- Gul Dukat: [of the Bajorans] I hated everything about them! Their superstitions, and their cries for sympathy, their treachery and their lies. Their smug superiority and their stiff-necked obstinacy. Their earrings, and their broken, wrinkled noses!
- Captain Sisko: You should have killed them all, hm?
- Gul Dukat: Yes! Yes! That's right, isn't it? I knew it! I've always known it! I should've killed every last one of them! I should've turned their planet into a graveyard the likes of which the galaxy had never seen! I should have killed them all.
- [Sisko clubs him over the back with a metal pole]
- Captain Sisko: And that is why you're not an evil man?
- Gul Dukat: About my daughter... You and Major Kira took care of her for almost a year. I wanted to thank you for that, it was very generous.
- Captain Sisko: Ziyal was a very special young woman. It was a pleasure to have her with us, even if it was only a short time.
- Gul Dukat: A short time is all she ever had.
- Gul Dukat: No more pretense, no games! Just you, me and the truth.
- Captain Sisko: What do you know about the truth? You bend the truth into whatever shape suits you.
- [first lines]
- Captain Sisko: Captain's log, stardate 51408.6. I've been aboard the Honshu for two days now, and I still haven't spoken to him, although the doctors have assured me that he's made a full recovery. Maybe that's what I'm afraid of. Maybe I prefer to think of him as a crazy man, a broken man. He'd be less dangerous that way. As terrible as it sounds, there's a part of me that wishes he were dead. But that's a thought unworthy of a Starfleet officer. He lost an empire, he lost his daughter, and he nearly lost his mind. Whatever his crimes, isn't that enough punishment for one lifetime?
- [the crew of the Defiant are arguing whether to keep searching for Sisko or to keep an appointment for another mission]
- Lt. Commander Worf: We all know what Major Kira's orders were. It would be dishonorable to ignore them.
- Doctor Bashir: You will forgive me, if I don't consider your honor to be worth Captain Sisko's life.
- Lt. Commander Worf: You may leave the bridge, Doctor.
- Gul Dukat: Pride. Stubborn, unyielding pride. From the servant girl that cleaned my quarters, to the condemned man toiling in a labor camp, to the terrorist skulking through the hills of Dahkur Province. They all wore their pride like some... twisted badge of honor.
- Gul Dukat: I'm so glad we had this time together, Benjamin, because we won't be seeing each other for a while. I have unfinished business on Bajor. They thought I was their enemy? They don't know what it is to be my enemy, but they will. From this day forward, Bajor is dead! All of Bajor! And this time, even their Emissary won't be able to save them!
- [last lines]
- Captain Sisko: You know, old man, sometimes life seems so complicated. Nothing is truly good or truly evil. Everything seems to be a shade of gray. And then you spend some time with a man like Dukat, and you realize that there is such a thing as truly evil.
- Lt. Commander Jadzia Dax: To realize that is one thing. To do something about it is another. So what are you going to do?
- Captain Sisko: I'll tell you what I'm not going to do: I'm not going to let him destroy Bajor. I fear no evil. From now on, it's him... or me.
- Captain Sisko: Is there anything I can get for you?
- Gul Dukat: Hmm. A bottle of kanar and an Orion slave girl would be nice.
- Captain Sisko: [smiling in spite of himself] I'll see what I can do.
- Major Kira: He's patronizing you!
- [sardonically]
- Major Kira: "You were a soldier and you had to carry out your orders." He doesn't believe that lame excuse any more than I do.
- Gul Dukat: This is growing tiresome.
- Capt. Benjamin Sisko: Dukat? Dukat! I thought you wanted to talk to me.
- Gul Dukat: Yes! But Nerys won't leave well enough alone. She's always interfering! Always trying to upset me!
- Capt. Benjamin Sisko: Maybe we should just ignore her. Let's pretend that the Major's not even here.