The Outer Limits

The Control Voice:
There is nothing wrong with your television. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are now controlling the transmission. We control the horizontal and the vertical. We can deluge you with a thousand channels or expand one single image to crystal clarity and beyond. We can shape your vision to anything our imagination can conceive. For the next hour we will control all that you see and hear. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the deepest inner mind to the outer limits.

The Control Voice:
Sometimes to uncover what is hidden we must first be made to look.

The Control Voice:
We rely on others to inform us, but wisdom can never be taught. And we must always decide the truth for ourselves.

Robert Beck:
I don't understand

Dr. Theresa Givens:
Only one of us has to.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Our yesterdays are like a string of pearls - unbroken, unchanging - but if we could change our past, would that also change who we are?

Dr. Theresa Givens:
No one should outlive their dreams.

Dr. Theresa Givens:
Work with me, Jamie Pratt!

Jamie Pratt:
How the hell do you know my name?

Dr. Theresa Givens:
That doesn't matter! What matters, and what you want to know, is whether I killed those men. And I did it. I killed all twenty monsters. And because of me, eighty-three women are still alive.

Jamie Pratt:
You couldn't have! You were only five years old!

Dr. Theresa Givens:
[Grabs Pratt's arm and drags her to the time portal] Time travel. A means by which to stop crime before it starts.

Alien Inquisitor:
Perhaps it's not too late. Danielle was right. You were the reason this experiment was conducted.

Cody Phillips:
Why?

Alien Inquisitor:
Because the day was coming when you would've pointed that gun at your fellow students.

Cody Phillips:
No, I don't believe that, no...

Alien Inquisitor:
In a fit of rage, the human is capable of anything. Fortunately, not all of the patterns of behavior you fall into are permanent. You have shown here that you are still capable of change.

Cody Phillips:
I don't understand.

Alien Inquisitor:
I think you do...

The Control Voice:
Care must be taken to protect our greatest resourse our children.

Alien Inquisitor:
Perhaps it's not too late. [Cody gets up] Danielle was right. You were the reason this experiment was conducted.

Cody Phillips:
Why?

Alien Inquisitor:
Because the day was coming when you would've pointed that gun at your fellow students.

Cody Phillips:
No, I don't believe that, no...

Alien Inquisitor:
In a fit of rage, a human is capable of anything. Fortunately, not all of the patterns of behavior you fall into are permanent. You have shown here that you are still capable of change.

Cody Phillips:
I don't understand.

Alien Inquisitor:
I think you do...

The Control Voice:
The Roman philosopher Boethius said, "In other living creatures, the ignorance of themselves is nature, but in men, it is a vice." Imagine treading into the deeper recesses of one's self and finding someone you never knew existed.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
People have long feared invasion by forces from other worlds. If that horror comes to pass, our leaders will stand as our first line of defense... unless, of course, our leaders themselves are invaders.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
There is an old proverb that says, "Be careful what you wish for, for it might come true." And if your wish is for immortality, it is something you will have to live with for a very long time.

The Control Voice:
Humankind has long tried to tame the forces the nature - to harness their power for our needs, but what if the very needs that drive us are the greatest power of all? Will we be able to control ourselves?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
The urge to hunt and kill, the need to mate and multiply - these are our most primitive human drives, but they pale in comparison to the most powerful human drive of all: the need for love.

The Control Voice:
Every child born is linked in a chain to generations past and future, but what happens when that chain is snapped?

Sherry McAllister:
I still hope the time will come when being a mother will be [gasps, catches herself, exhales] the most important job in the world.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Just as we inherited the earth of our forefathers, we, too, will bequeath this world so long as there are children to claim the inheritance.

Seth Todtman:
Oh come on, Martin. Are you trying to tie me up in logical knots like I was some sort of war game computer you can crash with a game of Tic-Tac-Toe?

Angie:
It doesn't matter how much you love him. You can't change who you are.

Ady Sutton:
I don't just love Norman. I really do care about him.

