- Moriarty: Is the definition of life "Cogito ergo sum" - I think, therefore I am?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Yes, that is one possible definition.
- Moriarty: It is the most important one - and for me, the only one that matters.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Data - I mean, Holmes, old boy - what are we looking for?
- Lt. Commander Data: For whatever finds us, my dear Watson.
- Moriarty: Perhaps we'll meet again, madam.
- Doctor Pulaski: It could be a long time. Time won't pass for you, but I may be an old woman.
- Moriarty: But I'll still fill you with crumpets, madam.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Clancy, I'll be gone for a while. See that no one touches this.
- Ensign Clancy: Aye, sir. And where can I reach you?
- Lt. Commander Data: He can be reached at 221B Baker Street!
- Ensign Clancy: Sir?
- Lt. Commander Data: In programming Moriarty to defeat me - not Holmes - he had to be able to acquire something which I possess.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: What exactly?
- Lt. Commander Data: Consciousness, sir. Without it, he could not defeat me.
- Moriarty: My mind is crowded with images, thoughts I do not understand, yet cannot purge; they plague me. You and your associate look and act so oddly. Yet though I have never met nor seen the like of either of you, I am familiar with you both; it's very confusing. I have felt new realities at the edge of my consciousness readying to break through. Surely, Holmes, if that's who you truly are, you of all people can appreciate what I mean.
- Doctor Pulaski: I have no idea what you're talking about.
- Moriarty: Of course you do, madam. The more you proclaim your ignorance, the more you try to mislead me, the more I'm on to you. Your every silence speaks volumes.
- Doctor Pulaski: Good. Then if you know what I'm saying when I'm not saying anything, what do you need me for?
- [she gets up]
- Doctor Pulaski: Thank you for the tea and crumpets. I guess I'll be going.
- Commander William T. Riker: [to Worf, who is dressed in a 19th-century suit] You'd be a big hit in London.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: The Doctor was right. Finally, we have a game worth playing.
- Moriarty: [entering the scene] The time for games is over.
- Lt. Commander Data: Professor Moriarty, I presume?
- Lt. Commander Data: Geordi, I've just had a strange conversation with your assistant. Although it is three days until we rendezvous with Starship "Victory", she...
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: She believes it has already arrived? Not the starship, my friend.
- [Geordi shows Data a model of the HMS Victory]
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: The original. This is my gift to the Victory's Captain Zimbata.
- Lt. Commander Data: Ah, most unusual.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: I served with him as an ensign. Sure wish he'd been in command of this Victory. Wind and sail. That's the proper way to move a ship.
- Lt. Commander Data: But Geordi, your Starfleet specialty is antimatter power, dilithium regulators...
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: That's exactly why this fascinates me, Data. See, it's human nature to love what we don't have. Simpler days, huh? Anyway, stringing this rigging has made me dream of handling sails...
- Lt. Commander Data: This is not a computer simulation?
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Data, the whole point in doing something like this is to make it by hand.
- Moriarty: [describing the Enterprise] A great monstrous shape, on which I am like a fly stuck on a turtle's back, adrift in a great emptiness.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: You all right?
- Doctor Pulaski: Yes, except for being crammed full of crumpets.
- Moriarty: Whatever I was when this began... I have grown. I am understanding more and more; and I am able to use the power at my fingertips.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: I can't help thinking how... or what else might have happened, all because I misspoke a single word.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: [referring to the model of the HMS Victory] I'll assume she'll be shipshape and Bristol fashion.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: "Bristol fashion", sir?
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: It's an old navy phrase, meaning everything in perfect order.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Hm... Yes, sir.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: As are we, Mr. La Forge.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Yes, sir.
- Moriarty: If I destroy these surroundings, this vessel, can you say that it doesn't matter to you? Interesting pun, don't you think? For matter is what I am not.
- Moriarty: And like the spider, I feel the strings vibrate whenever anyone new chances into my web. Welcome, my dear Holmes, but not Holmes and Dr. Watson, but not Watson.
- Doctor Pulaski: You're wasting your breath, Lieutenant. Saying that to Data is like asking a computer not to compute.
- Lt. Commander Data: Am I so different from you, Doctor? Are you able to cease thinking on command?
- Doctor Pulaski: All that he knows is stored in his memory banks. Inspiration, original thought, all the true strength of Holmes, it's not possible for your friend.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Data, what was the point in going to the holodeck?
- Lt. Commander Data: To solve a Sherlock Holmes mystery.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Exactly, but you've got them all memorized. The first time anyone opens their mouth, you've got it solved. So, there's really no mystery.
- Doctor Pulaski: Your artificial friend doesn't have a prayer of solving a Holmes mystery that he hasn't read.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: If this murder isn't connected to the disappearance of Dr. Pulaski, then the computer is running an independent program.
- Lt. Commander Data: Yes.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Why?
- Lt. Commander Data: I do not know. And that is what puzzles me.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Then you don't know what's going to happen next?
- Lt. Commander Data: No.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Aw, that's what I want to hear. Where to, now?
- Lt. Commander Data: We will find Dr. Pulaski in here.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: How do you know that?
- Lt. Commander Data: It's the only obvious choice.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Well, why is the obvious choice all of the sudden, the right one. I mean, isn't this a game of misdirection?
- Lt. Commander Data: Not anymore. He wants us to find him.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Who does?
- Lt. Commander Data: The master criminal, the man Holmes could only defeat at the cost of his own life at Reichenbach Falls. Our adversary, my dear Watson, is none other than Professor Moriarty, himself.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Theorize, Data. What are his limits?
- Lt. Commander Data: He is still a fictional character, sir, originally programmed with 19th century knowledge.
- Commander William T. Riker: Which now has access to 24the centruy knowledge.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: What does he need to make use of that?
- Lt. Commander Data: Only time, sir.
- Lt. Commander Data: What do these footfalls tell you, Watson?
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: That we're on the right track.
- Lt. Commander Data: More particularly, that our opposition consists of two men, and one of them is carrying the bound and gagged Dr. Pulaski.
- Lieutenant Geordi La Forge: Now, you know all this because you read it in a Holmes story, right?
- Lt. Commander Data: Not at all. Because we do not hear the doctor's footfalls, we must assume that she is being carried. And since we do not hear her cries for help. we know that she is gagged. Further, both sets of footfalls are heavy and masculine. One man seems to have shuffled and stumbled in an irregular pattern. Since the ground is level, we must conclude that Dr. Pulaski is struggling against one of her captors, sporadically knocking him off stride. Deduction, pure and simple.
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard: I suspect you shook this ship in order to get my attention. Well, now you have it. What is it you want?
- Moriarty: The same thing you want for yourself. To continue to exist.