Star Trek: Voyager (TV Series)

Cold Fire (1995)

Gary Graham: Tanis

Photos 

Quotes 

• Tanis : Focus on the goal, not the task.

• Tanis : The people on this ship, they live their lives trapped inside their primitive skulls, depending on flesh and bone to tell them what the universe is like. They don't know what it is to see beyond the physical.

  [he points at a flower] 

  Tanis : Touch it. This is how they know the universe. They touch the flower, their nerve impulses travel up their arm to the brain, and in their mind they sense the moisture of the petals, the texture of the leaves, the sharpness of the thorns, and they think they know what it feels like, but they don't.

  [he gently moves Kes's hand away from the flower] 

  Tanis : Now touch it. Reach out with your thoughts. Feel it for the very first time. Think of nothing but the flower. It's the only object in the universe. Know it. Know it in a way only an Ocampa can.

• Kes : [after burning all the plants to the ground]  I killed those plants - just like I almost killed Tuvok - but I don't want to hurt anybody.

  Tanis : Of course you don't. That's not the point. Hurt people, help them, give life, kill - it's all the same. Once you see beyond the physical, you see the universe as it truly is.

• Tanis : Captain, are you aware of how your ship is regarded, that when Voyager appears, people fear destruction?

  Ocampa Man : Your ship is known as a ship of death.

• Tanis : Because Suspiria is your future.

• Tanis : What would an Ocampa be doing on an alien starship?

  Kes : It's a long story... but I'd like to know what an Ocampa is doing on an alien space station.

  Tanis : That is also a long story.

  Kes : Then I suggest we meet and tell each other our stories.