The Control Voice:
When we look in a mirror, we see a reflection of ourselves, but how much more powerful than this is the reflection we see in the eyes of another, especially in the eyes of one we hold to be more beautiful than ourselves?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
We all wear masks - illusions of what we want the world to see - but when we hide our true selves from those we love, what price do we pay for that deception?

[to Vince and Andy]

Lt. Winters:
You two men don't have the sense of a jackass between ya!

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
It is said the human capacity for language is the quality which separates us from all other species on earth. Perhaps it is also the same quality which can link us to those beyond... but only if we are willing to listen.

The Control Voice:
Those who seek to predict the future might first look to the past. The past is a mirror, and those who ignore its sometimes dark reflection, are doomed to repeat it.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Will it be those seeking redemption who shall decide the future or will those driven only by greed and envy shape our destiny. Even a hundred years later, the outcome is still very much in doubt.

The Control Voice:
It is said that God made man in His image, but man fell from grace. Still, man has retained from his humble beginnings the innate desire to create, but how will man's creations fair? Will they attain a measure of the divine or will they, too, fall from grace?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Empathy, sacrifice, love. These qualities are not confined to walls of flesh and blood, but are found within the deepest, best parts of man's soul, no matter where that soul resides.

Carrie Emerson:
Miss Link, how do you know that the robot was actually reading the material you provided?

Mina Link:
He looked at it, and he remembered it. I don't know how else...

Carrie Emerson:
Wasn't he merely scanning the documentation, like any photocopying machine, storing it like any laptop computer?

Mina Link:
Laptop computers don't enjoy poetry. Adam liked to hear the sound of poetry, particularly when I read it to him.

Carrie Emerson:
Wasn't the robot merely reacting the way you wanted it to, the way it was programmed to?

Mina Link:
You don't get it. Shortly after my mother died, Adam and I were in the lab together, and I started to cry. And Adam came over and asked me what was wrong. I told him to go away. And then Adam said something to me that I will remember as long as I live. He said to me, "Mina, I will never leave you." Look, don't you see? He was trying to console me. He saw that I was in pain, and he wanted it to stop. That is not something that can be programmed, Miss Emerson. That is something that comes from inside, deep inside. It's what makes us human.

Thurman Cutler:
I'm about to push constitutional protection to the point of absurdity.

Adam:
I was not aware that this hearing was intended to be a lesson in the absurd.

Thurman Cutler:
I can't expect you to see the beauty in this, but I'm gonna force that judge to put a talking mannequin, albeit a highly sophisticated one, on trial for murder.

Adam:
Is that how you see me, Mr. Cutler, as a talking mannequin?

Thurman Cutler:
Your design and your construction are nothing short of genius, but even you must understand that you're basically a takeoff on the thoughts and feelings that Dr. Link programmed into you. A man suffers, a man bleeds, a man has a soul...

Adam:
[the robot reaches through the bars of the cell before the man can react, grabbing him around the throat] I could snap your neck as if it were a toothpick. In that sense, you're right. I'm not like most men. But like most men, I choose not to.

Adam:
Let me go.

Adam:
Why? Because I have respect for life, all life, even that of a jaded attorney who wants to put a talking mannequin on trial to discredit the legal system. [He releases him] You don't know me, Mr. Cutler. You don't know anything about me. The thought that Dr. Link, my creator, my friend, is dead, saddens me to no end. And the thought that I may have killed him, even if by accident, is abhorrent to me. Do you understand? I do suffer. But unlike men, my face doesn't show my feelings. Now, please, leave me alone...

The Control Voice:
Ghosts, haunted houses. Many maintain that such concepts have no place in our computerized 20th-century reality, but until man conquers death, one inevitable question will always linger within the recesses of the human mind: what lies beyond?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
What lies beyond? For each of us, the answer awaits at the end of life's journey. Until then, we must live with the ghosts that dwell, not in some musty basement, but within the recesses of the human soul.

The Control Voice:
If our lives are indeed the sum total of the choices we've made, then we cannot change who we are. But with every new choice we're given, we can change who we're going to be.

[last lines]

Leslie:
What do you see?

