.
It should be written on every schoolroom blackboard: life is a playground or nothing.
Do you want to play a game?
You may have thought it was a game, but it was also a test! A-ha! A test! Sent out across the universe to find those with the gift to be Starfighters. And here you are, my boy! Here you are!
I nearly died because you were at a ball game?
“C-c-c-clubs, My Lady? Those . . . those aren’t clubs, My Lady—they’re baseball bats!”
“Baseball bats?” What’s a baseball bat?"
“Baseball bats are what the batter uses in a baseball game, My Lady,”
“And what, might a baseball game be?”
“You mean people don’t play baseball on Manticore, My Lady?”
“Not only do they not play baseball—whatever it is—on Manticore, they don’t play it on Gryphon or Sphinx, either. And I’m still waiting for you to tell me what it is, Andrew!”
Why you no-good, stuck-up, scruffy-looking… nerf-herder!
Will someone get this big walking carpet out of my way?
No reward is worth this!
(I know that’s the actual next line, but it’s too perfect not to re-use).
“They’re talking about the Medal of Valor, for God’s sake! You don’t just tell Parliament ‘Thanks but no thanks’ when they offer you the Star Kingdom’s highest award for valor!”
Lincoln Sternn, you stand here accused of 12 counts of murder in the first degree, 14 counts of armed theft of Federation property, 22 counts of piracy in high space, 18 counts of fraud, 37 counts of rape… and one moving violation. How do you plead?
These insane charges do not belong in the Council of Counts. You must make them in a military court, if you make them at all, traitor.
So much for your vaunted justice.
“All right," said Susan. “I’m not stupid. You’re saying humans need… fantasies to make life bearable.”
REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
“Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—”
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
“So we can believe the big ones?”
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
“They’re not the same at all!”
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME…SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
“Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what’s the point—”
MY POINT EXACTLY.”
This may be the universe stopping us from doing something really stupid.
Look, see those birds? At some point a program was written to govern them. A program was written to watch over the trees, and the wind, the sunrise, and sunset. There are programs running all over the place. The ones doing their job, doing what they were meant to do, are invisible. You’d never even know they were here. But the other ones, well, we hear about them all the time. Every time you’ve heard someone say they saw a ghost, or an angel. Every story you’ve ever heard about vampires, werewolves, or aliens, is The System assimilating some program that’s doing something they’re not supposed to be doing.
The program Smith has grown beyond your control. Soon he will spread through this city, as he spread through the matrix. You cannot stop him. But I can.