Series 2 Quotes
SHADOW
Blake: We chose the wrong approach, that's all.
Gan: Is that all? I thought maybe we'd chosen the wrong people to get involved with.
Avon: "We chose the wrong approach"?
Blake: I chose the wrong approach. Does it matter?
Avon: Yes, it does.
Blake: All right, Avon. You were right and I was wrong. You said persuasion wouldn't work and it didn't. So now we use force.
Avon: Force? Yes, of course. Law makers, law breakers, let us fight them all. Why not?
Jenna: It's enough to fry your eyeballs.
Avon: …daintily put.
Jenna: Must be the company I keep.
Avon: It could have been frying eyeballs you heard.
Jenna: …daintily put.
WEAPON
Avon: Auron may be different, Cally, but on Earth it is considered ill-mannered to kill your friends while committing suicide.
Cally: Sooner or later, Blake is going to attack Federation Central Control on Earth itself.
Vila: Later. Much later.
Avon: And alone, probably.
Jenna: I doubt that.
Gan: He wouldn't be alone if you just left him, Avon.
Avon: You would stay with him?
Gan: Yes.
Avon (smirks): Virtually alone, then.
HORIZON
Vila: Why don't you go?
Avon: You are expendable
.Vila: And you're not?
Avon: No, I am not. I am not expendable, I'm not stupid, and I'm not going.
Avon: If I go alone, can I pilot the Liberator independently?
Orac: With the help of the automatics, of course you can.
Avon: I know that.
Orac: Then why did you ask the question?
Avon: I didn't. How long can I maintain myself?
Orac: Is that a question?
Avon: Yes
.Orac: We have concentrated food for one person for a thousand years.
Avon: And our power is self-regenerating.
Orac: Affirmative.
Avon: Can you plot courses to keep out of the range of any known spaceship manned by the Federation?
Orac: The battle and navigation computers can handle that perfectly adequately.
Avon: I asked if you could.
Orac: Of course, should it be necessary.
Avon: Failing that, we are powerful enough to resist all but an attack by three Federation pursuit ships at once.
Orac: Is that a question?
Avon: No. If we go now, we can sail the universe for as long as we like in reasonable safety, provided we keep out of everybody's way and we do not do anything rash.
Orac: No data available to answer the question, If it was a question.
Avon: I put it to you as a possibility. I request the odds.
Orac: The odds would be three point five to one on survival.
Avon: Therefore I do not need Blake, I do not need any of the others...
Orac: Is that a question?
Avon: I do not need anybody at all.
Orac: Is that a question? I - I - I must ask you to be more specific!
Avon: [snaps out of his thoughts] Shut up, Orac.
PRESSURE POINT
(Avon has just agreed to join Blake on his suicidal mission)
Blake: Do you want to tell me why?
Avon: I like the challenge.
Blake: You don't want to tell me why.
Avon: If we succeed, if we destroy control, the Federation will be at its weakest. It will be more vulnerable than it has been for centuries. The revolt in the outer worlds will grow. Resistance movements on Earth will launch an all-out attack to destroy The Federation, they will need unifying; they will need a leader. You will be the natural choice.
Blake: Possibly.
Avon: Don't be modest, Blake, you are the only one that they would all follow. You would have no choice; you would have to stay on Earth and organise the revolt.
Blake: If there's no other way.
Avon: There wouldn't be.
Blake: That still doesn't explain why you're backing me.
Avon: With you running the campaign on Earth, somebody has to take charge of all this.
Blake: [Laughing] You want The Liberator?
Avon: Exactly. If we succeed, the destruction of control gives us both what we want.
Blake: Could be you're planning just a little far ahead.
Avon: Perhaps.
TRIAL
Avon: Which only leaves one question to be answered. Is it that Blake has a genius for leadership, or merely that you have a genius for being led?
Vila: I see. So you've decided to be led like the rest of us?
Avon: I shall continue to follow. It's not quite the same thing.
Vila: I don't see the difference.
Avon: Well, I didn't really think that you would.
Travis: I will make the opening declaration.
Thania: Look, don't be a fool. You really think you're going to impress them sympathetically?
Travis: I think the Supreme Commander wants me to go to my death quietly. This is as close to quietly as I am going to get.
Thania: Look, I'm trying to save your life, Travis--
Travis: You'd be better occupied trying to save your own, Thania. Majors can die quite anonymously. And your involvement in this fiasco makes your life expectancy only slightly longer than my own.
Travis: A field officer, like myself, is frequently required to make fast, unconsidered decisions. You were all field officers, you know that's true. Time to think is a luxury battle seldom affords you. You react instinctively. Your actions, your decisions, all instinct, nothing more. But, an officer's instincts are the product of his training. The more thorough the training, the more predictable the instinct, the better the officer. And I am a good officer. I have been in the service all my adult life. I'm totally dedicated to my duty and highly trained in how to perform it. On Serkasta I, I reacted as I was trained to react. I was an instrument of the service. So if I'm guilty of murder, of mass murder, then so are all of you!
Servalan: It really is a pity he's got to die. He's so much better than anything I've got left.
Fleet Warden General Samor: Space Commander, we have considered your sentence at some length. Your contention that what happened on Serkasta was a direct result of your training concerned us greatly. We accept that you are trained to kill. As are we all. What we cannot accept is that this training leads inevitably to the murder of innocents. Your behavior was not that of a Federation officer, but rather that of a savage, unthinking, animal.
Vila: They missed us! Avon's gadget works!
Blake: I never doubted it for a moment. (Avon frowns.) Is something wrong?
Avon: It just occurred to me that, as the description of a highly sophisticated technological achievement, "Avon's gadget works" seems to lack a certain style.
Avon (To Blake): I would quite like to have met this Zil of yours. It's not often that one comes across a philosophical flea.
Vila: That's the stuff that legends are made of!
Avon: …then again, perhaps they are not so uncommon.
KILLER
Vila: I hope you can trust him.
Avon: I told you, he's a friend of mine.
Vila: Yes, I always knew you had a friend. I used to say to people, "I bet Avon's got a friend...somewhere in the galaxy."
Avon: And you were right. That must be a novel experience for you.
Vila: When Avon holds out the hand of friendship, watch his other hand. That's the one with the hammer.
Avon: Vila?
Vila: What?
Avon: You're a fool.
Vila: Nerves getting to you?
Avon: There are a quarter of a million volts running through that converter. I make one false move, I'll be so crisped up what's left of me won't fit into a sandwich.
Vila: I'm a vegetarian. Thanks for the offer, though.
Vila: You don't have a lot of time for Blake, do you?
Avon: I could never stand heroes.
Vila: A quarter of a million volts and you're putting your hand in?
Avon: Ah, but that is self-interest. We need that crystal. Blake takes risks to help other people. Sometimes people he doesn't even know. One day that great big bleeding heart of his will get us all killed.
Vila: Unless somebody ditches him first.