Stanley:
[surveys the widespread devastation outside from the window of an apartment on a higher floor] Another day.

The Control Voice:
Perhaps how we face death is not as important as how we face life - to live each day with hope, with courage and with love... as if it were our last.

The Control Voice:
[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Throughout history, the search for faith has led man to look to the stars and the heavens for answers, but only by looking into ourselves may we truly find it.

The Control Voice:
Before we allow ourselves to be consumed by our regrets, we should remember the mistakes we make in life are not so important as the lessons we draw from them.

The Control Voice:
Man has taught computers to perform complex calculations, to control a factory, or to launch a spaceship, but can we teach computers to enjoy the beauty of a rose, the sound of a symphony, or the love of another human being?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
As we become ever dependent on technology, we may find that a walk down the road paved in circuitry leads us on a path of no return.

Mona Lisa 37X:
You're the first human I met that was nice to me.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
Well don't expect it to happen again.

Mona Lisa 37X:
But I want to be your friend. You want to be friends don't you? I don't think it would be very nice if we weren't.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
What happens to people if they're not your friend?

Mona Lisa 37X:
Bad things.

Mona Lisa 37X:
How could you do that, Teddi?

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
I made a mistake.

Mona Lisa 37X:
I never did anything to you.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
Well, I was scared of you, all right?

Mona Lisa 37X:
And you acted like you were my friend, you told me about your daughter. And then, and then Dr. Haley comes to take me away like I was something you turned in at lost and found. You weren't even acting like a human being.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
Wanna bet?

Mona Lisa 37X:
No. Not a nice one.

Mona Lisa 37X:
When you decide to have a child, you decide forever to have your heart walking around outside your body.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
That is exactly what it's like. Did you just make that up?

Mona Lisa 37X:
No. It was Elizabeth Stone. She's a writer.

Mona Lisa 37X:
What's your name?

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
Teddi.

Mona Lisa 37X:
That's a funny name for a girl.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
I'm way past being a girl. Guess my dad never wanted one to begin with. That's why he called me Teddi. Theodora, actually. It's for Ted Williams. The baseball player.

Mona Lisa 37X:
Boston Red Sox. Last 400 hitter in the major leagues. Lifetime batting average .344.

Theodora 'Teddi' Madden:
Win lots of bets in bars, do you?

Mona Lisa 37X:
No.

Cadet 2nd Class Bree Tristan:
They're not changing me - they're changing me back.

The Control Voice:
Some of man's greatest achievements have been motivated by a driving need for love and acceptance. What happens when that need for recognition becomes a desire to be revered and then worshipped like a god?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Increasingly, modern science pursues powers traditionally reserved for the almighty, but those who encroach upon the province of the gods realize too late that the price for entrance is destruction.

Dr. Simon Kress:
Charlton Heston, eat your heart out.

The Control Voice:
What is freedom but the ability to make choices between courage and cowardice, duty and love, or even heaven and hell? The nature of the choices we make define us as human beings. We choose the world we inhabit.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Each of us creates his own world. We conjure paradises from our hopes and nightmares borne of fear, but what if they are both illusions?

The Control Voice:
Our history is filled with grim reminders of our inhumanity: armies are crushed, populations ravaged, enemies imprisoned behind walls of stone. But the human spirit is not so easily confined.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Of all the needs which drive us - hunger, thirst, desire - perhaps the most powerful is the simple need to be free.

The Control Voice:
It is the differences between people that cause conflicts - differences in religion, in race, in beliefs. What wars would be fought if the differences grew between two intelligent species: humans and those who might ultimately replace us?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
The wars of evolution are fought over generations but, sometimes, only the fittest survive battles which last the briefest moments. A hundred years from now, a new race may look back and, say, this little girl's stand was a turning point.

Jack, the Detective:
[looking into microscope] Alright. What am I looking at?

Coroner:
John Doe Number Two's brain. Took a .45 caliber bullet through the forehead. That is not human brain tissue. I mean I guess it could be it just doesn't look like any brain I've ever seen. The structure's so uniform, simple.

