Miles O'Brien quotes from Deep Space Nine

Miles O'Brien

Have you ever won a case?

Kovat

Winning isn't everything.

Miles O'Brien

You don't know me very well, Constable, but I've been in service to the Federation—Starfleet—all my adult life. No one has ever questioned my loyalty. No one in my entire life has ever had cause to ask, “Miles O'Brien, are you a criminal?” I took an oath to defend the Federation and what it stands for. I don't steal from them. I don't lie to them. I'm no angel, but I try to live every day as the best human being I know how to be. I need my little girl to wake up in the morning and look up at me and see a man she can respect. Until now, she always could.

Odo

Being accused of a crime is not a disgrace, Chief. Some of the great figures of history have shared the honor with you.

Miles O'Brien

I didn't figure on dying a martyr.

Odo

Not all of them were martyrs; not all of them died. Some of them were just innocent men, like you.

Chief O'Brien

[discussing the Jem'Hadar youth] I still don't understand why they would engineer someone to be addicted to a certain chemical.

Odo

I suspect it's another way of ensuring the loyalty of the Jem'Hadar to the Founders. If your soldiers are addicted to a drug that can't be replicated and only you can provide, that gives you a great deal of control over them.

Chief O'Brien

Seems a pretty cold-blooded thing to do.

Odo

My people don't have blood, chief.

Julian Bashir

Nervous, Chief?

Miles O'Brien

What are you talking about?

Julian Bashir

That's your fifth cup of coffee in twenty minutes.

Miles O'Brien

I didn't realize you were keeping track.

Julian Bashir

Oh, nervous and irascible.

Miles O'Brien

If you hadn't seen your wife and child for two months, you'd be irascible too.

Julian Bashir

Well, believe me, I'm looking forward to Keiko and Molly's visit as much as you are.

Miles O'Brien

Ha, I doubt that.

Julian Bashir

How many games of raquetball have we played in the last two months?

Miles O'Brien

I don't know. Fifteen, maybe twenty.

Julian Bashir

Try seventy. I've been keeping track of that, too, and do you know what all those games have proved to me? That I'm a poor substitute for your wife.

Miles O'Brien

I could have told you that sixty games ago.

O'Brien

Quark?

Quark

Yes?

O'Brien

Dabo.

Quark

Dabo? Huh?

Dabo!

Quark

O'Brien! Wait!

Julian Bashir

And you, Chief, you represent my uncertainty and my doubt.

Miles O'Brien

No I don't!

Chief O'Brien

I never thought I'd say this, but right now I'm glad the Dominion's around. Otherwise, we never would have started these upgrades, let alone have them almost finished by now.

Major Kira

There's something to be said for incentive.

Chief O'Brien

Uh-huh. I just hope everything works okay.

Major Kira

You're saying you're not sure?

Chief O'Brien

The way I see it, there are two possibilities: either everything will be fine, or...

Major Kira

Or?

Chief O'Brien

[slightly hesitant] Or we end up blowing the station to pieces. [chuckles]

Major Kira

Oh. Well, let's hope we don't have to find out.

Miles O'Brien

Keiko only spends a few days at a time on the station. I'm the one living in those quarters, and if I want to set up a little workshop in the bedroom—

Julian Bashir

You set up a workshop in the bedroom?

Miles O'Brien

Yeah. I don't use it when she's visiting.

Julian Bashir

No, of course not.

Miles O'Brien

She says I'm trying to live like a bachelor again, that I'm expressing a subconscious desire to push her out of our quarters.

Julian Bashir

Now that is ridiculous.

Miles O'Brien

That's what I said!

Julian Bashir

I mean, if anything, by spending your free time in the bedroom, a place you intimately associate with Keiko, you are actually expressing...a desire to be closer to her...during her absence. It's quite touching, really.

Miles O'Brien

Exactly! Exactly! See, you understand. Why can't she see that? Why can't she be more like—

Julian Bashir

More like?

Miles O'Brien

[Beat] Uh, a man. Y—you know, more like a man.

Julian Bashir

So...you wish that Keiko...was a man.

Miles O'Brien

I wish I was on this trip with someone else, that's what I wish.

Bashir

What a lovely place. Smells like a garbage dump.

O'Brien

I'm sorry I couldn't find a nicer place to crash-land. Should we try again?

Lt. Commander Worf

When was the last time the wormhole opened?

Major Kira Nerys

Twelve hours ago.

Worf

Perhaps it has returned to normal?

Kira

I suppose so.

Chief Miles O'Brien

You sound disappointed, Major.

Kira

I guess I am. Part of me was hoping that the Prophets were behind it, that they were finally going to show themselves to the Bajoran people.

Worf

I prefer Klingon beliefs.

Kira

I suppose your gods aren't as cryptic as ours.

Worf

Our gods are dead. Ancient Klingon warriors slew them millennia ago. They were more trouble than they were worth. [Kira and O'Brien exchange looks]

Kira

I don't think I'll ever understand Klingons.

O'Brien

Don't worry about it, Major. Nobody does. That's the way they like it.

Chief O'Brien

You probably wouldn't understand this, Quark, but when you care about a place and it's in trouble and you want to do something about it, and you can't, it's very frustrating.

Quark

I know exactly what you mean! When the Great Monetary Collapse hit Ferenginar, I was hundreds of light-years away serving as a ship's cook on a long-haul freighter. I can't tell you the heartbreak I suffered, knowing that rampant inflation and currency devaluation were burning like wildfires through the lush financial foliage of my home. It still depresses me, even today. I remembered thinking my accounts needed me and there was nothing I could do! I felt so... so helpless. So you see, I do understand.

Chief O'Brien

Somehow, you telling me that doesn't make me feel the least bit better.

Miles O'Brien

I don't know why Captain Sisko insists on me being here. I'm not a senior officer.

Julian Bashir

Maybe he just wanted to see you in your dress uniform. It does show off your figure.

Julian Bashir

What you have there is a sebaceous cyst.

Miles O'Brien

I know it's a cyst, but it's getting bigger.

Julian Bashir

There's nothing to worry about. Dermatalogically speaking, you're perfectly healthy.

Miles O'Brien

Oh, I'm perfectly healthy, except I've got a disgusting cyst on the back of my neck. Now either I paint a nose, eyes, and mouth on it and pretend I've got two heads, or you take it off.

Julian Bashir

I'll get you some paint.

Miles O'Brien

Julian! Get it off me!

Julian Bashir

Alright, alright. But you know what they say: two heads are better than one.

Miles O'Brien

Julian, I'm waiting!

Julian Bashir

It is sort of a shame to pack this stuff away.

Miles O'Brien

Wish we didn't have to.

Julian Bashir

It's like a sculpture, a monument to your year as a bachelor.

Miles O'Brien

I suppose it is.

Julian Bashir

Who are we to dismantle this piece of art?

Miles O'Brien

I don't know. But if we don't, Keiko will dismantle me.

Julian Bashir

Chief?

Miles O'Brien

Get outta here, Julian.

Julian Bashir

You don't want to do this, Chief.

Miles O'Brien

The hell I don't.

Julian Bashir

Look, I don't claim to know what you're going through, but whatever it is, it's not worth dying for.

Miles O'Brien

You don't understand at all. I'm not doing this for me. I'm doing it to protect Keiko and Molly and everyone else on this station.

Julian Bashir

Protect us from what?

Miles O'Brien

From me. I'm not the man I used to be. I'm dangerous. I nearly hit Molly today. All she wanted was a little attention, and I nearly hit her.

Julian Bashir

But you didn't. You're a good man, Miles Edward O'Brien, and whatever it is you think you've done wrong, you don't deserve to die.