Jack, the Detective:
Well, what kind of brain is it?

Coroner:
If I had to compare it to something, I don't know, maybe dolphin.

Jack, the Detective:
Dolphin?

Coroner:
Well, obviously it isn't.

Jack, the Detective:
Oh, no, of course it is. Marshall was shooting at these people and an unfortunate dolphin swam into the line of fire.

Henry Marshall:
It's every man for himself out there. That's the game. Those are the rules. That's what I've learned. That's what I know. That's what gets you ahead! You gonna blame me for playing by the rules?

Lucas:
Where has it gotten you?

Lucas:
In our world, we take on all the pain, and all the joy, of another, instantly.

George:
There's always one moment in childhood, when the door opens and lets in the future.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
It is nature's imperative that the differences among us endure, but what if we can no longer distinguish one being from another?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
The greatest horror of war is the fateful transformation of our children into heroes.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
There is no sound, no voice, no cry in all the world that can be heard... until someone listens.

The Control Voice:
There is the silence of the oceans and the unending silence of space. There is the welcome silence of serenity and the everlasting silence of death. A cry for help is lost in the shrill noise of the world, but the faintest of whispers, when spoken in silence, can resonate across the universe.

The Control Voice:
Man has long worked to stave off the disease that can ravage us, but what can happen when the cure grows more fearsome than the disease?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Over millions of years, man has become the very paragon of animals, but we must take care not to alter what nature has taken so long to forge... or risk being burned by the very fires of creation.

Nurse Gina Beaumont:
Why do you care so much what I think?

Raymond Dalton:
Because you are the only one who I really respect.

The Control Voice:
A poet once wrote, "In dreams begins responsibility." So too, perhaps, with love. Without the hope for a better life, a brighter future, it is difficult for love to flourish, and without love, there are no dreams.

The Control Voice:
A safe place, warm and quiet; a place to rest and recover. When all is said and done, isn't that what we all want... a safe place in someone's home, or someone's heart?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
What if you were to wake up to a different world tomorrow - a world of invaders? Would you raise your voice with the aliens in a chant of remembrance and regret, bidding farewell to a vanished world... or would you fight against those who might ultimately help us?

The Control Voice:
What is our last line of defense? Is it the military with all of their power and might, or is the courage of a solitary man?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Sleep soundly in the knowledge that the dawn will come, rest assured that our leaders are watching over us, but beware - for it is only their vigilance that stands between our restful slumber... and the end of the world.

The Control Voice:
The true measure of a hero is when a man lays down his life with the knowledge that those he saves... will never know.

Silloin:
[furious] Subject will enter chamber!

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Mankind will be forever doomed to destruction if we continue to ask for the truth, but then refuse to listen.

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
To those who would fail to heed their own words be warned: you never know who's listening.

The Control Voice:
The wounds of war run deep, cutting across generations. But there is always the hope of healing, so long as there are souls among us whose hearts are more full of love than hate.

The Control Voice:
Buried deep within the heart of every conflict... lies a territory known as "Common Ground". But how do we summon the courage to seek out its borders?

The Control Voice:
Life is, at best, an uncertain path. Perhaps, we should be grateful with what we have, for even these riches may disappear along the way.

The Control Voice:
Our lives follow a long and winding path through time, but what happens if we're forced off the course of our own destiny?

The Control Voice:
Man has always been fascinated with the concept of going back in time. The question is often asked, "If you could go back, would you do anything differently?" But what if it goes the other way? We never hear the question, "Would you do anything differently if you could go forward?"

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
Time is a river, winding steadily through the landscape of tomorrow. There are those who would steal a glimpse around the next bend and those who would fight the current, but the wisest are those who turn their eyes from the waters and seek out a fellow traveler to share in the journey.

The Control Voice:
As technology evolves, the means to communicate with each other become increasingly sophisticated, but will these means ever be sufficient to bridge the gaps between us or will they only serve to pull us further apart?

[last lines]

The Control Voice:
The distances between us so vast and so close are so easily bridged not by what we make but by what we feel.